RTHK: UK leader proposes banning paid lobbying by lawmakers British Prime Minister Boris Johnson proposed on Tuesday that lawmakers be banned from acting as paid political consultants or lobbyists, after a row over second jobs posing conflicts of interest. Johnson said the code of conduct for members of parliament (MPs) should be updated and those who are prioritising their outside interests over their constituents "should be investigated and appropriately punished". The British leader has come under pressure from damaging media reports about lawmakers being paid for external work after his Conservative government sought to change parliamentary conflict-of-interest rules to protect a colleague threatened with suspension. Johnson's handling of the affair has been criticised by some in his own party as well as opponents, and recent polls suggested it was having an impact on his standing, with surveys suggesting the opposition Labour Party was now ahead. In a letter to the speaker of the House of Commons, he backed measures recommended by parliament's Committee on Standards in Public Life which would ban MPs from accepting paid work as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant, and all second jobs should be within "reasonable limits". "They would also ban MPs from exploiting their positions by acting as paid political consultants or lobbyists," Johnson wrote. (Reuters) This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: SAA eyes Lagos route South African Airways (SAA) says it expects to expand its route network to include Lagos, Nigeria, from 12 December this year. SAA interim Chief Executive, Thomas Kgokolo, said the move is part of the airlines gradual growth strategy after the airline was grounded for more than a year. Local flights took off in September between Johannesburg and Cape Town with routes also opened to several other African countries. Our intention is to continue to develop our route network driven by passenger demand and revenue potential. We are constantly evaluating opportunities, both locally, regionally and internationally, Kgokolo said. He added that Lagos in particular is a significant route on the continent. This specific destination takes SAA into one of the biggest travel markets in Africa and were delighted that we are again able to resume operations, providing a link between Africas two biggest economies, he said. In a statement, the airline highlighted that it expects that the continuing revision of international travel restrictions by countries will lead to more visitors in the country and increased activity in the two countries tourism markets. Not only does the new Johannesburg Lagos route function as a key economic link between the two countries but will also service the burgeoning tourism market in both countries. SAAwill continue in partnership with SA Tourism to promote the country in Nigeria in the expectation that it will lead to more visitors now that international pandemic travel restrictions are being revised. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Electoral Commission receives clean audit opinion The Electoral Commission (IEC) has received a clean bill of health from the Auditor-General. The clean audit opinion issued by the Auditor-General is one of the highlights contained in the Electoral Commissions annual report, which was presented before the National Assemblys Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs, on Tuesday. Commission Chairperson Glen Mashinini and Chief Electoral Officer Sy Mamabolo led a delegation which tabled the report which covers the 2020/21 financial year before the portfolio committee. Both Mashinini and Mamabolo expressed pride at the achievement of the Commissions finance team led by Chief Finance Officer Dawn Mbatha, which achieved the first clean audit in five years. I am immensely proud of this report for the reason that the Auditor-General South Africa (AGSA) issued us with a clean audit opinion. Our institution is ever committed to the highest levels of financial probity. This financial year was like no other in that the Coronavirus pandemic continued to wreak health and economic havoc in South Africa and around the world. Members of staff of the Electoral Commission were either infected or affected by the pandemic in one way or another, Mamabolo said. Meanwhile, Mashinini told Members of Parliament that the Commission takes pride in having delivered a succession of credible, free, fair and successful elections in the past 27 years. In delivering these elections, the Electoral Commission has met its Constitutional obligations. Important in any election is transparency, accountability and ethical conduct by all involved in this crucial exercise of democracy. Accountability and transparency are the main reasons we are here. It is important to us that the Electoral Commission, established in terms of Section 181 of the Constitution, accounts on a regular basis to Parliament, said Mashinini. In addition to appearing before this committee on a regular basis, our books are audited, on an annual basis, by the Auditor-General and we have, we are proud to disclose, received favourable and positive audit outcomes, he said. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Employment and Labour revamps Labour Activation Programme (LAP) The Department of Employment and Labour is revamping its Labour Activation Programme (LAP) to deepen its impact in job creation initiatives and help integrate the unemployed into the labour market. Speaking during his opening address at the departmental LAPs three-day workshop on Tuesday, the Director-General, Thobile Lamati, said the goal of the revamp is to shorten the response time and make impact immediate. The workshop, held at Saint George Hotel in Irene, is being attended by senior departmental officials from various branches such as the Public Employment Services and those of its entities such as the Unemployment Insurance Fund, the Compensation Fund and Productivity SA. The objective of the LAP is to enhance employability, enable entrepreneurship and preserve jobs. Lamati said the workshop needs to ask the question what type of LAP do we want to see?. He said South Africas broad unemployment rate currently sitting at 42% was concerning and too high by any standard. The Director-General added that the economy is faced with structural challenges in regard to skills mismatch and it is not growing fast to absorb the growing army of the unemployed. Faced with this reality like any country, South Africa has adopted active labour market policy interventions. Active labour market policies are our shield. This means that we need to stimulate the demand and supply. LAP is part of our active labour market intervention policies to deal with unemployment, he said. Lamati said the job of the department is to work with other stakeholders who are involved in job creation to help the unemployed into employment and business opportunities. Over the next few days, we will look at the structure, monitor the impact of our interventions in responding to the needs of the unemployed. Labour activation has since its inception become an important cog of our unemployment interventions and a game-changer to work seekers in general, Lamati said. Some of the models that will be considered include - the flexicurity, mutual obligation and active inclusion for all. Through this proposed LAP revamp we want a high degree of efficiency - no matter the model. The focus is not institutional arrangement nor the structure. Our focus should be how best we make the programme highly efficient. The structure is not an overriding factor. We also need to protect existing jobs, he said. Some of the LAP programmes that have been undertaken by the department includes the Training of the Unemployed (TOU), Enterprise Development (ED) Training Layoffs Scheme (TLS) and Turnaround Solutions (TAS). SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: National Assembly passes Second Special Appropriation Bill A Parliament National Assembly (NA) hybrid sitting has passed the 2021 Second Special Appropriation Bill. It will now go to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) for concurrence, Parliament said on Tuesday. In a statement, Parliament said the 2021 Second Special Appropriation Bill proposes to appropriate additional urgent funding allocations in the 2021/22 financial year, to the Votes of National Treasury, Social Development, Defence, Police, and Trade, Industry and Competition. An amendment to the Bill enables the Minister of Finance to approve urgent expenditure for contingency funding. Section 213(2) of the Constitution provides that money may be withdrawn from the National Revenue Fund only in terms of an appropriation by an Act of Parliament. The Bill was tabled in Parliament by the Minister of Finance on 23 August 2021 and was referred to the committees for consideration and report to the National Assembly, as prescribed in section 13 of the Act. In processing the Bill, section 4(4)(c) of the Act also requires the committees on Appropriations in both Houses to consult with the Financial and Fiscal Commission (FFC). In addition to consulting with the FFC, the committees also invited the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) to comment on the Bill. They also consulted with stakeholders directly affected by the Bill, namely the South African Special Risks Insurance Association. The 2021 Second Special Appropriation Bill proposed an additional R26.7 billion to Social Development to cater for the Social Relief Grant, inclusive of R500 million (inclusive of the R250 million allocated through section 16 (1) of the Public Financial Management Act) to the South African Social Security Agency for system enhancements to improve application and payment processes, including a strengthened eligibility assessment system. Parliament said the Bill also proposed an additional R700 million to Defence to fund the deployment of military personnel to assist police with bringing order after the July 2021 riots, mainly in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal. The Bill also proposed an additional R1.3 billion to Trade, Industry and Competition to support businesses affected by the July riots. The NCOP is scheduled to debate the 2021 Second Special Appropriation Bill in December. Meanwhile, at the same plenary sitting, the NA agreed to the Sectional Titles Amendment Bill, which seeks to amend certain provisions of the Sectional Titles Act, 1986 (Act No. 95 of 1986) (the principal Act). The Portfolio Committee on Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development, having deliberated on the content of the Bill, realised that it was necessary to amend provisions of the principal Act, which were not included in the Bill. The Bill will be sent to the NCOP for concurrence. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Sewing for change Touched by the high unemployment rate in the Msinga area, Lelly Mntungwa felt she needed to do something to create job opportunities for the locals, particularly young women. Mntungwa left her job at a financial institution to start sewing. Prior to sewing clothes, she conducted research of her own to see what she can do to create jobs as well as impart skills to her KwaZulu-Natal community. Skills transfer is a sustainable gift that can empower people to become income generators and survive during difficult situations, she says. She tells SAnews during a recent visit to her Msinga Clothing factory, that it was not easy to get the factory off the ground. It was not easy. People did not understand what I was trying to do. Some were even laughing at me and my family when we were cleaning the building, she says of the factory located in Keates Drift. Prior to its new lease on life, the factory was an abandoned and vandalized building, which in its previous life, had once served as a shoe factory that closed its doors 26 years ago. Its closure left 3000 families without a source of income. Using funds she received from a previous employer package, it took seven years in total to get the factory up and running. The factory was established 2012 with the initial objective being to organise youth and women who were involved in sewing businesses within the area, and providing them with technical training. Today the entrepreneurs factory employs 160 women who sew clothes for well-known clothing company The Foschini Group (TFG), which has assisted by donating cutting tables to work on when making garments. The good work produced by the company, saw it attract government support and in April 2019 it received 30 sewing machines from the Department of Economic Development facilitated by the then Kwazulu-Natal MEC for Economic Development, Sihle Zikalala. Furthermore, the Skills Education Training Authority (SETA), a body responsible for overseeing skills development and training, intervened and trained 60 women and youths on the manufacturing of sanitary towels, masks as well as school uniforms. Currently, the factory makes garments for TFG, Mr Price as well as Ackermans. Deputy Minister of the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition Nomalungelo Gina, who visited the factory in April, hailed the company as a perfect example of what government and the private sector can achieve when working together. This company is a perfect example of the public-private partnership in action. All spheres of government and various state-owned agencies were involved in making this company a success. This company exemplifies what government wants to do to ensure that the private sector plays a role in stimulating the economy of the rural areas and creating the much-needed jobs. As government we are also working hard to rejuvenate the clothing and textile sector to that it regains its importance as a significant contributor to our economy, said Gina at the time. Developments at the factory speak directly to the Retail-Clothing, Textile, Footwear and Leather (R-CTFL) Value Chain Masterplan which is aimed at creating a noticeably and sustainable market for the Clothing, Textile, Footwear and Leather (CTFL) sector. The factory has helped many women to put food on the table. Since I came here, I have learnt a lot. Now I can sew clothes - something I couldnt do when I started here, says Ngendzeni Dumakude, an employee and mother of three who has been working at the factory since 2019. Stakeholders in the sector have since committed to growing the market for local clothing, textile, footwear and leather producers. The agreed target is to grow total clothing, textile, footwear and leather retail sales to R250 billion in 2030. It is envisioned that 333 000 jobs including 165 000 clothing, textile, footwear and leather formal sector manufacturing jobs will be created. The 42-year-old Mntungwas vision is not only to provide job opportunities but also to start a school where people will be trained on how to operate sewing machines. She also aims to become a trusted brand in the clothing and textile industry not only provincially but in the rest of the country as well. This also includes becoming a market leader in the knowledge of the industry and use of energy efficiency technology and becoming a trustworthy supplier to their clients. As she continues to grow the factory, the entrepreneur was afforded an opportunity by the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition, to receive training in clothing and textiles, including cotton processing at Minjiang University, in Fuzhou, China in 2017, an experience she will not forget. Over the years, government has appealed to South Africans to support local industries by buying local at a time when many jobs have been lost due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The countrys national Buy Local campaign seeks to strongly influence procurement in public and private sectors, to increase local production, influence consumers to buy local and stimulate job creation. Earlier in the year, President Cyril Ramaphosa said every effort must be made to support local businesses that were severely affected by COVID-19 in a bid to save existing jobs while also creating new ones. Speaking at the annual Proudly South African Buy Local Summit and Expo, the President said the country needs to step up its efforts not just to get locals to buy local but also to improve the entry of South African goods and services into export markets as well. Operating a business in the time of a pandemic is no easy feat but companies like Msinga Clothing are helping to create a tapestry that is changing the landscape from one of unemployment and despair to one where skills are imparted and jobs are created. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Creecy: Phase down of coal should happen in a just manner Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment Minister Barbara Creecy says the Glasgow climate conference outcome on helping developing countries like South Africa accelerate the phase down of unfiltered coal to low-carbon energy should be done in a manner that takes into consideration national interests and availability of resources. The Minister said this when she briefed the media on the outcomes of the recently concluded Glasgow Climate Conference (COP26). The final text of the cover agreement at the end of the two-week COP26 negotiations with regards to the issue of coal contains wording that talks about the phase down of coal. There is also wording there that talks about the recognition of national circumstances and the importance of a just transition. And I think that what that language is all about is saying that for developing countries, there is a recognition of the enormous cost that transitioning economies to lower carbon growth paths and to climate resilient societies is going to have. I think that there is been an estimation by the OECD [Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development] that developing countries will require in the region of US$4 trillion over the next 15 years to achieve these transitions. And I think that text was really about saying that countries must be transitioning. Like our country, we have to do our fair share. But we have to be transitioning at a manner and at a pace that is determined by our national sovereign interests and by the availability of resources. We cant be signing up to a situation that we are not ensuring that we have adequate financial support for the transitions that will be taking place, she said. This comes after President Cyril Ramaphosa recently announced that South Africa has secured a historic partnership with leaders of the world of a R131 billion highly concessional climate financing to help SA transition from coal to low-carbon energy. Briefing the media on Wednesday, Creecy said the international community has united behind a shared objective to inject a greater sense of urgency to address the global climate crisis and to do so on the basis of international equity and latest available science. She said the concluded Paris Agreement Work Programme will assist Parties to fully implement the Paris Agreement, in the context of a Just Transition and Sustainable Development, leaving no one behind. The complex Glasgow package outcome strikes the right balance to accommodate the very different national circumstances and capacities among nearly 200 Parties, so that all are enabled and empowered to contribute their fair share and to enhance their climate ambition. COP26 sets the international community on the right track to addressing the existential challenge of climate change. For the first time the Governing Bodies of the Convention and Paris Agreement have agreed to the importance of supporting developing countries in financing Just Transition elements of their climate actions, and to support the implementation of Just Transitions that promote sustainable development and the eradication of poverty, the creation of decent work and quality jobs, she said. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Police activate 72-hour plan after officer killed, two injured Gauteng Police have launched the 72-hour activation plan after a police officer was killed and two others wounded in the last 24 hours. In a statement, police spokesperson Colonel Athlenda Mathe said in the first incident, an off-duty police officer attached to the Orlando Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences Investigations Unit (FCS) was robbed of his service pistol by three males after being shot multiple times. The member sadly succumbed to his injuries on scene. This incident happened in Freedom Park in Soweto on Tuesday evening just after 10pm, she said. A case of murder and armed robbery have been registered and no arrests have been made as yet. In the second incident, two members attached to the Pretoria Public Order Policing (POP) Unit were shot, while on patrol in a police Nyala in Extension 6, Akasia on Tuesday evening. The area was engulfed by unrests during the day due to evictions that were taking place. The two front tyres of the police Nyala have also been damaged as a result of the shooting. A case of attempted murder and malicious damage to property have been registered. No arrests have been made thus far. Mathe said both members were taken to a local hospital where they were receiving further medical treatment. The SAPS called for a heightened collaborative approach and cooperation with communities in a bid to curb the scourge of police murders. Police said communities remained the eyes and ears of all law enforcement agencies and are pivotal to the reduction of crimes, especially those that are serious and violent in nature. Communities who may have information on both incidents are encouraged to call the Crime Stop Hotline Number on 086 00 10111 or download the MySaps App on any android or smart phone, Mathe said. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. South Africa: Toilet hygiene for better health The Department of Water and Sanitation has called on residents to value their sanitation facilities to prevent the spread of illnesses in communities. We are calling out on residents to have renewed relationships with their toilets. What we have found over time is that conversations about toilets are uncomfortable. Unfortunately, this is a conversation we cannot put off as a department anymore, especially now as the world is faced with a global pandemic, department spokesperson Sputnik Ratau said. The call comes ahead of World Toilet Day, which is observed by the global community on 19 November. The annual World Toilet Day aims to raise awareness about the significance of dignified and safely managed sanitation facilities. It also inspires action to tackle the global sanitation challenges to help achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG 6), which promises sanitation for all by 2030 and beyond. Ratau said poor sanitation facilities have detrimental effects on the health of children and adults with underlying health conditions and can lead to other health problems including dehydration, anaemia, and malnutrition. A poorly kept toilet has devastating consequences not only for ones health but also the environment, particularly in the poorest and most marginalised communities. It is for this reason that as a department we are advocating for a new vision and approach to sanitation services provision which entails the notion that it should not all be about flushing, but effectively managed sanitation, Ratau said. Ratau added that the need to value toilets is of paramount importance, as they are an integral part of peoples live hoods and deserve a decent social status. According to Statistics South Africa, households with access to improved sanitation in South Africa increased from 49% in 1996 to 82.2% in 2019. Ratau said the department is aware that there are still approximately 2.8 million households in the country without access to improved sanitation services, and it is working tirelessly to ensure improvement of access. There is work being done, while wheels are set in motion to continue to eradicate the bucket toilet system in provinces such as the Free State, Eastern Cape, North West, Northern Cape and Limpopo Provinces. We urge members of the public to practice good upkeep of their sanitation facilities, Ratau said. SAnews.gov.za This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Hong Kong: EDB holds working meeting in SZ Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung and Ministry of Education officials held a regular working meeting in Shenzhen today. Mr Yeung briefed Executive Deputy Director of the Office of Hong Kong, Macao & Taiwan Affairs of the Ministry of Education Xu Yongji and other officials on the education policies and measures in the 2021 Policy Address. He also updated them on the implementation of citizenship and social development curriculum and national security education. Both sides also exchanged views on education issues of mutual interest and followed up on the progress of collaboration projects, including strengthening Mainland exchange activities for Hong Kong teachers and students. They include Mainland study tours as well as science, technology, engineering and mathematics education. Also discussed were the plans of Hong Kong's universities and school sponsoring bodies to operate schools in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. Mr Yeung said that the smooth implementation of various education initiatives in recent years have been conducive to Hong Kong developing an education system that is compatible with one country, two systems. He added that it can leverage the advantages of local education to nurture students to become talent that the community needs, and help them extend their pathways by integrating into the national development and grasping opportunities in the bay area. This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. RTHK: UK's Queen Elizabeth reappears in good health Queen Elizabeth, who missed a Remembrance Sunday service at the Cenotaph due to a sprained back, was shown standing and smiling while meeting Britain's most senior uniformed military adviser at Windsor Castle on Wednesday. The queen, 95, the world's oldest and longest-reigning monarch, met Nick Carter, chief of the defence staff. The chief of the defence staff is the professional head of the armed forces and principal military adviser to the defence minister. Carter is due to step down from the role at the end of November. (Reuters) This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Hong Kong: FS promotes HK to US Financial Secretary Paul Chan attended a webinar today to update the American business community on Hong Kong's core strengths as an international financial centre, its active role in national development and the ample opportunities for American businesses. In his keynote remarks, Mr Chan highlighted the long-established relations between Hong Kong and the US in terms of trade and investment. He said bilateral trade has grown resoundingly, with Hong Kongs exports to the US increasing more than 17% year-on-year in the first three quarters of this year, while imports from the US soared nearly 21%. At last count, almost 1,300 US companies called Hong Kong home, ranking third behind only the Mainland and Japan. Mr Chan said that the National 14th Five-Year Plan supports Hong Kong in enhancing its status as an international financial, transportation and trading centre, a global offshore renminbi business hub and an international asset and risk management centre. He said it also supports the city's development as an international hub for both aviation and innovation and technology. The plan points out the need to improve Hong Kong's integration into the overall development of the country, deepen co-operation in the Pearl River Delta region and promote high-quality development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. Mr Chan highlighted that the launch of Cross-boundary Wealth Management Connect in the Greater Bay Area in September has enabled residents in Hong Kong, Macau and nine cities in Guangdong to carry out cross-boundary investment in wealth management products distributed by banks in the area. The Financial Secretary said the Wealth Management Connect opens up a broader market for the financial and relevant professional sectors, bringing enormous business opportunities for international financial institutions. 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 centre will be further reinforced, he added. Mr Chan emphasised the restoration of social stability in Hong Kong, providing a safe and secure environment conducive to business and investment for companies and investors from all over the world. Despite challenges in the past two years, Hong Kong's financial market has remained stable, and the Linked Exchange Rate System and various segments of the financial market have been functioning well. Meanwhile, the banking system has remained robust and the financial services sector has been performing well in different aspects. He noted that the citys financial institutions will continue to proactively grasp development opportunities in Hong Kong and the Mainland. The webinar was co-organised by the Hong Kong economic & trade office in Washington, DC, and the US-China Business Council and was joined by around 100 participants. Mr Chan also discussed the city's anti-epidemic measures, the Government's policies and support for the financial services sector as well as the Hong Kongs future growth areas and competitive edge during the webinars question-and-answer session. This story has been published on: 2021-11-17. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. Under the Previous Administration, Wall Construction Cost American Taxpayers Up To $46 Million per Mile, Shortchanged the Military, and Caused Serious Risks to Life, Safety, and the Environment Address the root causes of migration from Central America. The Budget provides an $861 million investment in the region as a first step toward a 4-year commitment of $4 billion. Make our legal immigration system operate more fairly and effectively. The Budget includes $891 million for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, including funds to support 100 new immigration judges to reduce immigration court backlogs, and $345 million for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to reduce asylum backlogs and modernize systems. Advance 21st century solutions for border management. The Budget provides roughly $1.2 billion for border infrastructure, which includes: modernization of land ports of entry; investments in modern border security technology and assets; and efforts to ensure the safe and humane treatment of migrants in Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) custody. $10 million for the Missile Field Expansion at Fort Greely in Alaska. The field is part of the U.S. defenses against North Korean ballistic missiles, and was due for an expansion to add two missile interceptors. More than $25 million for the 2nd Radio Battalion Complex in North Carolina. Congress provided funds for the new complex to co-locate two battalions, improve intel fusion capability and efficiencies in training for combat readiness, and meet the growing threat of cyber warfare. $79 million for Spangdahlem Elementary School for U.S. Military Children in Germany. The school, which currently supports over 600 military children, lacks proper air conditioning, plumbing, and security systems and was due for replacement when the prior Administration diverted funds to the wall. More than $25 million for the Fire/Crash Rescue Station at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida. The station is designed to support up to 15 fire-fighting vehicles and provide space for physical fitness, training, and living quarters for military personnel. More than $9 million for a Small Arms Range in Indiana. The range is needed to enhance readiness of the Air Guard unit through marksmanship training. Should Beaufort County's commissioners be resolved to ask the federal government to defend our Southern Border by ending the Biden /Harris Open Border policy in regards to that one border that is intentionally made wide OPEN? Yes, Illegal Migrants are a huge expense to local governments. No, the cost of Undocumented Immigrants is insignificant in our providing a pathway for Dramatic Demographic Upheaval.. I do not care about important issues since I only consider my own pleasures. 125 total vote(s) What's your Opinion? The Biden Administration inherited a broken immigration system - one that wasted billions of taxpayer dollars and neither kept the American people safe nor adhered to our values. Wall construction along the Southern border in recent years is just one example of the prior Administration's misplaced priorities and failure to manage migration in a safe, orderly, and humane way.In total, the previous Administration built 52 miles of wall where no barrier previously existed, with some wall segments costing American taxpayers up to $46 million per mile. The effort diverted critical resources away from military training facilities and schools, and caused serious risks to life, safety, and the environment. It also took attention away from genuine security challenges, like drug smuggling and human trafficking.On his first day in office, President Biden issued a Proclamation terminating the redirection of funds for border wall construction, pausing all wall construction to the extent permitted by law, and requiring the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Secretary of Defense, in consultation with the Office of Management and Budget, to develop plans for funds concerning the Southern border wall.The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Defense (DOD) have developed plans reaffirming the Administration's commitment to serious policy solutions. Under these plans, DHS and DOD are: 1) canceling wall projects funded with resources diverted from military construction and other efforts and return the remaining available funds to their original appropriated purposes; 2) ending wall expansion to the extent permitted by law; and 3) addressing safety and environmental issues resulting from border wall construction under the previous Administration.Additionally, the Administration is reiterating its call for Congress to cancel funds it previously appropriated for border barrier projects so that these resources can instead be used for modern, effective border management measures to improve safety and security.This Administration is focused on strategies that facilitate fair and orderly migration at the border and keep border communities safe. This includes addressing the root causes of migration, driving 21st century technological solutions for border management, and giving people options to apply for asylum and other legal pathways in their home country.Building a massive wall that spans the entire southern border and costs American taxpayers billions of dollars is not a serious policy solution or responsible use of Federal funds. Most contraband is likely to come through legal ports of entry. And many families fleeing the violence in Central America are voluntarily presenting themselves to border patrol officials. Fixing our immigration system will require investments in flexible solutions and technologies that expand the ability to detect illicit activity and improve the effectiveness of border management operations.Agency plans for border wall funds build on the Administration's commitment to real policy solutions, including proposals in the President's Budget for Fiscal Year 2022 to:Additionally, the Administration continues to call on Congress to pass the U.S. Citizenship Act to put in place long-term reforms and allocate additional resources necessary to update a broken immigration system.To build a wall along the Southern border, the previous Administration redirected billions of dollars Congress provided for supporting American military personnel and their families and for investing in military installation infrastructure and vehicles, aircraft, and ships.The Biden Administration is committed to properly equipping American military personnel and caring for their families. Under the agency plans for border wall funds, no more money will be diverted for the purposes of building a border wall, and DOD has started cancelling all border barrier projects using the diverted funds. DOD is also announcing today that it is returning the more than $2 billion remaining in unobligated military construction funds to 66 previously deferred projects in 11 states, 3 territories, and 16 countries. This action will restore funds for on-base schools, hangars, housing, and essential operational and training facilities, including:Although most of the funds used for the border wall were diverted from other purposes, Congress provided DHS with some funding for border barrier projects. DHS is legally required to use the funds consistent with their appropriated purpose.The Administration will uphold the rule of law, and utilize all legal authorities to stop wall expansion. The President's Budget proposes no new funding for border wall construction, and calls on Congress to cancel any border barrier funds that remain at the end of the year so that these resources can instead be used for modern, privacy-protective, and effective border management measures like enhanced technology between points of entry and improved infrastructure at Land Ports of Entry. Unless and until Congress acts on the request, the Administration will continue to use the funds responsibly for their appropriated purpose, as required by law, and DHS has developed a plan to do so.As part of its plan to use appropriated funds responsibly and consistent with their appropriated purpose, DHS is announcing today that it will prioritize the remaining border barrier funds to address urgent life, safety, and environmental issues resulting from the previous Administration's wall construction. For instance, DHS has already started work to repair the Rio Grande Valley flood protection system that the prior Administration compromised, and to remediate dangerous soil erosion due to improper soil compaction along a 14-mile wall segment in San Diego, California. Neither safety project involves expanding the border barrier, and the projects will be paid for with funds Congress provided DHS for fiscal year 2021.Additionally, DHS is announcing today that it will also prioritize using the remaining appropriated funds consistent with their appropriated purposes for necessary clean-up of construction sites formerly funded by DoD, including drainage, erosion control, site remediation, and material disposal. And appropriated funds could also be used for mitigating some environmental damage caused by border wall construction.For those projects that are not urgently needed to address urgent life, safety, and environmental issues, DHS will engage in a comprehensive review that includes detailed environmental impact analysis and remediation, and robust and substantive engagement with relevant stakeholders, including border community residents, their elected representatives, tribal communities, and environmental and other interested non-governmental organizations and advocates.DHS will also review the status of all pending border wall land eminent domain actions and reassess the extent to which land acquired in prior years remains necessary after environmental planning activities have been completed. If DHS determines use of the land will be necessary, particularly for life, safety, environmental, or other remediation work, it will initiate robust landowner engagement. If DHS determines it no longer requires the use of such land, it will work to return the land to its prior owners.DHS is also returning remaining Treasury Forfeiture Fund resources to the Department of Treasury. Two rare langurs rescued in Thanh Hoa A man in the northern central province of Thanh Hoa has rescued a mother langur and its child and handed it over to local authorities. Tran Duc Manh, 27, from Lang Chanh District saw the two exhausted grey langurs hanging at a cliff. He quickly took them home and contacted local authorities. The two langurs have been rescued The animals have been brought to the Cuc Phuong National Park's the Endangered Primate Rescue Centre. They are being taken care of by experts at a special quarantine site. The male child langur weighs around one kilo and is 4-5 months old. According to Nguyen Manh Cuong, director of Vietnam's rare primate rescue project, this was the first time the centre had received a male grey langur. The national park now has six female grey langurs and one male one. "Well try our best to take care of the male grey langur. This will help the development of this species in Vietnam in the future, Cuong added. Cuong noted that over the past time, many individuals and organisations have contacted the centre to donate wild animals, demonstrating better community awareness of the need for environmental protection. Currently, Vietnam is home to around 500 grey langurs. Vietnam receives additional 1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses donation from US A batch of one million doses of the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine donated by the United States arrived in Vietnam on November 17. Vietnam receives additional 1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses donation from US on November 17. Photo from the US Embassy According to the US Embassy in Hanoi, the latest shipment raised the total number of Covid-19 vaccines donated by the US to Vietnam to more than 16 million, making the US Vietnams largest vaccine donor. Earlier, more than 2.87 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine supported by the US through the COVAX Facility were delivered to Vietnam on November 6, 7, and 8. Besides vaccine donations, the US committed USD26.7 million in grants to help Vietnam respond to the pandemic and more than USD1 billion to develop local health infrastructure. The US Department of Defence has also delivered 77 out of 111 ultra-low temperature freezers to Vietnam to help store vaccines. In June, US President Joe Biden pledged to share a total of 80 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccines worldwide. He said about 75 percent of the vaccines will be delivered through the COVAX Facility, while the remaining 25 percent will be distributed directly. Vietnam Airlines to launch first regular flight to US soon National flag carrier Vietnam Airlines will operate its first regular commercial flight to the US from November 28. The information was given by Le Hong Ha, General Director of Vietnam Airlines. According to Ha, the flight will depart Tan Son Nhat International Airport in HCM City for San Francisco International Airport in California, taking around 13 hours and 50 minutes. An airplane of Vietnam Airlines On the return route, it would leave San Francisco on the evening of November 29 (local time) for HCM City 16 hours and 40 minutes later. From December this year, there will be two fights per week. The frequency will be raised by one weekly when the Covid-19 pandemic is controlled better. The carrier will use the Airbus A350 for the route. On November 4, the Federal Aviation Administration announced Vietnam Airlines had secured a licence to conduct direct flights for both passengers and cargo. This was the final permit required from the US side for Vietnam Airlines to carry out the route. On November 16, Charles Ranado, Senior Commercial Officer of the US Embassy in Vietnam, presented the licence to Vietnam Airlines. He expected that the air route would help to contribute to boosting the relationship between the two nations. Vietnam Airlines' General Director Le Hong Ha said that the national carrier has considered opening flights to Los Angeles in the coming time. Vietnam, Israel look toward bilateral FTA next year Vietnamese Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Hong Dien has hailed Israel as a promising market of Vietnam in West Asia. At the working session (Photo: VNA) During a working session with Israeli Ambassador to Vietnam Nadav Eshcar in Hanoi on November 16, Dien said Israel is now the fifth largest trade partner of Vietnam. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic last year, two-way trade still hit 1.6 billion USD, up 36.4 percent annually. The figure went up 14.3 percent year-on-year to 1.3 billion USD in nine months of this year. Vietnams major exports to Israel include mobile phones, computers and accessories, aquatic products, cashew nuts, apparel, footwear, coffee, pepper, machinery and equipment, natural rubber, beverages, plastic and wooden products, chemicals, handicrafts and ceramics. Dien suggested the ambassador offer support to the country in trade promotion, both directly and indirectly, to bring more Vietnamese goods such as pepper, cashew nuts, coffee, fruits and vegetables, leather and footwear to Israel. According to him, both sides should consider a mechanism on sharing of information regarding technical requirements for exports, contributing to lifting two-way trade. Eshcar, for his part, said negotiations on a free trade agreement between Vietnam and Israel are in the final stage which will create a new breakthrough for bilateral ties. If the deal is signed, two-way trade could increase to 3-4 billion USD each year quickly. The Israeli side is urging agencies concerned to complete the talks this year and look to sign the deal next year, he said. The host wished that the Israeli firms would invest more in support and electronics industries in Vietnam, as well as offer more assistance in investment, digital transformation, and technological infrastructure. Vietnam is ready to step up negotiations towards reaching a bilateral FTA with balanced interests for both sides, he said./ Xi's explanation on CPC landmark resolution released Xinhua) 08:04, November 17, 2021 A ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is held at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Li Ga) BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- An explanatory address delivered by Xi Jinping on a landmark resolution on the major achievements and historical experience of the Communist Party of China (CPC) over the past century was made public Tuesday. Entrusted by the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Xi, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, delivered the speech to the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee. The resolution was deliberated and approved at the plenum held in Beijing from Nov. 8 to 11. CONSIDERATIONS "Our Party has always attached great importance to reviewing its historical experience," said Xi when he explained the considerations on the session agenda. He hailed the significance of reviewing the Party's century-long journey, saying it will help build a broader consensus and stronger unity in will and action among all Party members and rally and lead the Chinese people of all ethnic groups in achieving new and great success in building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. Xi also noted "taking a clear-cut stance against historical nihilism" and clearing up confusion and misunderstandings over certain major questions in the Party's history. Xi briefed the session on the priorities in drafting the resolution: First, the resolution must focus on the Party's major achievements and historical experience over the past century, he said, noting the move will help "pool our wisdom, strengthen our unity, and boost our confidence and morale." On the previous two resolutions on the Party's historical issues, adopted in 1945 and 1981 respectively, Xi said "their basic points and conclusions remain valid." Second, the resolution must highlight the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics, Xi said, noting this will help further fortify confidence among all Party members and focus on the current endeavors. Third, the resolution's appraisal of major historical events, significant meetings, and important figures must be consistent with the CPC Central Committee's existing conclusions, Xi said. The basic points and conclusion that have already been made for the major events, meetings, and figures in Party history prior to its 18th National Congress were to be upheld in the new resolution, he said, adding that the resolution should reflect the CPC Central Committee's updated understanding on the Party's century-long history. A ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is held at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Tian Dingyu) DRAFTING PROCESS In March, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee decided that the sixth plenary session would focus on a comprehensive review of the Party's major achievements and experience in its century-long history, Xi said. A drafting group was established, with Xi as its chief, and Wang Huning and Zhao Leji as deputy chiefs. On April 1, the CPC Central Committee issued a circular to solicit opinions from Party members and non-Party figures within an appropriate scope. The consulted localities, departments and sectors widely held that the invaluable experience gained in the past century merits a systematic review, according to Xi's explanation. They suggested that the review focus on the new era and on the historic achievements and historic shifts and the latest experience that the Party has gained during this period, according to Xi. The text of the draft resolution was issued on Sept. 6 to select Party members, including retired senior Party officials, for consultation. Opinions were also sought from leaders of other political parties and the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and prominent figures without party affiliation, Xi said. The feedback indicated full endorsement of the draft resolution, he said. The drafting group analyzed the solicited opinions and suggestions. A total of 547 revisions were made to the preliminary draft. The Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and its Standing Committee held multiple meetings during the drafting process before the draft document was submitted for deliberation at this session, according to Xi. FRAMEWORK &MAJOR CONTENT In addition to a preamble and a conclusion, the document has seven sections. The first section is "A Great Victory in the New-Democratic Revolution." It analyzed the historical background of the founding of the Party and reviewed the revolutionary struggle in this period. It also highlighted the achievements including the establishment of Mao Zedong Thought, according to Xi. This section emphasized that the founding of the People's Republic of China, national independence, and the people's liberation represented China's great transformation from a millennia-old feudal autocracy to a people's democracy, he said. The second section is "Socialist Revolution and Construction." This part reviewed the Party's great achievements following the founding of the People's Republic of China. It also included the rational appraisal of Mao Zedong Thought, according to Xi. The section emphasized the great transformation from a poor and backward Eastern country with a large population to a socialist country, he said. The third section is "Reform, Opening up, and Socialist Modernization." This part highlighted the great significance of the third plenary session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, and documented the historic contributions made by the Chinese communists with Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao as their chief representatives, Xi said. This section commended the great achievements which made possible the Chinese nation's tremendous advance from standing up to becoming prosperous, he said. The fourth section is "A New Era of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics." With a focus on the original ideas, transformative practices, new breakthroughs, and landmark accomplishments over the past nine years, the section highlighted the great achievements and historic shifts in the new era in 13 areas. The great achievements in this period provided better institutional conditions, stronger material foundations and a source of inspiration for realizing national rejuvenation, Xi said. The Chinese nation has achieved the tremendous transformation from standing up and becoming prosperous to growing strong, he said. The fifth section is "The Historical Significance of the Party's Endeavors over the Past Century." The section spelled out the CPC's historic contributions to the Chinese people, the Chinese nation, Marxism, the cause of human progress, and the development of Marxist political parties, Xi said. The sixth section is "The Historical Experience of the Party's Endeavors over the Past Century." This section summarized the Party's historical experience in 10 aspects: upholding the Party's leadership, putting the people first, advancing theoretical innovation, staying independent, following the Chinese path, maintaining a global vision, breaking new ground, standing up for ourselves, promoting the united front, and remaining committed to self-reform. "All of us must cherish them, uphold them over the long term, and continue to enrich and develop them in practice in the new era," Xi said. The seventh section is "The Communist Party of China in the New Era." It called on the whole Party, the military, and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups to make tireless efforts to realize the second centenary goal and the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation. Full Text: Xi's explanation of resolution on major achievements and historical experience of CPC over past century (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Du Mingming) Full Text: Xi's explanation of resolution on major achievements and historical experience of CPC over past century Xinhua) 08:08, November 17, 2021 BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- An explanatory address delivered by Xi Jinping on a landmark resolution on the major achievements and historical experience of the Communist Party of China (CPC) over the past century was made public Tuesday. Entrusted by the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Xi, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, delivered the address to the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee. The resolution was deliberated and approved at the plenum held in Beijing from Nov. 8 to 11. Please see the attachment for the English translation of the full text of Xi's explanatory address. Enditem Full Text: Xi's explanation of resolution on major achievements and historical experience of CPC over past century Explanation of the Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party over the Past Century Xi Jinping On behalf of the Political Bureau of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), I will now brief you on the Resolution of the CPC Central Committee on the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party over the Past Century and related issues. I. Considerations on the Agenda of the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee Our Party has always attached great importance to reviewing its historical experience. As early as in the Yanan period, Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out, We will not be able to achieve greater success unless we have a clear understanding of our history and of the roads we have traveled. In 1945, at the critical juncture for securing final victory in the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, the Sixth CPC Central Committee convened its seventh plenary session and adopted the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party. The resolution reviewed the history of the Party and the experience it had gained and lessons it had learned since its founding in 1921, especially those in the period between the fourth plenary session of the Sixth Central Committee in January 1931 and the Zunyi Meeting in January 1935. It drew conclusions on major historical issues of the Party, leading to a broad consensus among all Party members, particularly high-ranking officials, on fundamental questions pertaining to the Chinese revolution. It served to strengthen the solidarity of the Party, paved the way for the convocation of the Seventh CPC National Congress, and helped advance the Chinese revolution significantly. When our country entered a new period marked by the launch of reform and opening up, Comrade Deng Xiaoping noted, The experience of successes is invaluable, and so are the lessons learned from mistakes and setbacks. Principles and policies formulated on the basis of the experience gained and lessons learned will unify all Party members in thinking. The unity so formed is most reliable. In 1981, at its sixth plenary session, the 11th Party Central Committee adopted the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the Peoples Republic of China. The resolution reviewed the Partys history in the period before the founding of the Peoples Republic and summarized the experience it had gained in the course of socialist revolution and construction. The resolution gave assessments of certain major events and important figures, particularly a correct appraisal of Comrade Mao Zedong and Mao Zedong Thought. It drew a clear distinction between right and wrong and corrected the erroneous Leftist and Rightist viewpoints existing at the time. Through the resolution, the Party came to a clear consensus and was more united than ever in support of a forward-looking approach. All this provided a strong impetus to the Partys endeavors in reform, opening up, and socialist modernization. Seventy-six years have passed since the adoption of the Partys first resolution on historical issues, and 40 years since the second. The past four decades have witnessed tremendous progress in the cause of the Party and the country and tremendous advances for the Party in theoretical and practical terms. We have now arrived at a new historic milestone. As we look back and set our sights on the future, we have both an objective need and the subjective conditions for a full review of our Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century, especially those in the 40-plus years of reform and opening up. The Central Committee considers it important in both a practical and historical sense to have a comprehensive review of the major achievements and historical experience of the Party over the past century as we celebrate its centenary and the fulfillment of the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects and move on toward the Second Centenary Goal of building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects. This review will help build a broader consensus and stronger unity in will and action among all members and rally and lead Chinese people of all ethnic groups in achieving new and great success in building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. The Central Committee understands that the Party has gone through an extraordinary journey over the past century. The great endeavors of the Party span a long period of time, cover a wide range of fields, and involve many issues that merit our careful study. As a general requirement, we need to review our history and understand the underlying dynamics of its development so as to prepare for the future with greater confidence. To this end, we need to relive the glories of the Party and appreciate how the Party has rallied and led the Chinese people in making magnificent achievements. We need to take stock of the invaluable experience the Party has gained in carrying out revolution, construction, and reform, and summarize the Partys theories and practices that have proved successful in advancing the cause of the Party and the country since the 18th CPC National Congress. To be more specific, we need to revisit the Partys century-long history of leading the people in carrying out revolution, construction, and reform. We need to review the Partys great historical course of achieving one victory after another and the historic accomplishments the Party has achieved in the interests of the country and the nation. We need to revisit the Partys century-long history in which the Party has advanced Marxism in the Chinese context by adapting the basic tenets of Marxism to Chinas realities and fine traditional culture, and we need to gain a deeper understanding of the Partys innovative theories for the new era. We need to revisit the Partys century-long history in which the Party has maintained unity and upheld the Central Committees authority and its centralized, unified leadership. We need to appreciate the significance of enhancing the Partys political development, which is a distinctive feature and political strength of a Marxist party such as ours. We need to revisit the Partys century-long journey in pursuit of happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation. We must always bear in mind that the Party and the people are inextricably connected and rise and fall together. It is only with such understanding that we Party members can better devote ourselves to the benefit of the people and rely on them in our endeavor for greater accomplishments. We need to revisit the Partys century-long journey in which it has grown stronger through self-improvement and self-reform. We must never falter in exercising full and rigorous self-governance of the Party and must see this as a mission that is forever ongoing so as to make sure that the Party always remains a powerful leadership core in the endeavor to uphold and develop socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. We need to fully appreciate the laws and prevailing trends of history, seize the historical initiative in the cause of the Party and the country throughout our new journey in the new era, and galvanize even greater courage and strength for keeping to our set goals and striding ahead with pride and confidence. The Central Committee considers it essential to follow the methodology of dialectical and historical materialism in the review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century. We need to look at the Partys history from a concrete, objective, and holistic perspective while recognizing that it is interconnected and evolving. We need to maintain a rational outlook on Party history and see history from a broader perspective so as to develop an accurate understanding of the underlying trends and defining features of the CPCs history of evolution. We need to properly address the mistakes and setbacks that have occurred on the Partys path forward. We should draw experience from our successes and learn lessons from our mistakes so as to score new victories. We need to do better at setting things straight, taking a clear-cut stance against historical nihilism, strengthening ideological guidance and theoretical analysis, and clearing up confusion and misunderstandings over certain major questions in the Partys history. The Central Committee has made it clear that the following are the top priorities in drafting the resolution to be adopted at this session: 1. The resolution must focus on the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century. Our Party has already produced two resolutions on historical issues. These settled controversies on major issues in Party history in the period from its founding to the early stage of reform and opening up, and their basic points and conclusions remain valid. Since reform and opening up began, the cause of the Party and the country has generally speaking made smooth progress in the right direction with achievements that have earned worldwide recognition, despite certain problems that have occurred in the Partys work. In view of this, the resolution to be adopted at this session should focus on a review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century. This will help pool our wisdom, strengthen our unity, and boost our confidence and morale. 2. The resolution must highlight the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics. This resolution places emphasis on the new era, mainly reviewing the historic achievements and the historic shifts in the cause of the Party and the country, and the latest experience that the Party has gained during this period. This is because the previous two resolutions on historical issues were devoted to Party history during the new-democratic revolution period, the period of socialist revolution and construction, and the period between the third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee in 1978 and its sixth plenary session in 1981. As for the achievements and experience from the period marked by reform, opening up, and socialist modernization, the Central Committee has already conducted earnest reviews on the occasions of the 20th and 30th anniversary celebrations of the third plenary session of the 11th CPC Central Committee. I also gave a systematic analysis of the achievements and experience from this period in my address at a gathering marking the 40th anniversary of reform and opening up. Therefore, the resolution before us needs to focus on the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics along with a brief summary of Party history prior to the 18th National Congress based on existing reviews and conclusions. This will help further fortify confidence among all Party members, focus on our current endeavors, and enable us to forge ahead on the new journey with greater morale and make still greater contributions in the new era. 3. The resolutions appraisal of major events, significant meetings, and important figures must be consistent with the Party Central Committees existing conclusions. The previous two resolutions, along with the Partys long list of important literature, document the major events, meetings, and figures in Party history prior to its 18th National Congress, and contain well-considered conclusions on historical issues. These points and conclusions are to be upheld in the new resolution. Since the 18th National Congress, I have spoken about Party history and the Partys conclusions on historical issues on a number of important occasions, including events marking the 95th anniversary of the founding of the Party, the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Peoples Liberation Army, the 70th anniversary of the founding of the Peoples Republic of China, and the Partys centenary in particular. These statements represent an updated understanding on the part of the Central Committee of the Partys century-long history. This updated understanding needs to be reflected in the new resolution. IIThe Drafting Process In March of this year, the Political Bureau decided that the sixth plenary session of the 19th Party Central Committee would focus on a comprehensive review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience in its century-long history. To this end, a working group was established to draft the document under the auspices of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau. I am chief of this group, and my colleagues Wang Huning and Zhao Leji serve as its deputy chiefs. The groups membership is composed of other Party and state leaders, as well as heads of relevant central departments and localities. On April 1, the Central Committee issued a Circular on Soliciting Opinions on the Agenda of the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee of Focusing on a Full and Systematic Review of the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party, in order to seek comments and suggestions from Party members and non-Party figures within an appropriate scope. From their feedback, we can see unanimous agreement among all consulted localities, departments, and sectors that the decision of the 19th CPC Central Committee to focus its sixth plenary session on a comprehensive review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century is a well-considered decision of historic and strategic significance. They believe the decision reflects the Partys firm resolve to stay true to its original aspiration and founding mission and remain vibrant as ever. It demonstrates the Partys keen understanding of the general trends of history, its strong sense of mission and responsibility, and its commitment to always taking the initiative in advancing the cause of the Party and the country. It also embodies the Partys broad and farsighted vision, its willingness to learn from history, and its commitment to remaining firmly grounded while setting its sights on the future. They expressed their unanimous endorsement of the Central Committees decision to focus the session on a review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century. They have also come up with many constructive comments and suggestions on what issues should be covered in the resolution. They all agree that the Party has united and led the Chinese people in a continued endeavor to carry out revolution, construction, and reform during all periods of its century-long history; that the Party and the people have created miracles which will go down in the annals of the Chinese nation, world socialism, and human society; that the Party and the people have fundamentally changed the course of the Chinese nations history in modern times and written a brilliant chapter in the history of world socialism, adding new dimensions to Marxism; that the Party and the people have scored indelible achievements toward national rejuvenation and made significant contributions to human progress; and that the Party and the people have gained a wealth of invaluable experience on this great journey. All of these merit a systematic review. The localities, departments, and sectors involved in the consultation suggest that the review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century must focus on the new era and on the historic achievements and the historic shifts in the cause of the Party and the country, and the latest experience that the Party has gained during this period. Under the planning of the Central Committee, the drafting group first carefully studied the Partys major historical documents. Following a thorough review of all major issues in the Partys history and based on comments and suggestions from the localities, departments, and sectors consulted, the group then began drafting the resolution. In accordance with a decision made at a meeting of the Political Bureau, the text of the draft resolution was issued on September 6 to select Party members, including retired senior Party officials, for consultation. We also sought the opinions from leaders of other political parties and the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce and prominent figures without party affiliation. The feedback we have received indicates full endorsement by the consulted localities, departments, and sectors of the text of the draft resolution and its general framework and main content. They all agree that the most salient feature of the document is its focus on facts and its respect for history. They also agree that the document highlights the Partys commitment to its original aspiration and founding mission in all its endeavors over the past century. It is a facts-based document and its descriptions and appraisals of major events, meetings, and figures are consistent with the descriptions and conclusions in the Partys existing historical documents. It also demonstrates the Party Central Committees updated understanding of Party history in the period after the Partys 18th National Congress. Under the sub-heading, Historical Significance of the Partys Endeavors over the Past Century, the document provides a comprehensive, in-depth, and systematic summary of the Partys historic contributions to China and humanity. Under the sub-heading, Historical Experience of the Partys Endeavors over the Past Century, the document summarizes the Partys historical experience and also highlights its significance for guiding ongoing and future endeavors. All consulted localities, departments, and sectors agree that this resolution is a political declaration of the Chinese communists adherence to their original aspiration and founding mission and their commitment to upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. It is a guideline for the Party to create a brighter future and achieve national rejuvenation by learning from history. They also agree that the resolution is imbued with the same spirit as the two previous resolutions on historical issues while also reflecting the spirit of the times. It will inspire the whole Party to strive for greater achievements on the journey ahead. Over the course of soliciting opinions, we received many valuable comments and suggestions from the localities, departments, and sectors consulted. The drafting group analyzed these opinions and suggestions individually and incorporated as many of them as possible. Following multiple discussions and careful consideration, a total of 547 revisions were made to the preliminary draft. The revised draft therefore fully reflects the input of those consulted. During the drafting process, the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau met three times and the Political Bureau twice for the purpose of discussing and finalizing the draft. The current draft for your consideration is a product of these meetings. III. The General Framework and Main Content of the Document In addition to a preamble and a conclusion, the document has seven sections. 1. A Great Victory in the New-Democratic Revolution This section outlines the major tasks of the Party during the new-democratic revolution period, namely opposing imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism, and working for the nations independence and the peoples liberation, so as to create the fundamental social conditions necessary for realizing national rejuvenation. This section analyzes the historical background of the founding of the Party, and highlights the revolutionary struggle waged by the people under the Partys leadership as well as the great accomplishments they made in the early days of the Party and during the periods of the Great Revolution, the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, and the War of Liberation. It also highlights the Partys major achievements, such as establishing Mao Zedong Thought, and initiating and advancing the great project of Party building. This section emphasizes that the founding of the Peoples Republic of China, national independence, and the peoples liberation represented Chinas great transformation from a millennia-old feudal autocracy to a peoples democracy. With these accomplishments made through tenacious struggle, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people showed the world that the Chinese people had stood up and the time in which the Chinese nation could be bullied and abused by others was gone and would never return. This marked the beginning of a new epoch in Chinas development. 2. Socialist Revolution and Construction This section specifies the Partys major tasks during this period, which were to realize the transformation from new democracy to socialism, carry out socialist revolution, promote socialist construction, and lay down the fundamental political conditions and the institutional foundations necessary for national rejuvenation. It reviews the Partys great achievements during the period following the founding of the Peoples Republic of China, in which the Party led the people in surmounting many tough challenges to consolidate the newly-established state power, completing the process of socialist transformation, establishing the socialist system, launching large-scale socialist construction on all fronts, and breaking new ground in foreign affairs. It recaps the efforts of the Party to build up its capacity as the governing party, and summarizes preliminary experience gained in this regard. It gives a rational appraisal of Mao Zedong Thought based on a summary of the creative theories put forward by the Party during this period. The section also highlights the great achievements the Chinese people made under the Partys leadership, which brought about a great transformation from a poor and backward Eastern country with a large population to a socialist country. With these accomplishments made through tenacious struggle, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people showed the world that the Chinese people were not only capable of dismantling the old world, but also of building a new one, that only socialism could save China, and that only socialism could develop China. 3. Reform, Opening up, and Socialist Modernization This section recounts the major tasks of the Party during this period, which were to continue exploring the right path for building socialism in China, unleash and develop the productive forces, lift the people out of poverty and help them become prosperous in the shortest time possible, and fuel the push toward national rejuvenation by providing new, dynamic institutional guarantees as well as the material conditions for rapid development. This section highlights the great significance of the third plenary session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, and documents the historic contributions made by the Chinese communists with Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao as their chief representatives. It reviews the spectacular progress and resounding success the Party made in this period in leading the people in setting things right in all sectors, developing the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics, advancing reform, opening up, and socialist modernization, effectively responding to the many risks and trials confronting Chinas overall reform, development, and stability, promoting national reunification, safeguarding world peace and pursuing common development, and launching and advancing the great new project of Party building. This section commends the great achievements scored by the Party and the people during this period, which made possible the Chinese nations tremendous advance from standing up to becoming prosperous. With these accomplishments made through tenacious struggle, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people showed the world that reform and opening up was a crucial move in making China what it is today, that socialism with Chinese characteristics is the correct road that has led the country toward development and prosperity, and that China has caught up with the times in great strides. 4. A New Era of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics This section outlines the major tasks of the Party during this period as accomplishing the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, launching a new journey to realize the Second Centenary Goal of turning China into a great modern socialist country in all respects, and continuing to advance toward the ultimate goal of national rejuvenation. This section elaborates on the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics, which represents a new historical phase in Chinas development. It reviews the achievements the Party has made in theoretical innovation since its 18th National Congress, and thoroughly analyzes the conditions, risks, and challenges faced by the Party in the new era. With a focus on the original ideas, transformative practices, new breakthroughs, and landmark accomplishments of the past nine years, the section highlights the great achievements and historic shifts in the cause of the Party and the country in the new era in the following 13 areas: --upholding the Partys overall leadership; --exercising full and rigorous self-governance; --pursuing economic development; --deepening reform and opening up; --advancing political work; --comprehensively advancing law-based governance; --driving cultural advancement; --promoting social advancement; --spurring ecological advancement; --strengthening national defense and the armed forces; --safeguarding national security; --upholding the One Country, Two Systems policy and promoting national reunification; and --bolstering the diplomatic front. This section emphasizes that the great achievements the people have made under the leadership of the Party during this period provide better institutional conditions, stronger material foundations, and a source of inspiration for realizing national rejuvenation. With these accomplishments made through tenacious struggle, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people have shown the world that the Chinese nation has achieved the tremendous transformation from standing up and becoming prosperous to growing strong. 5. The Historical Significance of the Partys Endeavors over the Past Century Based on a thorough review of the Partys major achievements over the past century, this section highlights the historical significance of the Partys endeavors from a broader perspective in the following five respects: --fundamentally transforming the future of the Chinese people; --opening up the right path for achieving rejuvenation of the Chinese nation; --demonstrating the strong vitality of Marxism; --producing a profound influence on the course of world history; and --making the CPC a forerunner of the times. It spells out the CPCs historic contributions to the Chinese people, the Chinese nation, Marxism, the cause of human progress, and the development of Marxist political parties. This five-point summary is rooted in Chinas experience, but represents a vision for the future of humanity. It reflects the close bond between the CPC and the Chinese people and nation, and the connections between the CPC and Marxism, world socialism, and the development of human society. It also embodies the historical, theoretical, and practical logic of the Partys endeavors over its century-long history. 6. The Historical Experience of the Partys Endeavors over the Past Century The historical experience of the Party is of fundamental and far-reaching guiding significance. This section summarizes this experience in 10 aspects: --upholding the Partys leadership; --putting the people first; --advancing theoretical innovation; --staying independent; --following the Chinese path; --maintaining a global vision; --breaking new ground; --standing up for ourselves; --promoting the united front; and --remaining committed to self-reform. These 10 points form a systemic, interconnected, and indivisible whole. They are critical to the continued success of the Party and the people. They are the source of the Partys inviolable strength, and are the very reason why the Party has always been able to seize the historical initiative. They are essential for the Party to preserve its advanced nature and integrity and always stand at the forefront of the times. This section reiterates that the 10 points represent valuable practical experience the Party has gained on its century-long journey and they are intellectual treasures created through the joint efforts of the Party and the people. All of us must cherish them, uphold them over the long term, and continue to enrich and develop them in practice in the new era. 7. The Communist Party of China in the New Era This section focuses on the Second Centenary Goal of building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects. It calls on all Party members to make unremitting efforts to advance the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation with the determination to never let up until we reach our ultimate goals and the attitude that the last leg of the journey marks the halfway point only. This section stresses the importance of adhering to the basic theory, guideline, and policy of the Party, and of grounding our work in this new stage of development, applying the new development philosophy, fostering a new pattern of development, and pursuing high-quality development. It calls for coordinated nationwide efforts to make our people prosperous, our nation strong, and our country beautiful. This section reiterates the need to forever maintain the Partys close ties with the people and the need to better realize, safeguard, and advance the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the people. It reminds us that one may thrive in adversity and perish in laxity, requires us to see things from a long-term, strategic perspective, and always remain mindful of potential dangers, and inspires us to continue advancing the great new project of Party building in the new era. It stresses that we must cultivate the people who will carry on the cause of the Party from generation to generation. It calls on the whole Party, the military, and Chinese people of all ethnic groups to remember the glories and hardships of yesterday, rise to the mission of today, and live up to the great dream of tomorrow. It also calls on us to learn from history, work hard, forge ahead for a better future, and make tireless efforts to realize the Second Centenary Goal and the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation. Comrades, The key task of the present session is to review and adopt the resolution. I hope that in doing so you will act in accordance with the requirements of the Central Committee, and adopt a holistic perspective on the past, the present, and the future of our Party. I also hope you will carry out in-depth discussions on the draft resolution and come up with constructive ideas and suggestions based on your collective wisdom. Let us work together to make this session a great success and produce a well-revised version of the resolution. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Du Mingming) Xi, Biden pledge to steer China-U.S. relations back on right track Xinhua) 08:19, November 17, 2021 Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Yue Yuewei) -- The two sides had thorough and in-depth communication and exchanges on issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance shaping the development of China-US relations and on important issues of mutual interest. -- The two Presidents agreed that their meeting is candid, constructive, substantive and productive. -- The meeting helps increase mutual understanding, adds to the positive expectation of the international community for this relationship, and sends a powerful message to the two countries and the world. BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping had a virtual meeting with US President Joe Biden on Tuesday. The two sides had thorough and in-depth communication and exchanges on issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance shaping the development of China-US relations and on important issues of mutual interest. President Xi pointed out that both China and the US are at critical stages of development, and the "global village" of humanity faces multiple challenges. As the world's two largest economies and permanent members of the UN Security Council, China and the US need to increase communication and cooperation, each run their domestic affairs well and, at the same time, shoulder their share of international responsibilities, and work together to advance the noble cause of world peace and development. This is the shared desire of the people of the two countries and around the world, and the joint mission of Chinese and American leaders. SOUND, STABLE CHINA-US RELATIONSHIP URGED President Xi stressed that a sound and stable China-US relationship is required for advancing the two countries' respective development and for safeguarding a peaceful and stable international environment, including finding effective responses to global challenges such as climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic. China and the US should respect each other, coexist in peace, and pursue win-win cooperation. President Xi expressed his readiness to work with President Biden to build consensus and take active steps to move China-US relations forward in a positive direction. Doing so will advance the interests of the two peoples and meet the expectation of the international community. President Xi pointed out that the most important event in international relations over the past 50 years was the reopening and development of China-US relations, which has benefited the two countries and the whole world. The most important event in international relations in the coming 50 years will be for China and the US to find the right way to get along. History is a fair judge. What a statesman does, be it right or wrong, be it an accomplishment or a failure, will all be recorded by history. It is hoped that President Biden will demonstrate political leadership and steer America's China policy back on the track of reason and pragmatism. President Xi highlighted that a review of the experience and lessons learned in growing China-US relations shows that for the two countries to get along in the new era, three principles must be followed. First, mutual respect. The two countries need to respect each other's social systems and development paths, respect each other's core interests and major concerns, and respect each other's right to development. They need to treat each other as equals, keep differences under control, and seek common ground while reserving differences. Second, peaceful coexistence. No conflict and no confrontation is a line that both sides must hold. The US side has suggested coexistence between China and the US. One more word can be added to make it peaceful coexistence. Third, win-win cooperation. With their interests deeply intertwined, China and the US stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation. The world is big enough for the two countries to develop individually and collectively. The right thing to do is to choose mutual benefit over zero-sum game or the I-win-you-lose approach. Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Huang Jingwen) President Xi identified four priority areas where China and the US should focus their efforts on. First, shouldering responsibilities of major countries and leading global response to outstanding challenges. China-US cooperation may not solve all problems, but few problems can be solved without China-US cooperation. The global initiatives China has proposed are all open to the US. We hope the reverse is also true. Second, acting in the spirit of equality and mutual benefit to move forward exchanges at all levels and in all areas and generate more positive energy for China-US relations. President Xi expressed his readiness to stay in touch with President Biden through multiple means to set the direction and inject more momentum into bilateral relations. The two countries, with broad common interests in a wide range of areas including economy, energy, mil-to-mil, law-enforcement, education, science and technology, cyber, environmental protection and sub-national interactions, should complement each other to make the cake bigger for China-US cooperation. The two sides could fully harness the dialogue channels and mechanisms between their diplomatic and security, economic and financial, and climate change teams, in an effort to advance practical cooperation and resolve specific issues. Third, managing differences and sensitive issues in a constructive way to prevent China-US relations from getting derailed or out of control. It is only natural for the two countries to have differences. The key is to manage them constructively so that they don't magnify or exacerbate. China will certainly defend its sovereignty, security and development interests. It is important that the US properly handle the relevant issues with prudence. Fourth, strengthening coordination and cooperation on major international and regional hotspot issues to provide more public goods to the world. The world is not tranquil. China and the US need to work together with the rest of the international community to defend world peace, promote global development, and safeguard a fair and equitable international order. President Xi compared China and the US to two giant ships sailing in the ocean. It is important for the two sides to keep a steady hand on the tiller, so that the two giant ships will break waves and forge ahead together, without losing direction or speed, still less colliding with each other. CHINESE PEOPLE'S ASPIRATION FOR BETTER LIFE CANNOT BE STOPPED President Xi explained China's development path and strategic intentions. The just concluded sixth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee took stock of the major achievements and historical experience of the CPC in the past 100 years. Over the past century, the CPC has kept to its founding aspiration and mission of striving for the happiness of the Chinese people and rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. A lot has been accomplished in this direction, but that is far from enough. More needs to be done. President Xi said that when he took office, he said publicly that the Chinese people's aspiration for a better life is the goal to strive for. The Chinese people's aspiration for a better life is the biggest internal driver for China's development and an inevitable trend of history. Any attempt to stop this historical trend will be rejected by the Chinese people, and will by no means succeed. President Xi said that as China's leader, serving the 1.4 billion Chinese people and working with them for a better life is a great challenge and a great responsibility. "I shall put aside my own well-being and live up to people's expectations," President Xi said. Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Huang Jingwen) President Xi pointed out that the Chinese people have always loved and valued peace. Aggression or hegemony is not in the blood of the Chinese nation. Since the founding of the People's Republic, China has never started a single war or conflict, and has never taken one inch of land from other countries. China has no intention to sell its own development path around the world. On the contrary, China encourages all countries to find development paths tailored to their respective national conditions. President Xi stressed that opening-up is a fundamental state policy and a hallmark of China. China will not change its determination to open up at a higher level. China will not change its determination to share development opportunities with the rest of the world. And China will not change its determination to make economic globalization more open, inclusive, balanced and beneficial to all. The new development paradigm that China is working to establish is aimed at expanding domestic market, fostering both domestic and international circulations with greater scope and scale, and building a business environment that is more market-oriented, law-based and up to international standards. All this will provide a bigger market and more opportunities to other countries. President Xi highlighted China's commitment to peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom, which are common values of humanity. Drawing ideological lines or dividing the world into different camps or rival groups will only make the world suffer. The bitter lessons of the Cold War are still fresh in memory. We hope that the US side can meet its word of not seeking a "new Cold War" with concrete actions. President Xi stated China's principled position on the Taiwan question. He noted the new wave of tensions across the Taiwan Strait, and ascribed the tensions to the repeated attempts by the Taiwan authorities to look for US support for their independence agenda as well as the intention of some Americans to use Taiwan to contain China. Such moves are extremely dangerous, just like playing with fire. Whoever plays with fire will get burnt. The one-China principle and the three China-US Joint Communiques are the political foundation of China-US relations. Previous US administrations have all made clear commitments on this question. The true status quo of the Taiwan question and what lies at the heart of one China are as follows: there is but one China in the world and Taiwan is part of China, and the Government of the People's Republic of China is the sole legal government representing China. Achieving China's complete reunification is an aspiration shared by all sons and daughters of the Chinese nation. We have patience and will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts. That said, should the separatist forces for Taiwan independence provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures. Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Ding Lin) MULTILATERALISM WITHOUT CHINA-US COOPERATION IS INCOMPLETE President Xi highlighted that civilizations are rich and diverse, and so is democracy. Democracy is not mass produced with a uniform model or configuration for countries around the world. Whether a country is democratic or not should be left to its own people to decide. Dismissing forms of democracy that are different from one's own is in itself undemocratic. China is ready to have dialogues on human rights on the basis of mutual respect, but we oppose using human rights to meddle in other countries' internal affairs. President Xi pointed out that China and the US need to uphold the international system with the UN at its core, the international order underpinned by international law, and the basic norms governing international relations based on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter. Multilateralism without China-US cooperation is incomplete. On trade ties, President Xi described the China-US economic and trade relations as mutually beneficial in nature. Business is business. Economic and trade issues between the two countries should not be politicized. The two sides need to make the cake bigger for cooperation. China takes seriously the wishes of US business community to travel to China more easily, and has agreed to upgrade fast-track arrangement, which will further enhance economic and trade exchanges between China and the US and boost the recovery of the two economies. The US should stop abusing or overstretching the concept of national security to suppress Chinese businesses. It is imperative for China and the US to maintain communication on macroeconomic policies, support world economic recovery and guard against economic and financial risks. The US should be mindful of the spillover effects of its domestic macro policies, and adopt responsible macroeconomic policies. On energy security, President Xi noted the need for China and the US to call on the international community to jointly protect global energy security, strengthen cooperation on natural gas and new energy, and work with other countries to keep global industrial and supply chains safe and stable. On climate change, President Xi recalled China-US cooperation that helped bring about the Paris Agreement. He pointed out that, as both countries are transitioning to green and low-carbon economy, climate change can well become a new highlight of cooperation. President Xi reiterated his belief that clear water and green mountains are as valuable as gold and silver, and that we must protect the environment the way we protect our own eyes, and treat the environment the way we treat our own lives. Today, ecological conservation has become a household concept and social consensus in China. China will make the world's biggest cut in carbon emission intensity in the shortest time frame in history, a task that will require extraordinary efforts. China means what it says. It only commits to what it can deliver, and never makes a promise it cannot keep. China is still the largest developing country in the world. The issue of unbalanced and inadequate development still stands out. All countries need to uphold the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, and strike a balance between addressing climate change and protecting livelihoods. What the world needs is less finger-pointing or blame game, but more solidarity and cooperation. Words matter, but actions matter even more. Developed countries need to earnestly fulfill their historical responsibilities and due obligations, and maintain policy consistency. On public health, President Xi pointed out that the pandemic once again proves that humanity lives in a community with a shared future. There is no higher priority than people's lives. Solidarity and cooperation is the most powerful weapon for the international community to defeat COVID-19. Response to any major disease must be based on science. Politicizing diseases does no good but only harm. The pressing priority in the global COVID response is to address the vaccine deficits and close the vaccination gap. President Xi said that he suggested making COVID vaccines a global public good at the early stage of the pandemic last year, and put forth a Global Vaccine Cooperation Action Initiative just recently. China is among the first to offer vaccines to developing countries in need, delivering over 1.7 billion doses of finished and bulk vaccines to the world. We will consider making additional donations in light of the needs of developing countries. COVID-19 will not be the last public health crisis facing humanity. China and the US need to call for the establishment of a cooperation mechanism for global public health and communicable disease prevention and control, and promote further international exchanges and cooperation. Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Yue Yuewei) US HAS NO INTENTION TO CONFLICT WITH CHINA President Biden said that the US-China relationship is the most important bilateral relations in the world. As two major countries, the US and China have a responsibility to the world as well as to our people. The two sides need to have open and candid dialogues to enhance understanding of each other's intentions, and make sure that competition between the two countries is fair and healthy and does not veer into conflict. President Biden echoed President Xi's comment that history is a fair judge, and that they should make the relationship work and not mess it up. China has been a major power since 5,000 years ago. Biden reiterated that the US does not seek to change China's system, the revitalization of its alliances is not anti-China, and the US has no intention to have a conflict with China. Biden reaffirmed the US government's long-standing one-China policy, stated that the US does not support "Taiwan independence", and expressed the hope for peace and stability to be maintained in the Taiwan Strait. The US is willing to work with China on the basis of mutual respect and peaceful coexistence, increase communication, reduce misperception, and handle differences constructively. Biden emphasized the need for the US and China to work more closely in areas where their interests align, respond to global challenges such as the COVID pandemic and climate change, and deliver better lives to the two peoples. We should encourage the younger generation to interact more and be more exposed to each other's culture, which will help make the world a better place. The two sides also exchanged views on Afghanistan, the Iranian nuclear issue, the situation on the Korean Peninsula, and other international and regional issues of mutual interest. The two Presidents agreed that their meeting is candid, constructive, substantive and productive. It helps increase mutual understanding, adds to the positive expectation of the international community for this relationship, and sends a powerful message to the two countries and the world. The two sides agreed to maintain close communication in different forms and steer China-US relations back on the right track of sound and steady development, for the good of the people in both countries and around the world. Ding Xuexiang, Liu He, Yang Jiechi and Wang Yi were present at the meeting. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Du Mingming) China's WTO entry facilitates globalization, benefits global growth -- U.S. economist Xinhua) 08:39, November 17, 2021 "China is a big supporter of the multilateral system, and this is exactly what we need right now," says Jeffrey Sachs. "Most of our problems are global scale. Unless we have effective global institutions, we won't be able to solve these problems." NEW YORK, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) two decades ago was "a tremendous push to globalization," benefiting both China and the world, a renowned U.S. economist has said. "Without (China's) membership in WTO, a lot of economic growth and integration would not have taken place," Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, told Xinhua in a recent interview. Sachs said he believes in globalization, "because we really have a benefit of sharing each other's knowledge, of travel and tourism, of different cultures, of different ways of knowledge, of different ways of innovation." He noted that China has developed as a significant player over the past decades, becoming "the major trading partner for most of the world now," which is not only "a remarkable accomplishment," but also "a huge benefit for the world." In the past 20 years, China's global ranking of trade in goods has risen from the sixth to the first, while that of its trade in services has jumped from the 11th to the second. Calling China's sustained efforts to develop economic and trade ties with other countries an "excellent strategy," Sachs said the world's second largest economy is recommended to "continue to increase its trade with other parts of the world," adding China "can play a hugely positive role" in development in regions such as Southeast Asia, Central Asia, and Africa. Moves like the Belt and Road Initiative are very important for helping finance development in other places, upgrading the infrastructure and building the economies that are still lagging behind, which in the long run are "mutually beneficial," he noted. Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, speaks at a symposium of the university in New York, the United States, Nov. 5, 2021.(Xinhua/Liu Yanan) Sachs, who is also a senior United Nations advisor, lauded China's role in safeguarding multilateralism. "China is a big supporter of the multilateral system, and this is exactly what we need right now," he said. "Most of our problems are global scale. Unless we have effective global institutions, we won't be able to solve these problems." Sachs also highlighted China's "very constructive role" in stabilizing the global supply chain, noting other countries should also play their distinct part in mitigating the current supply-chain disruptions. Meanwhile, he underscored the importance to keep "the international trading system open," as "an open international trading system is good for the world." Sachs cautioned about the consequences of the U.S. obsession with the so-called "decoupling" theory, while emphasizing the need and urgency for closer collaboration between the world's two leading economies. "Those who say we should decouple could lead us to conflict, which would be very dangerous. I like the interdependence," he said. "It's extremely important that China and the United States find cooperative approaches" to address their differences, keep normal economic relations with each other and work together to solve some big problems like climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and the conservation of ecosystems, he added. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) 5G energizes Chinas iron and steel industry 09:06, November 17, 2021 By Shen Zhilin, Jiang Xiaodan ( People's Daily The integration of 5G technology into the industrial Internet has helped improve the quality and efficiency of Chinas traditional iron and steel industry by accelerating the application of products with big data-based functions such as remote control, collaborative operation and troubleshooting in recent years. Workers monitor steel production remotely at the central control room of a plant under Hunan Valin Xiangtan Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. in central Chinas Hunan province. (Photo/State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Hunan Provincial Peoples Government) At the steelmaking zone of a wide and heavy plate plant run by Hunan Valin Xiangtan Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. (Xiangtan Steel) in Xiangtan, central Chinas Hunan province, four large electromagnetic bridge cranes were busy attracting scrap steel with a weight of several tons and then moving it accurately onto a truck. The bridge cranes were remotely controlled by Tan Bin, who sat in a spacious central control room and accomplished loading and unloading tasks by simply pulling or pushing levers and pressing buttons in front of a screen. Work was so much tougher when I had to stay in the operators cab of bridge crane before remote control was possible, Tan recalled. The operators cab was noisy, and would sometimes be infiltrated by dust. So we needed to wear masks all the time in work, the operator added. Taking advantage of the ultra-high reliability and ultra-low latency of new technologies, the plant realizes the ultra-high-speed uploading and downloading of data, thus allowing workers to control the equipment accurately and remotely, according to He Wei, deputy director of the production equipment department of Xiangtan Steel, who said that the integration of 5G into bridge cranes has greatly improved operators work efficiency. Shougang Jingtang United Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. in Tangshan city, north Chinas Hebei province, has set up a management system that can monitor in real time the operation of the four main devices of coke ovens, an essential facility for iron and steel companies, namely coke pusher, coke barrier vehicle, coke quenching vehicle and coal charging car. These machines playing different roles are closely connected with each other and form an organic and unified whole through the transmission of signals. Besides real-time monitoring of the four main devices of coke ovens, the management system enables man-machine dialogues, allowing workers to give orders to machines. The four devices can send their operating data to the central control room, explained Ding Hongqi, a staff member at the coking department of the iron and steel company in Tangshan. A slag adding robot is busy performing its tasks at a plant under Hunan Valin Xiangtan Iron and Steel Co., Ltd. in central Chinas Hunan province. (Photo/State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of Hunan Provincial Peoples Government) However, due to low bandwidth, image transmission was often troubled by network latency in the past, Ding said, adding that the problem has been solved after the company employed 5G technology. As a typical process manufacturing industry, the steel industry is characterized by continuous production process and requires timely transmission of large amounts of information in a complex environment, something that the companys former information system can no longer sustain. Therefore, the industry is in urgent need of intelligent transformation. In 2019, the coking department of the company applied 5G in the remote operation of the four devices to realize their intelligent and synchronous connection, making the remote operation of the equipment more reliable, efficient and safer. We have realized the stable, safe and fast transmission of images, said Ding, adding that after analysis and logical judgment, the central control room gives corresponding instructions to the programmable logic controllers of the four devices, thus ensuring their collaboration. Since 2019, the company has promoted the transformation and upgrading of steel manufacturing technologies and equipment by integrating 5G into the industrial Internet, increasing its production efficiency by about 15 percent. After upgrading key basic equipment by combining 5G and the industrial Internet, Ansteel Information Industry Co., Ltd. based in Dalian, northeast Chinas Liaoning province, has enabled data collected by sensors installed in equipment, such as temperature, vibration, pressure, and flow, to be transmitted to a cloud platform in real time to realize real-time monitoring, diagnosis and troubleshooting for equipment with the help of artificial intelligence (AI) and big data analysis, according to Liu Jiawei, chief researcher of the company. Since the application of 5G technology and the industrial Internet, data on the current of motors on each one of the roller beds of the companys 1,780-milimeter hot strip mill production line has been collected in real time. Whenever an abnormality occurs, the equipment automatically sounds alarm and locates the fault accurately. In the past, after spotting scratches on products caused by motor failure, we needed to examine over 400 roller beds of the production line one by one, which took 30 minutes to one hour. Now we can determine the problems basically within 10 minutes, said Ma Liang, a worker at the production line. While the maintenance efficiency has improved and the downtime of equipment shortened, the percentage of rejects and degraded products has dropped from about 7 percent to 3.8 percent, which has helped the company cut costs, Ma added. Besides breakdown recovery, the application of 5G technology and Industrial Internet has also enabled active maintenance of equipment. Thanks to relevant applications, the experience of veteran workers has been converted into data models, which help achieve scientific maintenance and full lifecycle management of equipment based on data analysis, Liu said. For the 1,780-milimeter hot strip mill production line, the number of emergency shutdowns and troubleshooting has decreased by 20 percent and the operating rate of equipment increased by 5 percent after the transformation of the production line, Liu pointed out. (Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun) Congo, China should strengthen local government cooperation: Congolese PM Xinhua) 09:06, November 17, 2021 BRAZZAVILLE, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- The Republic of the Congo and China should promote their partnership by further strengthening cooperation between the local governments of the two countries, the Republic of the Congo's Prime Minister Anatole Collinet Makosso said Tuesday at the opening ceremony of the 4th China-Africa Local Government Cooperation Forum. The forum, which was held online on Tuesday, brought together about 300 political leaders from African countries, and officials of local governments and relevant institutions from China and Africa. In his speech via video link from Brazzaville, the Congolese Prime Minister lauded "Congo's regular participation in the meetings of this forum", an event that demonstrates "the excellence of multifaceted relations" between the two countries. Noting that his government places "special" emphasis on developing and promoting cooperation between its local communities and other local governments, especially those of China, Makosso highlighted the fruits of the bilateral partnership at the local government level. From twinning program between bilateral cities, to the donation of anti-COVID-19 medical equipment from Chinese municipalities, as well as reciprocal visits of delegations, the two countries have benefited from the "constant strengthening of the Congo-China partnership at the level of local government," he said. The two countries should promote the partnership between their local governments, so as to serve the interest of their peoples, said Makosso, calling on both sides to rise to the challenges, especially urban governance, poverty reduction, public health and innovative development. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) "Double 11" online shopping festival reflects huge potential of Chinese consumption market 09:08, November 17, 2021 By Wang Ke, Luo Shanshan ( People's Daily Singles' Day shopping festival that falls on Nov. 11 each year, also known as "Double 11", is one of the most anticipated date of the year for Chinas consumers. Employees of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com sort express delivery packages at a logistics park of the company in Luquan district, Shijiazhuang, north China's Hebei province, Nov. 11, 2021. (People's Daily Online/Liang Zidong) This year, "Double 11" transaction data delivered by major e-commerce platforms in China still kept an upward trend, signaling the huge potential of the Chinese consumption market. E-commerce giant JD.com said transaction volume on its platform totaled 349.1 billion yuan ($54.6 billion) during the Single's Day period, and the figure exceeded what the company had witnessed last year. In particular, the value of household appliance orders placed on the company's platform surpassed 2 billion yuan in the first five minutes after 20:00 pm on Nov. 10. Tmall, online marketplace of Chinese multinational Alibaba, reported gross merchandise volume of 540.3 billion yuan during the annual online shopping spree. A number of small- and medium-sized brands achieved leapfrog growth on the platform. A total of 698 such brands that racked up over one million yuan during last year's "Double 11" witnessed their turnover hitting 10 million yuan in the first 11 days of November this year. Li Zhengbo, an expert with the China International Electronic Commerce Center, an institute under the country's Ministry of Commerce, noted that the sales promotions represented by the "Double 11" have become important shopping events recognized and accepted by many consumers. The "Double 11" not only demonstrates the huge potential of China's consumption market, but also will further boost consumer confidence, the expert added. The sales performance of agricultural products was a highlight of this year's "Double 11," as e-commerce platforms both expanded sales channels of these products and improved farmers' income. For instance, apples directly sourced from Gansu province, were sold out immediately after they were placed on Taote (Taobao Special Edition) , an e-commerce platform of Alibaba. On JD.com's platform, the sales of king crabs surged 600 times from a year ago, and that of kiwifruits produced in Xiuwen, southwest China's Guizhou province also grew tenfold. A woman shops in a duty-free store in Haikou, south China's Hainan province, Nov. 11, 2021. (People's Daily Online/Wang Chenglong) Just minutes after JD.com officially started the "main course" part of the online shopping spree on the evening of Nov. 10, a man surnamed Lin in Weinan, northwest China's Shaanxi province got a box of kiwifruits he ordered on the company's platform. It was the one millionth order received by the JD.com smart supply center in Wugong county, Shaanxi province since the center started trial operation. Li believes that the "Double 11" has reshaped consumers' shopping habits over the past years. The consumers now pay more attention to the quality of commodities and the delivery service as well, and they have also become more rational when shopping, the expert explained. These changes have released new consumption demands and raised higher requirements for e-commerce platforms, he pointed out. Merchants and logistics enterprises must enhance their capability to process orders in peak hours, so as to reinforce consumers' loyalty with constant, stable and high-quality services. Sales data during the online shopping spree, as an important indicator of China's consumption market, mirrored the trend of consumption upgrading in the country. The transaction volume of an oxygen concentrator produced by Yuwell, a Chinese medical equipment solution supplier, exceeded one million yuan just one minute after the "Double 11" started on JD.com. The platform's official online pharmacy also witnessed a 100 percent growth in transaction volume in five minutes after the shopping spree began. An employee of an agricultural e-commerce company in Daoxian county, Yongzhou, central China's Hunan province sells navel orange on a livestream platform, Nov. 6, 2021. (People's Daily Online/He Hongfu) Online retailer Suning.com said middle- and high-end household appliances were hot during this year's "Double 11." The sales of appliance sets grew 46 percent from a year ago, and that of low-energy-consumption appliances went up 39 percent. Service consumption was another keyword of this year's "Double 11" as housekeeping, auto maintenance, physical check-ups, and home decor services received huge attention from the consumers. The number of auto maintenance orders on Chinese car maintenance start-up Tuhu increased nearly 40 percent year on year. Li Yongjian, a researcher with the National Academy of Economic Strategy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences told People's Daily that the "Double 11" just showed new characteristics for its in-depth integration of online and offline services. On one hand, online platforms, by employing new technologies such as AI, further optimized consumption experiences. On the other hand, offline shopping also went through a transition to offer more convenience for the consumers. The online shopping spree, experiencing a constant optimization on the supply side, is conducive to releasing more consumption potential on the Chinese market, and will give consumption a bigger role in the building of a new development stage, the researcher said. (Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun) Xi Jinping: an inspiring and visionary leader People's Daily Online) 09:14, November 17, 2021 In August 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping wrote back to representatives of foreign participants at the Global Young Leaders Dialogue, encouraging them to further exchanges and mutual learning, and contribute to the building of a community with a shared future for humanity. Here, five young leaders share their feelings after reading the letter. (Web editor: Liang Jun, Bianji) China builds international consumption center cities to release potentials of domestic demands 09:14, November 17, 2021 By Luo Shanshan ( People's Daily Earlier this year, China's State Council approved Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, Tianjin, and Chongqing to take the lead in developing international consumption center cities. People visit Nanjing Road, one of the most famous shopping streets in Shanghai, Sept. 10, 2021. (People's Daily Online/Yan Daming) It was a move made according to the Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) and the Long-Range Objectives Through the Year 2035, which plans to build international consumption center cities and a batch of regional consumption hubs. Modern international metropolises shall play as international consumption centers to significantly facilitate and drive consumption. Since China's reform and opening-up, the country's consumption market has embraced rapid development, with its consumption structure on a constant upgrade. Some of the cities in the country, with their massive scale, rapid development and strong potential in consumption, have become much more international and been playing a stronger catalytic role. They have the necessary prerequisites for building themselves into international consumption centers. The five cities have a clear positioning for themselves in developing international consumption center cities. They have also implemented forceful and distinctive measures in this regard with their respective focuses. An livestream show introducing the food of Chongqing municipality is held at a shopping mall in the municipality, Aug. 17, 2021. (People's Daily Online/ Sun Kaifang) Taking advantages in its huge market and circulation, Shanghai has developed a strong capability in consumption supply. It is striving to build itself into a center of global launch events and an international consumption destination. Beijing is currently building a batch of consumption landmarks of international influence. The capital has proposed ten action plans to drive consumption. Guangzhou enjoys a big market and strong consumption power. Its manufacturing and service sectors are also in a leading position in the country. At present, the southern city is building a consumption city cluster of international influence in collaboration with Hong Kong and Macao. As an important industrial and commercial center, as well as a transport hub in north China, Tianjin has bolstered areas of weakness, consolidated its foundation and established new platforms, so as to make its urban characteristics in rivers, sea, ports and exotic buildings even more prominent. Chongqing has proposed to build itself into a globally renowned city for its shopping atmosphere, food, exhibitions, tourism and culture, as well as an international consumption center city with local features that radiates the western region and is particularly open to Southeast Asia and South Asia. Citizens pose for pictures at Haixinsha on the central axis of Guangzhou, south China's Guangdong province, May 16, 2021. (People's Daily Online/Wei Jinsong) The measures taken by the five cities manifest their own local characteristics, and help them better integrate into the national market, which is conducive to the consumption restructuring. In the first three quarters of this year, final consumption contributed 64.8 percent to economic growth, becoming the largest driver of China's growth. In a long-term perspective, the establishment of a "dual circulation" development pattern in which domestic economic cycle plays a leading role while international economic cycle remains its extension and supplement will offer more support for China's economic development. The building of international consumption center cities will encourage the national market to release its consumption potentials and lay a solid foundation of domestic demand for building the "dual circulation" development pattern. Meanwhile, the international consumption center cities are also expected to enhance China's position in the international consumption market, and lead the upgrading of China's supply side with high-quality consumption. China has entered a new development stage, which has lifted its people's living standard onto a higher level and spurred a wave of consumption upgrade. The building of international consumption center cities will further accelerate the upgrading of the consumption market, improve cities' consumption capability and internationalization, and contribute to China's high-quality development. Photo shows the Beijing central business district sandwiched between the 3rd Ring Road and the 4th Ring Road in the east of the city. (People's Daily/Yu Kun) (Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun) China's free trade port unveils opening-up plan Xinhua) 09:22, November 17, 2021 Photo taken on April 5, 2021 shows Lingshui Li'An international education innovation pilot zone in Li'An peninsula of Lingshui Li Autonomous County, south China's Hainan Province. (Xinhua/Guo Cheng) HAIKOU, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- South China's Hainan Province plans to lock in three sectors, including duty-free shopping, international medical care and international education, in its drive to become an international tourism and consumption destination, according to its 2021-2025 development plan. The island province is a free trade port. The plan recently published sets the target for its tourist industry to contribute to 17.8 percent of its total economic growth by 2025. Efforts will be made in the Hainan Boao Lecheng International Medical Tourism Pilot Zone to introduce and cultivate a batch of high-end and professional medical institutions to promote the research progress on stem cell, immune cell and gene therapy, plus other new techniques in the biomedical sector. The medical pilot zone also encourages people from the countries joining the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) to come for treatment. By 2025, Lecheng is expected to attract about 500,000 people to receive medical service in Hainan, the plan noted. In regards to education, Hainan encourages overseas colleges and educational institutions to settle on the island. The number of international students in Hainan is expected to reach 10,000 by 2025. The province will also introduce about 15 international high schools and kindergartens and more than three overseas high-level universities and vocational colleges in science, agriculture and medicine by 2025. Last June, China released a master plan to build the southernmost province into a globally influential and high-level free trade port by the middle of the century. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Experts say Xi-Biden virtual meeting sends positive signal on China-U.S. ties Xinhua) 09:24, November 17, 2021 BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Political experts and scholars around the world view the virtual meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden, as a strong signal that would enhance positive expectations of the international community on bilateral ties. The two heads of state had a virtual meeting on Tuesday. The two sides had thorough and in-depth communication and exchanges on issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance shaping the development of China-U.S. relations and on important issues of mutual interest. Robert Lawrence Kuhn, chairman of the Kuhn Foundation, told Xinhua that the virtual meeting is an applauding step in navigating the bilateral relationship to the right direction. Noting that the meeting was "exceedingly important" and "a small uptick in the right direction, he said the importance of the online meeting has been "significantly elevated" as the world is facing serious challenges that could hardly be tackled without the U.S.-China cooperation. Kenneth Quinn, president emeritus of the World Food Prize Foundation and former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia, told Xinhua that close collaboration between the two sides is "absolutely essential" to enable humankind to meet the great challenges in the future, including food shortage, the negative impact from climate change, and public health risks. Calling the meeting "very encouraging," Lyazid Benhami, vice-president of the Paris Association of French-Chinese Friendship, said that the two countries have obligation not only to their peoples but also to the rest of the world. Cavince Adhere, an international relations scholar in Kenya, said that the world expects to see more stable and sustainable relations between the two countries. This raises prospects for a more stable international system which can facilitate global cooperation for the benefit of mankind. "The rest of the world can make little progress in addressing the international challenges without full participation and cooperation of China and the United States," he said, referring to such issues as the COVID-19 pandemic, and climate crisis. Herman Tiu Laurel, founder of Philippine-BRICS Strategic Studies, said that China and the United States, two major powers on earth, shoulder the hope of the entire world for a safe, secure and healthy place attaining prosperity for all, which can only be achieved by the partnership of the two. Faced with common challenges, the commitment and efforts towards durable and permanent peace, as well as stable international political and diplomatic environment is paramount for the major powers to promise and pursue, Laurel added. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Villages around Mount Fanjing in SW China find green paths to prosperity 09:28, November 17, 2021 By Wan Xiubin, Cheng Huan ( People's Daily By taking advantage of local ecological resources, villages around Fanjingshan (Mount Fanjing) National Nature Reserve in southwest Chinas Guizhou province have found their roads to prosperity. Photo shows Fanjingshan (Mount Fanjing) National Nature Reserve in southwest Chinas Guizhou province. (Peoples Daily Online/ Wang Hua) At the monitoring center of the management bureau of the nature reserve, several white light spots, which seemed to be moving, suddenly appeared on the fire alarm system of a large screen supported by infrared thermal imaging technology. It doesnt signify a fire, said Lei Xiaoping, deputy head of the management bureau, who realized immediately that a group of gray snub-nosed monkeys entered the monitoring range of the system. Mount Fanjing, situated in Tongren city of Guizhou, has preserved a mid-subtropical island mountain ecosystem and is rich in biodiversity. In 2018, Mount Fanjing was added to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations (UNESCO) World Heritage List, and the Fanjingshan scenic spot was granted a 5A rating, the topmost level of the countrys tourist attraction rating system. Mount Fanjing is a gene pool of flora and fauna. It is home to over 7,000 wild animal and plant species. Zhaishadong village at the foot of Mount Fanjing in southwest Chinas Guizhou province is ablaze with lights and crowded with tourists, July 10, 2021. (Peoples Daily Online/Li He) To maintain the authenticity and integrity of the natural ecosystems of Mount Fanjing, the municipal government of Tongren issued regulations on the protection and management of the mountain in 2018. To put under comprehensive protection the animals and plants at the Fanjingshan National Nature Reserve, which covers a large area, the management bureau of the nature reserve has set up a team of over 100 rangers and installed infrared cameras and surveillance devices to realize integrated management for work including ecological investigations, fire prevention and protection, fight against unlawfully felling trees and poaching as well as the approval of construction activities, according to Lei. Zhaishadong village at the foot of Mount Fanjing was once a typical poverty-stricken mountainous village. In 2010, the per capita net income of residents in the village was less than 2,000 yuan ($313.4). To alleviate poverty, the local government decided to explore eco-tourism to stimulate economic development while protecting ecological resources. While relocating all residents in the core areas of the nature reserve, the local government began to develop rural tourism moderately at some experimental zones of the nature reserve, creating more income sources for villagers nearby. Since 2011, taking advantage of the unique geographical gifts and cultural tourism resources of Zhaishadong village, the local government has gradually changed the village into a pristine eco-tourism destination that combines folk culture, B&B, catering services, and live performances. After being added to the UNESCO World Heritage List, Mount Fanjing has won increasing fame and attracted more tourists from across the country. Many tourists come to Zhaishadong village after their tour of Mount Fanjing. They live in B&Bs, enjoy local food, and take part in bonfire parties of the Dong ethnic group, said Xia Yongfa, a resident of the village who has transformed his old house for agritainment business. During holidays, tourists usually need to make a reservation for a room at our B&Bs half a month in advance, Xia noted, adding that the agritainment business brought him an annual income of several hundred thousand yuan the year it was opened. The successful experience of Zhaishadong village has effectively inspired and driven the development of its neighboring villages. At present, more than 1,200 villagers living near the Fanjingshan scenic spot engage directly in tourism services such as catering, accommodation and performance.And more than 10,000 residents see their income increased and become better-off by being indirectly employed in the tourism industry. Tourists enjoy a bonfire party in Zhaishadong village at the foot of Mount Fanjing in southwest Chinas Guizhou province, July 10, 2021. (Peoples Daily Online/Li He) Besides developing eco-tourism, Tongren has explored deep processing of special agricultural products according to local conditions, blazing a new path to prosperity for local people. The city has a long history of tea planting and has been a famous production base of the Tongren tea since ancient times. In May 2017, GuiTea, a Guizhou-based tea company, decided to build an industrial park in Jiangkou county, Tongren city. Merely several years passed and it has grown into a well-known matcha enterprise. In addition to matcha drinks, the company has also created a series of highly processed products, including matcha coffee, cakes, noodles, and facial cleansers, which not only sell well across China, but are exported to over 10 foreign countries and regions. Mount Fanjing has an extremely high forest coverage rate and is inhabited by over 100 improved varieties of wild edible fungus. Tongren city has formed a complete industrial chain featuring agaric, shiitake, and three other kinds of edible fungus. During the first half of this year, the city cumulatively planted 558 million sticks of edible fungi, which generated an output value of over 2.2 billion yuan. Today, a green industrial system dominated by tea, camellia oleifera, edible fungi, poultry eggs, and Chinese medicinal herbs has been gradually established in Tongren, helping villagers near Mount Fanjing live a happier life. (Web editor: Hongyu, Liang Jun) Chinese court rules to confiscate illegal gains of Red Notice fugitive Xinhua) 09:47, November 17, 2021 WUHAN, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- A court in central China's Hubei Province has ruled in favor of an application to confiscate the illegal gains of Red Notice fugitive Xu Jin, who is suspected of embezzlement and bribery. The Wuhan Intermediate People's Court on Monday ruled to confiscate the right of use to over 780 mu (52 hectares) of state-owned land as well as eight real-estate properties, three parking spaces and a vehicle obtained through bribery. The court trial found that Xu took advantage of his position as the government head of Wuhan's Huangpi District to embezzle over 197 million yuan (about 30.83 million U.S. dollars) to pay the charges for the assignment of land-use rights, and provided assistance in matters such as land transfers and commercial projects for others. In return, Xu accepted large amounts of money and gifts between October 2006 and May 2011. The evidence proves that Xu committed the crimes of embezzlement and bribe-taking, according to the court, adding that the ruling on confiscation was arrived at in accordance with relevant legal procedures. Xu fled overseas in May 2011 and remains at large. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) State councilor stresses level playing field in market Xinhua) 10:00, November 17, 2021 Chinese State Councilor Wang Yong addresses the 7th BRICS International Competition Conference in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- State Councilor Wang Yong on Tuesday underscored efforts to ensure a level playing field in the Chinese market and called for global antitrust cooperation. Wang made the remarks while addressing the VII BRICS International Competition Conference in Beijing. He gave credit to China's persistence in reforming its mechanism for anti-monopoly supervision and conducting fair competition reviews, which helps protect the legitimate rights and interests of market entities and consumers. The country will continue ramping up regulation in key areas to create a level playing field for all market players, Wang said. Wang also called on the BRICS countries to implement the consensus reached at the 13th BRICS Summit, coordinate competition policies and deepen cross-border antitrust cooperation. Joint efforts should also be made to seek new regulatory methods for the digital economy and fine-tune the international competition rules, he added. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) China-LAC Business Summit kicks off in China's Chongqing Xinhua) 10:03, November 17, 2021 CHONGQING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- The 14th China-Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) Business Summit kicked off in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on Tuesday to further boost trade ties and corporate investment. Political, business and academic representatives from China and the LAC region attended the conference online or offline. Gao Yan, head of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, said that the LAC region is an important participant in the Belt and Road Initiative. In recent years, China-LAC economic and trade cooperation has entered the fast lane. China is the second-largest trading partner of the LAC region, and the annual bilateral trade volume has exceeded 300 billion U.S. dollars for three consecutive years. The LAC region is also the second-largest destination for China's outbound investment, with more than 2,700 Chinese-funded enterprises operating in Latin America and the Caribbean. The Chongqing Initiative by Business Communities of China and LAC Countries was released at the summit. Representatives of business communities from China and LAC countries held an in-depth exchange of views at the summit and reached a consensus on deepening areas of cooperation in a new development paradigm, including economic, trade, infrastructure and finance cooperation. The initiative included jointly tackling the challenges of COVID-19, firmly embracing openness, continuing to promote infrastructure connectivity, effectively promoting financial integration, vigorously engaging in cooperation on innovation, and fully supporting small and medium-sized enterprises. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Commentary: Xi-Biden virtual meeting charts course for bilateral ties Xinhua) 10:08, November 17, 2021 BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday held their first virtual meeting since Biden came into office, setting the direction and injecting impetus for the development of bilateral ties. Right now, China-U.S. relations are at a critical historical juncture. The meeting between the two heads of state, which was "candid, constructive, substantive and productive," covered issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance. The two countries should learn to get along well in the new era, and Xi's proposal of "three principles" -- namely mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation -- is thought-provoking. Equality and mutual respect are the preconditions for state-to-state relations. Mutual respect involves respecting each other's social systems and development paths, respecting each other's core interests and major concerns, and respecting each other's right to development. China will certainly defend its sovereignty, security and development interests, and it is important that the United States properly handle the relevant issues, such as the Taiwan question, with prudence. Any connivance with and support for the "Taiwan independence" forces would only boomerang in the end. While it is natural for China and the United States to have differences, the key is to manage them constructively. The world's two largest economies should not only pursue coexistence, but also "peaceful coexistence," and jointly hold the line of no conflict and no confrontation. The significance of China-U.S. ties has gone far beyond the two countries, and has implications for the future of the world. During the meeting, the two heads of state both voiced opposition to the so-called "new Cold War," which is a positive signal. It is hoped that the United States will implement the consensus and stop drawing ideological lines or forming various small cliques to suppress China. With the interests of China and the United States deeply intertwined, it is important for the two countries to cooperate in a wide range of areas, including economy, energy, military-to-military cooperation, law-enforcement, education, science and technology, cyberspace, environmental protection and sub-national interactions, to deliver benefits to the people in the two countries and the world. As Xi said during the meeting, "China-U.S. cooperation may not solve all problems, but few problems can be solved without China-U.S. cooperation." The world has high expectations that the two countries will shoulder the responsibilities of major countries and lead the global response to address both urgent issues like COVID-19 response and outstanding challenges like climate change. It is hoped that the two sides will implement the consensus of the two heads of state, look ahead and press forward, and move bilateral relations back on to the right track of sound and steady development. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Chinese Premier stresses closer China-Africa local government cooperation Xinhua) 10:16, November 17, 2021 Chinese Premier Li Keqiang addresses the 4th Forum on China-Africa Local Government Cooperation via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Ding Lin) BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Tuesday said that China and Africa should expand their pragmatic cooperation to create a better future for the 2.7 billion Chinese and African people. Li made the remarks during his address at the 4th Forum on China-Africa Local Government Cooperation, which he attended via video link. Noting that the friendship between China and Africa is unbreakable, Li said China is willing to increase the aid of vaccines and anti-epidemic materials to Africa according to its needs, so as to build a solid defense line for people's health. China is willing to further align each other's development strategies, strengthen the exchange of experiences in urban governance, poverty eradication, social construction and agricultural modernization, and promote cooperation between friendship cities, Li said. He added that China will work with Africa to safeguard the common interests of developing countries, maintain the friendly tradition of mutual respect, equality, unity and cooperation, adhere to multilateralism, and support each other on issues concerning their respective core interests and major concerns. Stressing the significance of exchanges and friendship between Chinese and African people, Li said with joint efforts of both sides, there is much to be achieved through cooperation between local governments of China and Africa. About 300 political leaders from African countries and officials of local governments and relevant institutions from China and Africa attended the conference both online and offline. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Commentary: Responsible Washington needed for sound China-U.S. ties Xinhua) 10:22, November 17, 2021 BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Under an earnest global gaze, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden, agreed in a productive virtual meeting on Tuesday to steer the world's arguably most important bilateral relationship back on track. The encouraging consensus, along with other positive outcomes of the first meeting between the two heads of state since Biden took office in January, has delivered a direly needed shot of optimism to China-U.S. ties and the struggling world as well. With the world having entered a period of new turbulence and transformation, and both China and the United States having reached a critical stage of development, building a sound and steady relationship between the world's top two economies is particularly crucial. Just as Xi pointed out in a phone call with Biden in September, whether China and the United States can handle their relationship well "is a question of the century to which the two countries must provide a good answer." China's answer has been clear and consistent. It seeks to foster a healthy and stable relationship with the United States that features mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation, and it has been moving responsibly towards this goal. It is high time that the United States started to act in a truly responsible fashion and join China to build on the hard-won momentum and advance their relations for the benefit of both nations as well as the world at large. A responsible Washington ought to uphold mutual respect with China with all its heart. Mutual respect is the foundation of the edifice of China-U.S. relations. It means the two countries should treat each other as equals and respect each other's social system and development path, core interests and major concerns, as well as right to development. Thus Washington needs to stop slinging mud at China's system, path and institutions, which have been chosen by the Chinese people in line with China's unique conditions and have led the world's largest developing and most populous country to the two miracles of rapid economic growth and enduring social stability. What is particularly imperative now is that the United States should respect the one-China principle, honor its pledge not to support "Taiwan independence," and cease playing with fire on the Taiwan question, the most important and sensitive issue in China-U.S. relations. No provocation or threat would make China budge an inch. It is also a far cry from mutual respect if one side just invents some so-called "rules of the road" on its own or through a clique, and then imposes them on the other side. Mutual respect entails genuine consultation. A responsible Washington ought to seek peaceful coexistence with China in good faith. With no conflict and no confrontation being the bottom line both sides have to hold, the two countries should adopt a constructive approach to managing their differences and sensitive issues, which naturally exist but should not be allowed to metastasize or even undermine the overall relationship. In retrospect, the most important development in international relations over the past half century is the reopening and development of China-U.S. relations, which has delivered enormous benefits to both countries and the rest of the world. Looking ahead, Washington should work with China to increase communication, learn from the ups and downs in the historical trajectory of their ties, and chart the right course for the future development of their consequential relationship. Given its behavior over recent years, Washington needs to take concrete actions to prove that its call for properly managing U.S.-China ties and proclamation of not seeking to contain China are a strategic choice, instead of a tactical gambit. A responsible Washington also ought to pursue win-win cooperation with China in real earnest. Considering their giant economies and complementary strengths, it would amount to a regrettable squandering of great opportunities and resources should China and the United States merely seek to coexist in peace. Meanwhile, the world has witnessed over the past 50 years that if they cooperate, the two countries can do so much to boost each other's development, improve their people's well-being and make the world a better place. As Xi pointed out in the Tuesday meeting, China-U.S. cooperation may not solve all problems, but few problems can be solved without China-U.S. cooperation. Pandemic response, climate change and many other common challenges demand their concerted efforts. Without doubt, competition does exist between China and the United States. However, it is unhelpful and irresponsible to use the ominous term of "strategic competition" to define such an important relationship with such great positive potential for the whole world. As Xi vividly pointed out, China and the United States are two giant ships sailing in the ocean, which should break waves and forge ahead together without losing direction or speed, let alone colliding with each other. For that to happen, the United States should join China to act responsibly. The time to start is now. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) 880 stranded tourists to leave east China's Jiangxi amid COVID-19 resurgence Xinhua) 10:24, November 17, 2021 NANCHANG, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- A total of 880 tourists stranded in Yanshan County, a popular tourist destination in the city of Shangrao, east China's Jiangxi Province, will return home in succession starting from Wednesday. The county has carried out 13 rounds of mass nucleic acid testing during the recent COVID-19 resurgence and none of the stranded tourists have tested positive for the virus, said local authorities in Shangrao during a press conference on Tuesday. Yanshan, located at the northern foot of China's renowned Wuyi Mountains, is the first in the province to report new COVID-19 cases amid China's latest coronavirus resurgence. On Oct. 30, Yanshan County registered one locally transmitted confirmed COVID-19 case, a person who worked in a local restaurant at a holiday resort. From Oct. 30 to 9:00 a.m. Tuesday, the city of Shangrao had logged 21 locally transmitted confirmed cases and 60 asymptomatic carriers, of which 32 had been cured and discharged from hospital. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) Philippines thanks China for "life-saving vaccines" Xinhua) 16:23, November 17, 2021 Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) MANILA, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- A Philippine government official thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, told reporters at the airport in Manila that the fresh delivery completes the vaccines the Philippines purchased from the Chinese vaccine maker. "Sinovac has truly been a very reliable partner of the Philippine government," said Galvez. He said it was the China-donated Sinovac vaccines that helped his country kick-start a national vaccination program. China has sustained the COVID-19 vaccine supply to the Philippines since the first delivery on Feb. 28. The Southeast Asian country kicked off its vaccination drive on March 1. "We will not forget your kindness and compassion. You are really a friend who helped a friend in need," Galvez told China's Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian, who was also at the airport to receive the vaccines. With the arrival of the latest batch of Sinovac vaccine, Galvez said the Philippines is closer to achieving population protection by year end. In a brief statement to reporters at the airport, Huang expressed hope that the newly delivered vaccines will further bring down the infections in the Philippines and pave the way for the country's early recovery from the pandemic. Philippine Presidential Assistant on Foreign Affairs Robert Borje, who represented President Rodrigo Duterte, lauded the partnership between China and the Philippines. "As we can say, this is a partnership that works under Duterte's independent foreign policy," he said. The Philippines has administered nearly 71 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines as of Tuesday. More than 31.8 million people have been fully vaccinated. The government aims to vaccinate up to 70 percent of its 110 million population this year. To date, the Philippines has received more than 124 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from different vaccine makers. More than 40 percent of the country's vaccine stockpile came from China. As of Tuesday, the Philippines has more than 2.8 million confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 45,808 deaths. Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) A staff member transports a cargo containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) China's Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian (R) and Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of Philippine government's measures to combat COVID-19, are seen in front of cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) China, Africa boost trade cooperation despite COVID-19 Xinhua) 16:40, November 17, 2021 BEIJING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- China and Africa have maintained robust economic and trade cooperation, despite COVID-19, as their bilateral trade has set a record high in the January-September period. Trade between China and Africa rose 38.2 percent year on year to 185.2 billion U.S. dollars in the January-September period, reaching the highest level in history for the same period, Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Qian Keming said Wednesday. China's direct investment in Africa hit 2.59 billion U.S. dollars in the first nine months, up 9.9 percent, year on year. The growth rate is 3 percentage points higher than China's overall outbound investment, Qian said, adding that the growth rate outperformed the pre-pandemic level in the same period of 2019. Chinese enterprises signed 53.5 billion U.S. dollars in new contracts in Africa in the period, up 22.2 percent year on year, with a turnover of 26.9 billion U.S. dollars, up 11.6 percent year on year. These figures fully demonstrated the confidence of Chinese enterprises in Africa's future development, Qian said. The Eighth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) takes place in Senegal at the end of November. Against the backdrop of COVID-19, the 55 FOCAC members will gather again, which shows the strong willingness of China and Africa to deepen cooperation, Qian said. Qian believes the conference will boost the China-Africa comprehensive strategic and cooperative partnership and chart the course for sustainable and high-quality development of China-Africa cooperation. He also said it would play a positive role in building a China-Africa community with a shared future in the new era. China has maintained its position as Africa's largest trade partner for 12 years straight. The bilateral trade defied pandemic pressure to hit 187 billion U.S. dollars in 2020. Ever since the establishment of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in 2000, trade between China and Africa and China's direct investment in Africa have increased 20 and 100 times, respectively, said Xu Bu, president of the China Institute of International Studies, at a forum in October. China-Africa trade is generally balanced from a long-term perspective. Since 2000, China has imported 1.2 trillion U.S. dollars of goods from Africa and exported 1.27 trillion U.S. dollars of goods to Africa, Qian said. Regarding sustainable development, Qian said China is ready to strengthen policy coordination with Africa. China would boost green, low-carbon, and clean energy cooperation and conduct technology exchanges to support Africa in enhancing its capacity to adapt to climate change and achieve sustainable development. (Web editor: Zhong Wenxing, Liang Jun) HEFEI, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- The fourth World Manufacturing Convention will kick off Friday in east China's Anhui Province under the theme of "Innovation-Driven, Digitally Empowered: Global Manufacturing Industry Aligned for High-quality Growth." The four-day event, scheduled until Nov. 22 in the provincial capital Hefei, is set to promote high-quality manufacturing and boost cooperation between China, a global manufacturing powerhouse, and the rest of the world, according to the organizers. The convention, covering an area of more than 43,000 square meters, will feature various industrial seminars, business matchmaking events, and exhibitions of new energy vehicles, intelligent manufacturing, imported products, among others. As the event's guest of honor, the Republic of Korea will set up a national pavilion and hold a number of cooperation and exchange activities. "Over 400 enterprises have signed up for the convention, and about 800 guests from home and abroad will attend the event, including foreign diplomats, officials of relevant international organizations, senior managers of Global Fortune 500 companies," said Liu Guang, deputy director of the provincial department of commerce. The just-concluded fourth China International Import Expo (CIIE) has created a spillover effect for the convention, as a number of companies that attended the CIIE will also participate in this convention, Liu added. A total of 1,752 projects with investments of 1.8 trillion yuan (around 282 billion U.S. dollars) were signed at the previous three conventions, of which more than 80 percent had kicked off construction by the end of October 2021. The sixth plenary session of the 19th Communist Party of China Central Committee is held in Beijing, from Nov 8 to 11, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua] Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, has called for adopting a rational outlook about the Party's history and drawing on the experience and lessons of the past century to blaze a path toward new victories. Xi made the remarks when explaining the draft of the resolution on the major achievements and historical experience of the CPC's 100 years of endeavors, which was passed by the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee held on Nov 8 to 11. Xi's speech about the explanation of the draft document at the meeting and the text of the adopted resolution were released on Tuesday. Explaining the draft of the resolution to the meeting's participants, Xi called for resolutely opposing "historical nihilism"which refers to some political thoughts that seek to distort the history of the Chinese revolution, the CPC and the armed forces. He underlined the need to see history from a broader perspective in order to develop an accurate understanding of the underlying trends and defining features of the CPC's development. "We need to properly address the mistakes and setbacks that have occurred on the Party's path forward. We should draw experience from our successes and learn lessons from our mistakes so as to score new victories," Xi said. The landmark resolution highlighted Xi's core position on the CPC Central Committee and in the whole Party as well as the significance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era in advancing the cause of the Party and the State. It reflected on the Party's great achievements in the country's new-democratic revolution, socialist revolution and construction, reform and opening-up as well as the socialist modernization process, and underscored the accomplishments it has made since the country entered a new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics following the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012. The resolution also stressed the historical significance of the Party's endeavors over the past century, saying they have fundamentally transformed the future of the Chinese people, opened up the right path for achieving the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, and had a profound influence on the course of world history. The resolution listed 10 items with respect to the Party's historical experience, including upholding the Party's leadership, putting the people first, staying independent, following the Chinese path, maintaining a global vision, and remaining committed to self-reform. While noting that the nation is closer, more confident and more capable than ever of realizing the goal of national rejuvenation, the resolution cautioned that there remain many risks and challenges on the journey ahead. It urged all Party members to have a precise grasp of historical trends, stay true to the Party's founding mission and not be intimidated by any risks or led astray by any distractions. The review of the major achievements and historical experience of the Party over the past century "will help build a broader consensus and stronger unity in will and action among all members and rally and lead Chinese people of all ethnic groups in achieving new and great success in building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era", Xi said at the sixth plenary session. China has ramped up energy production and reined in prices to secure sufficient energy for factories and support the economy, assuaging concerns over stagflation. Energy prices have surged globally since the start of this year amid a supply crunch. In China, energy strains caused power outages in September, hitting families in certain regions and forcing some factories to halt production. "China has worked to boost coal production and bring coal prices back to a reasonable range," Meng Wei, spokesperson for the National Development and Reform Commission, told a regular press conference Tuesday. HIGHER OUTPUT, LOWER PRICES China's coal output grew 4 percent year on year to 360 million tonnes in October, and coal production is maintaining steady growth this month, showed data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The coal stockpiles of the country's power producers rebounded, with power plants nationwide reporting a total of 129 million tonnes of coal in their inventories on Nov. 14, sufficient for 22 days of consumption. This is nine days more than the level at the end of September. Increased coal output and inventories at power plants helped drive down the once-soaring coal prices, with coal futures on the Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange diving nearly 60 percent from their peak within a month. Apart from coal, China also cranked up the production of natural gas to ensure adequate supplies. Since Nov. 7, China's daily supply of natural gas has reached more than 1 billion cubic meters, about 100 million cubic meters more than the same period last year. "Gas companies must enhance production to increase domestic supplies," Meng said. EASING STAGFLATION CONCERNS A surge in commodity prices once raised concerns of stagflation in the world's second-biggest economy, an economic phenomenon in which prices rise yet business activity stagnates. Stagflation leads to high unemployment and reduced consumer spending power. The once-soaring energy prices increased production costs to companies and exacerbated stagflation concerns. There seemed to be some signs of stagflation due to the pandemic, natural disasters, international commodity price hikes, and tightening supplies of raw materials. These were "caused by short-term factors, and the situation will be temporary," said NBS spokesperson Fu Linghui. The country's economy has maintained sound recovery, according to NBS data on Monday, with retail sales and factory output beating expectations and the unemployment rate remaining low in October. China's value-added industrial output increased 3.5 percent year on year in October, compared with 3.1 percent in September. Retail sales of consumer goods increased 4.9 percent year on year last month, 0.5 percentage points higher than a month earlier. The surveyed urban unemployment rate stood at 4.9 percent in October, 0.4 percentage points lower than in the same period last year. UBS analyst Wang Tao echoed Fu's view, dismissing risks of stagflation, partly because the energy crunch has eased. "We expect the producer price index to wane next year as energy shortages get addressed, and the whole year's consumer price index to hit 2 percent, so the country will be unlikely to go through stagflation," Wang noted. HEFEI, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Eight people were killed and eight others injured following a collision of a bus and a heavy truck on a highway in east China's Anhui Province on late Monday, local authorities said Tuesday. The accident happened at 10:11 p.m. at an intersection in Bowang Township in the city of Ma'anshan. The injured are being treated in a local hospital and are in stable condition. The cause of the accident is being investigated. Enditem By Wang Junsheng At the 76th session of the UN General Assembly this year, South Korean President Moon Jae-in once again reiterated his proposal for a declaration to formally end the war on the Korean Peninsula. As a key step in instituting the peninsular peace mechanism, the end-of-war declaration is nothing new and has been discussed many times. During the six rounds of four-party talks held among China, the US, DPRK and ROK from December 1997 to August 1999, a key objective was establishing a peace mechanism for the peninsula, and the September 19 Joint Statement reached at the Six-Party Talks in 2005 pointed out that the directly related parties will negotiate a permanent peace regime on the Korean Peninsula at an appropriate separate forum . Given the dramatic changes in the strategic environment on the Korean Peninsula, the Korean Armistice Agreement signed in 1953 can no longer regulate the behaviors of relevant actors, and a new peace regime, including an end-of-war declaration, must be created. In the past year, relevant country on the peninsula has constantly test-fired strategic weapons like submarine-based missiles and cruise missiles, pushing the peninsula to the brink of an arms race. China has taken an active part in the efforts to bring about the end-of-war declaration, which is a reasonable move according to international law, whose basic principles dictate that a multilateral agreement shall not be altered or terminated by an international document signed by only some of the contracting parties. A formal termination of the Korean Armistice Agreement of 1953 requires the presence and approval of all signatories. The agreement was jointly signed by the DPRK, China, ROK and the United Nations Command back then. Leaders of certain countries repeatedly claimed that the end-of-war declaration was more a political gesture than a legal document, but whatever it is, any document that intends to formally terminate it would need the approval from China, a signatory of the 1953 agreement. On the other hand, it is known to all that China is a main participant in the Korean War with numerous soldiers of the Chinese Peoples Volunteers devoting their lives to it. If China isnt involved in the declaration of the formal end of the war, it would be theoretically wrong and emotionally and morally disrespectful for the Chinese martyrs fallen on the battlefield of the peninsula. Should the end-of-war declaration be signed by leaders of three parties or four? I believe, in terms of both international law and common sense, it should be the four parties DPRK, China, the US and ROK negotiating the termination of the Korean Armistice Agreement and jointly pushing for the signing of a new peace agreement on the Korean Peninsula. We should also see that the establishment of a peninsular peace regime, including an end-of-war declaration, is closely linked to the denuclearization of the peninsula as a piece of paper wont be able to guarantee peace unless the peninsulas denuclearization process makes some substantial progress. Therefore, the negotiation for the end-of-war declaration should be combined with denuclearization efforts. In other words, the declaration should be something more than just a symbol it should be genuinely conducive to building mutual trust between DPRK and the US and advancing the denuclearization process on the peninsula. During a virtual meeting in November with Noh Kyu-duk, the ROK's special representative for Korean Peninsula peace and security affairs, Liu Xiaoming, the Chinese governments special representative on Korean Peninsula affairs, said, as an important party of the peninsula affairs and a signing party of the Korean Armistice Agreement, China is willing to play a constructive role by maintaining communication with relevant parties on matters including the promotion of peace talks and the announcement of the end-of-war declaration. He reiterated Chinas hope that relevant parties and the international community take more positive actions to contribute to the political settlement of the peninsula issues. (The author is a senior researcher and director of the Department of Chinas Regional and Global Strategy, National Institute of International Strategy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) Editor's Note: This article is originally published on huanqiu.com, and is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information, ideas or opinions appearing in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn. A "Flying Tigers" veteran(right) poses with a man for a picture at a 2015 ceremony in Kunming, Yunnan province commemorating the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II and the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression. [Photo/IC] Tales of friendship forged in war offer timeless lessons on how efforts can be pursued to open the door wider to cooperation between China and the United States. That consensus emerged during an online event that envisaged not only a better future for the two countries but also for the world. On Tuesday, participants gathered virtually to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Flying Tigers' arrival in China. The heroism of the US fighter pilots and the Chinese forces they served alongside were recounted at the event, which sought to help keep alive the spirit of cooperation in a world facing shared threats including the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. "What we have learned from the story of the Flying Tigers is that, human beings are different in races, languages, and cultures, but for the sake of world peace and justice, as well as the welfare of all peoples around the world, the Chinese and American peoples are fully able to work in solidarity and fight side by side," said Lin Songtian, president of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, the organizer of the webinar. In 1941, the volunteer pilots who went on to become celebrated as the Flying Tigers began to help China drive back the Japanese invaders. They also flew over the Himalayas, helping to ship strategic supplies to China to help the Chinese break through the Japanese blockade. The US pilots left China in 1944. Chinese Ambassador to the United States Qin Gang said the Flying Tigers are a symbol of the deep friendship between the two peoples, and their example also sheds light on ways to address the challenges of today and tomorrow. "China and the US should carry on the legacy of the spirit of solidarity and friendship, instead of heading to the road of misunderstandings and conflicts," said the envoy, who called on the two countries to share responsibilities to meet challenges and find a way toward a better future for humankind. The event also drew veterans who recounted the stories shared and the friendships forged with Chinese people. Bill Peterson, a 95-year-old Flying Tigers veteran, told of how he and his fellow airmen would go to nearby villages when they had a night off and give the children and their parents food packages. "We could not speak Chinese, but we could tell from their eyes what they felt in their hearts," he said. "I just plain love the Chinese people." The veteran said he has done everything he can to promote good relations with China. "I mention China at least three times a day to people I interact with," told the gathering. "If the US people could meet the Chinese people in person, they could understand how peaceful and loving they truly are." Larry Jobe, president of the Flying Tiger Historical Organization, praised the special bond forged 80 years ago, which opens a door to boosting mutual understanding and cooperation in the present and the future. "Emulating the Chinese people and Flying Tigers of World War II in confronting a seemingly unbeatable enemy as a team of friends working together for the good of all is demanded today if we are to succeed against the current enemies of our troubled world," he said. "Certainly the crisis of climate change, COVID, other diseases yet to surface, lack of fresh water due to drought, starvation and many ills, are common enemies today, enemies against which we all need to unite in a fight for the common good." Harry Moyer gestures after landing on the ground in San Luis Obispo, California, the United States, Oct. 30, 2020. (Xinhua/Gao Shan) "We must keep the bond between the US and China alive. It was forged in blood and honor," said Harry Moyer, a veteran pilot who flew with the famed "Flying Tigers" 76 years ago in China to help the Chinese combat the Japanese invasion. Moyer celebrated his centennial birthday on Friday by taking a solo flight. He was feted by a joyful crowd of family, friends, the press and well-wishers at the San Luis Obispo County Regional Airport, where they had all gathered to celebrate his birthday and contribution to WWII victory. Moyer spoke from the heart about his love for flying and his eventful war years in the "Flying Tigers," before taking off into the skies in his Mooney MK21 plane. "Out in that wide, blue sky, dipping in and out of the clouds -- the sense of space, of freedom," he mused. "Nothing compares to being up there," he told the gathering. Moyer joined the US Army Air Corps in 1942. He is noted for serving with distinction in combat in different theaters of operations during WWII. Moyer's squadron joined the 23rd Fighter Group of the 14th Air Force in China in 1944 and was primarily responsible for protecting Chinese airfields and the B-29 bombers stationed there tasked with counter-attacks on Japan. "We just did what we had to do," he said humbly. Growing up, Moyer told Xinhua, he had always felt a connection with China. His father had Chinese friends who owned a restaurant in town, so he became friends with the owner's son. Then he read "The Good Earth" by Pulitzer and Nobel prize-winner, Pearl S. Buck, which made him long to visit China. So, even though he had already served his allotted time as a fighter pilot during WWII and was due to go home, when he heard General Claire Lee Chennault, who he considered a visionary wartime leader, was looking for pilots to serve in China, Moyer didn't hesitate to go. "I really respected the man and his farsighted fighter tactics," he said of Chennault. "I was so happy to be able to work with him and the Chinese. That was the highlight of my flying career." "It was wartime, so we had a hard time over there, but nothing compared to the suffering the Chinese had to bear from the indiscriminate bombing raids of the Japanese," he told Xinhua. He praised his Chinese worker friends who toiled, at the risk of their own lives, to build dozens of airfields in China using only picks, shovels and massive stone rollers pulled by hand. The "Flying Tigers" protected the vital shipments of war munitions coming into China by air and rail, such as guns, bullets, and bombs. "I was happy the Flying Tigers were able to come and do their part to help protect Chinese villages and runways when help was most needed," said Moyer. He told Xinhua he remembers his time in China fondly, despite the wartime horrors. "Those memories and occasions were special. We and the Chinese shared with each other, flew with each other, and fought together ... Serving side-by-side against a common enemy established a bond that really meant something." "That bond that we forged with the Chinese people has never been broken and it must be honored," he added. "The Chinese people still honor it more than our younger American generations do." "The Chinese were good to us. They knew we were there to help them and they made us feel appreciated. They still rolled out the red carpet for us over there," Moyer said, recalling the extraordinary hospitality and welcome he received there when he returned to China after the war. Jeffrey Greene, chairman of the Sino-American Aviation Heritage Foundation, which brings WWII servicemen back to China and co-organizes special events between the United States and China, also believed it is essential to keep that special bond alive. "The Chinese and American people share a common heritage that was forged in the skies above China during the Second World War," said Greene. "During World War II, a large number of young American pilots, including you came to China to fight a just war with the Chinese people against the Japanese aggression," wrote Deng Lan, director general of the Research Center for People-to-People Diplomacy of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, in a congratulatory letter to Moyer, adding that those young US pilots "were fearless of danger, difficulty and sacrifice and have forged deep friendship with the Chinese people." "You are truly a glorious member of the Flying Tigers, a witness to the China-US friendship and to peace and justice of the world. We will always cherish our friendship with you as you are an old friend of the Chinese people," Deng said in the letter. A virtual meeting between the leaders of China and the United States on Tuesday comes as the two nations' ties arrive at a "key crossroads" and is a major event concerning not only bilateral ties but also international relations, the Foreign Ministry said on Monday. The people of China and the US, as well as the international community hope the meeting will yield results that benefit both countries and the world, said Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian. President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden will have a candid, in-depth and full exchange of views on strategic issues concerning the future of bilateral relations and other important issues, Zhao said. The US should strengthen talks and cooperation with China, manage differences effectively, handle sensitive issues properly, discuss with China the way for the two major countries to get along while respecting each other and bring bilateral relations back to the right track of sound and steady development, Zhao said. The US has further complicated bilateral ties with recent actions encouraging "Taiwan independence" forces. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke recently of US "interest in peace and stability "across the Taiwan Straits and "commitments" to Taiwan. Zhao said that the US statements on the Taiwan question had been distorted and regressed over the past 40 years, "and deviated from the consensus it reached with China when the two countries established diplomatic ties". He added that the one-China principle and the three China-US joint communiques are important political consensus between the two countries and form the political foundation of bilateral ties. The so-called "Taiwan Relations Act" and the "Six Assurances" the US made in 1982 were "a pure concoction by some forces in the US "running counter to the three China-US joint communiques, and are "illegal and void", Zhao said. The root of the current tension across the Taiwan Straits lies in the fact that the Democratic Progressive Party-led authorities and separatist forces in Taiwan have been colluding with external forces to seek "Taiwan independence", Zhao added, emphasizing that China's reunification is an unstoppable trend, and that it is the consensus of the international community to stick to the one-China principle. "Any kind of behavior to support and embolden 'Taiwan independence' forces is interference in China's domestic affairs and goes against the peace and stability of the Straits," he said, urging the US to observe the one-China policy and the three China-US joint communiques and deal with the Taiwan question properly. By Ma Hanzhi Coups have taken place in Niger, Mali, Guinea, and Sudan in Central and Western Africa and the characteristics of local political and security turbulence in Africa have further emerged since the beginning of this year. The COVID-19 pandemic has resonated with the inherent historical, religious, regional, and political conflicts in Africa and brought increased political turmoil. Historically, Central and Western Africa have a high incidence of coups. From 1952 to 2019, there have been 17 coups or failed coups in Sudan, 10 in Ghana and Sierra Leone; eight in Nigeria, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Guinea-Bissau; seven in Chad and Niger. However, since the beginning of the new century, the number of coups in Africa as a whole has dropped significantly. In the past 20 years, the number of coups in Africa has been reduced to about two times a year. The military coups that occurred this year are mainly concentrated in high-incidence areas in history, highlighting the historical continuity of the political turmoil in the above-mentioned countries. The occurrence of military coups in the above-mentioned countries has a common mechanism. First, the countries face persistent political and economic difficulties. Since the pandemic, Africa has encountered severe economic and social crises. Countries such as Guinea, Mali, and Sudan, which have a single economic structure, are particularly troubled by crises. The full-scale crisis magnified by the pandemic has completely cost the "performance legitimacy" of the current government and the military then "naturally" seized power. Second, military forces continue to play an important role in the above-mentioned countries. Military forces have been deeply involved in political life in some West African French-speaking countries. Among them, the middle and senior military officers have become the "main force" involved in politics. In addition, compared with a weak and inefficient government, the military itself has stronger capabilities of organization and mobilization and it can quickly oust the current government through its mastery of the state's machinery of violence. Third, the loss of autonomy or interests of military organizations is the direct cause of the coups. Officers and soldiers seek to control the supreme power of the country in order to protect their own interests. The direct fuse that triggered the mutiny in Guinea was the government's attempt to cut military and police spending due to the stretched state treasury, which was approved by the National Assembly of Guinea. In the context of the raging pandemic and the aggravated political and economic crises in Africa, certain coups can meet the expectations of some people to a certain extent. Coups in Africa usually use the excuses of anti-corruption, anti-nepotism, anti-waste of public funds, economic reform, welfare improvement, and the establishment of security. However, after the honeymoon period, the problem of how to overcome the shortcomings of the previous government and re-establish the legitimacy of its own governance becomes prominent. The history of Africa shows that the coup leaders cannot solve the political, economic and social problems left by their predecessors in a short period of time. However, coups have brought devastating effects to the African people in all fields. Military interventions set a precedent for future military coups. When there is its first coup in a country, this is usually a sign of more coups in the future. The current successive military coups in Central and West African countries have a certain connection with Mali's coup detat in 2020 and the recognition by the African Union. Finally, officers and soldiers who come to power through a military coup will generally increase their spending on the troops and national defense, and even push the entire country astray into "militarization". More importantly, compared with the civil government, the military regime's lack of experience in governing the country cannot bring real benefits to the people. The African Union, Africa's sub-regional organizations and major countries need to truly proceed from the needs of Africa and create conditions for Africa to explore the path of independent development. In response to the ongoing military coups in Africa, some Western media have strongly advocated that international organizations, the US and the West increase external intervention in African politics. This is obviously a wrong solution. To a certain extent, the continuous interference of the US and the West is precisely the cause of the continuing turmoil in Africa. During the Cold War, the US, the UK, France and other countries disgracefully contributed to coups in African countries and even participated directly. In the past coups in Sudan, Mali, and Guinea, the US and France used their own "democracy" and "human rights" standards to interfere and reform the above-mentioned countries and created continuous political tension and confrontation. The frequent coups indicate the urgency for Africa to explore the path of independent development, rather than the necessity of gross interference from the West. Since 2001, the African Union has launched clear regulations that governments that come to power in violation of the Constitution will not be accepted to participate in the activities of the union. However, due to the lack of necessary means, such regulations are not well enforced. Next, the international community should increase multi-dimensional cooperation with the African Union, sub-regional organizations and African countries. The international community should increase "creative intervention" in the democratic process of African countries while respecting the sovereignty of African countries, rather than gross interference from the West. In addition, the international community should support the African Union in tapping local "democratic resources" of African countries, enriching the democratic practices of African countries, and making up for the shortcomings of Western-style democracy. (Ma Hanzhi is an assistant researcher at the Department for Developing Countries Studies, China Institute of International Studies) Editor's note: This article is originally published on thepaper.cn, and is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information, ideas or opinions appearing in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn. Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party over the Past Century Adopted at the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on November 11, 2021 Preamble Since its founding in 1921, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has remained true to its original aspiration and mission of seeking happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation. Staying committed to communist ideals and socialist convictions, it has united and led Chinese people of all ethnic groups in working tirelessly to achieve national independence and liberation, and then to make our country prosperous and strong and pursue a better life. The past century has been a glorious journey. Over the past hundred years, the Party has led the people to a number of important milestones: achieving great success in the new-democratic revolution through bloody battles and unyielding struggles; achieving great success in socialist revolution and construction through a spirit of self-reliance and a desire to build a stronger China; achieving great success in reform, opening up, and socialist modernization by freeing minds and forging ahead; and achieving great success for socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era through a spirit of self-confidence, self-reliance, and innovating on the basis of what has worked in the past. The endeavors of the Party and the people over the past century represent the most magnificent chapter in the millennia-long history of the Chinese nation. A review of the Partys major achievements and historical experience over the past century is necessary for the following purposes: --starting a new journey to build China into a modern socialist country in all respects in the historical context of the Partys centenary; --upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era; --strengthening our consciousness of the need to maintain political integrity, think in big-picture terms, follow the leadership core, and keep in alignment with the central Party leadership; --enhancing our confidence in the path, theory, system, and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics; --resolutely upholding Comrade Xi Jinpings core position on the Party Central Committee and in the Party as a whole and upholding the Central Committees authority and its centralized, unified leadership to ensure that all Party members act in unison; --advancing the Partys self-reform, building all Party members fighting capacity, strengthening their ability to respond to risks and challenges, and maintaining the Partys vigor and vitality; and --uniting and leading all Chinese people in making continued efforts to realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation. All Party members should uphold historical materialism and adopt a rational outlook on the Partys history. Looking back on the Partys endeavors over the past century, we can see why we were successful in the past and how we can continue to succeed in the future. This will ensure that we act with greater resolve and a stronger sense of purpose in staying true to our Partys founding mission, and that we more effectively uphold and develop socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. The Party adopted the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party at the seventh plenary session of its Sixth Central Committee in 1945 and the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the Peoples Republic of China at the sixth plenary session of its 11th Central Committee in 1981. These two resolutions embody a facts-based review of major events in the Partys history, as well as important experience gained and lessons learned. These documents unified the whole Party in thinking and action at key historical junctures and played a vital guiding role in advancing the cause of the Party and the people. Their basic points and conclusions remain valid to this day. I. A Great Victory in the New-Democratic Revolution In the period of the new-democratic revolution, the main tasks of the Party were to oppose imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism, seek national independence and the peoples liberation, and create the fundamental social conditions necessary for realizing national rejuvenation. With a history stretching back more than 5,000 years, the Chinese nation is a great and ancient nation that has fostered a splendid civilization and made indelible contributions to the progress of human civilization. After the Opium War of 1840, however, China was gradually reduced to a semi-colonial, semi-feudal society due to the aggression of Western powers and the corruption of feudal rulers. The country endured intense humiliation, the people were subjected to untold misery, and the Chinese civilization was plunged into darkness. The Chinese nation suffered greater ravages than ever before. To save the nation from peril, the Chinese people rose to fight back, and patriots of high ideals sought to pull the nation together, putting up a heroic and moving struggle. The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement, the Westernization Movement, the Reform Movement of 1898, and the Yihetuan Movement rose one after the other, and a variety of plans were devised to ensure national survival, but all of these ended in failure. The Revolution of 1911 led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen brought down the absolute monarchy that had reigned over China for thousands of years, but it failed to change the semi-colonial and semi-feudal nature of Chinese society and to alter the bitter fate of the Chinese people. China was in urgent need of new ideas to lead the movement to save the nation and a new organization to rally forces of revolution. With the salvoes of Russias October Revolution in 1917, Marxism-Leninism was brought to China. The May 4th Movement of 1919 spurred the spread of Marxism throughout the country. Then in July 1921, as the Chinese people and the Chinese nation were undergoing a great awakening and Marxism-Leninism was becoming closely integrated with the Chinese workers movement, the Communist Party of China was born. The founding of a communist party in China was an epoch-making event, and from then on the Chinese revolution took on an entirely new look. The Party was keenly aware that the conflicts between imperialism and the Chinese nation, and those between feudalism and the people constituted the principal contradiction in modern Chinese society. To realize national rejuvenation, it would be essential to initiate an anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggle. In the early days of the Party and during the Great Revolution, the Party formulated the program of the democratic revolution, launched movements of workers, youths, peasants, and women, promoted and supported the reorganization of the Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) and the founding of the National Revolutionary Army, and led the great anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggle across the country, bringing about a surge in the Great Revolution. In 1927, the reactionary clique within the KMT betrayed the revolution, brutally massacring communists and other revolutionaries. Meanwhile, the Right deviationist ideas within the Party represented by Chen Duxiu grew into Right opportunist errors and came to dominate the Partys leadership. The Party and the people were unable to mount an effective resistance, resulting in a disastrous defeat for the Great Revolution under the surprise attack of a powerful enemy. During the Agrarian Revolutionary War, the Party realized in light of harsh realities that without revolutionary armed forces, it would be impossible to defeat armed counter-revolutionaries, win the Chinese revolution, and thus change the fate of the Chinese people and the Chinese nation. The Party would need to fight armed counter-revolution with armed revolution. The Nanchang Uprising of 1927 fired the opening shot of armed resistance against KMT reactionaries. This marked the start of the Communist Party of Chinas journey to lead the revolutionary struggle independently, build the peoples armed forces, and seize state power by force. Soon afterwards, the policy of carrying out agrarian revolution and organizing armed uprisings was established at the August 7th Meeting. The Party led the Autumn Harvest Uprising, the Guangzhou Uprising, and uprisings in many other areas. Due to the great disparity in strength between the enemy forces and our own, most of these uprisings ended in failure. The fact of the matter was that in view of objective conditions at the time, the Chinese communists could not follow the example of Russias October Revolution and win nationwide revolutionary victory by taking key cities first. The Party urgently needed to find a revolutionary path compatible with Chinas actual conditions. The shift from attacking big cities to advancing into rural areas was a new starting point of decisive importance in the Chinese revolution. Led by Comrade Mao Zedong, soldiers and civilians established the first rural revolutionary base in the Jinggang Mountains, where the Party led the people in overthrowing local despots and redistributing the land. The Gutian Meeting of 1929 established the principles of strengthening the Party ideologically and the military politically. As progress was made in the struggle, the Party established the Central Revolutionary Base as well as the Western Hunan-Hubei, Haifeng-Lufeng, Hubei-Henan-Anhui, Qiongya, Fujian-Zhejiang-Jiangxi, Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi, Hunan-Jiangxi, Zuojiang-Youjiang, Sichuan-Shaanxi, Shaanxi-Gansu, and Hunan-Hubei-Sichuan-Guizhou bases. In addition, the Party also set up Party organizations and other revolutionary organizations in KMT-controlled areas and launched revolutionary mass struggles. However, the fifth counter-encirclement and suppression campaign in the Central Revolutionary Base ended in failure as a result of the misguided leadership of Wang Mings Left dogmatism within the Party. The Red Army was forced to make a strategic shift, and arrived in northern Shaanxi Province after enduring the extraordinarily bitter and arduous journey of the Long March. The errors of the Left line caused enormous losses to revolutionary bases as well as revolutionary forces in KMT-controlled areas. In January 1935, the Political Bureau of the Central Committee convened a meeting in Zunyi on the Long March, at which Comrade Mao Zedong was confirmed as the de facto leader of the Central Committee and the Red Army. The meeting laid the groundwork for establishing the leading position within the Central Committee of the correct Marxist line chiefly represented by Comrade Mao Zedong, as well as for the formation of the first generation of the central collective leadership with Comrade Mao Zedong at its core. The meeting opened a new stage in which the Party would act on its own initiative to address practical problems concerning the Chinese revolution, and saved the Party, the Red Army, and the Chinese revolution at a moment of greatest peril. It also subsequently enabled the Party to defeat Zhang Guotaos separatism, bring the Long March to a triumphant conclusion, and open up new horizons for the Chinese revolution. The Zunyi Meeting is therefore considered a pivotal turning point in the Partys history. After the September 18th Incident in 1931 during the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, the conflict between China and Japan gradually overtook domestic class conflict as the issue of primary importance. As Japanese imperialists intensified their aggression against China, the country was plunged into an unprecedented national crisis. The Party was the first to propose that China should fight Japanese aggression with armed resistance, and launched extensive resistance movements. It also facilitated a peaceful settlement of the Xian Incident, thus playing a historic role in promoting a second period of cooperation between the KMT and the CPC and the united resistance against Japanese aggression. Following the July 7th Incident in 1937, the Party implemented the right policy on the Chinese united front against Japanese aggression, and adhered to the line of all-out resistance. It devised and executed the strategic guidelines for a protracted war as well as a whole set of strategies and tactics for a peoples war, opened up vast battlefronts behind enemy lines, and developed bases for the resistance. The Party led the Eighth Route Army, the New Fourth Army, the Northeast United Resistance Army, and other forces of the peoples armed resistance in brave fighting, and they were the pillar of the entire nations resistance until the Chinese people finally prevailed. This marked the first time in modern history that the Chinese people had won a complete victory against foreign aggressors in the war of national liberation, and was an important part of the global war against fascism. During the War of Liberation, as the KMT reactionaries flagrantly launched an all-out civil war, the Party led soldiers and civilians in gradually shifting from active defense to strategic offensive. It secured victories in the Liaoxi-Shenyang, Huai-Hai, and Beiping-Tianjin campaigns as well as the Crossing-the-Yangtze Campaign, advanced triumphantly into the central-south, northwest, and southwest, and wiped out eight million KMT troops, thus overthrowing the reactionary KMT government and the three mountains of imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat-capitalism. With the support of the people, the Party-led peoples army demonstrated heroic mettle and unyielding resolve as they fought to the last against these fierce enemies, making a historic contribution to the victory of the new-democratic revolution. In the course of the revolutionary struggle, Chinese communists, with Comrade Mao Zedong as their chief representative, adapted the basic tenets of Marxism-Leninism to Chinas specific realities and developed a theoretical synthesis of Chinas unique experience which came from painstaking trials and great sacrifices. They blazed the right revolutionary path of encircling cities from the countryside and seizing state power with military force. They established Mao Zedong Thought, which charted the correct course for securing victory in the new-democratic revolution. In the course of the revolutionary struggle, the Party carried forward its great founding spirit comprised of the following principles: upholding truth and ideals, staying true to its original aspiration and founding mission, fighting bravely without fear of sacrifice, and remaining loyal to the Party and faithful to the people. The Party initiated and advanced the great project of Party building, introduced the principle of focusing on strengthening the Party in ideological terms, and upheld democratic centralism. It stuck to the three fine styles of conduct, namely combining theory with practice, maintaining close ties with the people, and conducting criticism and self-criticism; it developed the three important tools of the united front, armed struggle, and Party building, as it strived to build a national Marxist party of the people, which was fully consolidated in ideological, political, and organizational terms. The rectification movementa Party-wide Marxist ideological education movementwas launched in 1942 and yielded tremendous results. The Party formulated the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party, which helped the entire Party reach a common understanding of the basic questions regarding the Chinese revolution. At the Seventh National Congress, the correct line, principles, and policies were formulated for building a new-democratic China, and as a result the Party became united as never before in ideological, political, and organizational terms. On October 1, 1949, the founding of the Peoples Republic of China was proclaimed after 28 years of bitter and courageous struggle carried out by the people under the leadership of the Party and with the active support of other political parties and democrats without party affiliation, thus realizing the independence of the Chinese nation and the liberation of the Chinese people. This put an end to Chinas history as a semi-colonial, semi-feudal society, to the rule of a handful of exploiters over the working people, to the state of total disunity that plagued the old China, and to all the unequal treaties imposed on our country by foreign powers and all the privileges that imperialist powers enjoyed on our land, marking the countrys great transformation from a millennia-old feudal autocracy to a peoples democracy. This also reshaped the world political landscape and offered enormous inspiration for oppressed nations and peoples struggling for liberation around the world. It has been proven through practice that history and the people have chosen the Communist Party of China, and that without its leadership, it would not have been possible to realize national independence and the peoples liberation. Through tenacious struggle, the Party and the people showed the world that the Chinese people had stood up and the time in which the Chinese nation could be bullied and abused was gone and would never return. This marked the beginning of a new epoch in Chinas development. II. Socialist Revolution and Construction In the period of socialist revolution and construction, the main tasks of the Party were to realize the transformation from new democracy to socialism, carry out socialist revolution, promote socialist construction, and lay down the fundamental political conditions and the institutional foundations necessary for national rejuvenation. After the founding of the Peoples Republic, the Party led the people in surmounting a multitude of political, economic, and military challenges. It cleared out bandits and remnant KMT reactionary forces, peacefully liberated Tibet, and unified the entire mainland. It stabilized prices, unified standards for finances and the economy, completed the agrarian reform, and launched democratic reforms in all sectors of society. It introduced the policy of equal rights for men and women, suppressed counter-revolutionaries, and launched movements against the three evils of corruption, waste, and bureaucracy and against the five evils of bribery, tax evasion, theft of state property, cheating on government contracts, and stealing of economic information. As the stains of the old society were wiped out, China took on a completely new look. Meanwhile, the Chinese Peoples Volunteers marched valiantly across the Yalu River to fight alongside the Korean people and troops. They ultimately defeated a powerful enemy that was armed to the teeth, demonstrating the gallantry of our army and our country, and the unyielding spirit of our people. Chinas resounding victory in the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea safeguarded the security of the nascent Peoples Republic, and testified to its status as a major country. The new China thus gained a firm foothold amid complex domestic and international environments. Under the Partys leadership, a government of peoples democratic dictatorship was established and consolidated, which was led by the working class and based on an alliance of workers and peasants. This created the conditions necessary for the countrys rapid development. In 1949, the Common Program of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) was passed at the CPPCCs first plenary session. In 1953, the Party officially set forth the general line for the transition period, namely gradually realizing the countrys socialist industrialization and socialist transformation of agriculture, handicrafts, and capitalist industry and commerce over a fairly long period of time. In 1954, the Constitution of the Peoples Republic of China was adopted at the first session of the First National Peoples Congress. In 1956, China basically completed the socialist transformation of private ownership of the means of production, and put into practice public ownership of the means of production and distribution according to work, thus marking the establishment of the socialist economic system. Under the Partys leadership, China established the system of peoples congresses, the system of CPC-led multiparty cooperation and political consultation, and the system of regional ethnic autonomy, providing institutional guarantees for ensuring that it is the people who run the country. Under the Partys leadership, China also forged and strengthened unity among people of all ethnic groups, established and developed socialist ethnic relations based on equality and mutual assistance, and achieved and cemented unity between workers, peasants, intellectuals, and people from other social strata across the country. As a result, a broad united front was consolidated and expanded. The establishment of the socialist system laid the foundation for all of Chinas subsequent progress and development. In light of the domestic situation following socialist transformation, the Party propounded at its Eighth National Congress that the main contradiction in China was no longer the contradiction between the working class and the bourgeoisie, but rather that between the demand of the people for rapid economic and cultural development and the reality that the countrys economy and culture fell short of the needs of the people. Therefore, the major task facing the nation was to concentrate on developing the productive forces and realize industrialization in order to gradually meet the peoples growing material and cultural needs. The Party called on the people to redouble their efforts to build China step by step into a strong socialist country with modern agriculture, industry, national defense, and science and technology, and it led them in carrying out large-scale socialist construction across the board. Through the execution of several five-year plans, an independent and relatively complete industrial system and national economic framework were established, the conditions of agricultural production were markedly improved, and impressive progress was made in social programs such as education, science, culture, health, and sports. With continuous breakthroughs in cutting-edge technologies, including nuclear weapons, missiles, and satellites, Chinas defense industries underwent steady growth after starting from scratch. The Peoples Liberation Army continued to grow in strength, expanding from ground forces alone into a composite military force comprised of the navy, air force, and other specialized units. This provided firm support for the Peoples Republic to consolidate the newborn peoples government, establish Chinas position as a major country, and defend the nations dignity. The Party adhered to an independent foreign policy of peace, championed and upheld the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and firmly defended Chinas independence, sovereignty, and dignity. It provided support and assistance for other oppressed nations in seeking liberation, for newly independent countries in their pursuit of development, and for various peoples as they put up just struggles, and stood opposed to imperialism, hegemonism, colonialism, and racism. The humiliating diplomacy of the old China was put to an end. The Party adjusted its diplomatic strategies in light of evolving circumstances, worked to restore all lawful rights of the Peoples Republic of China in the United Nations, opened up new horizons for Chinas diplomacy, and fostered commitment to the one-China principle among the international community. The Party put forward the theory of the differentiation of the three worlds and made the promise that China would never seek hegemony, earning respect and acclaim from the international community and developing countries in particular. The Party fully foresaw the new challenges it would face after assuming power over the whole country. As early as at the second plenary session of its Seventh Central Committee which was held shortly before nationwide victory was attained in the War of Liberation, the Party called on all members to remain modest, prudent, and free from arrogance and rashness in their work, and to preserve the style of plain living and hard struggle. After the founding of the Peoples Republic, the Party focused on the major issue of Party building in the context of governing, and worked to strengthen the Party and consolidate Party leadership ideologically, organizationally, and in terms of conduct. The Party bolstered efforts to encourage officials to study theory and increase their knowledge, improved its capacity for exercising leadership, and demanded that all members, especially high-ranking officials, act with a greater sense of purpose to safeguard Party unity and solidarity. Rectification campaigns were carried out throughout the Party to strengthen education within the Party, consolidate primary-level organizations, raise membership requirements, and oppose bureaucratism, commandism, graft, and waste. The Party was on high alert against corruption, worked hard to prevent degeneracy among officials, and responded to corruption with firm punishment. These important measures strengthened the integrity of the Party and the solidarity of all Party members, built closer ties between the Party and the people, and accumulated essential starting experience for building a governing party. During this period, Comrade Mao Zedong proposed a second round of efforts to integrate the basic tenets of Marxism-Leninism with Chinas realities. Chinese communists, with Comrade Mao Zedong as their chief representative, enriched and developed Mao Zedong Thought by taking stock of new realities, and put forward a series of important theories for socialist construction. These included recognizing that socialist society was a long historical period; strictly differentiating between two types of contradictions, namely those between the people and the enemy and those among the people, and properly dealing with these contradictions; handling the ten major relationships in Chinas socialist construction appropriately; finding a path to industrialization suited to Chinas realities; respecting the law of value; implementing the principle of long-term coexistence and mutual oversight between the Communist Party and other political parties; and applying the principle of letting a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend to scientific and cultural work. These creative theoretical achievements maintain important guiding significance to this day. Mao Zedong Thought represents a creative application and advancement of Marxism-Leninism in China. It is a summation of theories, principles, and experience on Chinas revolution and construction that has been proven correct through practice, and its establishment marked the first historic step in adapting Marxism to the Chinese context. The living soul of Mao Zedong Thought is the positions, viewpoints, and methods embodied in its constituent parts, which are reflected in three basic pointsseeking truth from facts, following the mass line, and staying independent. These have provided sound guidance for developing the cause of the Party and the people. Regrettably, the correct line adopted at the Partys Eighth National Congress was not fully upheld. Mistakes were made such as the Great Leap Forward and the peoples commune movement, and the scope of the struggle against Rightists was also made far too broad. Confronted with a grave and complex external environment at the time, the Party was extremely concerned about consolidating Chinas socialist state power, and made a wide range of efforts in this regard. However, Comrade Mao Zedongs theoretical and practical errors concerning class struggle in a socialist society became increasingly serious, and the Central Committee failed to rectify these mistakes in good time. Under a completely erroneous appraisal of the prevailing class relations and the political situation in the Party and the country, Comrade Mao Zedong launched and led the Cultural Revolution. The counter-revolutionary cliques of Lin Biao and Jiang Qing took advantage of Comrade Mao Zedongs mistakes, and committed many crimes that brought disaster to the country and the people, resulting in ten years of domestic turmoil which caused the Party, the country, and the people to suffer the most serious losses and setbacks since the founding of the Peoples Republic. This was an extremely bitter lesson. Acting on the will of the Party and the people, the Political Bureau of the Central Committee resolutely smashed the Gang of Four in October 1976, putting an end to the catastrophic Cultural Revolution. From the founding of the Peoples Republic to the eve of reform and opening up, the Party led the people in completing the socialist revolution, eliminating all systems of exploitation, and bringing about the most extensive and profound social change in the history of the Chinese nation and a great transformation from a poor and backward Eastern country with a large population to a socialist country. Despite the serious setbacks it encountered in the process of exploration, the Party made creative theoretical achievements and great progress in socialist revolution and construction, which provided valuable experience, theoretical preparation, and material foundations for launching socialism with Chinese characteristics into a new historical period. Through tenacious struggle, the Party and the people showed the world that the Chinese people were not only capable of dismantling the old world, but also of building a new one, that only socialism could save China, and that only socialism could develop China. III. Reform, Opening Up, and Socialist Modernization In the new period of reform, opening up, and socialist modernization, the main tasks facing the Party were to continue exploring a right path for building socialism in China, unleash and develop the productive forces, lift the people out of poverty and help them become prosperous in the shortest time possible, and fuel the push toward national rejuvenation by providing new, dynamic institutional guarantees as well as the material conditions for rapid development. After the end of the Cultural Revolution, the Party stood at a crucial historical juncture in which it was confronted with the question of which course the Party and the country should take. The Party came to recognize that the only way forward was to launch a program of reform and opening up; otherwise, our endeavors in pursuing modernization and building socialism would be doomed to failure. In December 1978, the 11th Central Committee held its third plenary session. At the session the Party decisively abandoned the policy of taking class struggle as the key link, and initiated a strategic shift in the focus of the Party and countrys work, thereby ushering in a new period of reform, opening up, and socialist modernization. This marked a great turning point of far-reaching significance in the Partys history since the founding of the Peoples Republic of China. The Party also made the momentous decision to completely renounce the Cultural Revolution. Over the more than 40 years that have passed since then, the Party has never wavered in following the line, principles, and policies adopted at this session. After the third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee, Chinese communists, with Comrade Deng Xiaoping as their chief representative, united and led the whole Party and the entire nation in conducting a thorough review of the experience gained and lessons learned since the founding of the Peoples Republic. On this basis, and by focusing on the fundamental questions of what socialism is and how to build it and drawing lessons from the history of world socialism, they established Deng Xiaoping Theory, and devoted their efforts to freeing minds and seeking truth from facts. The historic decision was made to shift the focus of the Party and the countrys work onto economic development and to launch the reform and opening up drive. Chinese communists brought the essence of socialism to light, set the basic line for the primary stage of socialism, and made it clear that China would follow its own path and build socialism with Chinese characteristics. They provided sensible answers to a series of basic questions on building socialism with Chinese characteristics, and formulated a development strategy for basically achieving socialist modernization by the middle of the 21st century through a three-step approach. They thus succeeded in founding socialism with Chinese characteristics. After the fourth plenary session of the 13th Central Committee, Chinese communists, with Comrade Jiang Zemin as their chief representative, united and led the whole Party and the entire nation in upholding the Partys basic theory and line, deepening their understanding of what socialism is and how to build it, and what kind of party to build and how to build it. On this basis, they formed the Theory of Three Represents. In the face of complex domestic and international situations and serious setbacks confronting world socialism, they safeguarded socialism with Chinese characteristics, defined building a socialist market economy as an objective of reform and set a basic framework in this regard, and established a basic economic system for the primary stage of socialism under which public ownership is the mainstay and diverse forms of ownership develop together, as well as an income distribution system under which distribution according to work is the mainstay while multiple forms of distribution exist alongside it. They opened up new horizons for reform and opening up across all fronts and advanced the great new project of Party building. All these efforts helped to successfully launch socialism with Chinese characteristics into the 21st century. After the 16th National Congress, Chinese communists, with Comrade Hu Jintao as their chief representative, united and led the whole Party and the entire nation in advancing practical, theoretical, and institutional innovation during the process of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. They gained a deep understanding of major questions such as what kind of development to pursue and how to pursue it under new circumstances, and provided clear answers to these questions, thus forming the Scientific Outlook on Development. Taking advantage of an important period of strategic opportunity, they focused their energy on development, with emphasis on pursuing comprehensive, balanced, and sustainable development that put the people first. They worked hard to ensure and improve peoples wellbeing, promote social fairness and justice, bolster the Partys governance capacity, and maintain its advanced nature. In doing so, they succeeded in upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics under new circumstances. In order to promote reform and opening up, the Party re-established the Marxist ideological, political, and organizational lines, thoroughly refuted the erroneous two whatevers policy, and correctly appraised the historical position of Comrade Mao Zedong and the value of Mao Zedong Thought as a scientific system. The Party made it clear that the principal contradiction in Chinese society was that Chinas underdeveloped social production was unable to meet the ever-growing material and cultural needs of the people, and hence the central task of the Party was to resolve this contradiction. On this basis, the Party put forward the goal of building China into a moderately prosperous society. The Party restored and formulated a series of correct policies in all fields of work, and began the process of readjusting the national economy. Under the leadership of the Party, comprehensive steps were taken to set things right ideologically, politically, and organizationally, and extensive efforts were made to redress wrongs suffered by those who were unjustly, falsely, and wrongly accused and to regulate social relations. The adoption of the Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party since the Founding of the Peoples Republic of China marked the successful conclusion of the Partys efforts to rectify its guiding principles. The Party came to recognize that to open up new prospects for reform, opening up, and socialist modernization, it needed to steer the advancement of its endeavors with theoretical innovation. Comrade Deng Xiaoping once said, When everything has to be done by the book, when thinking turns rigid and blind faith is the fashion, it is impossible for a party or a nation to make progress. Its life will cease and that party or nation will perish. With this understanding, the Party led and supported extensive discussions on the criterion for testing truth, upheld and developed Marxism in light of new practices and the features of the times, and effectively answered a series of basic questions regarding socialism with Chinese characteristics, including development path, stage of development, fundamental tasks, development drivers, development strategies, political guarantee, national reunification, diplomacy and international strategy, leadership, and forces to rely on, thereby forming the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics and achieving a new breakthrough in adapting Marxism to the Chinese context. At its 12th through 17th national congresses, the Party made consistent overall plans for advancing reform, opening up, and socialist modernization in view of evolving circumstances at home and abroad and new requirements for the countrys development. The Central Committee convened several plenary sessions dedicated to planning major initiatives for promoting reform, development, and stability. The introduction of the household contract responsibility system in rural areas marked the initial breakthrough in Chinas reform, further steps were gradually taken to reform the economic structure in the cities, and reform initiatives were then carried out across the board. Oriented toward the development of a socialist market economy, this reform gave greater and broader play to the basic role of market in allocating resources, while upholding and improving Chinas basic economic and income distribution systems. While resolutely advancing economic structural reform, the Party simultaneously carried out political, cultural, and social structural reforms as well as institutional reforms related to Party building, which led to the formation and development of vigorous institutions and mechanisms that suited the conditions of contemporary China. The Party designated opening up as a fundamental national policy. Under this policy, China progressed from establishing special economic zones in Shenzhen and a few other areas to opening up more parts of the countryPudong in Shanghai, key inland cities as well as areas along the coastline, borders, the Yangtze River, and major transportation routes. It also acceded to the World Trade Organization, and went from bringing in to going global. In this process, we fully utilized both domestic and international markets and resources. With continuous progress in reform and opening up, China achieved the historic transformations from a highly centralized planned economy into a socialist market economy brimming with vitality, and from a country that was largely isolated into one that is open to the outside world across the board. In an effort to accelerate socialist modernization, the Party led the people in promoting economic, political, cultural, and social development and made immense achievements. The Party continued to take economic development as the central task, stood by the conviction that development is of paramount importance, and put forward the notion that science and technology constitute the primary productive force. It implemented major strategies such as invigorating China through science and education, pursuing sustainable development, and developing a quality workforce. It advanced large-scale development of the western region, revitalized old industrial bases in the northeast and other regions, promoted the rise of the central region, and supported the trailblazing development of the eastern region in an effort to promote the coordinated development of urban and rural areas and different regions. The Party promoted the reform and development of state-owned enterprises, encouraged and supported the development of the non-public sector, and accelerated the transformation of the economic growth model. It stepped up environmental protection and promoted sustained and rapid economic development. All of this enabled Chinas composite national strength to increase by a large margin. Upholding the unity between the Partys leadership, the running of the country by the people, and law-based governance, the Party worked to develop socialist democracy and promote socialist political progress and advanced reform of the political system in a proactive and prudent manner. With a commitment to integrating the rule of law with the rule of virtue, a new Constitution of the Peoples Republic of China was formulated, China built itself into a socialist country under the rule of law, and a socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics took shape. The Party made earnest efforts to respect and protect human rights and consolidated and developed the broadest possible patriotic united front. The Party stepped up education on ideals and convictions, advanced the development of the core socialist values, promoted cultural-ethical progress, and fostered an advanced socialist culture, thus pushing socialist culture to flourish. The Party accelerated social development with a focus on improving public wellbeing. It worked to improve peoples living standards and rescinded taxes on agriculture. It devoted constant effort to ensuring access to education, employment, medical services, elderly care, and housing and to promoting social harmony and stability. The Party put forward the overall goal of building a strong, modern, and standardized revolutionary military, and it made winning local wars in the information age the focal point in preparation for military struggle. It advanced military transformation with Chinese characteristics by following an approach of having fewer but better troops. Facing a rapidly changing international landscape, the Party upheld the Four Cardinal Principles, eliminated all kinds of interference, and calmly responded to a series of risks and trials related to Chinas overall reform, development, and stability. The late 1980s and early 1990s witnessed the demise of the Soviet Union and the drastic changes in Eastern European countries. In the late spring and early summer of 1989, a severe political disturbance took place in China as a result of the international and domestic climates at the time, and was egged on by hostile anti-communist and anti-socialist forces abroad. With the peoples backing, the Party and the government took a clear stand against the turmoil, defending Chinas socialist state power and safeguarding the fundamental interests of the people. The Party led the people in successfully responding to the Asian financial crisis, the global financial crisis, and other economic risks. We successfully held the 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Beijing. We overcame natural disasters, such as severe flooding on the Yangtze, Nenjiang, and Songhua rivers, the devastating earthquake in Wenchuan, and the SARS epidemic. All these victories demonstrated the Partys ability to withstand risks and cope with complicated situations. Defining national reunification as a major historical task, the Party worked tirelessly to complete it. Comrade Deng Xiaoping introduced the creative and well-conceived concept of One Country, Two Systems, paving a new path for achieving reunification through peaceful means. Through arduous work and struggle, the Chinese government successively resumed its exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong and Macao, thus ending a century-long history of humiliation. Since Hong Kong and Macaos return to the motherland, the central government acted in strict compliance with Chinas Constitution and the basic laws of the special administrative regions and maintained lasting prosperity and stability in the two regions. Keeping in mind the big picture with regard to resolving the Taiwan question, the Party set forth the basic principles of peaceful reunification and One Country, Two Systems and facilitated agreement across the Taiwan Strait on the 1992 Consensus, which embodies the one-China principle. It advanced cross-Strait consultations and negotiations, established comprehensive and direct two-way mail, transport, and trade links across the Strait, and launched dialogues between political parties of the two sides. The Party pushed for the enactment of the Anti-Secession Law, resolutely deterred separatist forces seeking Taiwan independence, promoted national reunification, and thwarted attempts to create two Chinas, one China, one Taiwan, or Taiwan independence. Based on a judicious assessment of global trends and the features of the era, the Party put forward the concept that peace and development are the themes of our times. In line with this concept, China upheld its fundamental foreign policy goal of preserving world peace and promoting shared development. It adjusted its relations with other major countries, developed friendly relations with neighboring countries, and deepened friendly cooperation with other developing countries. It actively participated in international and regional affairs and created a new comprehensive and multi-layered framework for foreign relations. The Party promoted the development of a multipolar world and the democratization of international relations and pushed economic globalization in a direction toward common prosperity. China took an unequivocal stand against hegemonism and power politics, endeavored to safeguard the interests of developing countries, worked for a new international political and economic order that would be fair and equitable, and promoted lasting peace and common prosperity in the world. The Party has always stressed that to do a good job of governing the country, we must first do a good job of governing the Party, and that means governing it strictly. With this in mind, it focused its efforts on strengthening the Party and launched the great new project of Party building. The Party formulated the Code of Conduct for Intraparty Political Life, strengthened democratic centralism, promoted democracy within the Party, and normalized intraparty political activities. It launched a party-wide rectification campaign through a well-planned, step-by-step approach in order to address the problems of defects in terms of thinking, conduct, and organization within the Party. The Party also worked to fortify its ranks with the aim of cultivating younger, more revolutionary, better educated, and more specialized officials, and it made a strong point of promoting young and middle-aged officials and advancing the process of succession. With a view to addressing the two historical challenges of improving the Partys leadership and governance and bolstering its ability to resist corruption, prevent moral decline, and withstand risks, and with its focus on enhancing its governance capacity and advanced nature, the Party made a series of decisions on major issues including strengthening its ties with the people, its style of work, and its governance capacity. It also carried out education campaigns on the importance of study, political integrity, and rectitude, on the Theory of Three Represents, on preserving the advanced nature of Party members, and on studying and applying the Scientific Outlook on Development. The Party defined efforts to improve Party conduct, uphold integrity, and combat corruption as issues concerning the very survival of the Party and the country, and pushed forward the development of systems for preventing and punishing corruption. On the 40th anniversary of the launch of reform and opening up, the Party held a grand ceremony to mark this important event. In his address at the ceremony, Comrade Xi Jinping reviewed the great achievements made and valuable experience accumulated over those four decades. He stressed that reform and opening up represented a great awakening for the Party and a great revolution in the history of the Chinese nations development, and he called for continued efforts to see this process through. Our countrys impressive achievements in reform, opening up, and modernization attracted the whole worlds attention. China achieved the historic transformation from a country with relatively backward productive forces to the worlds second largest economy, and made the historic strides of raising the living standards of its people from bare subsistence to moderate prosperity in general and then toward moderate prosperity in all respects. All these achievements marked the tremendous advance of the Chinese nation from standing up to growing prosperous. Through tenacious struggle, the Party and the people showed the world that reform and opening up was a crucial move in making China what it is today, that socialism with Chinese characteristics is the correct road that has led the country toward development and prosperity, and that China has caught up with the times in great strides. IV. A New Era of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics Following the Partys 18th National Congress, socialism with Chinese characteristics entered a new era. The main tasks facing the Party in this period are to fulfill the First Centenary Goal, embark on the new journey to accomplish the Second Centenary Goal, and continue striving toward the great goal of national rejuvenation. The Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has implemented the national rejuvenation strategy within the wider context of once-in-a-century changes taking place in the world. It has stressed that the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics is an era in which we will build on past successes to further advance our cause and continue to strive for the success of socialism with Chinese characteristics under new historical conditions; an era in which we will use the momentum of our decisive victory in building a moderately prosperous society in all respects to fuel all-out efforts to build a great modern socialist country; an era in which Chinese people of all ethnic groups will work together to create a better life for themselves and gradually realize the goal of common prosperity; an era in which all the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation will strive with one heart to realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation; and an era in which China will make even greater contributions to humanity. This new era is a new historic juncture in Chinas development. Chinese communists, with Comrade Xi Jinping as their chief representative, have established Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era on the basis of adapting the basic tenets of Marxism to Chinas specific realities and its fine traditional culture, upholding Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Theory of Three Represents, and the Scientific Outlook on Development, thoroughly reviewing and fully applying the historical experience gained since the founding of the Party, and proceeding from new realities. Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era makes the following clear: The leadership of the Communist Party of China is the defining feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the greatest strength of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and that the Party is the highest force for political leadership. Therefore, all Party members must strengthen their consciousness of the need to maintain political integrity, think in big-picture terms, follow the leadership core, and keep in alignment with the central Party leadership; stay confident in the path, theory, system, and culture of socialism with Chinese characteristics; and uphold Comrade Xi Jinpings core position on the Party Central Committee and in the Party as a whole, and uphold the Central Committees authority and its centralized, unified leadership. The overarching task of upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics is to realize socialist modernization and national rejuvenation, and that on the basis of completing the goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, a two-step approach should be taken to build China into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful by the middle of the 21st century, and to promote national rejuvenation through a Chinese path to modernization. The principal contradiction facing Chinese society in the new era is that between unbalanced and inadequate development and the peoples ever-growing needs for a better life, and the Party must therefore remain committed to a people-centered philosophy of development, develop whole-process peoples democracy, and make more notable and substantive progress toward achieving well-rounded human development and common prosperity for all. The integrated plan for building socialism with Chinese characteristics covers five spheres, namely economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological advancement, and that the comprehensive strategy in this regard includes four prongs, namely building a modern socialist country, deepening reform, advancing law-based governance, and strengthening Party self-governance. The overall objectives of comprehensively deepening reform are to develop and improve the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics and to modernize Chinas system and capacity for governance. The overall goal of comprehensively advancing law-based governance is to establish a system of socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics and to build a socialist rule of law country. China must uphold and improve its basic socialist economic system, see that the market plays the decisive role in resource allocation and the government plays its role better, have an accurate understanding of this new stage of development, apply a new philosophy of innovative, coordinated, green, open, and shared development, accelerate efforts to foster a new pattern of development that is focused on the domestic economy but features positive interplay between domestic and international economic flows, promote high-quality development, and balance development and security imperatives. The Partys goal for military development in the new era is to build the peoples armed forces into world-class forces that obey the Partys command, that are able to fight and to win, and that maintain excellent conduct. Major-country diplomacy with Chinese characteristics aims to serve national rejuvenation, promote human progress, and facilitate efforts to foster a new type of international relations and build a human community with a shared future. Full and rigorous self-governance is a policy of strategic importance for the Party, and the general requirements for Party building in the new era include making all-around efforts to strengthen the Party in political, ideological, and organizational terms and in terms of conduct and discipline, with institution building incorporated into every aspect of this process, continuing the fight against corruption, and ensuring that the political responsibility for governance over the Party is fulfilled. By engaging in great self-transformation, the Party can steer great social transformation. These strategic concepts and innovative ideas are the important outcomes of the Partys theoretical development based on a deeper understanding of the underlying laws of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Comrade Xi Jinping, through meticulous assessment and deep reflection on a number of major theoretical and practical questions regarding the cause of the Party and the country in the new era, has set forth a series of original new ideas, thoughts, and strategies on national governance revolving around the major questions of our times: what kind of socialism with Chinese characteristics we should uphold and develop in this new era, what kind of great modern socialist country we should build, and what kind of Marxist party exercising long-term governance we should develop, as well as how we should go about achieving these tasks. He is thus the principal founder of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. This is the Marxism of contemporary China and of the 21st century. It embodies the best of the Chinese culture and ethos in our times and represents a new breakthrough in adapting Marxism to the Chinese context. The Party has established Comrade Xi Jinpings core position on the Party Central Committee and in the Party as a whole, and defined the guiding role of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. This reflects the common will of the Party, the armed forces, and Chinese people of all ethnic groups, and is of decisive significance for advancing the cause of the Party and the country in the new era and for driving forward the historic process of national rejuvenation. The significant achievements attained in the cause of the Party and the country since the launch of reform and opening up have laid a solid foundation and created favorable conditions for developing socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. At the same time, however, the Party has remained soberly aware that changes in the international environment have brought about many new risks and challenges and China faces no small number of long unresolved, deep-seated problems as well as newly emerging problems regarding reform, development, and stability. Moreover, previously lax and weak governance has enabled inaction and corruption to spread within the Party and led to serious problems in its political environment, which has harmed relations between the Party and the people and between officials and the public, weakened the Partys creativity, cohesiveness, and ability, and posed a serious test to its exercise of national governance. The Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has demonstrated great historical initiative, tremendous political courage, and a powerful sense of mission. Keeping in mind both domestic and international imperatives, the Central Committee has implemented the Partys basic theory, line, and policy and provided unified leadership for advancing our great struggle, great project, great cause, and great dream. Acting on the general principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability, it has introduced a raft of major principles and policies, launched a host of major initiatives, pushed ahead with many major tasks, and overcome a number of major risks and challenges. It has solved many tough problems that were long on the agenda but never resolved and accomplished many things that were wanted but never got done. With this, it has prompted historic achievements and historic shifts in the cause of the Party and the country. 1. Upholding the Partys overall leadership Since the launch of reform and opening up, the Party has made continued efforts to strengthen and improve its leadership, providing fundamental political guarantees for the cause of the Party and the country. However, there have remained many problems within the Party with respect to upholding its leadership such as a lack of clear awareness and vigorous action as well as weak, ineffective, diluted, and marginalized efforts in implementation. In particular, the Central Committees major decisions and plans were not properly executed as some officials selectively implemented the Partys policies or even feigned agreement or compliance and did things their own way. The Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has made it clear that the leadership of the Party is the foundation and lifeblood of the Party and the country, and the pillar upon which the interests and wellbeing of all Chinese people depend. All Party members must maintain a high degree of unity with the Central Committee ideologically, politically, and in action. We need to enhance our capacity to conduct sound, democratic, and law-based governance, and ability to chart our course, craft overall plans, design policy, and promote reform. We must ensure that the Party fully exerts its core role in providing overall leadership and coordinating the efforts of all sides. The Party has clearly stated that it exercises overall, systemic, and integrated leadership, and that its lifeblood lies in maintaining its solidarity and unity. The centralized, unified leadership of the Central Committee is the highest principle of the Partys leadership, and upholding and strengthening this is the common political responsibility of each and every Party member. In upholding Party leadership, all Party members must, first and foremost, take a clear stance in maintaining political integrity to ensure that the whole Party obeys the Central Committee. The Code of Conduct for Intraparty Political Life under New Circumstances was approved at the sixth plenary session of the 18th Central Committee. The regulations of the Political Bureau on upholding and strengthening the centralized, unified leadership of the Central Committee were also issued. These documents were designed to strictly enforce the Partys political rules and discipline, to counteract and prevent self-centered behavior, decentralism, liberalism, departmentalism, and the nice-guy mentality, to cultivate a positive and healthy intraparty political culture, and to foster a sound political ecosystem featuring honesty and integrity within the Party. The Central Committee has required leading officials to improve their capacity for political judgment, thinking, and implementation; to remain mindful of the countrys most fundamental interests; and to be loyal to the Party, obey its command, and fulfill their duties to it. The Party has strengthened its leadership systems. It has improved the institutions for Party leadership over the peoples congresses, the government, the CPPCC, the supervisory, judicial, and procuratorial organs of the state, the armed forces, peoples organizations, enterprises and public institutions, primary-level peoples organizations for self-governance, and social organizations, thereby ensuring that the Party plays its role of providing leadership in all these organizations. The Party has practiced democratic centralism. It has put in place sound systems for ensuring its leadership over major work of the state. The functions and roles of the Central Committees decision-making, deliberative, and coordinating institutions have been strengthened, and the mechanisms for ensuring implementation of the Central Committees major policies have been improved. The Party has strictly implemented the system for requesting instructions from and submitting reports to the Central Committee; tightened political oversight and inspection; investigated and handled cases of deviation from the Partys line, principles, and policies as well as instances in which the Partys centralized, unified leadership has been undermined; and rid the Party of members who acted duplicitously. All these measures have helped ensure that the whole Party maintains a high degree of unity with the Central Committee in terms of political stance, political orientation, political principles, and political path. Since the 18th National Congress, the Party Central Committees authority and its centralized, unified leadership have remained robust, the Partys leadership systems have improved, and the way in which the Party exercises its leadership has become more refined. There is greater unity among all Party members in terms of thinking, political resolve, and action, and the Party has significantly boosted its capacity to provide political leadership, give guidance through theory, organize the people, and inspire society. 2. Exercising full and rigorous self-governance Since the launch of reform and opening up, the Party has upheld the principle of the Party exercising effective self-supervision and practicing strict self-governance, making notable progress in Party building. However, there was a certain period in which we failed to supervise Party organizations effectively or govern them with the necessary stringency. This resulted in a serious lack of political conviction among some Party members and officials, misconduct in the selection and appointment of personnel in some localities and government departments, a blatant culture of pointless formalities, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance, and a prevalence of privilege-seeking attitudes and behavior. To be more specific, some officials engaged in cronyism and ostracized those outside of their circle; some formed self-serving cliques; some anonymously lodged false accusations and fabricated rumors; some sought to buy popular support and rig elections in their favor; some promised official posts and lavished praise on each other for their promotions; some did things their own way and feigned compliance with policies while acting counter to them; and some got too big for their boots and made presumptuous comments on the decisions of the Central Committee. Such misconduct interwoven with political and economic issues led to a startling level of corruption that damaged the Partys image and prestige and severely undermined relations between the Party and the people and between officials and the people, arousing the discontent and indignation of many Party members, officials, and members of the public. Comrade Xi Jinping emphasized that it takes a good blacksmith to make good steel and that Chinas success hinges on the Party, especially on the Partys efforts to exercise effective self-supervision and full and rigorous self-governance. With this understanding, we must make strengthening the Partys long-term governance capacity and its advanced nature and integrity the main tasks, make enhancing the Party politically the guiding principle, make firm commitment to the Partys ideals, convictions, and purpose the foundation, and make harnessing the whole Partys enthusiasm, initiative, and creativity the focus of our efforts. We must keep improving the efficacy of Party building and build the Party into a vibrant Marxist governing party that stays at the forefront of the times, enjoys the wholehearted support of the people, has the courage to reform itself, and is able to withstand all tests. With the attitude and resolve to make Party building an unceasing endeavor, the Party has practiced rigorous self-governance and put the spotlight on leading officials, the key few. It has worked to ensure that responsibilities for taking charge and exercising supervision over self-governance are properly fulfilled, bolstered the enforcement of oversight, discipline, and accountability, and integrated the requirement for full and strict self-governance into all aspects of Party building. The Central Committee has convened meetings on Party building in various sectors and made effective plans in this regard, thus promoting all-around progress in Party building. The Central Committee has consistently stressed that our Party comes from the people, has its roots among the people, and is dedicated to serving the people. Once the Party becomes disengaged from the people, it will lose its vitality. To exercise strict self-governance in all respects, we must first address issues concerning Party conduct that the people are strongly concerned about. For this purpose, the Central Committee started with formulating and enforcing an eight-point decision on improving Party and government conduct and worked to improve the Partys style of work through a top-down approach, with members of the Political Bureau and leading officials taking the lead. The Political Bureau holds meetings every year to hear reports on implementation of the eight-point decision and to engage in criticism and self-criticism on this subject. With the persistence to keep hammering away, the Central Committee has made consistent efforts to tackle pointless formalities, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance. It has opposed privilege-seeking attitudes and behavior, shut down extravagant and wasteful spending and use of public funds for non-work-related gifts, dining, or travel, and worked to solve prominent problems that invite a strong public response or harm the publics interests. The Central Committee has reduced burdens at the primary level, and encouraged frugality while opposing wasteful spending. Thanks to these efforts, certain unhealthy tendencies that were once considered impossible to control have been reined in, and certain problems that had long plagued us have been remedied, while Party, government, and social conduct have significantly improved. The Party has always stressed that the whole Party must maintain firm ideals and convictions, well-constructed organizational systems, and strict rules and discipline. Our faith in Marxism, the great ideal of communism, and the common ideal of socialism with Chinese characteristics are our source of strength and the anchor of our political soul as Chinese communists, and they constitute the ideological foundation for maintaining the Partys unity. The Central Committee has stressed that ideals and convictions are like essential nutrients; without them, we would become frail and susceptible to corruption, greed, degeneracy, and decadence. The Party has remained committed to integrating efforts to strengthen the Party ideologically with those to bolster self-governance through institutional building. In recent years, it has launched campaigns for advancing study and implementation of the mass line; for pushing Party members to be strict with themselves in practicing self-cultivation, exercising power, and maintaining self-discipline and to be earnest in their thinking, work, and behavior; for requiring Party members to study the Party Constitution, Party regulations, and General Secretary Xi Jinpings major policy addresses and to meet Party standards; for raising awareness of the need to stay true to the Partys founding mission; and for encouraging study of the Partys history. Through these efforts, the Party aims to equip its members with its new theories and to turn itself into a learning party. It has worked to educate and guide Party members and officials, especially leading officials, so that they can keep the roots of their convictions healthy and strong and absorb the mental nutrients they need to maintain the right line in their thinking, and ultimately preserve their political character and the backbone of their identity as communists. The Party has introduced and implemented an organizational line for the new era. It has specified a set of criteria for good officials, which include firm convictions, devotion to serving the people, a strong and pragmatic work ethic, a willingness to take responsibility, and a commitment to being clean and honest. In appointing officials, the Party has adopted a rational approach with a greater emphasis on political integrity. It has adhered to the principle of selecting officials on the basis of both integrity and ability, with greater weight given to the former, and on the basis of merit regardless of background, and it is intent on appointing those who are dedicated, impartial, and upright. The Party has opposed the selection of officials solely on the basis of votes, assessment scores, GDP growth rates, or age, or through open popularity contests. It has strengthened the role of Party organizations in exercising leadership and final oversight in order to rectify misconduct in the selection and appointment of officials. The Party has mandated that leading officials at all levels cultivate a proper worldview, outlook on life, and sense of values, all of which serve as the master switch for their conduct, and that they appreciate the power entrusted to them, manage it well, and use it prudently. They must willingly submit to the oversight from all sides, share the Partys concerns at all times, make contributions to the country, and work for the peoples wellbeing. The Party has adhered to the principle of the Party supervising personnel, pursued a more proactive, open, and effective personnel policy, implemented the strategy of invigorating China by developing a quality workforce in the new era, and moved faster to build world-class hubs for talent and innovation, thus bringing together the brightest minds from all corners. The Party has constantly strengthened its organizational system with a focus on improving the organizational capacity of Party organizations and enhancing their political and organizational functions. By attaching greater attention to the primary level, the Party has promoted full coverage for its organizational framework and initiatives. The Party has upheld the principles that Party discipline should be even more stringent than the law and that discipline and law enforcement efforts should go hand in hand. It has conducted four forms of oversight over discipline compliance,[ The four forms are: 1) criticism and self-criticism activities and oral and written inquiries which are to be conducted regularly, to ensure that those who have committed minor misconduct are made to redden and sweat; 2) light penalties and minor organizational adjustments to official positions, which are to be applied in the majority of cases; 3) heavy penalties and major adjustments to official positions, which are to be applied in a small number of cases; and 4) investigation and prosecution, which are to be undertaken in a very small number of cases involving serious violations of discipline and suspected criminal activity.] strengthened political and organizational discipline, and promoted stricter observance of discipline on all fronts. The Party has remained committed to exercising rule-based governance over the Party, strictly abided by the Party Constitution, and developed a sound system of intraparty regulations. It has worked to ensure strict compliance with all Party institutions, and to make Party building efforts more rationally-conceived, institutionalized, and procedure-based. The Central Committee has stressed that corruption is the greatest threat to the Partys long-term governance. The fight against corruption is a major political struggle that the Party cannot and must not lose. If we let a few hundred corrupt officials slip through the cracks, we would let down all 1.4 billion Chinese people. We must confine power to an institutional cage and ensure that powers are properly defined, standardized, constrained, and subject to oversight in accordance with discipline and the law. The Party has made integrated efforts to see that officials do not have the opportunity, desire, or audacity to engage in corruption. It has used punishment as a deterrent, strengthened institutional constraints, and promoted heightened consciousness, so as to ensure that the powers conferred by the Party and the people are always used for the peoples benefit. The Party insists that no place is out of bounds, no ground is left unturned, and no tolerance is shown in the fight against corruption. It has imposed tight constraints, maintained a firm stance, and strengthened long-term deterrents against corruption. It has punished both those who take bribes and those who offer them and ensured that every case is investigated and all perpetrators of corruption are punished. The Party has shown the determination to adopt powerful remedies and the courage to take painful measures for the sake of the bigger picture, and taken firm action to take out tigers, swat flies, and hunt down foxes. The Party has intensified efforts to address corruption that occurs on the peoples doorsteps, hunt down corrupt officials who fled overseas and recover state assets they had stolen, and root out all corrupt officials. The Party has focused on dealing with cases involving both political and economic corruption, prevented interest groups from arising within the Party, and investigated and punished corrupt officials such as Zhou Yongkang, Bo Xilai, Sun Zhengcai, and Ling Jihua for their serious violations of Party discipline and the law. The Party has taken the lead in improving Party and state oversight systems, promoted the establishment of the National Commission of Supervision and local supervisory commissions at all levels, and developed an oversight network that facilitates coordination in disciplinary inspections conducted at different levels and mechanisms for promoting coordination between various types of oversight with intraparty oversight playing the main role. Through these efforts, we have strengthened checks and oversight on the exercise of power. By taking resolute action since the 18th National Congress, we have given full play to the role of full and strict Party self-governance in providing political guidance and guarantees, significantly strengthened the Partys ability to improve and reform itself and maintain its integrity, and addressed the problem of lax and weak governance over Party organizations at the fundamental level. An overwhelming victory has been achieved in the fight against corruption, and this momentum has been consolidated across the board. As serious potential dangers in the Party, the country, and the military have been rooted out, our Party has grown stronger through revolutionary tempering. 3. Pursuing economic development Since the launch of reform and opening up, the Party has concentrated on economic development as the central task, and led the people in working diligently to bring about a miracle of rapid growth. Chinas economic strength has thus risen by a significant margin. However, there existed problems such as undue emphasis on the rate and scale of growth in some localities and sectors and an extensive growth model. They, combined with the impact from sluggish world economy in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, led to a stack-up of institutional and structural problems in Chinas economy. Imbalanced, uncoordinated, and unsustainable development hence became a glaring issue. The Central Committee determined that Chinas economy had reached a new normal of development, and was transitioning from a stage of high-speed growth to a stage of high-quality development. Our traditional growth model could no longer be sustained in the face of a complex situation in which we must deal with a slowdown in economic growth, make painful structural adjustments, and absorb the effects of previous economic stimulus policies all at once. The Central Committee noted that applying a new development philosophy represented a profound shift affecting Chinas overall development. The GDP growth rate could not serve as the sole yardstick of success for development. Rather, it was imperative to achieve high-quality development in which innovation is the primary driver, coordination is an endogenous trait, eco-friendly growth prevails, openness to the world is the only way, and shared growth is the ultimate goal, with a view to propelling transformative changes in the quality, efficiency, and impetus of economic development. The Party stepped up strategic planning and unified leadership over economic work, and improved its institutions and mechanisms for leading economic development. Through the fifth plenary session of the 18th Central Committee, the 19th National Congress, the fifth plenary session of the 19th Central Committee, and a series of central economic work conferences, it rolled out new plans and made major decisions in this regard. They were as follows: focusing on the main theme of high-quality development and the main task of supply-side structural reform; building a modern economic system; expanding domestic demand as a strategic priority; and fighting effectively in the three critical battles against potential risk, poverty, and pollution. The Party has worked with unswerving commitment to consolidate and develop the public sector and to encourage, support, and guide the development of the non-public sector. It has prompted state capital and state-owned enterprises to grow stronger, better, and larger, established a modern enterprise system with Chinese characteristics, and worked to make the public sector more competitive, innovative, risk-resilient, and capable of exerting a greater level of influence and control over the economy. A cordial and clean relationship has been cultivated between government and business, and steps have been taken to facilitate the healthy growth of the non-public sector and encourage those working in this sector to achieve success. The Party has been committed to the innovation-driven development strategy. It has made self-reliance in science and technology the strategic pillar for the countrys development and developed a new system for mobilizing the resources nationwide for this purpose. It has strengthened Chinas capabilities in strategic science and technology, intensified basic research, and spurred breakthroughs and original innovation on core technologies in key fields. The Party has bolstered the creation, protection, and application of intellectual property rights, and moved faster to build China into a country of innovators and a global leader in science and technology. The Party has carried out supply-side structural reform on all fronts. It has worked to cut overcapacity, reduce excess inventory, deleverage, lower costs, and shore up weaknesses, and implemented the principles of consolidating gains made in this regard, strengthening the dynamism of micro entities, upgrading industrial chains, and ensuring unimpeded flows in the economy. It has increased efforts to build China into a manufacturer of quality, build a modern industrial system, expand the real economy, and develop the digital economy. The Party has improved its macroeconomic governance, adopted innovative ideas and approaches in macroeconomic regulation, shown greater initiative in macro policymaking, and implemented a proactive fiscal policy and a prudent monetary policy. The Party has pressed forward with efforts to streamline administration, delegate power, improve regulation, and upgrade services. Steps have been taken to ensure food, energy, and resource security as well as the security of industrial and supply chains. The Party has worked to ensure that the financial sector better serves the real economy, strengthened financial regulation across the board, taken measures to prevent and defuse economic and financial risks, and stepped up market supervision and anti-monopoly regulation. The Party has also taken measures to prevent runaway expansion of capital, maintain order in the market, galvanize market entities of all types, especially micro, small, and medium enterprises, and protect the rights and interests of workers and consumers. The Party has introduced a coordinated regional development strategy. It has promoted coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the development of the Yangtze Economic Belt and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, integrated development in the Yangtze River Delta, ecological protection and high-quality development in the Yellow River basin, and high-quality construction of Xiongan New Area to a high standard. The Party has prompted a new phase in the large-scale development of the western region, new breakthroughs in the revitalization of the northeast, and high-quality development of the central region, and encouraged the eastern region to accelerate its pace of modernization. The Party has provided assistance for improving working and living conditions in old revolutionary base areas, areas with large ethnic minority populations, border areas, and impoverished areas. It has promoted a new, people-centered type of urbanization and improved urban planning, development, and management. The Party has always made issues relating to agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents a top priority. It has introduced a rural revitalization strategy and accelerated the modernization of agriculture and rural areas. It has adopted a food crop production strategy based on farmland management and the application of technology, implemented the strictest possible system for the protection of farmland, and worked to increase self-reliance in seed technology and ensure that Chinas seed resources are self-supporting and under better control. With all these efforts, the Chinese peoples food supply has remained firmly in their own hands. Since the 18th National Congress, our economic development has become much more balanced, coordinated, and sustainable. Chinas GDP has exceeded 100 trillion yuan, while per capita GDP has topped US$10,000. Chinas economic strength, scientific and technological capabilities, and composite national strength have reached new heights, and our economy is now on a path of higher-quality development that is more efficient, equitable, sustainable, and secure. 4. Deepening reform and opening up After the third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee, Chinas reform and opening up embarked on a remarkable course and scored achievements that captured the attention of the world. Nevertheless, as practice changed, certain deep-seated institutional problems and impediments from vested interests became increasingly evident. Chinas reform thus entered a critical phase fraught with tough challenges. The Central Committee is keenly aware that evolving in practice, freeing minds, and reform and opening up are processes without end. Reform is always ongoing and can never be completed, and halting or reversing course would get us nowhere. Therefore, it is imperative to deepen reform in all areas through greater political courage and wisdom, to be well prepared to tackle tough issues and brave risky areas, to make institutional development a priority, to increase interconnectivity and synergy between reforms in different sectors, and to clear a path forward for reform by cutting away institutional barriers on all sides. At its third plenary session, the 18th Central Committee made arrangements for reforms of economic, political, cultural, and social systems and those pertaining to ecological conservation, national defense and the armed forces, and Party building. It defined the overall objectives, key strategic targets, ranking of priorities, focal points, working mechanisms, methods of implementation, timetable, and roadmap for the endeavor of comprehensively deepening reform. The third plenary session of the 11th Central Committee was an epoch-making event that ushered in the new period of reform, opening up, and socialist modernization. In the same way, the third plenary session of the 18th Central Committee was also of epoch-making significance. It enabled the transformation of reform from trials and breakthroughs limited to certain areas into an integrated drive being advanced across the board, and thus marked the beginning of a new stage in Chinas reform and opening up. The Party has worked to ensure that reform stays on the right path, that it is inspired and guided by the objectives of promoting social fairness and justice and improving peoples wellbeing, that it follows a problem-oriented approach, and that it focuses on further freeing minds, unleashing and developing the productive forces, and unlocking and boosting social dynamism. The Party has strengthened top-level design and overall planning, pursued reform in a more systemic, holistic, and coordinated manner, stimulated peoples creativity, and deepened and consolidated reforms in key areas. The Party has taken swift yet steady steps to promote and deepen reform in all areas, scoring multiple breakthroughs in the process. As we have gone from laying foundations and defining initial structures, to making overall progress and building momentum, to achieving systematic integration and efficient coordination, we have seen basic institutional frameworks put in place in various areas, and witnessed historic, systemic, and holistic transformation in multiple fields. The Central Committee is keenly aware that opening the door brings progress, while closing it leaves one behind. For Chinas development to gain the upper hand, seize the initiative, and have a good future, it is essential that we follow the tide of economic globalization, leverage the strengths of Chinas massive market, and pursue a more proactive opening up strategy. Adhering to the principle of achieving shared growth through consultation and collaboration, China has promoted high-quality development of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). We have advanced a large number of cooperation projects with significant implications for fueling economic development and improving peoples lives in countries along the BRI routes, and worked to build the BRI into an initiative of peace, prosperity, openness, green development, and innovation that brings different civilizations closer, and a widely welcomed public good and platform for international cooperation in todays world. While ensuring that its efforts to open up internally and externally reinforce each other and better integrating the bringing in and going global strategies, China has worked to promote trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, build a globally oriented network of high-standard free trade zones, including pilot free trade zones and the Hainan Free Trade Port, and expand opening up on the institutional level in terms of rules, regulations, management, and standards. Through these efforts, we are advancing opening up on a larger scale, across more areas, and in greater depth, and establishing an open economy that is diverse, balanced, secure, and efficient and brings benefit to all. In this way, China is consistently building new and greater strengths in international economic cooperation and competition. Since its 18th National Congress, the Party has consistently promoted broader and deeper reform across the board. The system of socialism with Chinese characteristics is now more mature and well-defined, and the modernization of Chinas system and capacity for governance has reached a higher level. The cause of the Party and the country now radiates with fresh vitality. 5. Advancing political work Since the launch of reform and opening up, the Party has led the people in keeping to the path of socialist political advancement with Chinese characteristics and developing socialist democracy, and has achieved substantial progress in this regard. Learning lessons from successes and failures in political development both at home and abroad, the Party has become deeply aware of the following: to have full confidence in the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, we must first and foremost foster strong confidence in the political system of socialism with Chinese characteristics; to promote socialist democracy and socialist political advancement, we must ensure that the political system of socialism with Chinese characteristics is deeply rooted in China; and mechanical copying of the political systems of other countries will get us nowhere, and could potentially lead our country to ruin. We must uphold the unity between the Partys leadership, the running of the country by the people, and law-based governance. Efforts must be made to actively develop whole-process peoples democracy, and advance comprehensive, extensive, and coordinated development of the systems and institutions through which the people run the country. We must establish diverse, unimpeded, and well-organized democratic channels, diversify forms of democracy, and expand the peoples orderly political participation at all levels and in various fields, so as to ensure that Chinas governance and institutions in all sectors give full expression to the will of the people, protect their rights and interests, and spark their creativity. We must remain on guard against the erosive influence of Western trends of political thought, including the so-called constitutionalism, alternation of power between political parties, and separation of powers. With a view to maintaining the long-term governance of the Party and the long-term stability of the country, the 19th Central Committee at its fourth plenary session outlined an overall plan for upholding and improving the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics and modernizing Chinas system and capacity for governance, and also laid out major plans for upholding and improving the fundamental, basic, and important systems that underpin socialism with Chinese characteristics. The Central Committee has stressed the importance of upholding the principal position of the people and ensuring their law-based participation in democratic elections, consultations, decision-making, management, and oversight. The Party has worked to uphold and improve the system of peoples congresses. We have supported and safeguarded the right of the people to exercise state power through peoples congresses, supported peoples congresses in exercising their statutory powers of enacting laws, conducting oversight, making decisions, and appointing and removing officials, and conducted decisive investigations of vote rigging and election bribery cases. Through these efforts, we have upheld the authority and dignity of the system of peoples congresses, and given full play to its role as Chinas fundamental political system. The Party has worked to uphold and improve the system of CPC-led multiparty cooperation and political consultation, and to improve systems through which the central committees of other political parties conduct special oversight over the implementation of major decisions and plans and make suggestions directly to the CPC Central Committee. We have stepped up institutional development in promoting the CPPCCs role as a specialized consultative body, advanced extensive, multilevel, and institutionalized development of socialist consultative democracy, and put in place a system of consultative democracy with Chinese characteristics. The Party has worked to consolidate government and improve democracy at the primary level, and to increase transparency in administration in order to protect the peoples rights to be informed, to participate, to be heard, and to exercise oversight. We have further reformed Party and government institutions to achieve thorough and systematic restructuring of their functions. In this process, we have followed the principles of upholding the Partys overall leadership, committing to a people-centered approach, promoting greater optimization, coordination, and efficiency, and ensuring law-based governance in all dimensions. The Party has worked to uphold and improve the system of regional ethnic autonomy, followed a correct and uniquely Chinese path to dealing with ethnic affairs, and made fostering a strong sense of community for the Chinese nation the main task in its work related to ethnic affairs. The Party has established policies for the governance of Tibet and Xinjiang in the new era, consolidated and developed socialist ethnic relations characterized by equality, solidarity, mutual assistance, and harmony, and pushed for all ethnic groups to work together in pursuit of common development and prosperity. In line with the Partys basic policy on religious affairs, we have upheld the principle that religions in China must be Chinese in orientation, and provided active guidance for the adaptation of religions to socialist society. The Party has worked to build a broad united front with the goal of expanding common ground and the convergence of interests and creating a mighty force to drive our push toward national rejuvenation. The Party has promoted reform and innovation within trade unions, Chinese Communist Youth League organizations, womens federations, and other peoples organizations with the objectives of strengthening their political consciousness, their advanced nature, and their ability to represent the people, so that these organizations can play their role more effectively. We have worked to promote human rights in all areas, with top priority given to safeguarding the peoples rights to subsistence and development. Since the 18th National Congress, we have made sweeping progress in improving the institutions, standards, and procedures of Chinas socialist democracy, and given better play to the strengths of the Chinese socialist political system. As a result, our political stability, unity, and dynamism have been reinforced and grown stronger. 6. Comprehensively advancing law-based governance Since the launch of reform and opening up, the Party has upheld law-based governance and kept advancing socialist rule of law. However, we have also faced serious problems such as laws being ignored or not being strictly enforced, lack of judicial impartiality, and violations of the law going unpunished, while judicial corruption occurring from time to time. Some judicial and law-enforcement personnel have bent the law for personal gain, or even provided shelter for criminals. These phenomena have seriously undermined the authority of the law, and had a negative impact on social fairness and justice. The Party is deeply aware that power is a double-edged sword. If it is wielded in accordance with the law and rules, it can bring benefit to the people, but if it is abused, it will invariably bring disaster to the country and the people. The Central Committee has stressed that when the rule of law prevails, the country will prosper, but should it weaken, the country will descend into chaos. Comprehensively advancing law-based governance is an essential requirement and important guarantee for socialism with Chinese characteristics; it is also a profound revolution in Chinas governance. Law-based governance and law-based exercise of state power begin with compliance with the Constitution. We must remain committed to the path of socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics; implement Chinese socialist rule of law theory; pursue coordinated progress in law-based governance, law-based exercise of state power, and law-based government administration; promote integrated development of the country, the government, and society based on the rule of law; and comprehensively enhance peoples awareness of the need to respect, study, and abide by the law and their ability to apply the law. At the fourth plenary session of the 18th Central Committee and the central conference on the rule of law, dedicated efforts were made to analyze the issue of advancing law-based governance in all respects. Top-level designs and major plans were put forward on ens BEIJING, Nov. 17 -- Recently, nearly 100 teachers and students from more than ten secondary schools in Hong Kong (HK) and the "Future Star" Alumni Association of Dagong Wenhui Media Group visited the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) Hong Kong Garrison Exhibition Center . The exhibition mainly displays China's achievements in national rejuvenation, PLA's glorious history, and the efforts made by the PLA Hong Kong Garrison to implement the "One Country, Two Systems" Policy in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Visitors had a vivid Chinese history class through diversified exhibition forms such as models, graphics and videos. "Dreams can lead to development," said Qiu Wanguang, principal of the Po Leung Kuk Vicwood K. T. Chong Sixth Form College, noting that the Chinese Dream Exhibition Hall impressed him the most. Zhou Wolin, a student from Pui Kiu Middle School in Hong Kong, said that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China, and the PLA Hong Kong Garrison has been defending national sovereignty like a magic cudgel. He also expressed his great pride in the growing comprehensive strength of China. It is understood that since the opening of the PLA Hong Kong Garrison Exhibition Center in July this year, it has received more than 5,000 visitors, with local students and residents as the main body. The exhibition center has been gradually developed into an important site for national defense education. New measures are being investigated to allow local residents to gamble at domestic casinos, Minister of Culture, Sports, and Tourism Choung Byoung-gug said on Wednesday. At present, Koreans are banned from playing the tables in 16 of the country's 17 casinos, with the exception of one hotel resort in Gangwon Province. Choung said at a breakfast meeting held at the Korea Chamber of Commerce & Industry that domestic casinos should be open to Korean nationals, and he vowed to plough ahead with efforts to amend the current regulations. It is absurd to ban Korean citizens from entering gambling halls while at the same time encouraging foreigners to do so, he added. "I will look for ways for allow locals to enter casinos," he said. "I'm not sure if I will be able to accomplish this during my term, but I will push ahead with the project." Choung assumed his current role with the ministry in January. Of the 16 casinos that cater only to foreigners, Seoul accounts for three and Jeju Island has eight. There are another two in Busan, and one each in Incheon, Daegu and Sokcho. The only place Koreans can gamble is at a hotel resort known as Kangwon Land that operates under a special law which was passed to develop the local economy. "Since many Koreans disapprove of opening casinos to local citizens, those who want to gamble go abroad and spend their money in foreign countries," Choung said. "The result is that we end up losing out on what should be a highly lucrative and high-end tourism draw." He said repealing the ban was not likely to generate negative side effects. Taking Las Vegas as an example, he suggested such a move could in fact lead to other revenue-generating developments and spin-off industries. "Las Vegas used to be a playground for gambling, but now it is more focused on the convention industry and has turned into a city for shopping," said Choung. Korean online fashion retailers are becoming more popular in Japan and elsewhere thanks to K-pop bands and TV series. Musinsa, Korea's No. 1 online fashion retailer, chose Japan as its first overseas market and established a branch office there. Zigzag, a shopping app that sells trendy clothes from the Dongdaemun garment district of Seoul, launched trial marketing services in Japan after joining hands with popular influencers there. Brandi, another online retailer selling Dongdaemun brands, joined hands with Internet portal Naver to start doing business in Japan. And mobile fashion app A-bly launched a Japanese version in January. Korea's TV series "Vincenzo" appears as the most-viewed on Netflix Japan, in this grab from the video streaming platform. Last month, cable channel tvN's recently-ended series "Vincenzo" became the most viewed program on Netflix Japan. An Internet search on Yahoo Japan leads to postings about the formal suits featured in the drama as well as clothes worn by the female lead, Jeon Yeo-been. Musinsa is not increasing its physical presence in Japan but gives clothes makers here the support they need in marketing their products there. Zigzag, which was acquired by Kakao earlier this year, introduced a fashion e-commerce app called Naunau in Japan to pave the way for Dongdaemun apparel makers to sell their products there. Brandi is selling its products through an online store in Japan run by Naver. Industry insiders say Naver and Kakao plan to expand their online fashion sales worldwide using Japan as a launching board. Some small online fashion retailers had already pioneered the Japanese market before these big names. An industry insider said, "Japan's fashion market centers on offline retail shops and specialty stores, but demand for online fashion malls surged last year due to the coronavirus pandemic." The screenshot of Zigzag's Japanese app Naunau on its website Japanese consumers are discerning fashionistas, and the garment businesses of Dongdaemun are expert at keeping up with the latest trends and responding promptly, so they are well suited to meet the demand. Another favorable factor is the similar climate to Korea, which creates similar demand for seasonal clothing. Another business insider said, "We thought about selling our clothes in Southeast Asia, but the biggest drawback was that demand there is for summer clothes only." Another appeal of Japan is that younger Japanese consumers are rarely swayed by the notoriously fractious relations between the neighbors. Unlike China, where customers are testily patriotic and ever ready to join government hate campaigns and boycotts, Japan is a dependable market. "Korean fashion houses tend to prefer Japan, where customers are less political," one retailer said. The White House readout said Biden "underscored that the United States remains committed to the 'one China' policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances, and that the United States strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait." These are references to existing U.S. policy on Taiwan, set in place under past U.S. administrations. China has escalated the dispatch of its military planes into Taiwan's air defense identification zone in recent months, with a record number of sorties flown last month. Officials said Biden made U.S. interests clear to ensure that there are "no unilateral changes to the status quo" across the Taiwan Strait during their virtual meeting that lasted for about three-and-a-half hours. Biden "was quite direct about his concerns about some of Beijing's behavior that he believes is at odds with" the peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, said a senior U.S. administration official during a phone briefing after the virtual meeting. U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping held "an extended discussion" on Taiwan Monday night, broaching a long-running point of disagreement between the two that many worry remains a flashpoint for conflict. The Chinese readout, however, struck a different tone, excluding the Taiwan Relations Act and the Six Assurances that the U.S. deemed as fundamental to its long-standing policy. "The 'One-China principle' and the three Sino-U.S. joint communiques are the political foundation of Sino-U.S. relations," said the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. "Some people in the United States intend to use Taiwan to contain China. This trend is very dangerous. It is playing with fire, and playing with fire must burn oneself," added the Chinese statement, published following the virtual meeting. That is "pretty provocative language to use in this type of setting," said Ryan Hass, who is a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution in Washington. During a webinar on Tuesday, Hass said Beijing is doing so "because they're frustrated" as the United States continues to "demonstrate visibly its support for Taiwan" and make "progress in internationalizing the Taiwan issue." "There's been a real effort to raise awareness of the international stakes of Taiwan's security in a way that frustrates Beijing's efforts to isolate, intimidate Taiwan and to treat Taiwan as a feature of U.S.-China competition," he added. The U.S. says its one-China policy is "distinct" from Beijing's one-China principle, under which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) asserts sovereignty over Taiwan. The U.S. has never accepted the CCP's sovereignty claim over Taiwan and has refrained from taking a position on sovereignty over Taiwan. China considers Taiwan a breakaway province that someday will be reunified with the mainland. Taipei considers the island a sovereign state. "The U.S. and China are trying to signal the intention to each other, and it is worth noting how the U.S. and China put out policy guidance differently," said Professor Yeh-chung Lu, who chairs the Department of Diplomacy at Taiwan's National Cheng-chi University. Under the Taiwan Relations Act, the U.S. considers any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means, including by boycotts or embargoes, a threat to the peace and security of the western Pacific area and of grave concern. The U.S. also maintains "the capacity of the United States" to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of the people who live on the island. Lu sees the regular transits by U.S. Navy ships through the Taiwan Strait as "reassuring," as the Chinese military intensifies its warplane flights into Taiwan's air defense identification zone. The U.S. is telling China "not to change the status quo," Lu told VOA in an email, adding, "There is a similarity" with 25 years ago. He was referring to the Taiwan Strait crisis in March 1996. At that time, the U.S. dispatched two carrier battle groups to waters surrounding Taiwan as China conducted missile tests during the run-up to Taiwan's first democratic presidential election. The Pentagon still conducts Taiwan Strait transits in accordance with international law. A State Department spokesperson told VOA that the transits "demonstrate U.S. commitment to peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait." The U.S. and Taiwan enjoy a robust unofficial relationship. Next week, the U.S. and Taiwan will hold economic talks, the so-called Economic Prosperity Partnership Dialogue (EPPD) which was launched last November, with the resilience of global supply chains among the topics. The 1979 U.S.-China Joint Communique switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing. Relations between the U.S. and Taiwan have been governed by the Taiwan Relations Act that Congress passed in April 1979, under which the U.S. provides defense equipment to Taiwan. Under the "Six Assurances" offered by former U.S. President Ronald Reagan's administration, the U.S. did not agree to prior consultation with Beijing on arms sales to Taiwan, nor did it agree to take any position regarding sovereignty over Taiwan. The U.S. also promised it will never pressure Taiwan to negotiate with Beijing. The Chinese readout said Biden stated during Monday night's virtual meeting that the U.S. does not support "Taiwan independence." "On the question of Taiwan independence," a senior U.S. administration official told reporters after the meeting, "It is not something that the United States supports" but it is not a U.S. policy "that's particularly new." Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen has said there is no need for Taiwan to declare independence as the Republic of China (R.O.C.) has been established since 1912.R.O.C. is Taiwan's formal name. Tsai staked out her government's approach to the sensitive issue during her 2021 National Day Address. "Let us here renew with one another our enduring commitment to a free and democratic constitutional system, our commitment that the Republic of China and the People's Republic of China should not be subordinate to each other, our commitment to resist annexation or encroachment upon our sovereignty, and our commitment that the future of the Republic of China (Taiwan) must be decided in accordance with the will of the Taiwanese people," Tsai pledged. Natasha Kassam, director of the public opinion and foreign policy program of the Australia-based Lowy Institute, recently wrote in an opinion piece in The New York Times that "most in Taiwan -- 87 percent, according to a recent poll -- want to maintain some form of the status quo." Kassam added the status quo means maintaining de facto independence but avoiding retaliation from China. And she wrote the percentage of Taiwan's people who want to maintain the status quo indefinitely is growing. An Antarctic glacier has been named in honor of the Korean port city of Incheon. The U.K. Antarctic Place-names Committee named one of nine previously unnamed glaciers along the Getz coast in West Antarctica "Incheon Glacier," the city said Tuesday. The committee named the glaciers after cities that have hosted major climate change conferences. Incheon hosted the 48th Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change conference in October 2018. The others are Bali, Berlin, Geneva, Glasgow, Kyoto, Paris, Rio and Stockholm. The move is aimed at raising awareness of the rapid melting of icecaps due to the global warming. According to a study by the Korea Polar Research Institute, the University of Leeds and Swansea University in February, 14 glaciers in West Antarctica, including the nine that have been newly named, are melting rapidly. The pace of melting is 23.8 percent faster than in 1994. The Incheon Glacier is the slowest, melting and moving toward the sea a mere 2.9 percent faster than 25 years ago. Satellite observation shows that a staggering 315 billion tons of ice vanished from the region from 1994 to 2018, enough to raise the sea level by some 0.9 mm. The letter, presumed to have been sent to a childhood friend by a Japanese diplomat who was involved in the murder, was found in Japan and could add more details to the enduring puzzle. A recently unearthed letter throws new light on the assassination of Empress Myeongseong by the Japanese in 1895. According to the Asahi Shimbun on Tuesday, a total of eight letters written by Kumaichi Horiguchi, a consular assistant at the Japanese Consulate in Seoul at that time, have been found recently. Horiguchi part of a gang of assassins consisting of soldiers, diplomats and civilians who raided Gyeongbok Palace in the early hours of Oct. 8, 1895 and assassinated Empress Myeongseong under the command of Goro Miura, a former army officer and the then Japanese minister to Korea. Horiguchi was merely suspended from work for a year right after the incident. The eight letters were sent to his childhood friend, Teisho Takeshi, between Nov. 17, 1894 and Oct. 17, 1895. They include a letter dated Oct. 9, 1895, the day after the assassination, the only one that was double-sealed and details the incident, the newspaper reported. "I led the raid. We murdered the queen after climbing over the wall... and reaching her bedroom with difficulty," Horiguchi writes. "I was very surprised as I found it easier than I thought." The letters were found by Steve Hasegawa (77), a Japanese American living in Nagoya, in a flea market. Golden couple have travelled the world since marriage By:Wu Qiong | From:english.eastday.com | 2021-11-17 19:11 While many newlyweds these days like to take a honeymoon overseas, in Shanghai, there is a golden couple (a couple that have been married for 50 years) who have been travelling ever since tying the knot. (A photo of Zong Zhenjun and Shen Xiujuan alongside Lake Taihu in 1971) Five decades ago when Zong Zhenjun married Shen Xiujuan on October 1, 1971, the newly-weds decided on a whim to go on a trip. After the ceremony in the morning, they hopped on a train to Nanjing and then went all the way to Wuxi and Yixing, before finally returning to Shanghai. Over the ensuing 50 years, the couple has been to 87 countries and regions. They even took a boat to Antarctica. Their travel was not suspended until the outbreak of the epidemic in early 2020. The couple have kept the photos they have taken during their travel across the world. Zong made several travel log albums, saying that the photos represent the nice time cherished by them and happy memories of their mutual support and companionship with each other. (Photos/xinmin.cn) Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site. 0108263 License for publishing multimedia online Registration Number: 130349 Registration Number: 130349 The Florida Department of Health in Leon County Observes The Great American Smokeout November 17, 2021 Florida Department of Health in Leon County Calls for Quit Attempts During the Great American Smokeout Tallahassee, Fla. With the annual Great American Smokeout taking place November 18, Tobacco Free Florida in Leon County is using this observance to encourage people to make a plan to quit smoking using the free tools and services available to Floridians. Tracing its history back more than 40 years, the American Cancer Societys Great American Smokeout marks a date when smokers are encouraged to use the date to either make a plan or to begin their quit journey.[1] This year, the American Cancer Society is highlighting tobacco-related disparities during the Great American Smokeout. While rates of cigarette smoking have declined, some groups smoke at higher rates and suffer disproportionately from smoking-relates illnesses. The health burden of tobacco use is especially high among racial and ethnic minorities, low-income individuals, the LGBT community and those with mental health conditions.[2] Additionally, lower-income populations have less access to health care, making it more likely that they are diagnosed at later stages of diseases and conditions.[3] Quitting smoking can add up to 10 years to life expectancy.[4] The health benefits of quitting smoking include reducing the risk of heart attack and stroke, improving lung function and lowering the chances of getting an array of different cancers.[5],[6] Even if you just join the Smokeout for 24 hours, you will prove to yourself you have the power to quit, said Claudia Blackburn,Florida Department of Health in Leon County Health Officer. If you can stretch your personal participation in the Great American Smokeout to weeks, months, and years, youll have made an essential commitment to yourself, your family, and your community the rest of your life. Information on the history of the Great American Smokeout, national activities to support quitting and other materials can be found at https://www.cancer.org/healthy/stay-away-from-tobacco/great-american-smokeout.html. Tobacco Free Floridas quit tips, tools and more are available by visiting www.TobaccoFreeFlorida.com or by calling 1-877-U-CAN-NOW (1-877-822-6669). Submitted by: Pamela Saulsby | Public Information Officer ### About Tobacco Free Florida The Florida Department of Healths Tobacco Free Florida campaign is a statewide cessation and prevention campaign funded by Floridas tobacco settlement fund. Since the program began in 2007, more than 254,000 Floridians have successfully quit using one of Tobacco Free Florida's free tools and services. There are now approximately 451,000 fewer adult smokers in Florida than there was 10 years ago, and the state has saved $17.7 billion in health care costs.[7] To learn more about Tobacco Free Floridas Quit Your Way services, visit www.TobaccoFreeFlorida.com or follow the campaign on Facebook at www.facebook.com/TobaccoFreeFlorida or on Twitter at www.twitter.com/tobaccofreefla. [1] "History of the Great American Smokeout." American Cancer Society. https://www.cancer.org/healthy/stay-away-from-tobacco/great-american-smokeout/history-of-the-great-american-smokeout.html. [accessed 10 August 2020.] [2] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Best Practices User Guide: Health Equity in Tobacco Prevention and Control. Atlanta: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2015.[Accessed 2021 September 21] [3] Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. Tobacco and Socioeconomic Status [PDF56.2 KB]pdf iconexternal icon. Washington, D.C.: Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, 2015 [Accessed 2021 September 21] [4] U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The Health Consequences of Smoking50 Years of Progress: A Report of the Surgeon General. Atlanta: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2014. [accessed 10 August 2020.] [5] U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (USDHHS). (2014). Let's Make the Next Generation Tobacco-Free: Your Guide to the 50th Anniversary Surgeon General's Report on Smoking and Health (Consumer Booklet). Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health. [accessed 10 August 2020.] [6] U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A Report of the Surgeon General. How Tobacco Smoke Causes Disease: What It Means to You. Atlanta: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2010 [accessed 2020 August 10]. [7]Mann, Nathan M, Nonnemaker, James M., Thompson, Jesse. "Smoking-Attributable Health Care Costs in Florida and Potential Health Care Cost Savings Associated with Reductions in Adult Smoking Prevalence." 2016. Al-Jazeeras Khartoum bureau chief, Sudanese Al-Moussalami al-Kabbachi, was released on Tuesday, the Qatari channel announced, while hundreds of arrests have taken place since the October 25 coup in this East African country. Arrested on Sunday at his home, Mr. Kabbachi had been transferred to prison even though the prosecutors office had ordered his release, according to Al-Jazeera, before finally being released on Tuesday. The army has not yet announced the reason for his detention, the satellite TV station said, while the editor of the armys daily newspaper accused him on Tuesday of publishing false information and old videos and inviting hostile personalities to sow discord. Khartoum had already closed the office of Al Jazeera and withdrawn the accreditation of its journalists in 2019, the year in which the army deposed the dictator Omar al-Bashir under the pressure of a popular revolt. The new government installed by General Abdelfattah al-Burhane regularly ignores court decisions. Prior to Mr. Kabbachis arrest, many journalists from the official media had been banned from returning to their posts. Private radio stations transmitters were also seized. Sudan ranks 159th out of 180 countries in the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. Saudi Arabia will initiate discussions with China for the development of the hydrogen as the Gulf country envisagesto reach net zero by 2060. The cabinet, Arab New notes citing state-run news agency SPA, has delegated the Kingdoms Energy minister to discuss and sign a potential Memorandum of Understanding in the field of hydrogen energy with China. It is unclear when the discussion will begin but the move is line with the kingdoms plans to reduce to reach net zero by 2060, without diminishing its position as the worlds leading oil producer. Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman, the facto leader, has pledged to $187 billion in climate action this decade, Arab News notes. Saudi Arabia is joining the race of hydrogen development in the region for energy transition. Early this month, the UAE announced it aims to capture 25 percent of the global hydrogen fuel market by 2030. The Arab country also indicated that it was implementing more than seven ambitious hydrogen projects, targeting main export markets including Japan, South Korea, Germany and India, in addition to other markets in Europe and East Asia. Hydrogen is derived through water electrolysis, which uses electricity to split water molecules into oxygen and hydrogen, according to experts. Green hydrogen is also produced using renewable energy sources such as solar and wind to drive the chemical reaction, without emitting carbon byproducts. According to a press release published by the government of the UK on November 16, 2021, an Intergovernmental Framework Agreement was signed in London. This document continues to progress on joint projects to develop the capabilities of the Naval Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as agreed in June when the UK, Ukraine, and industry signed a Memorandum of Implementation to collaborate to boost Ukraines naval capabilities. Follow Navy Recognition on Google News at this link Sandown class minehunter HMS Blyth (Picture source: Royal Navy of Scotland) The agreement concerns two Sandown-class minehunters, eight Barzan-class fast attack craft, and a frigate. The Sandown class is a class of fifteen minehunters built primarily for the Royal Navy by Vosper Thornycroft. The Sandown class also serves with the Royal Saudi Navy and the Estonian Navy. The first vessel was commissioned into Royal Navy service on 9 June 1989 and all the British ships are named after coastal towns and cities. They have a secondary role as offshore patrol vessels. The Sandown Class is equipped with two underwater PAP 104 mk5 remote-controlled mine-disposal vehicles, supplied by Societe ECA. The vehicle is controlled via a 2,000 m fiber-optic cable. A lighting system, low light level black and white camera, and a color camera are fitted. The vehicle is also fitted with high-resolution sonar. The sensor data is transmitted back to the operations control center on the ship. The Barzan class is a class of 4 British-designed fast attack missile boats for the Qatari Emiri Navy, also known as Super Vita. Your browser does not support the video tag. When Royce Mann told his political science class he was running for office, some werent sure he was serious. With the citywide race now behind him, Mann plans to continue his efforts to engage and energize young voters. Photo courtesy of Mann. Royce Mann doesnt like to sit still. Days after he came up short in securing a spot in the runoff for a seat on the Atlanta Board of Education and after antibiotics conquered a nasty sore throat the Emory University sophomore was out canvassing for two Atlanta City Council candidates vying for wins in their runoffs later this month. He and his supporters are also taking steps toward forming a nonprofit to focus on reversing the trend of abysmal youth voter turnout at local elections. Recruiting the most engaged and passionate high school and college-aged people to run for office, such as school boards, would also be a priority for the new group. We want to energize those new voters around candidates their own age, Mann says. Were the future, but we are also the present, he continues. And if we want to create the best future for our generation and generations to come then we have to have young folks at the table. Mann, an Atlanta native and Atlanta Public Schools graduate, turned 20 five days before Election Day on Nov. 2. He took the semester off from Emory to focus on his campaign but is resuming classes in the spring. Talking to voters and participating in forums were energizing and educational, Mann says. The experience continues an already impressive journey of social and political activism. In 2016, as Black Lives Matters protesters marched in cities across the country, a video of Mann performing his slam poem White Boy Privilege went viral. He was 14, an eighth grader at The Paideia School, and was inspired to write the piece after taking a course called Class, Race and Gender. Dear everyone who isnt a middle or upper-class white boy, Im sorry, he says in the piece. I have started life on the top of the ladder while you were born on the first rung. The poem led to invitations to speak at conferences and serve on panels across the country, including an invitation to the Obama Foundation Summit. He met numerous accomplished organizers and political leaders who gave him confidence in his voice to spur change. He realized he and other young people could have an impact on their communities and the world. The biggest lie that adults have been telling us isn't about Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny, Mann says. It's that we have to wait to have political power and to really make change. If I could have any sort of impact with my words, then the possibilities were endless if I would put my actions behind them. Advocating for change Mann soon told his family he was done with private school. He wanted to finish his high school years at Grady High School. He was very specific about why he wanted to do so it was about diversity, says his mother, Sheri Mann Stewart. But Mann wasnt prepared for the segregation he saw when he entered the Midtown school. Despite the schools diversity, it was as if there were two different schools under one roof, most visible in the cafeteria during lunchtime, he says. I simultaneously fell in love with APS and fell desperately into this sense of feeling a responsibility to try and fix the things I saw, Mann says. He became involved in student government, started a chapter of Amnesty International and was appointed by the principal to be the student member of the local school governance panel. He helped lead the student movement to successfully rename Grady High School to what is now Midtown High School. He was a lead organizer of the Atlanta March for Our Lives rally. Mann interned with the Board of Education and was appointed to the school districts LGBTQ+ task force. He became heavily invested in finding a way to get APS student representation on the Board of Education and was also part of Georgias high-profile U.S. Senate races as co-founder of Students for Ossoff and Warnock. A model of whats possible Mann was not sure what college he wanted to attend and had offers from other universities across the country. He chose to stay in his hometown and go to Emory to study political science after being awarded the universitys prestigious Woodruff Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship. The bonus as an Emory student, he knew he would run for a seat on the Atlanta Board of Education on a platform of ending segregation, ensuring equity for all students and prioritizing culturally relevant curriculum. Mann garnered nearly 10,000 votes in the election. He finished fourth out of a field of five for the open, citywide seat. Turnout was disappointing, he acknowledges. But he says many young people reached out to him to tell him they were inspired by his campaign. He hasnt ruled out a future run for public office but is not sure politics is the direction he wants to take after he graduates from Emory. The values of community service and civic engagement are traits his parents have instilled in him, no matter what career path he may pursue, he explains. I'm definitely interested in the advocacy side of things and doing work with different nonprofit groups, he says. Public education is likely to remain a passion and teaching is a possibility. Its in public schools where he sees the best opportunities to address societys inequities. Education is the great equalizer, he says, quoting Horace Mann (no relation), the politician and education reformer who advocated for American public education in the 1800s. And it can be, but when we have students coming into the same school from really diverse parts of the city and then we continue to uphold these inequities by segregating students across racial and economic lines, its clearly not being the great equalizer. Michael Leo Owens, associate professor of political science, taught Mann in his Political Science 367 Urban Politics course. The students election loss was not surprising, Owens says, because voters tend to be biased against young people and running a citywide campaign is difficult for even the most experienced politicians. But Manns knowledge of and involvement in local politics is a rarity among undergraduates. When Mann announced over Zoom during class this spring that he was running for school board, Owens says he and the other students were unsure at first if he was serious. But, yes, he was for real, Owens says. Most undergraduates don't pay any attention to local politics. So to have a young adult make it very plain that they're serious about running for local office makes them an outlier. Edmund Goode is Manns primary academic advisor as part of the Emory College Woodruff Scholars Program. The fact that he chose Emory is actually important because I think Atlanta really matters to him, Goode says. It is a theme that just sort of threads its way through everything he does. He knows Mann is disappointed he didnt win the election, but as an educator, Goode believes Manns willingness to put himself out there will contribute to his success and will impress upon his peers that they can also become involved to make change. The courageousness of what he did, the boldness, this is what we saw in Royce, Goode says. He is a model of what's possible. He is part of this programs legacy of creating a better community. Decrease Font Size Font Size Increase Font Size Article body The right educator, offering the right guidance at the right time, can be a transformative figure in the lives of college students, and Jennifer Robinson has committed herself to being that type of difference-maker at Auburn University. The Alumni professor from the Department of Psychological Sciences in the College of Liberal Arts is adored by her students, whom she provides with knowledge through top-flight instruction, experience-driven advice from a caring heart and the foundation for successful careers after graduation. For her commitment to her students, her dedication to life-changing research and service to military veterans, Robinson has been selected to receive the Gerald and Emily Leischuck Endowed Presidential Awards for Excellence in Teaching. Gerald and the late Emily Leischuck, 1964 graduates and retired Auburn University administrators, created the Endowed Presidential Awards for Excellence in Teaching in 2005 to recognize two full-time, tenured faculty members who have demonstrated effective and innovative teaching methods, along with a continuing commitment to student success through advising and mentoring. Robinson was selected for this years distinction and a $10,000 prize along with Paul Holley, professor and director of the Center for Construction Innovation and Collaboration in the College of Architecture, Design and Constructions McWhorter School of Building Science. The special honor has been motivational for Robinson, not only personally, but to urge other professors to put themselves out there for similar distinctions. I think its an incredibly special honor when your students feel that strongly and highly of your investment in them, said Robinson, an Auburn professor since 2012. Its also nice to get recognition as a faculty member. I hope that some day Ill be able to provide that same kind of recognition or a similar mechanism for faculty, because I think its really important. Im so grateful to the Leischucks for providing such a distinguished award. You feel a sense of responsibility to usher forward the same mission that got you where you are and to also just encourage other faculty who are doing amazing things to apply for Auburns faculty awards. I do feel like there is a responsibility that comes with this type of recognition to continue teaching at the highest level and try to be both inspirational and motivational. I think in the last year, weve really been tested to keep the classroom, which can sometimes be a computer screen, engaging. Robinsonwho earned masters and doctoral degrees in experimental psychology from Case Western Reserve University in Clevelandteaches both undergraduate and graduate students. Her classes range from cognitive neuroscience and introduction to psychology to research methods in psychology, and she is heavily involved with the Auburn University MRI Research Center. An inherent passion for the work, as well as a love for the students, is what drives Robinson. Auburn is just such a special place, said Robinson, who holds appointments in the School of Kinesiology and Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. I love what I do, so, that is very helpful. I think when you are doing things that you love, it intertwines with your regular life. So, Im sure my work-life balance is a little off, but I also find a lot of joy in what Im doing, so, its soul-filling. It really is a pleasure, and honestly, my students are phenomenal. My graduate students make life a lot easier on me, and they pick up that it takes a village to accomplish anything. They are kind, brilliant and hard-working team players, and Ive found that when you surround yourself with really great people, great things happen. Mentoring as a methodology Robinson remembers what its like to be a college student, including one who may not be sure about where their path may lead. I thought for sure I knew what I wanted to do until I was a year away from graduating and found something else I was way more interested in, she said. I was like, Oh, shoot, now what? Helping her students not only learn the material, but also have the light bulb moment is a thrill for Robinson. I think thats the beauty of this career, that you get to see those moments regularly, and not many people have a career where you get that constant reinforcement, said Robinson, the 2017 Psi Chi International Honor Society Teacher of the Year. Theres nothing really like it to see that light bulb go off or even see them go off into a field because they found inspiration in your class. Helping them find their passion is pretty special. Robinson is no stranger to lofty honors, winning the 2020 College of Liberal Arts Teaching Excellence Award and the 2019 Alumni Excellence in Teaching Award. She takes her role as a mentor seriously and thinks about the emotions of students parents who may be trepidatious about their children leaving the nest for college life. I have these young adults who are at such an awesome time in their life, and theyre very vulnerable and malleable, and theyre trying to figure things out, said Robinson, who serves on the Auburn Graduation Committee, the College of Liberal Arts Budget Committee and the Auburn Institutional Review Board. Its such an honor to be a part of that journey, and to get to share that time with them. Then I think from the parent side, the parents are letting go of their kids for the first time into a new environment where theyre trying to figure out life. We have the honor of taking that position to a degree and being mentors and trying to help them navigate that next step which sets the foundation for the rest of their life. To me, that is such a tremendous honor. Robinson has spearheaded the Auburn University Brain Camp, or AUBC, for high school students since 2013 and provides opportunities for students to learn about functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, and psychophysiology as part of their curriculum. She promotes an engaging and welcoming atmosphere in class and the laboratory, committing herself to four key qualities of emphasiscommitment, enthusiasm, respect and scholarship. Her students know Robinson cares about them and has their best interests at heart. In the classroom, Dr. Robinson epitomizes what is expected of educators at the collegiate level, wrote Kate Conkey, an Auburn doctoral candidate and active-duty colonel in the U.S. Army who was a student of Robinsons, in a recommendation letter. Intelligent, informed and personable, Dr. Robinson connects easily with students and creates a classroom where students are engaged and enjoy learning. Her passion for education and dedication to student development is an undeniable asset to Auburn University. Cutting-edge research changing lives Robinson runs the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, or CAN Lab, participates in the Human Brain Mapping Mentor Program and directs the Cognitive and Behavioral Sciences, or CaBS, doctoral program. She uses those endeavors to further research about the brain, examining how different regions are interconnected and relating her findings to topics like post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Robinsons research uses fMRI and psychophysiological techniques to investigate the interplay of emotions and cognitive thought, and her lab is one of the only labs in the world to combine these technologies. I dont know of any university Ive been at that makes imaging and scanners so accessible to students, said Robinson, who has published more than 50 peer-reviewed articles and contributed to two books. Auburn is very unique in that the Auburn University MRI Research Center, housed in the [Ginn] College of Engineering under the direction of Tom Denney, is so gracious and generous about allowing us to use the scanner for teaching, and obviously, for research. Having the opportunity to show students the magnificence of their own brain is a powerful teaching and learning tool. To be able to say, Every thought that youve had, every memory, every personality trait is housed in this small organ in your head. And we can take a picture of that in a couple of minutes, and we can see how it works. Robinson, who serves as associate editor of Frontiers Brain Imaging Methods journal and has been a grant reviewer for the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, has long been fascinated by the brain. Everything comes from that command center, said Robinson, who won the 2016 Presidents Outstanding Collaborative Units Award for a neuroscience partnership with seven other professors. I think giving students an appreciation for just how important that is and how unique that organ is compared to all the others is important. Its fascinating how impressive our brains are. Ive always been interested in the mind-body connection, and just how much of our mental health can affect our physical health. So, I was always interested in medicine and making peoples lives better. I have a servants heart, and helping others brings me a lot of joy. Through her research, Robinson hopes to advance science and learn more about the brain. We dont know enough about the brain, so I think inspiring the future generations of neuroscientists and getting folks interested in the brain is crucial, said Robinson, who has been awarded more than $300,000 in grants the last five years. We dont have a cure for almost all neurological or psychiatric conditions. We have treatments that can slow progression, but we really dont have cures. So, Im hoping that this new generation will be able to usher in a new age of medicine. A service to those who serve Her servants heart has carried over into the military realm. Robinson works routinely with the Veterans Resource Center, from obtaining grants to helping veterans deal with PTSD. Theres always been a very special place in my heart for folks who have fought for our country and given me opportunities that most dont get, said Robinson, the 2019 Veterans Advocate Award recipient from the Auburn Student Veterans Association. Unfortunately, women dont get opportunities to go and get Ph.D.s everywhere in the world. I think sometimes we forget just how privileged we are to live in the United States, and I dont think we have done a terribly awesome job of taking care of veterans when they come back home from war. Post-traumatic stress disorder is just tough to deal with in general because its so complex and so different. I never wore a uniform, but I feel like this is the way I can give back in that capacity, to try and help on the back end of things. I guess the goal of most research is to learn so you can apply it to practical things to make peoples lives better. An environment in which to thrive Robinson is invigorated by being part of a team of elite faculty in the Department of Psychological Sciences. Psychological Sciences has some pretty phenomenal educators who balance everything really, really well, she said. I think being surrounded by faculty who have figured out how to be successful educators and researchers who are willing to mentor junior colleagues creates a culture of excellence. An Auburn resident for nearly a decade, the Ohio native has a special place in her heart for the Plains. Its been a dream come true and so fun, Robinson said. Its not just that Im blessed to be in a career that I love, but the Auburn community is extraordinary. Its a vibrant community, really. I love my hometown of Lakewood, Ohio. It set the bar very high, but Auburn does a really good job of making me feel at home. I love it here. MoU aimed at exploring long-term business opportunities and sharing knowledge The Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX) has signed a strategic Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) aimed at exploring long-term business opportunities and exchanging information, with S & Royal Group Mongolia, a Mongolian-based investment firm involved in industries such as energy, infrastructure, foreign trade and construction. Under the MoU, both organisations will establish a long-term business relationship which includes exchanging expert knowledge, opinions and ideas on potential business prospects, as well as explore the possibility of importing and exporting goods between UAE and Mongolia. S & Royal Group will also explore becoming a permanent member of DGCX and the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC). Les Male, CEO of DGCX, said: Mongolia is a land that is rich in natural resources and potentially lucrative opportunities, and this MoU with S & Royal Group Mongolia - a leading investment of the country - is aligned with our goal of fostering greater cross-border collaboration and enhancing our knowledge base. The potential benefits of this agreement are vast, and we see this MoU as merely the first step in a long and beneficial relationship. Serjbudee Dolgorsuren, president of S & Royal Group Mongolia, said: We are delighted to partner with the DGCX. Mongolia and the UAE have a rich, historical relationship that dates back a quarter of a century. Our companys ambition is to become a gateway to the Mongolian market as well as support the country as a major hub for the whole Central Asia region. We look forward to a fruitful and mutually beneficial cooperation with the DGCX. The MoU agreement comes after the UAE and Mongolia recently celebrated 25 years of diplomatic relations, as well as the announcement that Mongolia plans to open an embassy in Abu Dhabi.Established in 2004, S & Royal Group currently owns and manages a portfolio of four sister companies including Yokohoma Tire Mongolia, Gas Service Corporation of Mongolia, Royal Electric Corporation, and Royal Infrastructure Development which are all collectively aimed at implementing long-term strategic projects that will make a significant contribution to Mongolian economic development. business@khaleejtimes.com Welcome Guest! You Are Here: The 11-year-old Shanghai Phil gelding Champagne Phil fired off a pocket ride to secure a trip to the winners circle in the $10,000 Horses & Geldings Preferred 3 Pace on Tuesday (Nov. 16) at The Raceway at Western Fair District. Driver Natasha Day settled the Kenneth Oliver trainee behind pacesetter JKNR Liketell, who set an uncontested clip of :28.2, :58.2 and 1:27. Jaydens Place attempted a first-over bid out of fourth passing the half, but stalled up the backside with Homey Joe in tow from second over. JKNR Liketell cruised around the final turn while Champagne Phil continued to loom on his back. And once around the corner, Champagne Phil charged after JKNR Liketell and powered through to a half-length victory over the favourite in 1:56. Homey Joe rallied for third, another four lengths behind, while Mo Bettor took fourth. Owned by ICR Racing, Champagne Phil won his sixth race from 21 starts this season and his 49th from 246 overall, pushing his earnings to $632,651. He paid $10.70 to win. To view Tuesday's harness racing results, click on the following link: Tuesday Results - Western Fair Raceway. Trotting freshmen competed in the second leg of their Delaware Standardbred Breeders Fund series on Tuesday (Nov. 16) at Dover Downs, with the five $20,000 preliminary events two for fillies, three for colts and geldings establishing the finalists for the $100,000 dashes next Tuesday (Nov. 23). Our Last Penny completed a sweep of her preliminary events with a 2:02.3 score in the first filly division over Just Pump It and Giant Arbitration. Trainer-driver Rod Allen owns and bred the daughter of CR Commando and CR Penny Lane. Shes All Woman captured the second split in a lifetime-best 2:00. Jared Moyer steered Anders Bluestone-Wark Woman filly for trainer John Wagner and owner-breeder Pamela Wagner. Miss Timber Wolf finished second and Xactly What I Want took third via disqualification. Shes All Woman winning her DSBF preliminary Shes All Woman winning her DSBF preliminary Among the trotting males, Rivers took top honours with a 1:57.4 score in the first division in line to Corey Callahan. The son of Anders Bluestone and Stargazer Lily, trained by Nicholas Callahan for Stuart Chambers Racing, Divine Horse Racing, Cinbrew Enterprises and BCJM Inc., defeated LGs Reed O Wen and Tua. The Callahan and ownership team came back in another division to win with Wolfpack Russ, a Winbak Farm-bred son of Glidemaster and Emilys Ego who defeated JAS Bluestone and Canoe Trip to take a mark of 2:00.1 in the final colt and gelding division. Wolfpack Russ winning his DSBF preliminary Wolfpack Russ winning his DSBF preliminary Navy Blue took a lifetime record in the second colt and gelding division, defeating Big Daddy D and Brief Legacy in 1:58.4. Trainer-driver Art Stafford Jr. co-owns the son of Anders Bluestone and Overnight Hit with Wyatt Starkey. Northern Express upset the heavy favourite Morairtime in Tuesday's $25,000 Open Handicap Trot. Northern Express and driver Russell Foster cut fractions of :27.4, :58, and 1:26.4. Morairtime, the 1-5 publics choice in the wagering, and driver Jack Parker Jr. pulled from the pocket to challenge Northern Express nearing the three-quarter pole. The two trotters dueled gamely in the stretch, however, Northern Express prevailed to win by a half-length in 1:54.1 and paid $9.60 for the win. Morairtime finished second and Great Unknown finished third. Northern Express (Muscle Massive) is owned and trained by Arty Foster Jr. The $35,000 Progress Pace elimination highlights the Wednesday card. Ten three-year-old colt and gelding pacers go postward. The top eight in the official order of finish will qualify for the $310,000 final on November 24. Two-year-old pacing fillies will also contest their second leg of the DSBF series on Wednesdays program. Post time is 4:30 p.m. (EST). (DSBF & Dover Downs) By Trend The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) stands ready to help Azerbaijan boost investment in the green economy, Kamola Makhmudova, EBRD head in Azerbaijan, said in an exclusive interview with Trend. "The government of Azerbaijan has made a strategic decision to develop its renewable energy sector. To that end, it has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 35 per cent and to producing 30 per cent of its total electricity generation from renewables by 2030, in line with the countrys commitments under the Paris Agreement. In order to support these objectives, the EBRD stands ready to help Azerbaijan boost investment in the green economy, as we see huge potential for the renewable energy sector and aim to make a real impact in this area," she said. Makhmudova noted that indeed, one of the EBRDs key priorities in its 2019-24 country strategy for Azerbaijan is to support a green economic transition. "As part of this strategy, the EBRD is prominently supporting the energy sector of Azerbaijan through a number of policy engagements, following a letter of intent signed with the Ministry of Energy in September 2017. The letter of intent focused on ways to foster the development of renewable energy and support market liberalisation through the establishment of an independent energy regulatory agency," said the EBRD country head. By Trend The Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA) held a foreign currency auction with the participation of the State Oil Fund (SOFAZ) on November 16, Trend reports via the CBA. According to the CBA, the demand of local banks for the foreign currency amounted to $90.1 million and was fully met. At the end of the auction, the weighted average rate of the manat to the US dollar amounted to 1.7 AZN/USD. The first foreign exchange auction for a long time was held with the participation of SOFAZ on March 10, 2020, during which Azerbaijani banks purchased $323.2 million. The CBA began to conduct currency auctions through a one-way sale of currency in a competitive environment from mid-January 2017. A decision was made in March 2020 to hold extraordinary currency auctions due to the increased demand of the population for foreign currency amid the failure of the OPEC + deal, which led to a sharp drop in oil prices. By Trend The Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan are holding a joint commission for road transport on 15 and 16 November 2021 in Baku. Javad Hedayati, the head of the Road Maintenance and Transport Organization (RMTO) in Iran, is heading Iran's delegation to Baku to discuss the facilitation of road traffics and removing barriers against bilateral trade between the two countries. Iran and Azerbaijan have 4 formal border crossings along a 750 km-long border that makes it a unique opportunity for mutual cooperation, added Hedayati. North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC) is an important common ground for regional cooperation. In this sense, Iran is seeking ways for further road traffics to link the Persian Gulf to the Black Sea, he stated. Anar Rzayev, the head of the State Road Transport Service of Azerbaijan Republic, also emphasized transport collaborations between the two countries and pointed to the long-lasting relationships and numerous commonalities that ease future cooperation. The commercial transactions between Iran and Azerbaijan had been increasing during the last 10 months, but the officials are dissatisfied with the $340 million volume of trade as they believe it should be further expanded. By Trend Cooperation between Russia and Azerbaijan in the field of the agro-industrial complex is progressively developing in all major areas, the Ministry of Agriculture of Russia told Trend on October 19. According to the ministry, Azerbaijan is the most important strategic partner of Russia and is one of the largest buyers of domestic agricultural products. The ministry noted that the main platform for discussing topical issues of interaction in this area is the Russian-Azerbaijani working group on cooperation in the field of agriculture. "At present, our ministry is considering the issue of sending a representative of the Russian Ministry of Agriculture to Azerbaijan in order to intensify bilateral cooperation in the agricultural sector," the ministry said. By Trend The Board Chairman of the Independent Industrialists and Businessmens Association of Turkey (MUSIAD) Mahmut Asmali and the head of the department for diplomatic relations of the association, Osman Nuri Onugoren, shared their impressions from the 25th International Business Forum (IBF), recently held in Baku, within Trend's video project "Relevant with Sahil Karimli". The Turkish guests also talked about the great interest that businessmen from various countries show to Azerbaijan, the desire of hundreds of businessmen to invest in Azerbaijan, the strengthening of mutual trade ties, and future goals. The forum was attended by 550 businessmen from 30 countries. For the first time, the event in Azerbaijan brought together such a number of business representatives. It was organized by the Small and Medium Business Development Agency of Azerbaijan (SMBDA) and MUSIAD with the aim of developing bilateral trade and economic relations between countries, creating models of sustainable cooperation, strengthening ties in the field of investment and business. The IBF Forum, founded in 1995 by MUSIAD and held once a year, organizes panel discussions, presentations, bilateral meetings and other events. Trend News Agency, Day.Az and the TURKIC.World media projects were the official media partners of the IBF. By Trend Azerbaijans Alat Free Economic Zone (FEZ) will be able to receive the first investors and businessmen, being ready to organize their activities there, by the middle of 2022, the board chairman of the authorized structure of the Alat FEZ Valeh Alasgarov said, Trend reports on Nov. 17. Alasgarov made the remark during a business mission of Russian companies for the development of the "Smart City" urban infrastructure in Baku. "At the next stage, its planned to expand the territory of the Alat FEZ and create new opportunities for businessmen," he noted. Speaking about the conditions created in the free economic zone, the board chairman said that there are no more attractive conditions for doing business anywhere in the world. "A distinctive feature of the Alat FEZ is that there businessmen are exempted from all types of payments on permanent basis. Besides, our legal framework envisages the exclusion of all potential risks for the businessmen. The framework prevails being the main basis for doing business in the FEZ," he added. Alasgarov also stressed that government agencies dont interfere with the activities of the FEZ, either request any information about the companies. "All business procedures, issuance of licenses, registration of companies, and others are carried out exclusively on the territory of the Alat FEZ by its authorities. We also exempt businessmen from taxes and payments on imported and exported goods," concluded the official. By Azernews By Laman Ismayilova Over 400 dancers from Agjabadi, Ganja, Shaki, Baku and Aghdam have gathered at Karabakh Open Dance Cup 2021 to show their best in choreography art. The final night was held in Aghdam's Guzanli village. The dancers performed in various dance types, including classical, modern, acrobatic, folk, Indian dance and stylization of folklore (author's dance). The event was co-organized by the Azerbaijan Dance Association and the Youth Union. Speaking about the dance cup, president of the Azerbaijan Dance Association Aziz Azizov noted that there was particular tension during the competition in formation dance category due to large teams. "To make a decision on this nomination, the judges had to take a technical break. The cup system does not imply the latter, third and other places. After a long discussion, the decision was made in favor of the Alov team (Baku) led by Emil Panakhov. However, Khamsa dance team (Ganja) was named best among ensembles (from 12 to 24 dancers)," said Azizov. The list of Karabakh Open Dance Cup 2021 winners included dance ensembles Alov, Ayan, Buta, Cimbeybi (Baku), Khamsa (Ganja), Turaj? (Agdam). In conclusion, he congratulated all professionals who focuses on development of the country's young talents in the region and those who contributes to the renovation of dance art in Azerbaijan. Media partners of the event are Azernews.az, Trend.az, Day.az, Milli.az By Trend The Azerbaijani draft state budget for 2022 was discussed in the first reading of the plenary session of the Azerbaijani parliament on November 16, Trend reports. Following the discussions, the document was put to a vote and adopted in the first reading. The discussions of the draft state budget will continue in the parliament on Nov. 17. The revenues of the Azerbaijani state budget next year, according to the official forecasts, will reach about 26.8 billion manat ($15.8 billion), increase of 5.4 percent compared to 2021. At the same time, state budget expenditures are planned to reach 29.9 billion manat ($17.6 billion) next year, which is by 4.7 percent more than this year. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov Azerbaijan marks National Revival Day on November 17. Starting from early 1988 Armenia waged its open aggression against Azerbaijan. The anti-Azerbaijan rhetoric and activities gained momentum across Armenia and in Azerbaijans Khankandi city mostly populated by Armenians. As a result of Moscow's indifference to these events, Armenians began widespread deportations of Azerbaijanis from their ancestral lands in Armenia under the instruction of its government. Over 200,000 ethnic Azerbaijanis living in Armenia were forced to leave their native lands and several thousand of them were subjected to mass slaughter by Armenians. The Soviet leadership under Mikhail Gorbachev did not adequately react to the Armenian vandalism against innocent Azerbaijanis. In February 1988, Armenians living in Azerbaijan's historical Karabakh region staged revolts and even proposed merging the region to Armenia. In response to the processes in Armenia and Karabakh, the Azerbaijanis expressed their protest to the government, which failed to take effective measures against Armenian aggression. Initially, the slogans, photographs, and banners carried by Azerbaijani civilians at the period demonstrated their faith in Moscow and local authorities. People from all around the republic came to Baku and congregated on Azadlig Square (former Lenin Square at the time), conducted rallies, and clearly showed their dissatisfaction after receiving no real response from Moscow and the local Soviet administration. On November 17, 1988, Azerbaijani citizens began an infinite mass demonstration on Azadlig Square against the USSR's anti-Azerbaijani policy. It was a genuine national liberation struggle. On 22 November, a curfew was imposed in Baku, and contingents of Soviet army divisions, together with Internal Troops and the Militia, began to be deployed to the city, with the local units activated to prevent protest actions. On December 3, protesters were dispersed by force and approximately 400 people were arrested. In Azerbaijan, these events are seen as the beginning of the national liberation movement and the main factor in gaining the country's independence. As a result, Azerbaijan became an independent state in 1991 just three years after the historic demonstrations. Since 1992, November 17 has been marked as National Revival Day in Azerbaijan. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov Azerbaijani and German military legal experts have discussed military legislation at a meeting in Baku, the Defence Ministry reported on November 15. The meeting was held under the annual military cooperation plan signed between the Azerbaijani and German defence ministries, the report added. As a part of the meeting dedicated to military law, the experts exchanged views on matters such as mutual exchange of experience in the military legislation sphere, as well as issues of administrative execution and carrying out the line of duty investigation. The officials also focused on studying advanced practices for the activities of military lawyers and discussed other aspects. Germany recognized Azerbaijans independence on January 12, 1992, and diplomatic relations between the two countries were established on February 20, 1992. Azerbaijan opened its first embassy in Western Europe, in Germany on September 2, 1992. The countries have signed various agreements that cover different spheres of bilateral relations. The defence ministries of the two countries signed a document on military cooperation on March 9, 2006. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov The Military Prosecutors Office has launched criminal proceedings into the case of mine attack against Amys Maj-Gen Hikmat Hasanov, the Prosecutor-Generals Office reported on November 16. The case is under investigation under Azerbaijani Criminal Code Articles 29, 120.2.7 (attempted murder of two or more persons) and 29, 120.2.12 (attempted murder with national, racial, religious hatred or hostility), the report added. It should be noted that Hasanov was injured in an armored vehicle as a result of the mine explosion during his visit to liberated Aghdam region on November 20, 2020. Armenia deliberately and constantly laid mines on the Azerbaijani territories, in violation of the 1949 Geneva Convention, thereby being a major threat to regional peace, security and cooperation. Some 160 Azerbaijanis have been killed or injured in the explosion of mines planted by Armenians in Azerbaijans formerly occupied regions since the end of the war in autumn 2020 that saw Azerbaijan liberate most of its territories in and around the Nagorno-Karabakh region. On June 12, Azerbaijan handed over 15 Armenian prisoners in exchange for a map detailing the location of 97,000 mines in formerly-occupied Aghdam. On July 3, Armenia submitted to Azerbaijan maps of about 92,000 anti-tank and anti-personnel mines planted during the occupation of Fuzuli and Zangilan regions. In his interview to CNN Turk channel on August 14, President Ilham Aliyev said that the accuracy of the maps provided by Armenia at the latest stage is only 25 percent. Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a Russia-brokered peace agreement on November 10, 2020, to end 44 days of fighting and work toward a comprehensive resolution. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov Two Armenian citizens will stand trial in Azerbaijans Ganja city on terrorism charges, Trend reported on November 17. The preliminary investigation into the criminal case of terror suspects Sargsyan Ishkhan Ashot and Rafaelyan Vladimir Otari has been completed, the report added. According to the report, the criminal case materials were submitted for consideration to the Ganja Grave Crimes Court. Earlier, both Armenian citizens were reported to be charged under Article 214.2.3 (terrorism committed with the use of firearms and objects used as weapons) of Azerbaijans Criminal Code. Prime Minister Ali Asadov earlier said that Azerbaijan and Armenia exchanged 122 servicemen and detainees with the participation of Russian peacekeepers from December 2020. Asadov underlined that Azerbaijan fully complies with the paragraphs of the trilateral ceasefire deal signed by Baku, Moscow and Yerevan in November 2020, which also envisaged the transfer of detained servicemen. "With the participation of Russian peacekeepers, a total of 122 servicemen and detainees have been returned since December 22, 2020. Of these, 105 returned to Armenia and 17 to Azerbaijan," the prime minister said. Referring to the 62 Armenian servicemen who were detained on the Azerbaijani territory after the signing of a trilateral statement, Asadov stressed that "according to all international laws they are not considered prisoners of war. "They were detained after the war, entered our territory with a subversive purpose, and the status as prisoners of war does not apply to them. However, Azerbaijan returned 29 of them to the Armenian side. Thirty-three of this group were convicted by our courts and will be held responsible," he added. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov The Military Prosecutors Office has launched criminal proceedings against the latest Armenian provocations on the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border, the Prosecutor Generals Office reported on November 17. The criminal proceedings were initiated under Azerbaijani Criminal Code Articles 120.2.12 (murder motivated by national, racial, religious hatred or enmity) and 29, 120.2.12 (attempted murder motivated by national, racial, religious hatred or enmity), the report added. The prosecutor's office of the Republic of Azerbaijan carries out the necessary documentation and collects evidence in order to ensure that servicemen of the Armenian armed forces who have committed various crimes are brought to justice and punished in accordance with international law, the Prosecutor-General's Office said. It added that on November 16, under their military and political leadership's instructions, the Armenian armed forces shelled the Azerbaijani army positions in Kalbajar and Lachin regions in violation of the terms of the trilateral declaration signed by Baku, Moscow and Yerevan on November 10, 2020, as well as fundamental norms and principles of international law. As a result of measures taken by the Azerbaijani armed forces, the provocation committed by Armenia on the state border was prevented. However, seven Azerbaijani servicemen - Umud Niftaliyev, Orkhan Jabbarov, Natig Aliyev, Elchin Aghayev, Emin Alizade, Elchin Aliyev and Murad Khalilov were killed and 10 were wounded. On November 17, the Azerbaijani Defence Ministry stressed that the Armenian military-political leadership bears the entire responsibility for the tension and confrontation that arose on the state border of the two countries. By Trend The Council of Europe expresses concern over the incidents on the border between Azerbaijan and Armenia, Trend reports on Nov. 17 referring to the statement of Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Marija Pej?inovi? Buri?. I am concerned about reports of on-going incidents between Armenia and Azerbaijan that have already cost human lives, Buri? said. News of a ceasefire is welcome and I call on both sides to maintain it. When joining our organization more than twenty years ago, both Armenia and Azerbaijan committed themselves to solving conflict by peaceful means, Secretary General added. This commitment remains unchanged and must be strictly respected. We stand ready to facilitate dialogue between these two member states, with a view to building confidence and promoting reconciliation, Buri? said. Seven servicemen of the Azerbaijani army were killed and 10 were wounded as a result of the military provocation committed by Armenia on November 16 on the state border with Azerbaijan. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has signed a decree on measures to improve the material and technical supply of the housing and communal services of the city of Baku on November 17. According to the decree, in order to provide communal equipment for the housing and communal services of the Executive Power of Baku city, 18.8 million manat ($11 million) were allocated from the reserve fund of the President of Azerbaijan envisioned in the state budget for 2021 to the Executive Power of Baku. The Finance Ministry was instructed to provide funding in the amount specified in this decree, and the Cabinet of Ministers - to resolve issues arising from it. By Azernews By Vugar Khalilov Azerbaijani Security Council Secretary Ramil Usubov has attended a meeting of secretaries of the CIS countries' security councils held in Moscow, Trend reported on November 17. The participants discussed national, regional and international security issues at the meeting, the report added. Addressing the event, Russian Security Council Chairman Nikolai Patrushev urged the CIS countries to develop new biological safety rules amid the emergence of new infections and the development of genetic engineering. Furthermore, problems such as biological threats, challenges in the information sphere, issues related to artificial intelligence, and its role in ensuring national security were discussed during the meeting. The video conference meeting of the heads of the Security Councils of the CIS countries was held in 2020. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was founded in 1991 after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Meetings are held periodically on a rotating basis at the CIS countries capitals. An informal summit was held in Sochi, Russia in July 2001. Forums include the Council of Heads of State, the Council of Prime Ministers, and the Council of Foreign Ministers. The CIS performs its activities on the basis of the Charter, adopted by the Council of Heads of States on 22 January 1993, which stipulates the goals and principles of the Commonwealth, and the rights and obligations of the countries. The Charter states that the Commonwealth was formed on the basis of sovereign equality of all its members and that the Member States were independent and equal subjects under international law. The Charter also states that the CIS serves the development and strengthening of friendship, inter-ethnic accord, trust, mutual understanding, and cooperation between States. The Commonwealth does not have supranational powers. Countries interaction within the CIS is accomplished through its coordinating institutions: the Council of Heads of State, the Council of Heads of Government, the Councils of Foreign Ministers, Defense Ministers, Border Troops Commanders, the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, the Executive Committee, and the Interstate Economic Committee of the Economic Union. The Collective Security Council adopted documents such as the Collective Security Concept, the Declaration by the Collective Security Treaty States, and the Basic Guidelines for Deepening Military Cooperation among the Collective Security Treaty States. By Trend We want to translate our cooperation with the Prosecutor General's Office of Azerbaijan into a practical track, the chairman of the Investigative Committee of Belarus Dmitry Gora said to reporters during his visit to Baku, Trend reports. According to Gora, a memorandum of cooperation was signed in Baku between the Institute of the Investigative Committee of Belarus and the Scientific Center of the General Prosecutor's Office of Azerbaijan on November 16. Specific areas of scientific, in particular educational, activities were worked out yesterday. In this context, the General Prosecutor's Office of Azerbaijan has a very rich experience. All this experience, this knowledge must be passed on to our investigators. The future of our departments depends on this. This is the key to successful work, he said. The chairman of the Investigative Committee of Belarus also noted that the memorandum defines the main directions, the main approaches in the scientific and educational spheres. All other issues are resolved in working order. During this visit, so far, we have already held, we can say, informal negotiations, where we come to concrete forms and methods of training our specialists. We exchange experience in many areas, including scientific literature and scientific developments," Gora said. In addition, Gora emphasized the existing prospects for cooperation of the Investigative Committee of Belarus both in general with the General Prosecutor's Office of Azerbaijan, and in the direction of the study of specific criminal cases. "Now crime is acquiring an international character, but what worries us in the first place is cybercrime, i.e. high-tech crime. I think that we will cooperate and develop further interaction in this direction," he said. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev sent congratulation to the Sultan of Oman - Haitham bin Tariq Al Said, Azertag reported on November 17. "I convey my sincerest congratulations and best wishes to you and through you, to your people on my own behalf and on behalf of the people of Azerbaijan on the occasion of the national holiday of the Sultanate of Oman," the president said. "I believe that the Azerbaijan-Oman relations will continue to evolve and our collaboration will expand within international institutions, and particularly in the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the Non-Aligned Movement. On this festive day, I wish you strong health, success in your activities, and everlasting peace and prosperity to the friendly people of Oman," the head of state wrote. By Trend Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan has appointed a new defense minister - fourth during his four-year ruling as Armenia's Prime Minister. Suren Papikyan has been appointed the new Defense Minister, with his predecessor being Arshak Karapetyan. "Arshak Karapetyan was remembered for his provocative actions, his illegal trips to the Azerbaijani lands liberated from the Armenian occupation and provocations against Azerbaijani servicemen in Lachin district and the recent aggravation of the situation, Azerbaijani MP, political analyst Rasim Musabayov told Trend. He said that the frequent appointment in the Armenian Ministry of Defense and the Foreign Ministry shows that Pashinyans regime cannot properly regulate power. Karapetyan committed many provocative actions, all this was a problem for Pashinyan, Musabayov added. I think that Russia did not like such behavior of Karapetyan. The Azerbaijani MP said that all these factors forced Pashinyan to appoint new people in the defense ministry. It is difficult to say how well the new minister will be able to control the situation, Musabayov said. This will depend on his skills, willpower, Pashinyans support, including an assessment of the real situation and adequate behavior. Military expert Adalat Valiyev told Trend that the dismissal of Karapetyan is connected with the tough position of the Azerbaijani side after his illegal visit to Karabakh region on November 6-8. It is known that after the victory in the second Karabakh war, two high-ranking Armenian officials, namely, ex-foreign minister Ara Ayvazyan and ex-defense minister Arshak Karapetyan visited Karabakh region, Valiyev said. He added that the fact that after these illegal trips, both were immediately dismissed from their posts, openly demonstrates Pashinyans position in connection with trips to Karabakh region. Valiyev noted that the fact that the current minister of defense is a civilian rather than a military man shows that Pashinyan has no choice. New Minister of Defense Suren Papikyan was appointed Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure of Armenia three months ago, Valiyev said. He was a peaceful official. The expert said that apparently, Pashinyan has no other option but to appoint a civilian to this position because the Armenian military elite consisting of 60 people signed an appeal against Pashinyan. The appointment of one of the generals who signed this appeal would mean Pashinyans defeat in front of the military elite, Valiyev said. According to the Armenian media, new Armenian Minister of Defense Suren Papikyan taught history in one of Yerevans schools in 2010-2016. Moreover, Papikyan, known as the "asphalt tycoon", has a criminal record. A criminal case was filed against him for stabbing a commander while serving in the army. Suren Papikyan, found guilty of a criminal act, was imprisoned for 2 years and 3 months on March 27, 2006. He was released as part of amnesty on February 23, 2007. By Trend The subsistence minimum for 2022 has been approved in Azerbaijan, Trend reports on Nov. 17. This issue was discussed at the session of the Azerbaijani parliament. So, the subsistence minimum for next year for the country was set at 210 manat ($123.5), for the working-age population - 220 manat ($129.4), pensioners - 176 manat ($103.5), and for children - 193 manat ($113.5). By Trend It is necessary to amend the rules for the payment of tax by medical institutions in Azerbaijan, Azerbaijani MP Rashad Mahmudov proposed at the meeting of the Milli Mejlis (parliament), Trend reports on Nov. 17. According to Mahmudov, medical institutions in Azerbaijan operate in four different systems. "These are institutions operating under TABIB (Azerbaijani Management Union of Medical Territorial Units), institutions operating under the Ministry of Health, medical institutions operating under separate state structures, and private clinics. All of them are medical institutions, but their tax payment rules are different. It would be appropriate to consider eliminating the differences," MP said. The Saudi British Bank (SABB) and the Saudi Export-Import Bank (EXIM) have signed a documentary credit Insurance policy agreement. The agreement was signed during the 9th Annual Saudi Trade Finance Summit in Riyadh, by Saad Alkhalb, CEO of EXIM, and Tony Cripps, Managing Director of SABB, in the presence of Majed Najm, Deputy Managing Director, Corporate and Institutional Banking at SABB. The agreement will allow SABB to accept more documentary letters of credit and enhance its dealings with international banks issuing LCs, as insurance coverage contributes to increasing opportunities for Saudi products to enter new markets. In addition, the two banks inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to collaborate in developing export capabilities and facilities to their clients. Furthermore, SABB presented its views on developing the future of trade finance in Saudi Arabia at the 9th annual Saudi Trade Finance Summit. The summit, recognized as the most significant event in the trade finance sector in the Kingdom brings together CEOs, Group CFOs and Treasury heads and key government agencies. This year the theme was Resilience in Trade, Supply Chain, and Treasury Management. During the discussion sessions, David Leslie, General Manager of Global Trade and Receivable Finance at SABB, delivered a keynote presentation titled End-to-end digitization of trade finance in which he highlighted boosting efficiency, automation, and risk mitigation through technological innovations, underlining the importance of digitalization in accelerating growth in addition to leveraging block-chain based infrastructure to increase efficiency, reduce costs and open up new prospects in trade finance. SABB, as the leading Trade Finance bank in Saudi Arabia attended the summit as a platinum sponsor and provided ground breaking input on building financial resilience strategies, developing trade finance tools, as well as discussing laws and strategies that will contribute to the growth of the Saudi economy. TradeArabia News Service Saudi Ports Authority (Mawani) has announced the launch of a new control tower designed to support Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic)s operations at King Abdulaziz Port in Dammam. The control tower will be jointly managed by Mawani, Sabic, Saudi Global Ports Company (SGP), and Tabadul, reported Saudi Press Agency (SPA). Using latest technologies, the control tower regulates the entry of trucks to the port and monitors the loading of containers to drive improved efficiency throughout Sabics export operations. Its advanced capabilities include the ability to integrate into the port community system and be able to check for confirmation of all customs x-ray procedures and other related logistics processes in a seamless setup. The new control tower further enhances King Abdulaziz Ports efficiency by optimising its operations, ensuring the smooth flow of cargo, and achieving faster turnaround times, bringing a number of benefits to the ports key stakeholders. The launch comes as part of Mawanis continued efforts to develop world-class ports and logistics services in Saudi Arabia and transform the Kingdom into a unique logistics hub connecting continents, positioning Saudi Arabia as a more competitive logistical hub. Mawani is accelerating the progress of Saudi Arabias maritime sector in line with the Vision 2030 goals by promoting investment opportunities, adopting state-of-the-art technology, improving infrastructure, and revamping the regulatory and operational frameworks to offer greater customer-centricity and transparency. Egis, a leading global player in the construction engineering and mobility services sectors, has joined hands with Israeli rail cybersecurity specialist Cylus to deliver the first Rail Security Operations Centre (SOC) through their joint cybersecurity Center of Excellence which opened in 2020. A SOC provides round the clock cybersecurity services to monitor, detect, identify, and respond to impending threats. The proposed SOC, by Egis and Cylus, will be the first to combine both IT and OT (operational technology) security services in the rail and urban transit sector. The heart of the SOC will be CylusOne, a revolutionary feat of engineering and artificial intelligence, delivering a real-time analysis of communications between critical systems and network interfaces - designed specifically for the rail industry. The SOC will be operated by a team of security experts on a rota to ensure 24/7/365 availability. Egis and Cylus expect the global-first rail SOC to be operational by January next year. The main SOC premises will be strategically located in Indian city of Mumbai and will be available to rail and urban transit customers globally. "We are excited by the most recent innovation to come out of our fruitful partnership with Cylus - the proposal to collaborate on a global-first rail Security Operations Centre," remarked Olivier Bouvart, Chief Excutive officer Rail, Egis. "Both teams have been working hard to realise this vision and we eagerly await the launch of the first SOC in early 2022." The development of this very innovative service was agreed in Dubai with the official signing of an agreement between both parties. It is a testament to the strength of partnership between Egis and Cylus, and the rapid advancement of the realm of rail cybersecurity. This global-first SOC is the culmination of shared expertise, innovation, and a drive to meet the needs of rail companies today, he added. Cylus said its proprietary machine learning-driven platform, CylusOne, is the backbone of the SOC. In addition to cutting-edge threat detection capabilities, CylusOne enables SOC teams to achieve operational excellence through smarter and smoother practices. On the tie-up, CEO Amir Levintal said the Egis-Cylus partnership has proven to be at the forefront of rail cybersecurity innovation. The new Security Operations Centre in India will be the first of its kind; combining security for a wide array of critical rail assets, networks, and systems." "After working closely with dozens of leading rail companies worldwide, we came to the realization that the need for a specialized, rail-specific SOC is of paramount importance," he noted. "In addition to cutting-edge threat detection capabilities, CylusOne enables SOC teams to achieve operational excellence, through smarter and smoother practices," explained Levintal. "With the platform, security experts can focus on advanced threat analytics and forensic investigations, instead of more mundane, manual procedures. This, of course, results not only in improved security operations, but also in immediate ROI for the rail company," he added.-TradeArabia News Service Global technology company SAP, the Innovative Enterprise Software Partner for Expo 2020 Dubai, has launched the SAP House featuring how real-time customer experience innovations can transform the economy, society and environment. Inspiring innovative customer experience solutions from SAP and its partners include: an immersive tunnel, an interactive gamification of equestrian sports, the PODway platform for people of determination, and SAP Customer Checkout for retail innovation. As SAP global partners, Deloitte is revealing what it takes to navigate relentless disruption and the futures uncertainty by becoming an intelligent enterprise, and Google Cloud is showcasing how the cloud is fueling digital transformation. Expo 2020 Dubai running in real-time on SAP solutions is a globally-leading example of how mega-events can transform exhibitor and visitor experiences, as well as operations, said Claudio Muruzabal, SAP President for Southern Europe, Middle East, and Africa. In line with the Expo 2020 Dubai theme of Connecting Minds, Creating the Future, our SAP House, at 900 square metres, is a showcase of how SAP and our partners are providing the latest innovations in cloud and emerging technologies to develop the future of business. Customer and citizen experience is a priority in the region, especially in the government and public sector. For example, among government IT decision-makers, 97% in Saudi Arabia and 94% in the GCC agree that technology is vital for transforming citizen experiences, according to new research by YouGov. The SAP House at Expo 2020 Dubai is an unparalleled immersive zone for real-time technology to solve the current eras most pressing challenges, including supporting people of determination, said Ahmed Al-Faifi, Senior Vice President and Managing Director, SAP Middle East North. With 94% of GCC government IT decision-makers agreeing that technology can transform citizen experiences, enabling the future of a Networked Economy is vital. Together with our partners Deloitte and Google Cloud, we are showcasing how cloud-based digital transformation can create the future through new levels of innovation. SAP is powering end-to-end Expo experiences with the SAP S/4HANA real-time business suite and the SAP Analytics Cloud for real-time operations. The SAP Customer Checkout application is already processing an expected 300,000 daily sales transactions from 500 retailers and more than 1,000 points of sale. SAP Ariba solutions are digitising and automating procurement for more than 25,000 local and global suppliers, who have already transacted more than AED1 billion in spend on the platform. SAP is also marking the debut of PODway, a platform that provides people of determination or those with disabilities an offering to safely navigate the Expo and ask for assistance as needed and provide feedback on their journey at Expo 2020. PODway also enables Expo 2020 to understand and work on the feedback and requests from the people of determination visiting the event and provide them a unique experience tailored to them. The SAP Co-Innovation Lab in the UAE, HERE Technologies, and Expo 2020 collaborated on the platform. PODway runs on a variety of real-time SAP solutions including the SAP Analytics Cloud, SAP Cloud Platform, the SAP CF Mobile Services, and SAP Qualtrics. Leveraging the power of SAPs global partnerships; Deloitte, a global services partner, and Google Cloud, a global cloud hyperscaler, are the SAP House Partners at the heart of Expo 2020 Dubai. Over the course of six months, SAP, Deloitte, and Google Cloud will be co-hosting a myriad of thought-provoking workshops and events in line with the Expo-themed weeks on Sustainability, Health, Tolerance, and inclusivity, amongst others. Deloitte, which provides industry-leading audit and assurance, consulting, tax, financial, and risk advisory services to many of the worlds most admired brands, is demonstrating at the SAP House how it helps organisations to become intelligent, cloud-based enterprises that are built to evolve using SAP technologies. Recognising its success, Deloitte recently won four SAP Pinnacle Awards for outstanding contributions as an SAP partner. The SAP House at Expo 2020 Dubai is the ideal global showcase to demonstrate how Deloitte is helping transform organisations enabled by technology to become Kinetic Enterprises that can reimagine everything, innovate rapidly, and evolve with confidence, said Tim Parr, Managing Director and CEO for the Consulting Practice at Deloitte Middle East. Deloitte has over 70 ready-to-use assets enabled through the SAP Cloud Platform that can be used to accelerate transformation. Middle East and global organisations that leverage these assets can rapidly drive innovation, optimise operations, and enhance customer experiences. Visitors to the SAP House can also experience Google Clouds business transformation solutions. Worldwide, Google Cloud serves as a global strategic cloud partner for the RISE with SAP offering, and also offers organisations the latest advancements in artificial intelligence and machine learning. SAPs enhanced ties with Google Cloud is part of the joint strategy to offer customers more choice for their SAP S/4HANA implementations on more hyperscaler cloud platforms and to integrate Google Cloud technologies. At the SAP House at Expo 2020 Dubai, Google Cloud is demonstrating to a global audience how organisations can digitally transform in a future-proof, secure, innovative, and low-latency environment on the industrys cleanest cloud, said Tarek Khalil, Director Middle East and North Africa, Google Cloud. With the Middle Easts rapid adoption of RISE with SAP, Google Cloud provides the advanced technology that supports customers in their digital transformation plans. During Expo, SAP University Alliances and SAP Next-Gen are hosting several academic and innovation sessions to explore the future of work, education, diversity and inclusion, and how youth will contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.-- TradeArabia News Service The UAEs Tawazun Economic Council has signed a Letter of Intent (LoI) to purchase 100 VRT500 helicopters from Aeroter at a total value of Euros 216.9 million ($248.5 million) for use across some government entities. The delivery of the 100 helicopters is expected by the end of 2023, reported Emirates News Agency WAM. Ahmed Ali Al Harmoodi, Chief Acquisition Management officer of Tawazun, said the LoI comes as part of Tawazuns new mandate of managing the UAEs strategic procurement and acquisition process. He revealed that the LoI also entails setting up of a helicopter service centre in Abu Dhabi, in collaboration with an Emirati Company. "Supported by the SDF, Aeroter is currently engaged in talks with a number of national companies on forming a strategic partnership to operate and manage the centre," he added. Al Harmoodi further stated that the strategic deal will result in the transfer of capabilities and operations to the UAE, in alignment with Tawazuns commitment to enable the industry for future growth and to support the countrys strategic investments. Abdulla Nasser Al Jaabri, Deputy Chairman of Aeroter, said: "We are pleased to close this contract for VRTs single light engine helicopter, which is characterized by various design advantages in terms of safety, performance and cost-effectiveness, to meet the customers expectations." Alexander Okhonko, Chief Executive Officer of Aeroter, said: "We are very pleased with this strategic partnership and we look forward to entering the UAE market, which we see as our launching pad to new markets in the Middle East & North Africa and other markets of the world. "VRT helicopters have a unique set of capabilities and designs for use in urban environments, medical and VIP transport, passenger support, crop spraying, aerial construction, seismic support, firefighting and other oil and gas operational activities. Aeroter is a leading player in helicopter industry, with capability to design and manufacture modern helicopters, including VRT 500, a light single-engine, seven-seat helicopter, perfectly suited for emergency and security transport. Strategic Development Fund, the investment arm of Tawazun Holding, is focused on financial return and economic impact within UAEs strategic sectors, through equity investment in local and international partnerships and developmental funding towards UAEs private sector. EDGE Group entity, Halcon, a regional leader in the production and supply of precision-guided weapons, has won an AED3.2 billion ($880 million) contract from the UAE Armed Forces for its Thunder and Desert Sting range of precision guided munitions. The Thunder range consists of different variants of aerial munitions (distinguished by weight and warhead size) all based on the same technology building blocks. It is a cost-effective, short-range system that combines an inertial measurement unit and global navigational satellite system measurements to guide it to pre-programmed target coordinates. A semi-active laser seeker can optionally be fitted to enhance precision. Desert Sting is a light weight guided weapon with a custom designed warhead that operates with a Halcon-designed stores interface unit (SIU) and can be deployed on multiple weapon (2 or 4) racks on aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles - independent of the level of integration with the aircraft. Saeed Al Mansoori, CEO of Halcon, said: At AED3.2 billion, this is a significant contract on a global scale for this type of weapons system. It is with a great sense of responsibility for having been entrusted with this undertaking that we move ahead in confidence that the performance of our systems will fully justify the UAE Armed Forces trust in us. Halcon now boasts autonomous technology capabilities in areas including guidance and control, navigation, aerodynamic design, weapon flight control computers, warheads, and servo systems. Most significantly, it has also boosted its capacity in fuze manufacturing compatible with the Mk81, Mk82, and Mk83 series of aerial munitions. Lahab, a sister EDGE company, is charged with filling the Desert Sting warhead, which is manufactured in the Halcon production facilities at Tawazun Industrial Park, in Abu Dhabi. Halcon is part of the Missiles & Weapons cluster within EDGE, an advanced technology group for defence and beyond that ranks among the top 25 military suppliers in the world. - TradeArabia News Service The Saudi Advanced Technologies Company (Wahaj) entered agreement with Honeywell as an accredited importer for aircraft spare parts, where Wahaj will manufacture and export a variety of spare parts to Honeywell Aerospace in the US, Europe and Asia. Wahaj is among companies that have received the AS9100 accreditation in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and works in manufacturing high precision components and other parts in the aviation industry, reported Saudi Press Agency (SPA). As part of the agreement, Wahaj will provide Honeywell original spare parts, such as tyres, brakes, energy systems, and the aero and thermal systems, and assisting energy units for several main platforms, including Airbus 350, 330, 320 neo, Boeing 737MAX and 777, Dassault Falcon 8X/M1000 and McDonnell Douglas 11. DP World's flagship Jebel Ali Port received MV CUL HUIZHOU, the first vessel of China United Lines Ltd (CULines) to call on the Middle East from Qingdao, China. This call reinforces Jebel Ali Ports position as a global maritime hub and one of the fastest-growing ports in the region that connects 150 ports globally, a WAM report said. Shahab Al Jassmi, Commercial Director, DP World UAE, welcomed the vessel and its crew led by Captain Wang Lei. Al Jassmi handed over a plaque to the Master of the vessel in the presence of Darico Dai, Owners Representative, CULines and other senior officials. Abdulla Bin Damithan, CEO and Managing Director, DP World UAE and Jebel Ali Free Zone (Jafza), said: "The arrival of MV CUL HUIZHOU is a significant milestone for the Jebel Ali Port that has reaffirmed its leading status. It is encouraging to see that the global shipping industry continues to acknowledge the ports role in world trade by introducing new lines that will enhance bilateral trade ties between countries and benefit the global trade and logistics industry." Bin Damithan added: "Jebel Ali Port is complemented by Jafza, DP Worlds leading trade and logistics hub in the Middle East. In 2020, the Dubai China non-oil bilateral trade stood at AED38.6 billion of which Jafza contributed AED11.5 billion, accounting for 30% of the total trade value. The new service will further contribute to these achievements by boosting the confidence of Chinese traders and giving them access to economies in the Middle East. Furthermore, in conjunction with the Projects of the 50, we are certain that this significant connection will contribute to the UAEs goal of increasing the current AED257 billion trade volume by AED40 billion each year." Raymond Chen, Chairman and CEO, China United Lines Ltd. (CULines) said: "CULines focuses on Southeast Asia and the Mainland China to Taiwan Cross-strait services. In the past two years, CULines grew gradually. In particular, in the first half of 2021, we launched a regular bi-weekly China-Europe service. In July, more than ten vessels were deployed into the Trans-Pacific service between China and the West Coast of the US. We currently rank 23rd on Alphaliner in terms of fleet capacity, in line with this over 64,000 TEUs of new containers were ordered in 2021. With the support of DP World, CULines has entered the Middle East market. CULines hopes to have more cooperation with DP World in the future. To aid this, a maiden voyage of the weekly service AGX (consortium named GCS) in cooperation with RCL/PIL/KMTC will be scheduled to call at DP Worlds terminal on December 13, 2021."-- TradeArabia News Service Al Habtoor Group (AHG), a leading business conglomerates in Mena, has reported a strong performance for the first ten months of 2021, with revenues for the year expected to soar at an average of growth of 37 per cent compared to 2019. Earlier in March, Khalaf Ahmad Al Habtoor, Founding Chairman of AHG, forecasted a healthy UAE economic growth in 2021 and is pleased that the results have exceeded his expectations. The World Bank has projected real GDP will average 3.4 per cent between 2021 and 2023. Al Habtoor said: All sectors of the economy are faring well due to one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, rebound in tourism, and activities related to the major events and conferences held in the country. And I believe this will continue in the coming years, supported by the strategic vision to stimulate the economy. Events like the COP28 climate conference in 2023, the Retire in Dubai campaign and many other initiatives reinforce the positive outlook for our economy. He added: As a diversified Group, we have seen this reflected in all the sectors in which we operate. Al Habtoor Motors, our automotive division, maintains its number one distributor position for Bentley and Mitsubishi, with double-digit revenue growth. The Groups car leasing business, Diamondlease, increased its fleet by more than 20 per cent in 2021 to reach more than 12,000 vehicles, with 90 per cent utilization. All our hotels in the UAE are performing exceptionally well. And Hospitalitys year-to-date forecast for Q1 of 2022 registering a 43 per cent increase over the same period in 2020. Emirates International School-Jumeirah, one of only a handful of schools worldwide to offer all International Baccalaureate Programmes, is celebrating its 30th anniversary this academic year, offering excellence in education to more than 3,680 students in both branches. He concluded: This good performance in 2021 is only the beginning. I am expecting a great year ahead in 2022, as the numbers are showing. The UAEs success is down to the excellent crisis management, the collaboration between the private and public sectors, as well as a united, determined community across the board, focused on the future. As a Group, we operate in several destinations around the globe, but more than 80 per cent of our investments are in the United Arab Emirates. My belief is stronger than ever, that the UAE is the haven of the world for investors, businesses and those looking to offer a safe and stable life for their families. I am proud of the UAEs achievements; the land of opportunities. TradeArabia News Service Tradeling, the hyper-growing eMarketplace focused on business-to-business (B2B) transactions in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena), has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) to enable Taiwan-based manufacturers, retailers and brands to export their goods and services to the Mena region on Tradelings e-commerce platform. The agreement will allow both entities to exchange information on trade, policies, goods, services and partnership possibilities that may be available from either side and to create partnerships by introducing each other to key service providers ranging from system integrators to logistics companies, a statement said. Tradeling will also provide logistics support and services such as trade finance and product registration and certification to Taiwanese companies to facilitate trade opportunities without the need for travel to the region. Commenting on the agreement, Marius Ciavola, Chief Executive Officer of Tradeling, said: Countries in the Mena region and Taiwan have long enjoyed strong trade relations across multiple sectors from petroleum oil to consumer electronics, and this agreement will further enhance these relations by allowing the SME sectors to have quicker access to products from Taiwan and vice versa. In addition, we will be organizing meetings, webinars, and seminars to inform the business community about the investment potential available and the efficiencies being achieved through B2B ecommerce. Fu-Tai Wei, Director of Taiwan Trade Centre, Dubai, said: As Taiwan's foremost non-profit trade promoting organization, we are glad to have a trust-worthy partner here in Dubai to help Taiwan do business in the Mena region. Tradelings local know-how, e-commerce platform and total solution services will definitely enhance the trade between Taiwan and Mena. According to the Taiwan Bureau of Foreign Trade, Ministry of Economic Affairs, bilateral trade between Taiwan and the UAE totaled $4.3 billion in the first 3 quarters this year, an increase of 47.4% over last year, including an increase of 10.3% in exports to the UAE. Led by a team of experienced technology start-up builders, Tradeling ensures a reliable and smooth trade process in addition to providing logistics and financing solutions. Connecting global suppliers with Mena-based demand, the platform leverages advanced technology to optimise the supply chain and creates economic value in addition to mitigating risks. Today, Tradeling has over 100,000 registered buyers and sellers from 55 countries with gross merchandising value growth of more than 65% month over month.TradeArabia News Service Hitachi Energy, the global technology and market leader in power grids has launched its game-changing IdentiQ, digital twin solutions for high-voltage direct current (HVDC) and power quality solutions. IdentiQ will help to advance the worlds energy system to be more sustainable, flexible and secure, accelerating the transition towards a carbon-neutral future. IdentiQ is the digital twin of a HVDC converter station, STATCOM or other power quality solution. It provides all the relevant asset information, analytics and operational data in an intuitive and easy-to-navigate dashboard, which users can customise to match their needs. IdentiQ includes 3D interactive visualisation of the complete asset, combined with one-click access to all the associated plant and equipment information, including engineering docu-mentation, operational and maintenance procedures, safety training and live operational data for monitoring and analytics. IdentiQ is a game-changing digital twin solution built on our unique domain expertise and leadership in power grid technologies and innovation, said Dr Mostafa AlGuezeri, Managing Director of Hitachi Energy for the UAE, Gulf, Near East and Pakistan. He added: It is a significant addition to Hitachi Energys digital offering and supports our customers efforts to continuously enhance the efficiency and reliability of their grid investments. IdentiQ will enable customers to improve the management of power grid assets by clustering all information into one digital location for seamless access by all operational functions. This approach stands at the core of Hitachi Energys vision for digital twin technology: delivering the right resources and information to the right people at the right time for optimised operations and smarter decision making. IdentiQ makes HVDC and power quality assets more: Sustainable and eco-efficient by enabling comprehensive remote analysis and support and by digitalising paper-based information on older installations; Flexible by adapting to continuously changing asset performance needs over the entire life cycle; Secure by complying with industry-leading cybersecurity standards and protecting all asset data and information from being misplaced or destroyed; and safer, by providing virtual training on on-site procedures, required clothing and evacuation routes before visiting a site. Digitalisation is essential to making electricity the backbone of the entire energy system and advancing a sustainable energy future for all. It is key to the integration of bulk and distributed renewables, as well as the electrification and decarbonisation of sectors like transportation, industries and data centres; and empowering countries and companies to meet their carbon emission reduction goals. IdentiQ integrates with a range of enterprise business systems, including Hitachis Lumada platform and the Lumada suite of Asset and Work Management software, and together they provide system-wide visibility from the site to the boardroom. IdentiQ is part of Hitachi Energys ambition to drive the pace of digital and eco-efficient innovation in power grid technologies and accelerate the transition towards carbon-neutral energy systems. The launch builds on a year of powerful innovation from Hitachi Energy, including: Lumada Asset and Work Management launched in January 2021, to enable asset-intensive industries to be more adaptive, collaborative, insightful and predictive. Lumada features technologies such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, advanced data analytics, hybrid cloud management and cybersecurity; and EconiQ launched in April 2021, providing an eco-efficient portfolio of products, services and solutions that deliver an exceptional environmental performance compared to conventional solutions. Both portfolios are integral to Hitachi Energys Sustainability 2030 strategic plan, which draws on the UNs Sustainable Development Goals to deliver social, environmental and economic value.-- TradeArabia News Service Sitecore, a top marketing technology company, has announced the appointment of its new Regional Vice President, Goncalo Mateus, who spoke at the CX Live event in Dubai, positioning Sitecore as a major player of the marketing technology industry. Mateus joins Sitecore with more than 10 years of experience in the martech and adtech space, having held leadership roles with one of the worlds largest software solutions providers. Mateus also spoke on a panel at CX Live in a dedicated session where he addressed how digital hubs transform the customer journey and retain to them with effective communication strategies. Mohammed Al-Khotani, Area Vice President Middle East and Africa, Sitecore said: I am pleased to congratulate Goncalo Mateus on his new role as the Regional Vice President and am confident that he can be a driving force to further strengthen Sitecores presence in the region. At CX Live, we showcased Sitecores fundamental role in unleashing new business potential and developing global reach for regional businesses. The Middle East market has seen a reorganization of the marketing stack over the past year with an emphasis on personalized customer experiences, thanks to a massive shift toward e-commerce and hybrid retail models. The two-day event, held on November 15 and 16, saw Sitecore as a Silver Sponsor, where the brand showcased its capabilities and capacities in customer experience management and marketing software. The event was also home to various talks about CX and Digital Transformation, changes in workplace culture and Design thinking. San Francisco-headquartered Sitecore is a global leader in customer experience management and marketing software. TradeArabia News Service Kissflow, a leading Software as a Service (SaaS) company with customers in over 160 countries, has signed partnership agreements with four Saudi IT firms Raqmiyat, LABS KSA, Nuummite Consulting, and Multisolutions. The tie-up will enable them to support a broader set of local enterprises in achieving their cloud transformation goals. With Saudi Arabia accounting for 50% of the Kissflows MEA revenues, the company is doubling down on investments in the kingdom as it targets 40% growth in the country in 2022. The recent Saudi Arabia CIO Survey by IDC has found that more than 25% of enterprises in Saudi Arabia have plans to deploy cloud infrastructure. Recognising this market demand, through 2021, Kissflow has established itself as a key enabler of cloud and digital transformation for Saudi enterprises with its market-leading No-code citizen developer platform. The companys flagship product, Kissflow Workflow is being utilised by a number of large enterprises and conglomerates in the country, including market leaders in the oil & gas, automotive, and banking sectors. This accounts for 50% of the companys business across the entire MEA region. With the onboarding of its dedicated technology partners in Saudi Arabia and the imminent launch of its Low-code platform, the company is now looking to double this customer base over the next nine months. The 'Cloud First Policy' introduced by Saudi Arabian Ministry of Communications and Information Technology advises that for any new IT investment, civilian and government entities should consider Cloud solutions as opposed to traditional solutions. Commenting on how his company is enabling organisations in the kingdom to align with this commendable vision, Vaidy Panchabikesan, Regional Director at Kissflow said: If the pandemic has taught us anything, it is that customers and employees now expect services at their fingertips. The kingdom's ambition of catering to this demand by evolving into a smart economy is dependent on digital transformation and cloud initiatives. Kissflow is committed to Saudi Arabia and Vision 2030, and our mission is to empower our customers in the country to be truly Cloud Ready. As organisations in the kingdom look to comply with the ZATCAs e-invoicing mandate, Kissflows Procurement Cloud platform has emerged as a highly effective and popular solution. By unifying advanced functionalities for purchase orders and requisition, vendor management, purchase invoicing, and integrations into a single platform, Kissflow Procurement Cloud enables end-to-end management of procurement lifecycles, along with the ability to enhance efficiencies and identify cost savings opportunities through data analytics. The company is gearing up to roll-out its Low-Code platform in Saudi Arabia. The platform eliminates technical skills barriers and enables non-IT staff such as line-of-business managers and department heads to collaborate and easily develop customised applications that automate and streamline business processes. This will empower Saudi businesses to rapidly create powerful, full-feature digital applications for both employees and customers, thereby accelerating digital transformation. Partnering with local Saudi IT companies is central to Kissflows strategy in the country which is centred around a deeply consultative approach. Explaining how each of the four new partners excels in a specific domain that is fundamental to the successful digital transformation of Saudi businesses, Panchabikesan said: Raqmiyat is an established leader in developing digital workplace programmes that facilitate the delivery of exceptional employee experiences. With their vast pools of software developers, LABS and Multisolutions offer impressive application development capabilities and are therefore perfectly positioned to enable our customers to realise the full potential and value of our Low-code platform. These systems integration and custom development capabilities are rounded out by the professional services expertise of Nuumitte Consulting who specialise in understanding complex business operations and automating processes to drive efficiency.-- TradeArabia News Service Lufthansa Technik Middle East (LTME) and Sanad will cooperate to develop innovation and technology solutions to digitalise maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) operations within the aviation industry. LTME and Sanad aim to support the growing digitalisation requirements of MRO businesses by investing in research and development as they prepare for a digitalised future. Both partners intend to use digital capabilities such as artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual reality (VR) to digitalise their MRO processes and optimise their overall market offerings. In line with the UAEs strategic initiative Operation 300bnand its focus on deploying Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) technologies, the two companies aim to streamline their maintenance processes through these digital capabilities by developing and implementing digital solutions set to reduce turnaround times and costs, ultimately to better serve their end-customers. For this, Sanad, the global aerospace engineering and leasing solutions leader wholly-owned by Mubadala Investment Company PJSC (Mubadala), signed a Technology Collaboration Agreement with LTME during this weeks Dubai Airshow 2021, which concludes at Dubai World Central on November 18. Our collaboration with Lufthansa Technik has identified common areas of improvement across MRO processes, and this agreement will seek to address these by reducing turnaround times, Mansoor Janahi, Deputy Group CEO, Sanad said. The partnership plays a vital role in enhancing our processes and will enable our teams to be able to support a greater number of customer projects and maintain our position as a leading global MRO service provider. In the expected return of the MRO business to post-Covid growth, digitalisation will play a decisive role, said Ziad al Hazmi, Chief Executive Officer of LTME. Therefore, we are proud to join forces with Sanad in order to jointly advance our capabilities in this field even further. I am confident that this new cooperation will not only improve our competitiveness, but will also open up whole new possibilites and capabilities for MROs in the Middle East. And most importantly, it will soon also yield the first benefits for our valued local and international customers. The collaboration with Sanad, and use of new technological tools should help LTME digitalise MRO processes and eliminate redundant ones, along with regulatory approvals for remote inspection; ultimately leading to a more timely exchange of information. LTMEs contribution to the collaboration can build on Lufthansa Technik Groups long-standing experience in the digitalisation of MRO processes, that in the past already stretched from advanced robotics and virtual as well as augmented reality to private networking, artificial intelligence and predictive algorithms, just to name a few.-- TradeArabia News Service Louvre Abu Dhabi will open the inaugural edition of its new annual contemporary art exhibition, Louvre Abu Dhabi Art Here2021, on November 18, showcasing artworks by the seven shortlisted artists for the first Richard Mille Art Prize. The exhibition will be on view at Louvre Abu Dhabis Forum until March 27, 2022. In its first edition, the shortlisted artists for The Richard Mille Art Prize Cristiana de Marchi, Latifa Saeed, Mays Albaik, Mohammed Kazem, Nasser Alzayani, Tarek Al-Ghoussein, and Taus Makhacheva were selected by the prizes jury following an open call for proposals from UAE-based artists. Participants were asked to respond to this years theme of Memory, Time and Territory, addressing questions of memory and belonging, and exploring the geography of identity through the artists personal relationships with territories. Each of the seven artists responded to the theme with their own unique interpretation, bringing each of their visions to life through different mediums. Cristiana de Marchi will present hand-embroidered canvas with her artwork Mapping Gaps:Beirut, whilst Latifa Saeed uses glass for her artwork The Pathway. Mays Albaiks Awaiting Weightlessness is an installation of aluminium video sculptures, and Mohammed Kazem will display his photographic series Photographs with Flags. Nasser Alzayani uses sand artefacts, collected recordings and works on paper in his installation Watering the distant, deserting the near, Tarek Al-Ghoussein will present prints from his ongoing Odysseus series, and Taus Makhacheva has employed a mix of video and body-oriented objects for her work Mining Serendipity. Manuel Rabate, Director of Louvre Abu Dhabi, said: We are proud to offer greater visibility to these incredibly talented UAE-based artists for this inaugural edition of the exhibition and prize. Living in the UAE, they were uniquely placed to respond to this years theme of Memory, Time and Territory, especially in a year where the nation reflects on 50 years of progress and development. Richard Milles timepieces have always sat at the intersection of watchmaking tradition, art, design and architecture, said Peter Harrison, CEO, Richard Mille Middle East. The Richard Mille Art Prize celebrates the thriving art culture here in the UAE, and in the region as a whole; establishing a platform dedicated to creativity, dialogue and diversity. The Prize will lay down the foundations for what is certain to be a very exciting chapter in the development of the regions rich and nuanced art scene. The artists have really shown a deep understanding of the theme and have responded with incisive, nuanced works. This exhibition and art prize are a significant addition to the contemporary art ecosystem of the UAE, and this focus on contemporary artists is an important extension of the universal storytelling our exhibitions and collection convey. We look forward to announcing this years winner and next years theme, said Dr. Souraya Noujaim on behalf of the jury panel. The shortlisted artists were selected by a distinguished four-member jury including HH Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, Chairman of UAE Unlimited and an art collector and patron of the Centre Pompidou, the British Museum and Sharjah Art Foundation; Christine Macel, Chief Curator at the Musee national dart moderne, Centre Pompidou and an art critic; Hala Warde, founding architect of HW Architecture and long-term partner of Jean Nouvel, who was the lead of the Louvre Abu Dhabi project; and Dr. Souraya Noujaim, Louvre Abu Dhabis Scientific, Curatorial and Collections Management Director. The winner of The Richard Mille Art Prize will be selected by the prizes jury from the seven shortlisted artists, to be announced at a ceremony in January 2022.The winner will be awarded $50,000. The Louvre Abu Dhabi Art Here 2021exhibition falls within the UAEs cultural season that includes Abu Dhabi Art, new exhibitions at the NYU Abu Dhabi Art Gallery, Dubai Design Week, Art Dubai, as well as this years Expo 2020 Dubai. TradeArabia News Service Young Adipec this year has Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) with the Arts (Steam) integrated across all workshops and hands-on learning experiences. Students can explore STEM jobs of the future at the Adnoc Young Adipec stand. Young Adipec, the annual youth outreach initiative by the Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (Adipec) - the global energy industrys largest, most important and influential event - has continued its successful work to promote the energy sector as a source of fulfilling careers for young Emiratis welcoming 500 students from 20 schools to its 9th edition, taking place from November 15 to 18 at Adnec in Abu Dhabi. Aimed at high school students aged 14-17 years old, more than 3,300 students from across the UAE have benefitted from the pioneering programme since its creation in 2013, and the Young Adipec programme has received praise and recognition from across the energy industry. Held under the patronage of Sheikh Nahayan Mabarak Al Nahayan, Minister of Tolerance and Coexistence, and supported by Abu Dhabi Department of Education and Knowledge (ADEK), Young Adipec 2021 includes five components: the Ambassadors Programme, the Alumni Programme, the Experiential and Edutainment Programme, the Young Adipec Talks, and several Industrial field trips. Christopher Hudson, President of dmg events, organisers of Adipec, said: For this 2021 edition, we have integrated Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) with the Art (Steam) across all workshops and hands-on learning experiences to continue to encourage students to explore what the industry has to offer. 500 students have had the opportunity to participate in robotics workshops, engineering workshops by Abu Dhabi University, technology & innovation workshops by Zayed University, STEM of for life workshops by Adnoc, and the Oil Storage and Refinery educational journey by Broog Energy. As a progressive, technology-focused energy company committed to building a more sustainable future, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) has partnered with Young Adipec to teach visiting students about Careers of the FutureToday and encourage them to consider future careers at Adnoc through a fun and interactive exhibition at Adipec covering topics such as artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and advanced engineering. Adnocs support for Young Adipec is in line with its broader initiatives to promote STEM education in the UAE. As many as 45,000 students from almost 900 schools across the UAE have benefited from Adnocs STEM Education programme since it was launched in 2017 and Adnoc plans to increase this number to 200,000 students by 2030 as it expands the programme. Adnoc is committed to the learning and development of students as they are crucial to enabling the UAEs long-term socioeconomic goals as it prepares for the next 50 years. Young Adipec provides an excellent platform to enhance their learning, stimulate creative thinking and provide exposure to state-of-the art technologies and future careers in the energy sector. As the UAE celebrates its Golden Jubilee, Young Adipec has developed a dedicated workshop Year of the Fiftieth with support with INPEX/JODCO, inspiring youth to have their vision about UAEs ambitions for the next 50 years. During the Year of the Fiftieth workshops, students shared their vision for the UAEs developments in sectors including education, health, energy, transportation, infrastructure, manufacturing, environment and space for the year 2071. This year, Weatherford hosted 15 Khalifa Bin Zayed school students at its state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Abu Dhabi. Students toured the manufacturing ADM plant for an opportunity to learn more about the wireline production services, different kind of drill pipes and were introduced to a wide range of essential tools and equipment that are used in drilling oil. Students also learned about health and safety rules and regulations within the oil and gas industry. Meanwhile, the Young Adipec talks were hosted over 12 sessions tailored to build an ambitious youth culture through a youth social innovation incubator, a collective youth community enabler and a think tank and research nucleus. Also, the Young Adipec Alumni programme allowed students to meet Engineer Mohamed Almazrouei, Drilling Supervisor at Adnoc, to hear how Young Adipec 2013 had inspired him to his future career. Young Adipec is supported by ADEK, Adnoc, Abu Dhabi University, Broog Energy, Coretrax Technology, ExxonMobil, INPEX/JODCO, Technip Energies, Weatherford, and Zayed University. Held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of the UAE, Adipec is hosted by Adnoc and supported by the UAE Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure, the UAE Ministry of Industry and Advanced Technology, the Department of Municipalities and Transport, the Abu Dhabi Chamber, the Abu Dhabi Department of Culture and Tourism and the Department of Education and Knowledge.-- TradeArabia News Service Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) and Abu Dhabi National Energy Company (Taqa) have signed an agreement to create a clean energy powerhouse with a total generating capacity of 30 Gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy by 2030. The new venture solidifies the UAEs global position in energy transition, paving the way towards the nations Net-Zero by 2050 Strategic Initiative. The new strategic partnership will focus on domestic and international renewable energy and waste-to-energy projects as well as the production, processing and storage of green hydrogen and ancillary activities. It will leverage Adnocs energy and hydrogen capabilities and Taqas renewables expertise for local and international growth. The agreement was signed by Dr Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology and Adnoc Managing Director and Group CEO, and Mohamed Hassan Alsuwaidi, Chairman of TAQA at the ONGOING abu dhabi international petroleum exhibition and conference (Adipec). Also present was Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Member of the Abu Dhabi Executive Council, Chairman of the Abu Dhabi Executive Office, and Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of Adnoc). Dr Al Jaber said: The strategic partnership between two Abu Dhabi energy giants future-proofs Adnocs business model, creating compelling business and commercial opportunities, as we fully embrace the energy transition. This innovative and collaborative venture is a bold new initiative, as it combines both companies respective areas of expertise and paves the way for our viable entry into the clean energy space. He said the platform will enable Adnoc to capitaliSe on the many renewable energy and hydrogen opportunities, both locally and globally. Dr Al Jaber also called on other partners to join this promising new venture on its exciting journey. As the UAE looks ahead to hosting COP 28 in 2023, our nation pledges an inclusive energy ecosystem, enabling sustainable future economic growth, for the benefit of Abu Dhabi and the UAE. Alsuwaidi said: This partnership between Taqa and Adnoc will be a powerful catalyst to unlock significant potential for accelerating the green hydrogen market and rapidly expanding renewable energy. Taqa is supporting Abu Dhabis aim to be a green hydrogen hub using our expertise in low-cost solar PV and desalinated water: two critical elements for green hydrogen. The UAE offers several strategic advantages that provide a robust platform to enable this partnership, including being home to some of the largest and lowest-cost solar plants in the world. This partnership will also benefit from the availability of low-cost renewable energy in the UAE and the countrys proximity to significant future demand centers for hydrogen and its carrier fuels. In October, Sheikh Khaled launched a new clean energy partnership between Adnoc and Emirates Water and Electricity Company (EWEC), which will see up to 100 per cent of the Adnocs grid power supplied by EWECs nuclear and solar clean energy sources. Moelis and Company is financial advisor to Adnoc, with Citi to TAQA. Tradearabia News Service The National Petroleum Construction Company (NPCC) has signed a strategic MoU with The Petroleum Projects and Technical Consultations Company (Petrojet). It seeks to explore engineering procurement and construction (EPC) services that will enhance NPCC's global geographic footprint. The agreement was signed at the Adipec Exhibition, the worlds most influential meeting place for oil, gas and energy companies and professionals, organised by Adnoc. NPCC, a subsidiary of UAEs National Marine Dredging company, signed the agreement with Egypts Petrojet for mutual cooperation in the fields of oil and gas for exploring EPC project opportunities in UAE and Egypt. The MoU was signed by Eng Ahmed Al Dhaheri, CEO of NPCC and Waleed Lotfy, Chairman of Petrojet, in attendance of Eng Tariq El-Mulla, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources in Egypt, Eng Yasser Zaghloul, Group CEO of NMDC and other senior officials from both companies. Petrojet has proven capabilities in the execution of petroleum, petrochemical, industrial and marine projects of different nature and size inside and outside Egypt. The MoU is a step towards exploring major opportunities in offering the vast experience of both companies and expand the business into new areas of interest. NPCC is a world-class EPC company that has been providing total EPC solutions to offshore and onshore oil and gas, petrochemicals and renewables sectors for over four decades in Mena and the Indian Subcontinent. Eng Yasser Zaghloul, Group CEO of NMDC, said: The MoU signed by NPCC further underline the confidence of global energy sector majors in its competencies in the EPC sector. Such partnerships are significant not only in growing the companys operations in the region, especially in the sectors such as downstream, but also to build our geographic footprint and add further value to our stakeholders and partners. Eng Al Dhaheri said: We continue to build on our partnerships with Petrojet through the strategic agreement to explore growth opportunities that benefit all the entities. The MoU highlights our proven track-record in delivering complex EPC projects as well as defines our strategic ambition to expand to new sectors, supported by our vision to be a global EPC major. Eng Lotfy said: Though this partnership we will be expanding our footprint and share expertise within the sector, and we will continue our focus on co-developing the localised solutions and capabilities required to enable us to respond to local and global market needs, while continuously improving the quality of service we provide to our customers. Being a part of National Marine Dredging Company, NPCC has plans to enter and explore new countries to further fulfil the EPC sector with world class services, solutions and expertise.-- TradeArabia News Service The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has announced the results of its 2021 Global Passenger Survey (GPS), which delivered two main conclusions: Passengers want to use biometric identification if it expedites travel processes; passengers want to spend less time queuing. IATAs Senior Vice President for Operations, Safety and Security Nick Careen said: Passengers have spoken and want technology to work harder, so they spend less time being processed or standing in queues. And they are willing to use biometric data if it delivers this result. "Before traffic ramps-up, we have a window of opportunity to ensure a smooth return to travel post-pandemic and deliver long-term efficiency improvements for passengers, airlines, airports and governments. Biometric identification According to the survey, 73 per cent of passengers are willing to share their biometric data to improve airport processes (up from 46% in 2019), while 88% will share immigration information prior to departure for expedited processing. Just over a third of passengers (36%) have experienced the use of biometric data when travelling. Of these, 86% were satisfied with the experience. Data protection remains a key issue with 56% indicating concern about data breaches. And passengers want clarity on who their data is being shared with (52%) and how it is used/processed (51%). Queuing at boarding was identified by 55% of passengers as a top area for improvement; 41% identified queuing at security screening as a top priority for improvement; and 38% identified queuing time at border control / immigration as a top area for improvement. With additional document checks for Covid-19, processing time at airports is taking longer. Pre-Covid-19, the average passengers spent 1.5 hours in travel processes (check-in, security, border control, customs, and baggage claim). Current data indicates that airport processing times have ballooned to three hours during peak time with travel volumes at only about 30% of pre-Covid-19 levels. The greatest increases are at check-in and border control (emigration and immigration) where travel health credentials are being checked mainly as paper documents. This exceeds the time that passengers want to spend on processes at the airport. The survey found that: - 85% of passengers want to spend less than 45 mins on processes at the airport if they are travelling with only hand luggage - 90% want to spend less than one hour on processes at the airport when travelling with a checked bag. IATA, working with industry stakeholders, has two mature programmes which can support a successful ramping-up of aviation post-pandemic and provide travellers with the expedited experience they are demanding. IATA Travel Pass is a solution to manage the complex myriad of travel health credentials that governments require. The app offers a safe and secure way for travellers to check the requirements for their journey, receive test results and scan their vaccine certificates, verify that these meet the destination and transit requirements and share these effortlessly with health officials and airlines prior to departure and using e-gates. This will reduce queuing and congestion for document checks - to the benefit of travellers, airlines, airports and governments. One ID is an initiative that is helping transition industry towards a day when passengers can move from curb to gate using a single biometric travel token such as a face, fingerprint or iris scan. Airlines are strongly behind the initiative. The priority now is ensuring there is regulation in place to support the vision of a paperless travel experience. One ID will not only make processes more efficient for passengers, but also allow governments to utilise resources more effectively. Careen said: We cannot just revert to how things were in 2019 and expect our customers to be satisfied. Pre-pandemic we were preparing to take self-service to the next level with One ID. The crisis makes its twin-promises of efficiency and cost-savings even more urgent. "And we absolutely need technologies like IATA Travel Pass to re-enable self-service or the recovery will be overwhelmed by paper document checks. The GPS results are yet another proof point that change is needed.-TradeArabia News Service Help India! Following the killing of two civilians in an encounter at the Hyderpora area of Srinagar, the family members of the slain duo have rubbished police claims that their slain kin were involved in militancy. The families are demanding bodies of the slain as Jammu Kashmir Police has constituted an enquiry to probe the controversial shootout. Auqib Javeed | TwoCircles.net Support TwoCircles SRINAGAR A massive outrage has erupted in Kashmir valley after the family members of two civilians who were killed in an encounter contested the police claims that the slain were working with militants. On November 15, the Jammu and Kashmir police said that an encounter broke out between militants and security forces in the Hyderpora area of Srinagar city. The encounter ended with the killing of four persons, including the owner of the house and his tenant. The other two slain were alleged militants. The slain militants were identified as Bilal Bhai, apparently from Pakistan and the other is a local militant from Ramban Gool, according to J&K police. The owner of the house was identified as Muhammad Altaf Bhat and his tenant Mudasir Gul, a dentist turned businessman. Both, according to J&K police, were killed in the operation. The Police said that Mudasir Gul was a militant associate and was involved in militancy, while Altaf was a house owner and both were killed in cross-firing during the encounter. However, the families of both the persons contested the police claims and said that the duo were killed in cold-blooded murder and were used as human shields. You killed my innocent uncle Mohammad Altaf Bhat in cold-blooded murder. In Hyderpora, you used him as a human shield and now you are saying he was OGW. Return us his body, tweeted a journalist Saima Bhat. You killed my innocent uncle Mohammad Altaf Bhat in cold blooded murder In Hyderpora, you used him as human shield and now saying he was OGW. return us his body @JmuKmrPolice @SrinagarPolice @IGP saimabhat (@saimabhat) November 15, 2021 As the news spread out on Tuesday morning, the family of both the persons demanded the bodies of the duo and urged Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha to hold an impartial enquiry into the killings. Just hand our body to us, Abdul Majeed, brother of Altaf Ahmad Dar, told reporters at his home. Altaf is survived by his wife and three kids. While narrating the incident, Dar said, At 5 p.m. security forces came and there was cordon. The shops were asked to be closed, he said, adding, Then around 30-40 persons were confined in Honda shops. Then there was a burst (firing). Then my brother was taken out and was told that the search was to be carried. After some time, they again confined our children in the shop. Later they brought a drone etc. and they took my brother again, saying that a fresh search is to be carried. After some time, he was again kept with these persons. The third time, they again asked him to come out for searches. This time he was killed, he said. The families of both the civilians held a protest at press enclave Srinagar and demanded that the bodies of their loved ones be returned for a proper burial, who as per the police were buried in Handwara keeping in view the law and order situation. Family of Dr. Mudasir Gul who was killed during an encounter at Hyderpora Srinagar demand return of his body, reiterating that he had no links with militants pic.twitter.com/kGjyAyHxM8 Basit Zargar () (@basiitzargar) November 16, 2021 Police should return the body of our son, said the wailing mother of slain Mudasir, adding that her son was innocent. She also appealed to LG Manoj Sinha to direct the police to return the body of Mudasir to their family so that they can see him one last time. Other family members and relatives of slain Mudasir out rightly rejected police claims that the slain was an OGW stating that Mudasir had no militant links and was innocent. Regret killing of house owner: Police Shortly after the outrage, Inspector General of Police, Vijay Kumar called a press conference in Srinagar and told reporters that police received information that there are militants present near Hyderpora on the Jammu-Srinagar highway. A cordon was laid and a search operation was started, he said. There were three rooms in the top storey (atop shops run by owner Altaf Ahmad Dar). The location was not known. The owner (of the house) Alfaf Ahmad Dar and one doing business there, Mudasir Gull. They both knocked and militants did not open the door. Again they were given the opportunity; then again the door was knocked. The militants started firing and in self-defence our troops opened fire and an encounter started, he said, adding, We then stopped the encounter and tried to rescue both of them and the place where they got trapped, it was hard to rescue them. Both were killed and in the ensuing encounter, two militants were also killed. The IG said police approached Altafs and Mudasirs families to participate in the funeral. Since we apprehended the law and order situation, we did not give bodies to families. Bodies were taken to Handwara (in north Kashmirs Kupwara district) where this morning they were buried, he said. The IGP said I want to share that Altaf Ahmad Dar had given rooms on rent to Mudasir Gull who was a contractor by profession and was running an unauthorized call centre. Six cabins and in one room there was a militant hideout where a lot of things were found. I want to share that two pistols were found from the encounter site and six phones from militants and 4 phones were recovered from the room. Six computers and six CPUs were there. Warm clothes were found. Also, injections used by (militants) during injury were recovered, he said, adding, I want to share with you that there was firing on police party in downtown (Nawa Kadal) in which one of our policemen sustained the injury in the neck. The same militant was involved. Mudasir had ferried him in his own vehicle to this building. Also, Mudasir was running this in the garb of business. He was ferrying militants from south to north and then keeping them in his house and militants used to carry activities. Regarding the owner, he said, Since militants were in his house, we will include him in harbouring and we will include him among OGW. Since his death took place in cross-firing, we regret the same. We tried to save him but it was difficult as firing was going from both sides. Mudasir was top-ranked OGW and was involved in militancy. On asking why the Police were including Altaf for harbouring militants when he had rented out the premises, the IGP said, See if you are giving premises on rent, it is your responsibility. We were not given any information who was given (the premises) in rent. He said a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police has been constituted to probe hi-tech hideout. Asked that the family claimed that Altaf has been killed in cold-blooded murder and demanded body, I, myself, said that Altafs death occurred in cross-firing. When an encounter takes place, nobody knows whose bullet hit and caused death. If there is pistol fire, 100 per cent death is due to militant fire and it will be revealed in postmortem, he said. Meanwhile, the political parties in Kashmir have questioned the encounter and police claims and demanded a probe into the sequence of events that led to the killing of the duo. The Jammu and Kashmir Peoples Conference (JKPC) while demanding a thorough and impartial investigation into the Hyderpora encounter urged the LG administration to immediately hand over the dead bodies of civilians to their respective families for the funeral rites. According to the JKPC spokesperson, the party has urged the LG administration to probe the claims of the family members of the slain civilians, who have contested the official version and refuted the allegations made by the police. Former Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti hit out at the government of India over the use of civilians as human shields during gunfights. Using innocent civilians as human shields, getting them killed in cross firing & then conveniently labelling them as OGWs is part of GOIs rulebook now. Imperative that a credible judicial enquiry is done to bring out the truth & put an end to this rampant culture of impunity. https://t.co/QOJonQ0kyS Mehbooba Mufti (@MehboobaMufti) November 16, 2021 The PDP president made the comments after the niece of one of the slain persons tweeted that: You killed my innocent uncle Mohammad Altaf Bhat in cold-blooded murder In Hyderpora, you used him as a human shield and now saying he was OGW. return us his body. Auqib Javeed is a journalist based in Kashmir. He tweets at @AuqibJaveed. New Chaldean Bishop Has Firsthand Experience of ISIS' Campaign of Genocide Chaldean Father Thabet Al-Mekko welcomes Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, R-Neb., Sam Brownback, then U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom, and USAID's Mark Green in Karemlesh in July 2018. Karemlesh, Iraq -- An Iraqi priest whose family home was destroyed by ISIS has been consecrated bishop in a church he has spent the past four years restoring. Chaldean Bishop Thabet Habib Yousif Al Mekko, a popular priest who for many years has dedicated himself to serving the faithful in his native Nineveh Plain town of Karemlash, was consecrated Bishop of Alqosh on Oct. 22 by Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako, the Chaldean Patriarch of Babylon. In this Nov. 14 email interview with the Register, Bishop Mekko shares his reaction to his appointment, describes the current challenges facing Christians in northern Iraq four years after liberation from ISIS, and shares his hopes for the beatification of Father Ragheed Ganni and companions, who were martyred in 2007. Father Ganni, who studied at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome, was buried in Karemlash in a church that Bishop Mekko has spent the last few years helping to restore, after it was ransacked by the Islamic State militant group in the mid-2010s. Bishop Mekko told the Register much still needs to be done to help restore the ancient Christian communities in the region, a major task, he said, that requires the charitable aid of the international community as well as commitment and dedication of the local faithful. What is your reaction to the news of your appointment? Being chosen as bishop was truly surprising, and I was embarrassed because I was very attached to the parish I had been serving. I had many projects there relating to the restoration of the village of Karemlash, as well as many goals, both pastoral and social, to achieve as a priest. However, the call of the Lord triumphed and guided me to give my consent to accept this grace that I do not deserve. Consecration Mass of Bishop Thabet Habib Yousif Al Mekko in St. Adday church, Karemlash, whose restoration work he led. How do you hope to exercise your ministry as a bishop to help local Christians? Zeal for the Church has been energy-giving for me, so I hope to continue with more strength and zeal proclaiming the word of God and helping my Christian brothers have more confidence in their Christian calling in Iraq. The service I began as a priest aimed to create a means through which faith is integrated with social commitment and fidelity to our Christianity in Iraq. What is the situation like at the moment in Alqosh? The Diocese of Alqosh has its own particular challenges. One moves between areas of the diocese through checkpoints that belong to KRG [Kurdish Regional Government] and others manned by the federal government of Baghdad, the PMF [Popular Mobilization Forces of the Iraqi government]. Also, there are destroyed areas that must be reconstructed, and very many continue to be displaced as a result of the former ISIS [occupation]. The political and administrative situation is unclear because of the problems between the KRG and the federal government. Unemployment and young people are without work, so many families have gone away, leaving behind a void and problems that arise from this complicated situation. The government is providing services in accordance with its capabilities, but there are many things they could do better. How safe are Christians in the region? What are the current challenges they are facing, and how many have returned since the ISIS occupation of 2014-2017? And what is the status of rebuilding churches after their destruction and damage caused by ISIS? Now the zone is secure, but always there are concerns that an ISIS-type scenario will return. When the federal government of Baghdad has forces in these areas, the security is strengthened, and Christians have more confidence. The problem is when there are Kurdish forces on one side of a Christian village and PMF forces on the other. Concern rises when there is disagreement and confrontation between these two sides. In the various regions of the diocese that ISIS occupied, 1,500 families have returned -- almost 50% of the original number. In the region of Tellskof, the churches have been restored, but still there is work to do. In Batnaya, where over 80% of the structures had been destroyed, the churches and religious sites have still not been restored; the houses even more so. In the village of Bakofa, the church has still not been rebuilt. How concerned are you about the rise of the Taliban and other Islamic extremist groups in Afghanistan and the effect it could have on Iraq and the region? We would hope that the Iraqi government would be alert to the challenges of exporting Islamic militants from Afghanistan to Iraq. If there are concerns about this, they will lessen if the government is strong, and the international community helps it in its war against terrorism. What is the situation like in your native Karemlash? What is the latest news on the cause of Father Ragheed Ganni, who is buried there? Will a shrine be built in his memory? Karemlash still has many burned houses and needs restoration work. Families still have to return, and there are concerns about demographic changes there. We are waiting for the beautiful news about the beatification of Father Ragheed and his companions. In the Church of St. Adday, where tomb of Father Ragheed lies and where the remains and relics of Father Ragheed and his companions are placed in anticipation of them being proclaimed "Blessed," I have had a chapel constructed. We hope to build a shrine to them. In nearby Qaraqosh is a Chaldean community that Father Ragheed served. He founded a pastoral house there, and today we are building a small church in the town for those faithful. I think this church in Qaraqosh will be a beautiful memorial to him. What can the faithful do to help you and your work there? A bishop without priests and the faithful gives his existence no meaning, so the local faithful of the diocese can do a great deal, first of all by receiving the Word of God and enabling the gifts of the Holy Spirit within them in order to serve in the Mystical Body of Christ. Concerning our faithful brothers in the world, we hope that they help to meet the charitable needs of the diocese in its pastoral work and reconstruction, knowing that their brothers in the Diocese of Alqosh are incapable of ameliorating the harsh situation alone. by Shafique Khokhar Rasulan Bibi, 65, allegedly stole 5,000 rupees from a Muslim family. After five months, the case seems to have been solved thanks to the intervention of some activists. Police officers had been told not to consider the case. Toba Tek Singh (AsiaNews) - For five months Rasulan Bibi fought to have charges of theft brought against her by a Muslim family for which he worked withdrawn. The matter was only recently resolved thanks to the intervention of human rights organisations. Rasulan, a 65-year-old Christian widow, has been working as a domestic worker in various homes for some time. In July, she was accused of stealing 5,000 rupees (about 2,550 euro) from the family she had worked for for eight years. "I am a 65-year-old woman, I have worked very honestly all my life," the Christian woman commented. "In order to withdraw the charges against me, they had pressured me to convert to Islam. My children and I also went to the High Court in Lahore to seek justice, but it was all in vain. One of Rasulan's sons, Amir, claimed that Waseem Sarwar, head of the Toba Tek Singh District Police Department, had forced the officers to disregard his mother's words, advising her to convert instead. "When we went to the police for help at first they welcomed us," Amir explained to AsiaNews. "But when we came back to be updated they stopped helping us. The officials and officers told us they could not do anything for us." Saleem Iqbal, a human rights activist from Lahore, said he himself went to speak to the police superintendent about Rasulan's case. The officers said it was evident that the Muslim family was using its influence. "The first information report filed by the police was only done to harass the woman and her children," Iqbal explained. "We have assured them that they will get justice and will soon be free from this case." Prolonged lockdowns and restrictions have led to an increase in domestic violence. From 688 cases in 2019 to 2853 in 2020. Homicides from 17 to 26, at least 13 committed by a partner. Reports of abuse and threats in the couple grew by 11.6%. Wizo activist: long-term programs to "treat post-traumatic disorders". Jerusalem (AsiaNews) - In 2020, the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic characterized by prolonged lockdowns and heavy restrictions on travel, domestic violence against women in Israel increased by 315%. The shocking figure is similar to that recorded in other nations of the world, confirming that the forced coexistence within domestic walls to contain the spread of the new coronavirus has triggered other emergencies of a social nature. First of all, that of abuse c in the family which, in the Jewish State, increased from 688 cases in 2019 to 2853 in 2020, not counting hidden or unreported abuse. The figures are contained in the annual report published in recent days by the Women's International Zionist Organization (Wizo), based on data provided by ministries, government agencies, the state auditor's office, the police and the prison department. Homicides of women in the family environment increased from 17 in 2019 to 26 last year; of these, at least 13 were the work of partners (husbands or partners) and, in four cases, complaints of mistreatment and abuse had been filed prior to the commission of the crime. In addition, 31.2% of the suspected homicides were already known to law enforcement. The increase in violence recorded last year is also confirmed by calls to 118, the number dedicated to complaints, with a figure for calls rising from 2286 in 2019 to 5866 in 2020. The report is published on the eve of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, which is celebrated on November 25, and reports 20140 complaints collected by the police for abuse and threats within the couple, an increase of 11.6% over the previous year. Everywhere you look, it's as if someone has lit a fire," Rivka Neumann, director of WIZO's Division for the Advancement of Women, told the Media Line. "During [COVID-19] lockdowns women and children found themselves stuck inside homes with an abusive person." "There was no way for them to go outside and they couldn't go to school or work," Neumann said. "This combination of locking people indoors and being [in close proximity] to a violent man resulted in a rise in domestic violence cases." For the Wizo activist, these troubling numbers are expected to improve within the next few years as pandemic-related restrictions are loosened, though the damage caused by 2020 will have repercussions for years to come. In addition, people with post-traumatic stress disorder (Ptsd), will require extensive help. "Trauma is like a wound if you dont take care of it, it will get infected and spread, she explained. I call on the Israeli government to take on these findings and translate them into long-term [programs] because we have many more families that have entered the cycle of violence and were seeing new types of complex post-traumatic stress disorder.. Today's headlines: UAE announces purchase of South Korean anti-missile system. US and China agree on visas for journalists. Japan tests first self-driving superfast train. Protests in Kazakhstan over high prices. India reopens export of Covid vaccines. Tensions between Indonesia and Vietnam over fishing rights. ARMENIA-AZERBAIGIAN Azerbaijani forces have killed and captured Armenian soldiers in a resumption of clashes for control of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region; Yerevan also admits the loss of two defensive positions; Baku reports the wounding of two soldiers. Last night the parties agreed to a ceasefire. Last year clashes between the two armies resulted in more than 6,000 deaths. UNITED ARAB EMIRATES-SOUTH KOREA The Gulf monarchy announced that it will purchase the "Cheongung II" anti-missile system from Seoul: a .5 billion deal. The South Korean government confirmed that the negotiations are in the final stages The defensive weapon is capable of intercepting and shooting down an enemy missile at an altitude below 40 km. CHINA-US After the Biden-Xi summit, Beijing and Washington reached an agreement to make it easier for their journalists to travel to each other's countries; the understanding removes some restrictions on granting entry visas. In February 2020, the U.S. classified Chinese state media as foreign "missions" and applied more controls to them. China responded a month later by expelling 13 U.S. newspaper reporters. JAPAN The East Japan Railway Co. will test the first fully self-driving superfast train today. The test will be conducted in Niigata Prefecture. The vehicle will be remotely piloted from a control center. KAZAKHSTAN In Almaty, hundreds of people have turned to the Financial Market Regulation Agency, protesting price increases, reduced wages and a general deterioration in the quality of life. The protesters almost all have bank debts that they are no longer able to repay. They hope for an amnesty, but the banks are unable to promise it. INDIA The Modi government has authorized the resumption of exports of Covid-19 vaccines. A batch of doses will be distributed to African nations under the WHO's Covax program; Myanmar, Bangladesh, Nepal and Iran will be the first to benefit from the reopening. Delhi had blocked the export of vaccines after a new wave of infections broke out in the spring. INDONESIA-VIETNAM Jakarta repatriated 166 Vietnamese arrested earlier for illegal fishing in Indonesian waters. The issue has long been a source of conflict between the two countries. Together with Chinese boats, Hanoi's vessels often venture into the waters of the Natuna Sea, an area part of the territorial disputes in the South China Sea. by Melani Manel Perera For two days, police have questioned Fr Cyril Gamini Fernando, a member of a committee representing victims, after he accused the intelligence services of failing to follow certain leads in connection with the 2019 massacres. Colombo (AsiaNews) The investigation into the 2019 Easter Sunday massacres shows no progress; yet the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) has been questioning Fr Cyril Gamini Fernando for days on end. Today, he refused to be questioned for a third consecutive day. The clergyman is a member of the National Catholic Committee for Justice to Easter Sunday Attack Victims, a group set up in the wake of a series of attacks against three churches and four hotels on Easter Sunday in 2019 that left 280 people dead and more than 600 wounded. At an online forum on 23 October, Fr Gamini said that intelligence operatives had provided assistance to Zahran Hashim, the leader of the National Thowheed Jamaath (NTJ), a movement blamed for the attacks. Major General Suresh Sallay, director of the State Intelligence Service (SIS), branded the claim as false, and filed a complaint against the priest two days later. For his part, Fr Cyril noted that Former Attorney General Dapula de Livera made a very serious statement about a grand conspiracy behind the Easter attack. Yet, neither the CID nor the police have taken any statement from him so far. What is more, no one has acted upon the recommendations of the Presidential Commission of Inquiry, nor has any victim be questioned. Two and a half years have already gone by without the truth being revealed, Fr Cyril laments. Behaving like this is completely unjust. by Steve Suwannarat While boasting about its interethnic harmony, the Singaporean of Indian origin and immigrants with an Indian background are refused housing by Chinese landlords because of their smelly cuisine. Members of Singapores ethnic minorities complain of hidden racism. Indo-Singaporeans represent 9 per cent of the countrys population. Singapore (AsiaNews) The curry conundrum is becoming a controversial issue in Singapore. Increasingly, landlords and property managers are taking into account the ethnic background of people looking for a place to live, often rejecting applicants with an Indian background, both locals and immigrants. The odours of Indian cuisine are being used as means of racial profiling against people who can trace their origins back to the Indian subcontinent. The latter represent 9 per cent of the population of the city-state. Discrimination is often indirect in a multiracial society like Singapores, where strict laws and a constitution promote social and racial harmony despite diversity. This leaves those who encounter such discrimination perplexed. This was the case of young British-Indian couple who sought a new life in Singapore. After a deal was reached for a flat, when they went to close it in person, the landlord backed out. More than others, their story seemed to open the eyes of the countrys mass media to a situation that cannot always be solved by sifting through real estate ads. Tense relations between people of Indian origin and Chinese owners are nothing new. So much so that since 2017, listing site PropertyGuru has required agents not list owners ethnic or racial preferences, threatening to suspend any who do. Still, Singapore has no anti-discrimination legislation in the housing sector; consequently, steps to raise awareness or dissuade have obtained few results. Questions like Do you cook with spices? and statements such as "I hope you are not related to the Indian race will continue; indeed, during the COVID-19 pandemic, hate speech and interethnic tensions have increased. Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Long recently announced plans to introduce a bill on racial harmony, noting however that it would not include punitive measures against violators. At the same time, he denied that ethnic Chinese (75 per cent of the population) are privileged, this despite the fact that the government mandates ethnic quotas in public housing, which represents 80 per cent of the market. Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in your country. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to your market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism. SeaRail (Botswana) (Pty) Limited, a logistics and transport company is expected to open a new office in Gaborone in the first half next year, a top official of the business has disclosed Botswana Guardian. The company was formed in 2013 to develop and operate a Dry Port land leased by Botswana government in Walvis Bay, Namibia. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary company of Botswana Railways, itself a 100 percent government entity. In order to cultivate more business on the Botswana market and in an effort to divert Botswana cargo through other regional ports to Walvis Bay the company is working on establishing an office in Gaborone by June 2022. The target is for Sea Rail to control over 50% of market share on container volumes going to Botswana, said an upbeat Acting Managing Director of the Sea Rail, Derick Mokgatle. The opening of the Botswana office will fall under the companys five year turnaround strategy which is expected to further prop up the companys revenue, and eventually its bottom line. Mokgatle is confident that Botswana, its home country, offers so many opportunities, which are yet to be fully tapped. He added, such opportunities can be fully harnessed if Sea Rail partners more with the local private sector and parastatals. He disclosed that, they have partnered with Botswana Investment and Trade Centre (BITC) to explore opportunities for easing Botswana exports into the lucrative Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) market through infrastructure and transport solutions. Sea Rail also has a Memorandum of Understanding that was signed in February 2020 which amongst others is for BITC to refer investors wishing to set up in Botswana to liaise with Sea Rail for logistics solutions via Walvis Bay. BITC is the main investment promotion authority in Botswana. Sea Rail is also working on new MoUs with Special Economic Zones Authority (SEZA) and other stakeholders in Botswana. Sea Rail is determined to grow partnerships with clients and other stakeholders to grow volumes for the dry port and these include transporters, and institutions like SEZA and other parastatals and non-governmental organisations, he stressed. In addition to providing dry port services of bonded storage facilities and cargo handling Sea Rail offers freight forwarding solutions that include transport and customs clearing to make it a one stop shop for cross border clients wishing to route their goods via the Port of Walvis Bay. Mokgatle, who is Motswana has also announced that, in collaboration with the Walvis Bay Corridor Group, they are currently planning a road show to all the mines in Botswana in February 2022 as well as to hold an information session in conjunction with the Botswana Chamber of Mines (BCM) in Gaborone to promote the Walvis Bay route. Botswana is currently experiencing a boom in the mining sector, more especially in the non-diamond sector. Mines which have opened in the past few years include the Botswana Stock Exchange listed Minergy which mines coal in Media village, within the Kweneng district. Khoemacau has also opened a copper mine near Toteng in the North West district. Sandfire Resources is also expected to open a new copper mine in Gantsi sometimes next year. Vision Ridge Investment has also just opened a new iron ore mine in Ikongwe, central district. More mines are also expected in the coming few years as most companies are at advanced stages of exploration and drilling. But, now that I have the luxury of being able to say what I really feel, I was delighted to see that at age 80, the Country Preacher was still on the case, despite his Parkinsons disease, his recent hospitalization for a fall and his hospitalization along with his wife in August after testing positive for COVID-19. In the last 30 days, one in four Chicago COVID cases have been in children under age 18, whereas over the whole pandemic, its been about half that, one in eight. Some of this is because theres more testing happening, of course, in schools that weve talked about, but this is also just a reflection that many children are only now getting the opportunity to be vaccinated. As a teacher of writing, Graywolfs books in the The Art of series have been indispensable resources for teaching topics like The Art of Subtext by Charles Baxter and The Art of Description by Mark Doty. Its awesome when a student comes to you with struggles and you can say, read this and call me in the morning, knowing that theyll return lit on fire by what theyve read. Haynes' meticulous eye and steady hand allow the performances to dominate. Since seeing the film in May at the Cannes Film Festival and in a second viewing more recently, I've wondered if everything Blanchett does is scaled correctly. Some moments feel a little big, in an outsize theatrical way. (It was certainly true of her Oscar-winning work in "Blue Jasmine.") And yet, Blanchett's a formidable technician, a performer of serious wit and fire. She serves "Carol" well and truly throughout. Mara, who won the best actress award at Cannes, initially takes the more passive character, and half the time you don't know what Therese is really thinking, just as you're intrigued by Mara's ability to hold back, keep us guessing. I do not have an intention to impose some sort of foreign vision for this museum from outside, Morales said in an interview with the Tribune. I believe in institutions that grow from within and that are responsive and tied to the communities that they serve. Chicago happens to have a very dynamic, complex artist community and as a city, it is so unbelievably rich. I hope to find my inspiration in the city itself. Ironically, Busk was one of the last things this writer saw before the pandemic shutdowns. Coincidentally, the company that performed it, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, is where Fisher-Harrell appointed as Hubbard Streets artistic director in February after 11 years of leadership by Glenn Edgerton spent the bulk of her career as a performer. Fisher-Harrells first professional job was at Hubbard Street. She left Juilliard at age 19 to dance for the company from 1989 to 1992, then led by founding artistic director Lou Conte. From there, Fisher-Harrell moved on to Ailey, where she danced for 13 seasons before moving into teaching roles in her hometown at Towson University, Baltimore School for the Arts and Ailey Camp Baltimore. Chansley, who pleaded guilty to a felony charge of obstructing an official proceeding, was among the first rioters to enter the building. He has acknowledged using a bullhorn to rile up the mob, offering thanks in a prayer while in the Senate for having the chance to get rid of traitors and scratching out a threatening note to Vice President Mike Pence saying, Its Only A Matter of Time. Justice Is Coming! At least four pedestrians had been standing in the 1200 block of West Randolph Street around 12:45 a.m. when gunshots rang out, authorities said. Three men and one woman were hit; none of their injuries were considered life-threatening. The wounded included: (Monday) morning, a GardaWorld crew was the target of violent and foiled robbery attempt while servicing a client ATM location on the South Side of Chicago, the statement read. Two of our employees were critically injured and taken to (a) hospital. One of our employees succumbed to their injuries while the other remains in (the) hospital. A third employee was on-site but did not (suffer) any serious injuries. Our community has been terribly shaken by the tragic killing of Shaoxiong Dennis Zheng, and we extend our condolences and deepest sympathies to his family, friends and loved ones, the university said in a statement. The problem of violence in our city has reached the level of a public health crisis, and it demands a commensurate response. We share the concerns of students and other members of the University community, and their input is actively helping inform our ongoing actions to address public safety. People must feel safe where they live, study and work, and this is a top priority for the University. In addition to the cash bribe, Presta admitted in his plea agreement that he solicited campaign donations from Maani in January 2018, during his unsuccessful run for county commissioner. The two agreed to disguise payment from Maani by having him pay cash to cover an invoice from an advertising firm, according to the plea. In his plea agreement with prosecutors, Mirkhaef admitted he also provided cash and other benefits over a three-year period to another elected official, identified only as Public Official A, in return for the official using his position to attempt to benefit and not interfere with the operation of Mirkhaefs business. The defense objected to jurors seeing the drone video, which the teens attorneys repeatedly have tried to ban. They have filed a motion for a mistrial, in part, because they contend the prosecution gave them a shorter, lower-resolution version of the recording than what was shown to the jury. The prosecution said it sent the video file via email at the defense teams request and that it was compressed in transmission from a Kenosha detectives iPhone to a defense attorneys Android phone. Schroeder has given Rittenhouse wide latitude to present his defense, offering rulings that local attorneys say are standard for the longtime jurist. For some watching on television particularly many people of color the case has become a symbol of racial inequities in the justice system when it comes to who has the ability, and money, to tell their side of the story. Ronald Reagan led the 1980 conservative takeover of the GOP, but he made common cause with moderates even choosing one of them, Bush, as his running mate. In his day, it was said that Democrats look for heretics while Republicans look for converts. Lately, though, the Republican Party seems to be taking lessons from The Spanish Inquisition for Dummies. Our hubris has reduced the natural world to an object to study, a resource to exploit or a recreational pastime. Animals and plants are intelligent in complex ways that we are just beginning to discover and understand. We need to engage in a more radical and long-term reconsideration of our relationship with nature or our efforts will never amount to more than a temporary patch. We need to reeducate ourselves. To understand and value the importance of biodiversity in nature can also teach us to value human diversity. The positive potential at stake is enormous. The officers have the right to choose their union leaders, just as Chicago voters have a right to choose their political leaders. But the city also looks to its police officers in the hope that they will keep their cool, politically and professionally, even as others around them may be losing theirs. Catanzaras history suggests the opposite. Chicagoans who appear on the citys controversial gang database will have a way to try to get their names removed under a plan backed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot that the City Council passed Wednesday, over the objections of several aldermen who said the change doesnt go far enough to fix the deeply flawed list. The report, filed last week to the Police Board, recommended that Officer Ella French be suspended for three days because French did not activate her body camera in a timely manner and failed to document her interaction with someone who she and other officers stopped outside of Youngs home on the night of the raid. I am running for Secretary of State to build the long-needed foundation our state needs to thrive, Brady said in a statement. I will focus on partnering with the brightest innovators and technology experts this state has to offer, addressing not only service efficiency, but issues of cyber-security and identity protection. The Shenyang Palace Museum in northeast China's Liaoning Province celebrated the 95th anniversary of its founding on Tuesday. The museum, one of the two well-preserved ancient palace complexes in China, currently has over 50 exhibition halls open to the public, said Li Shengneng, person-in-charge of the museum. Shenyang Palace Museum, where the former imperial complex of three emperors of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) was located, was set up in 1926 and opened to the public in 1929. In 2004, it was added to the World Cultural Heritage List. The museum has witnessed a thriving cultural and creative industry. It is estimated that the total revenue of cultural and creative products sold in the museum surpassed 1.25 million yuan (about 195,750 U.S. dollars) during the Labor Day holiday in May this year alone. Pianist seeks to revive the soft appeal of the fortepiano. One day in 2014, Wang Yuehan, then a student at Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music in the United States, met her teacher Elisabeth Wright, a professor of harpsichord and fortepiano at the school's Historical Performance Institute. The fortepiano was popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries. It has a softer sound and smaller frame. Wang says Wright asked her if she wanted to take fortepiano as a major. Wang had fortepiano as an elective course for a semester earlier. "I was excited and nervous," Wang says about meeting Wright, adding that her teacher answered all her questions about learning fortepiano. "That afternoon I made a decision that led to my career." Wang received her master's degree from Jacobs School of Music, double majoring in piano and fortepiano, in 2017. One year before her graduation, Wang bought a fortepiano made in the Czech Republic, a faithful replica of a fortepiano made by the Viennese piano maker Anton Walter in 1805. She returned to China in 2017 and has been promoting fortepiano since then. On Nov 11, when she turned 31, Wang released an album, titled Mozart Fantasie & Rondo, performing the composer's numbers: Fantasie in C Minor, K 396; Fantasie in D Minor, K 397; Fantasie in C Minor, K 475; Rondo in D Major, K 485; and Rondo in A Minor, K 511. All pieces were performed on the fortepiano. Walter's pianos were highly regarded by Mozart, Beethoven and other prominent composers, and historical records show that Mozart bought a Walter piano around 1782, using it for composition of his highly successful piano concertos, according to Wang. "I played Mozart's music on the fortepiano. It authentically brings back the music of his time," she says. Fortepiano, an early version of the piano, has changed tremendously since Italian instrument maker Bartolomeo Cristofori invented it. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the instrument itself and keyboard music changed dramatically. Wang says that compared to modern pianos, fortepianos have a smaller range and softer timbre. Older musical instruments, like fortepianos, are key to understanding the history of classical music and how those great composers created the classics, Wang says. When she started to learn the modern piano and fortepiano at the same time, Wang says she felt challenged by the two instruments. She tried to capture the spirit of composers and deliver the essence of music to the audience. During her days in the US school, Wang played harpsichord in the morning, fortepiano at noon and the piano in the afternoon, in a variety of styles, like jazz. "I got a sense of how different it is to perform with the instruments-I have to think differently when performing on them," she says. Born and raised in Wuhan, Hubei province, Wang studied the piano like many children in the country. From 2006 to 2012, she made trips between Wuhan and Beijing to study piano with veteran pianist Sheng Yuan. Sheng says there are few pianists willing to devote their time to researching and playing fortepiano in China. Many of his piano students refused to learn the instrument "because it would be hard to find jobs-the fortepiano is not popular anymore and no one listens to it now". "I really admire Wang's courage and passion for the old instrument, which will inspire more young Chinese pianists to learn," Sheng says. "Besides doing research, Wang plays fortepiano beautifully." The album, Mozart Fantasie &Rondo, has been produced by a new Chinese record label, Hearing the Silence, founded by Feng Hanying. The name refers to classical music concert etiquette, whereby audiences enjoy silence when music fades at the end of a note. "When we recorded the album, we tried to capture the most authentic and real sounds of fortepiano," says Feng. "Wang's performance offers the audience a close feeling about the old instrument." You are here: Arts Over 20 star dancers of the Beijing Dance Academy performed in a gala showcasing the beauty of traditional Chinese dance in Shanghai on Nov 13. Highlights include dancer-choreographer Wang Yabin, who performed her award-winning dance piece, Wu Shan Dan Qing, or Silky Fan and Ribbons, and dancer Hua Xiaoyi, who performed Dian Jiang Chun, or Crimson Lips Adorned. A female group dance, Xiang He Ge, which was featured in a new show titled Dancing Through the Millennium, co-produced by Henan TV and Chinese video platform Bilibili, where it premiered on Nov 6, was also staged during the gala. The gala was first staged in Beijing in the end of October and is touring Chinese cities, including Qingdao, Guangzhou and Zhuhai, through December. Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, speaks at a symposium of the university in New York, the United States, Nov. 5, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua] China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) two decades ago was "a tremendous push to globalization," benefiting both China and the world, a renowned U.S. economist has said. "Without (China's) membership in WTO, a lot of economic growth and integration would not have taken place," Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, told Xinhua in a recent interview. Sachs said he believes in globalization, "because we really have a benefit of sharing each other's knowledge, of travel and tourism, of different cultures, of different ways of knowledge, of different ways of innovation." He noted that China has developed as a significant player over the past decades, becoming "the major trading partner for most of the world now," which is not only "a remarkable accomplishment," but also "a huge benefit for the world." In the past 20 years, China's global ranking of trade in goods has risen from the sixth to the first, while that of its trade in services has jumped from the 11th to the second. Calling China's sustained efforts to develop economic and trade ties with other countries an "excellent strategy," Sachs said the world's second largest economy is recommended to "continue to increase its trade with other parts of the world," adding China "can play a hugely positive role" in development in regions such as Southeast Asia, Central Asia, and Africa. Moves like the Belt and Road Initiative are very important for helping finance development in other places, upgrading the infrastructure and building the economies that are still lagging behind, which in the long run are "mutually beneficial," he noted. Sachs, who is also a senior United Nations advisor, lauded China's role in safeguarding multilateralism. "China is a big supporter of the multilateral system, and this is exactly what we need right now," he said. "Most of our problems are global scale. Unless we have effective global institutions, we won't be able to solve these problems." Sachs also highlighted China's "very constructive role" in stabilizing the global supply chain, noting other countries should also play their distinct part in mitigating the current supply-chain disruptions. Meanwhile, he underscored the importance to keep "the international trading system open," as "an open international trading system is good for the world." Sachs cautioned about the consequences of the U.S. obsession with the so-called "decoupling" theory, while emphasizing the need and urgency for closer collaboration between the world's two leading economies. "Those who say we should decouple could lead us to conflict, which would be very dangerous. I like the interdependence," he said. "It's extremely important that China and the United States find cooperative approaches" to address their differences, keep normal economic relations with each other and work together to solve some big problems like climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and the conservation of ecosystems, he added. A ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is held at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua] An explanatory address delivered by Xi Jinping on a landmark resolution on the major achievements and historical experience of the Communist Party of China (CPC) over the past century was made public Tuesday. Entrusted by the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Xi, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, delivered the speech to the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee. The resolution was deliberated and approved at the plenum held in Beijing from Nov. 8 to 11. Considerations "Our Party has always attached great importance to reviewing its historical experience," said Xi when he explained the considerations on the session agenda. He hailed the significance of reviewing the Party's century-long journey, saying it will help build a broader consensus and stronger unity in will and action among all Party members and rally and lead the Chinese people of all ethnic groups in achieving new and great success in building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. Xi also noted "taking a clear-cut stance against historical nihilism" and clearing up confusion and misunderstandings over certain major questions in the Party's history. Xi briefed the session on the priorities in drafting the resolution: First, the resolution must focus on the Party's major achievements and historical experience over the past century, he said, noting the move will help "pool our wisdom, strengthen our unity, and boost our confidence and morale." On the previous two resolutions on the Party's historical issues, adopted in 1945 and 1981 respectively, Xi said "their basic points and conclusions remain valid." Second, the resolution must highlight the new era of socialism with Chinese characteristics, Xi said, noting this will help further fortify confidence among all Party members and focus on the current endeavors. Third, the resolution's appraisal of major historical events, significant meetings, and important figures must be consistent with the CPC Central Committee's existing conclusions, Xi said. The basic points and conclusion that have already been made for the major events, meetings, and figures in Party history prior to its 18th National Congress were to be upheld in the new resolution, he said, adding that the resolution should reflect the CPC Central Committee's updated understanding on the Party's century-long history. A ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is held at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. [Photo/Xinhua] Drafting process In March, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee decided that the sixth plenary session would focus on a comprehensive review of the Party's major achievements and experience in its century-long history, Xi said. A drafting group was established, with Xi as its chief, and Wang Huning and Zhao Leji as deputy chiefs. On April 1, the CPC Central Committee issued a circular to solicit opinions from Party members and non-Party figures within an appropriate scope. The consulted localities, departments and sectors widely held that the invaluable experience gained in the past century merits a systematic review, according to Xi's explanation. They suggested that the review focus on the new era and on the historic achievements and historic shifts and the latest experience that the Party has gained during this period, according to Xi. The text of the draft resolution was issued on Sept. 6 to select Party members, including retired senior Party officials, for consultation. Opinions were also sought from leaders of other political parties and the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and prominent figures without party affiliation, Xi said. The feedback indicated full endorsement of the draft resolution, he said. The drafting group analyzed the solicited opinions and suggestions. A total of 547 revisions were made to the preliminary draft. The Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and its Standing Committee held multiple meetings during the drafting process before the draft document was submitted for deliberation at this session, according to Xi. Framework & major content In addition to a preamble and a conclusion, the document has seven sections. The first section is "A Great Victory in the New-Democratic Revolution." It analyzed the historical background of the founding of the Party and reviewed the revolutionary struggle in this period. It also highlighted the achievements including the establishment of Mao Zedong Thought, according to Xi. This section emphasized that the founding of the People's Republic of China, national independence, and the people's liberation represented China's great transformation from a millennia-old feudal autocracy to a people's democracy, he said. The second section is "Socialist Revolution and Construction." This part reviewed the Party's great achievements following the founding of the People's Republic of China. It also included the rational appraisal of Mao Zedong Thought, according to Xi. The section emphasized the great transformation from a poor and backward Eastern country with a large population to a socialist country, he said. The third section is "Reform, Opening up, and Socialist Modernization." This part highlighted the great significance of the third plenary session of the 11th CPC Central Committee, and documented the historic contributions made by the Chinese communists with Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao as their chief representatives, Xi said. This section commended the great achievements which made possible the Chinese nation's tremendous advance from standing up to becoming prosperous, he said. The fourth section is "A New Era of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics." With a focus on the original ideas, transformative practices, new breakthroughs, and landmark accomplishments over the past nine years, the section highlighted the great achievements and historic shifts in the new era in 13 areas. The great achievements in this period provided better institutional conditions, stronger material foundations and a source of inspiration for realizing national rejuvenation, Xi said. The Chinese nation has achieved the tremendous transformation from standing up and becoming prosperous to growing strong, he said. The fifth section is "The Historical Significance of the Party's Endeavors over the Past Century." The section spelled out the CPC's historic contributions to the Chinese people, the Chinese nation, Marxism, the cause of human progress, and the development of Marxist political parties, Xi said. The sixth section is "The Historical Experience of the Party's Endeavors over the Past Century." This section summarized the Party's historical experience in 10 aspects: upholding the Party's leadership, putting the people first, advancing theoretical innovation, staying independent, following the Chinese path, maintaining a global vision, breaking new ground, standing up for ourselves, promoting the united front, and remaining committed to self-reform. "All of us must cherish them, uphold them over the long term, and continue to enrich and develop them in practice in the new era," Xi said. The seventh section is "The Communist Party of China in the New Era." It called on the whole Party, the military, and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups to make tireless efforts to realize the second centenary goal and the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation. Full Text: Xi's explanation of resolution on major achievements and historical experience of CPC over past century The 2021 Conference on Overseas Chinese Pioneering and Developing in China opened Tuesday in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province, attracting more than 500 guests from home and abroad. Speaking at the opening ceremony, Ding Zhongli, vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, acknowledged the contributions of overseas Chinese in China's process of revolution, construction and reform. The overseas Chinese are expected to carry forward the tradition of patriotism and love for their hometown, and actively participate in the implementation of China's major strategies as well as the friendly cooperation and exchanges between China and foreign countries, said Ding. The event is co-organized by the Hubei provincial government, the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council, and the Wuhan municipal government. Since its launch in 2001, the conference has become an important platform to attract talent and investment from overseas Chinese and promote cooperation and exchanges between China and foreign countries. On Monday, China released a swathe of economic data for October, surpassing expectations by economists. Its retail sales had grown by 4.9% year on year compared to an estimated 3.5%, while industrial production increased by 3.5%, up 0.4% from the previous month and an improvement on the prediction of 3.1%. Finally, fixed asset investment grew by 6.1%, which is relatively consistent with the estimated 6.2% but short of the forecasted 7.3%. The data demonstrates the continued resilience of the Chinese economy and its ability to face challenges, especially in regard to the keystones of growth: manufacturing, exports, and consumption. Throughout the month of October, much was made of a global commodity crisis, which caused the price of coal to surge. That led to a ripple effect on China's power supply and caused some factories to shut down due to their enormous energy requirements to fulfill production. Despite challenges, China brought the commodity crisis under control very fast. By adopting a series of measures, the country dramatically increased its supply and local capacity, punished rumor mongers who were artificially driving prices up for profits, and coordinated price controls. The result is that in the space of a month, state planners had brought the energy problem under control and offset the damage to the industry, allowing growth which has also been buoyed by strong demand overseas to recuperate. This proves that it continues to have one of the most resilient and reliable supply chains. Moreover, China's consumption was also up faster than expected, demonstrating the success of its pandemic prevention and control. There has been a growing debate in the West surrounding China's COVID-19 prevention and control policy, arguing that it will ultimately be detrimental to growth and consumption. However, there is no evidence to prove this. China has been able to save lives and offset economic damage through fast, targeted, and localized measures, keeping disruption to a minimum. This has allowed the public to remain broadly confident in their economic and spending activities, as opposed to the constant hesitation, uncertainty, and doubt in some Western countries regarding whether life will return to normal. Therefore, China's growth in retail sales was better than anticipated, and its pandemic prevention and control measures for small outbreaks are far more advantageous than long periods of restrictions, or alternatively, doing nothing. In contrast, deaths in the U.S. now amount to over 750,000. Moving beyond the pandemic, it should be noted that during last week's Singles Day shopping spree, e-commerce giants Alibaba and JD smashed their own records, reeling in $139 billion of sales and once again demonstrating continued growth in China's consumption. On the current trajectory, China will most likely go on to end the year in a better condition than what is currently anticipated, which will see a surge in exports and manufacturing, combined with getting energy prices under control. Despite the overall stability, there remain uncertainties internationally and domestically. The country has to do everything it takes to defeat the virus while making stronger efforts to keep its economy recovering steadily. Tom Fowdy is a British political and international relations analyst and a graduate of Durham and Oxford universities. He writes on topics pertaining to China, the DPRK, Britain and the U.S. For more information please visit: http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/TomFowdy.htm Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn. If you would like to contribute, please contact us at opinion@china.org.cn. Flash Chinese President Xi Jinping had a virtual meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday. The two sides had thorough and in-depth communication and exchanges on issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance shaping the development of China-U.S. relations and on important issues of mutual interest. President Xi pointed out that both China and the U.S. are at critical stages of development, and the "global village" of humanity faces multiple challenges. As the world's two largest economies and permanent members of the UN Security Council, China and the U.S. need to increase communication and cooperation, each run their domestic affairs well and, at the same time, shoulder their share of international responsibilities, and work together to advance the noble cause of world peace and development. This is the shared desire of the people of the two countries and around the world, and the joint mission of Chinese and American leaders. Sound, stable China-U.S. relationship urged President Xi stressed that a sound and stable China-U.S. relationship is required for advancing the two countries' respective development and for safeguarding a peaceful and stable international environment, including finding effective responses to global challenges such as climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic. China and the U.S. should respect each other, coexist in peace, and pursue win-win cooperation. President Xi expressed his readiness to work with President Biden to build consensus and take active steps to move China-U.S. relations forward in a positive direction. Doing so will advance the interests of the two peoples and meet the expectation of the international community. President Xi pointed out that the most important event in international relations over the past 50 years was the reopening and development of China-U.S. relations, which has benefited the two countries and the whole world. The most important event in international relations in the coming 50 years will be for China and the U.S. to find the right way to get along. History is a fair judge. What a statesman does, be it right or wrong, be it an accomplishment or a failure, will all be recorded by history. It is hoped that President Biden will demonstrate political leadership and steer America's China policy back on the track of reason and pragmatism. President Xi highlighted that a review of the experience and lessons learned in growing China-U.S. relations shows that for the two countries to get along in the new era, three principles must be followed. First, mutual respect. The two countries need to respect each other's social systems and development paths, respect each other's core interests and major concerns, and respect each other's right to development. They need to treat each other as equals, keep differences under control, and seek common ground while reserving differences. Second, peaceful coexistence. No conflict and no confrontation is a line that both sides must hold. The U.S. side has suggested coexistence between China and the U.S. One more word can be added to make it peaceful coexistence. Third, win-win cooperation. With their interests deeply intertwined, China and the U.S. stand to gain from cooperation and lose from confrontation. The world is big enough for the two countries to develop individually and collectively. The right thing to do is to choose mutual benefit over zero-sum game or the I-win-you-lose approach. President Xi identified four priority areas where China and the U.S. should focus their efforts on. First, shouldering responsibilities of major countries and leading global response to outstanding challenges. China-U.S. cooperation may not solve all problems, but few problems can be solved without China-U.S. cooperation. The global initiatives China has proposed are all open to the U.S. We hope the reverse is also true. Second, acting in the spirit of equality and mutual benefit to move forward exchanges at all levels and in all areas and generate more positive energy for China-U.S. relations. President Xi expressed his readiness to stay in touch with President Biden through multiple means to set the direction and inject more momentum into bilateral relations. The two countries, with broad common interests in a wide range of areas including economy, energy, mil-to-mil, law-enforcement, education, science and technology, cyber, environmental protection and sub-national interactions, should complement each other to make the cake bigger for China-U.S. cooperation. The two sides could fully harness the dialogue channels and mechanisms between their diplomatic and security, economic and financial, and climate change teams, in an effort to advance practical cooperation and resolve specific issues. Third, managing differences and sensitive issues in a constructive way to prevent China-U.S. relations from getting derailed or out of control. It is only natural for the two countries to have differences. The key is to manage them constructively so that they don't magnify or exacerbate. China will certainly defend its sovereignty, security and development interests. It is important that the U.S. properly handle the relevant issues with prudence. Fourth, strengthening coordination and cooperation on major international and regional hotspot issues to provide more public goods to the world. The world is not tranquil. China and the U.S. need to work together with the rest of the international community to defend world peace, promote global development, and safeguard a fair and equitable international order. President Xi compared China and the U.S. to two giant ships sailing in the ocean. It is important for the two sides to keep a steady hand on the tiller, so that the two giant ships will break waves and forge ahead together, without losing direction or speed, still less colliding with each other. Chinese people's aspiration for better life cannot be stopped President Xi explained China's development path and strategic intentions. The just concluded sixth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee took stock of the major achievements and historical experience of the CPC in the past 100 years. Over the past century, the CPC has kept to its founding aspiration and mission of striving for the happiness of the Chinese people and rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. A lot has been accomplished in this direction, but that is far from enough. More needs to be done. President Xi said that when he took office, he said publicly that the Chinese people's aspiration for a better life is the goal to strive for. The Chinese people's aspiration for a better life is the biggest internal driver for China's development and an inevitable trend of history. Any attempt to stop this historical trend will be rejected by the Chinese people, and will by no means succeed. President Xi said that as China's leader, serving the 1.4 billion Chinese people and working with them for a better life is a great challenge and a great responsibility. "I shall put aside my own well-being and live up to people's expectations," President Xi said. President Xi pointed out that the Chinese people have always loved and valued peace. Aggression or hegemony is not in the blood of the Chinese nation. Since the founding of the People's Republic, China has never started a single war or conflict, and has never taken one inch of land from other countries. China has no intention to sell its own development path around the world. On the contrary, China encourages all countries to find development paths tailored to their respective national conditions. President Xi stressed that opening-up is a fundamental state policy and a hallmark of China. China will not change its determination to open up at a higher level. China will not change its determination to share development opportunities with the rest of the world. And China will not change its determination to make economic globalization more open, inclusive, balanced and beneficial to all. The new development paradigm that China is working to establish is aimed at expanding domestic market, fostering both domestic and international circulations with greater scope and scale, and building a business environment that is more market-oriented, law-based and up to international standards. All this will provide a bigger market and more opportunities to other countries. President Xi highlighted China's commitment to peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom, which are common values of humanity. Drawing ideological lines or dividing the world into different camps or rival groups will only make the world suffer. The bitter lessons of the Cold War are still fresh in memory. We hope that the U.S. side can meet its word of not seeking a "new Cold War" with concrete actions. President Xi stated China's principled position on the Taiwan question. He noted the new wave of tensions across the Taiwan Strait, and ascribed the tensions to the repeated attempts by the Taiwan authorities to look for U.S. support for their independence agenda as well as the intention of some Americans to use Taiwan to contain China. Such moves are extremely dangerous, just like playing with fire. Whoever plays with fire will get burnt. The one-China principle and the three China-U.S. Joint Communiques are the political foundation of China-U.S. relations. Previous U.S. administrations have all made clear commitments on this question. The true status quo of the Taiwan question and what lies at the heart of one China are as follows: there is but one China in the world and Taiwan is part of China, and the Government of the People's Republic of China is the sole legal government representing China. Achieving China's complete reunification is an aspiration shared by all sons and daughters of the Chinese nation. We have patience and will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts. That said, should the separatist forces for Taiwan independence provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures. Multilateralism without China-U.S. cooperation is incomplete President Xi highlighted that civilizations are rich and diverse, and so is democracy. Democracy is not mass produced with a uniform model or configuration for countries around the world. Whether a country is democratic or not should be left to its own people to decide. Dismissing forms of democracy that are different from one's own is in itself undemocratic. China is ready to have dialogues on human rights on the basis of mutual respect, but we oppose using human rights to meddle in other countries' internal affairs. President Xi pointed out that China and the U.S. need to uphold the international system with the UN at its core, the international order underpinned by international law, and the basic norms governing international relations based on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter. Multilateralism without China-U.S. cooperation is incomplete. On trade ties, President Xi described the China-U.S. economic and trade relations as mutually beneficial in nature. Business is business. Economic and trade issues between the two countries should not be politicized. The two sides need to make the cake bigger for cooperation. China takes seriously the wishes of U.S. business community to travel to China more easily, and has agreed to upgrade fast-track arrangement, which will further enhance economic and trade exchanges between China and the U.S. and boost the recovery of the two economies. The U.S. should stop abusing or overstretching the concept of national security to suppress Chinese businesses. It is imperative for China and the U.S. to maintain communication on macroeconomic policies, support world economic recovery and guard against economic and financial risks. The U.S. should be mindful of the spillover effects of its domestic macro policies, and adopt responsible macroeconomic policies. On energy security, President Xi noted the need for China and the U.S. to call on the international community to jointly protect global energy security, strengthen cooperation on natural gas and new energy, and work with other countries to keep global industrial and supply chains safe and stable. On climate change, President Xi recalled China-U.S. cooperation that helped bring about the Paris Agreement. He pointed out that, as both countries are transitioning to green and low-carbon economy, climate change can well become a new highlight of cooperation. President Xi reiterated his belief that clear water and green mountains are as valuable as gold and silver, and that we must protect the environment the way we protect our own eyes, and treat the environment the way we treat our own lives. Today, ecological conservation has become a household concept and social consensus in China. China will make the world's biggest cut in carbon emission intensity in the shortest time frame in history, a task that will require extraordinary efforts. China means what it says. It only commits to what it can deliver, and never makes a promise it cannot keep. China is still the largest developing country in the world. The issue of unbalanced and inadequate development still stands out. All countries need to uphold the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, and strike a balance between addressing climate change and protecting livelihoods. What the world needs is less finger-pointing or blame game, but more solidarity and cooperation. Words matter, but actions matter even more. Developed countries need to earnestly fulfill their historical responsibilities and due obligations, and maintain policy consistency. On public health, President Xi pointed out that the pandemic once again proves that humanity lives in a community with a shared future. There is no higher priority than people's lives. Solidarity and cooperation is the most powerful weapon for the international community to defeat COVID-19. Response to any major disease must be based on science. Politicizing diseases does no good but only harm. The pressing priority in the global COVID response is to address the vaccine deficits and close the vaccination gap. President Xi said that he suggested making COVID vaccines a global public good at the early stage of the pandemic last year, and put forth a Global Vaccine Cooperation Action Initiative just recently. China is among the first to offer vaccines to developing countries in need, delivering over 1.7 billion doses of finished and bulk vaccines to the world. We will consider making additional donations in light of the needs of developing countries. COVID-19 will not be the last public health crisis facing humanity. China and the U.S. need to call for the establishment of a cooperation mechanism for global public health and communicable disease prevention and control, and promote further international exchanges and cooperation. U.S. has no intention to conflict with China President Biden said that the U.S.-China relationship is the most important bilateral relations in the world. As two major countries, the U.S. and China have a responsibility to the world as well as to our people. The two sides need to have open and candid dialogues to enhance understanding of each other's intentions, and make sure that competition between the two countries is fair and healthy and does not veer into conflict. President Biden echoed President Xi's comment that history is a fair judge, and that they should make the relationship work and not mess it up. China has been a major power since 5,000 years ago. Biden reiterated that the U.S. does not seek to change China's system, the revitalization of its alliances is not anti-China, and the U.S. has no intention to have a conflict with China. Biden reaffirmed the U.S. government's long-standing one-China policy, stated that the U.S. does not support "Taiwan independence", and expressed the hope for peace and stability to be maintained in the Taiwan Strait. The U.S. is willing to work with China on the basis of mutual respect and peaceful coexistence, increase communication, reduce misperception, and handle differences constructively. Biden emphasized the need for the U.S. and China to work more closely in areas where their interests align, respond to global challenges such as the COVID pandemic and climate change, and deliver better lives to the two peoples. We should encourage the younger generation to interact more and be more exposed to each other's culture, which will help make the world a better place. The two sides also exchanged views on Afghanistan, the Iranian nuclear issue, the situation on the Korean Peninsula, and other international and regional issues of mutual interest. The two presidents agreed that their meeting is candid, constructive, substantive and productive. It helps increase mutual understanding, adds to the positive expectation of the international community for this relationship, and sends a powerful message to the two countries and the world. The two sides agreed to maintain close communication in different forms and steer China-U.S. relations back on the right track of sound and steady development, for the good of the people in both countries and around the world. Ding Xuexiang, Liu He, Yang Jiechi and Wang Yi were present at the meeting. Flash Six people including three suicide bombers were killed and 33 others injured in twin bomb blasts in the Ugandan capital Kampala on Tuesday, police said. Fred Enanga, police spokesperson told reporters that three suicide bombers detonated themselves at a checkpoint at the Central Police Station and on the parliamentary avenue. Enanga said the injured were rushed to Mulago National Referral Hospital while counter-terrorism response teams managed to pursue a fourth suicide bomb attacker. "They shot and injured him, and immediately after, recovered an unexploded improvised explosive device, at Nansana-Katooke, at his home, which the bomb squad were going to neutralize. We are now pursuing other members of the terror groups," Enanga said. He said today's attacks show that there is still need to pre-empt, penetrate and prevent deadly attacks by domestic extremists in the days to come. "For now, the bomb threats are still active, and cannot be solved in one go, which calls for the popular intelligence and vigilance of the community," he said. Enanga said the blasts bear the hallmarks of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), an affiliate of the Islamic State in central Africa. "It clearly shows that the ADF linked radicalized groups, still have a desire to carry out lethal attacks, on soft targets, with suicide attackers and improvised explosive devices (IED)," Enanga said. "These kinds of threats remain significant because IEDs and suicide bomb jackets can easily be built from common household items found in local markets, retail shops, and supermarkets," the police spokesperson added. The latest attacks came about three weeks after two separate blasts, blamed on the ADF, killed two people and injured several others in central Uganda. Flash A gas explosion on Tuesday morning rocks a market in Lagos, Nigeria's economic hub, killing at least five people and injuring some others, an official said. Ibrahim Farinloye, coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency(NEMA) in the Lagos state, told Xinhua on the phone a gas explosion happened at about 8:00 a.m. local time on Tuesday at a liquefied petroleum gas retailing center in a popular market in Lagos, resulting in casualties. "Four adults, comprising three males and one female, were recovered dead," Farinloye said, adding a 10-year-old boy who was rescued alive died on his way to the hospital. He said responders have put the fire out as rescue and recovery of bodies were ongoing. Balogun Mubaraq, a resident in the area, told Xinhua many people with various degrees of burns have been rushed to a local hospital. You are here: World Flash Law enforcement authorities from China, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand joined forces on Tuesday to conduct the 111th joint Mekong River patrol. Two Chinese vessels departed for the patrol at 9 a.m. Tuesday from Jingha Port in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture of southwest China's Yunnan Province, said the Yunnan public security department. Prior to the operation, the law enforcement authorities held video conferences to jointly analyze the current COVID-19 pandemic and public security situations in the river basin. During the patrol, the four countries will carry out joint law enforcement activities in key waters of the river, and make every effort to ensure the security and stability of the river basin. The Mekong River, known as the Lancang River in China, is a vital waterway for cross-border shipping. China, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand have been carrying out joint patrols of the river since December 2011. Flash Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Tuesday said that China and Africa should expand their pragmatic cooperation to create a better future for the 2.7 billion Chinese and African people. Li made the remarks during his address at the 4th Forum on China-Africa Local Government Cooperation, which he attended via video link. Noting that the friendship between China and Africa is unbreakable, Li said China is willing to increase the aid of vaccines and anti-epidemic materials to Africa according to its needs, so as to build a solid defense line for people's health. China is willing to further align each other's development strategies, strengthen the exchange of experiences in urban governance, poverty eradication, social construction and agricultural modernization, and promote cooperation between friendship cities, Li said. He added that China will work with Africa to safeguard the common interests of developing countries, maintain the friendly tradition of mutual respect, equality, unity and cooperation, adhere to multilateralism, and support each other on issues concerning their respective core interests and major concerns. Stressing the significance of exchanges and friendship between Chinese and African people, Li said with joint efforts of both sides, there is much to be achieved through cooperation between local governments of China and Africa. About 300 political leaders from African countries and officials of local governments and relevant institutions from China and Africa attended the conference both online and offline. Flash Rehabilitation International (RI) held a virtual meeting for the Executive Committee of RI and the Governing Assembly of RI members Nov. 12 and 13. Zhang Haidi, chairperson of RI, presided over the events. The meetings were an opportunity for committee members to discuss the organization's finances, funds, centenary anniversary celebration and collaborative projects. Likewise, the Governing Assembly of RI members passed the organization's financial audit report, membership application, work plan for 2022 and budget. During her speech, Zhang said that with the support and participation of all members of the RI Executive Committee and RI members, it has made positive progress in its work. RI has collaborated on multiple projects with various United Nations agencies, including the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), the United Nations Population Fund and the World Health Organization, Zhang said. The group has also issued proposals on fostering more inclusive spaces for women with disabilities alongside the China Disabled Persons' Federation and the ESCAP, which was submitted to the UN secretary-general, Zhang said. RI established and presented the RI Award for Outstanding Achievements, and proactively appealed to the international community to protect the rights and interests of individuals with disabilities, as the community fights against the COVID-19 pandemic. These endeavors have significantly enhanced RI's global influence, Zhang noted. RI has funded a number of its members' projects related to people's wellbeing in Asia, Europe, the Americas and Africa. Additionally, RI used its website to outline its experience with the prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic, and has provided essential medical supplies to its members in hard-hit regions, as well as resources for children with disabilities. These activities have strengthened the organization's vitality and cohesion, said Zhang. Notably, RI successfully held its 24th World Congress via video links. Zhang pointed out that next year marks the centenary anniversary of the organization, and that RI should prepare for the celebration, and continue to present the RI Award for Outstanding Achievements. She stressed that RI needs to optimize its organizational structure, secure additional funding, create more branded campaigns and promote the sustainable development of its cause. The day before, I had walked out of the cafe without paying for my scone and coffee. Today I was back for another coffee and to make amends for my misdeed. As the waitress heard my apology and was assessing my bill, she asked me how my day was. I told her that I had just received my second Pfizer jab this morning and was feeling fine. I had even been for a walk along the beach. The waitress replied that I was fortunate. When she had received her first Pfizer jab, she had an adverse reaction which affected her heart and she was now on medication. The same thing had happened to her father but her mother had no adverse reaction to the vaccine. She was worried about having the second jab and was undecided at the moment. She needed to balance concerns about her personal health with protecting her 10 year-old son from the virus. After listening to her with empathy I responded, You should not feel under any pressure to take the second jab. My words gave her some comfort. The 90:10 rule In New Zealand, there has been significant government pressure to take a double dose of the Pfizer vaccine and an inoculation target has been set at 90 percent. Because of the government vaccination mandate, teachers, nurses, mid-wives and those on the frontline facing Covid at the border are being stood down if they refuse to take the vaccine. Currently there is talk about introducing vaccine certificates after we reach the 90 percent threshold and operating a traffic light system that gives much more freedom to those who have been vaccinated compared to those who are not. This means that unvaccinated people will not be able to go to public events, the hairdresser and restaurants if Covid is still in the community after 90 percent of the population are vaccinated. The 90 percent vaccination target and proposed vaccine certificate plans are causing much division and angst in society. It will also have an effect on church services with those who are unvaccinated being excluded from large church gatherings, and there would be a need for the church to police those who are vaccinated and those who are not. I have friends who are fully vaccinated and a number of friends who do not wish to take the vaccine including a medical professional. Those against vaccination have weighed up the evidence and decided not to take the vaccine for various reasons, whatever the personal cost to them. In some quarters, people who do not wish to take the vaccine are being painted as selfish, ignorant and conspiracy theorists. I was at a public meeting last week when the issue of Covid in the community was raised and a person yelled out, Those people who are not fully vaccinated should be refused medical treatment. There were some nods in the room, such is the fear mongering around Covid. There are many people who are taking the vaccine because they feel they have little choice. I cannot remember a time when there has even been such a divisive issue since the Springbok rugby tour of 1981. And I cannot remember a time in my lifetime when there has been a such a loud call for the persecution of a people group. Whatever the perceived health reasons, the calls to persecute the unvaccinated are a grave injustice and representative of a society that feeds on punishment. This is not the Christian way. As Christians we dont follow the ways of the world. We demonstrate compassion, love and grace and make amends in this lost world. If someone is crushed we build them up. I am not going to sit back and watch my non-vaccinated friends being persecuted. If they would like a coffee I will buy them a coffee. If they need a hairdresser I will find them a hairdresser. Jesus did not bully people. Jesus healed the lepers (Luke chapter 17, verses 11-14) and had dinner with the tax collectors (Matthew chapter 9, verse 10). Jesus stood in the gap for our sins. And never in recent times, has there been a greater call to faith. Faith in our traditional beliefs as followers of Jesus that there is only one way to walk in the light. Faith in the power of the cross, the resurrection and the power of the Holy Spirit. I am going to try and walk in the way Jesus would, in love and grace, and make amends for those who do not wish to take the vaccine in this age of persecution and punishment. A voice of peace in these troubling times. And may God shine His light on this situation, reveal the truth and set people free so his Word will bloom like the beautiful words in Psalm chapter 85. Psalm chapter 85, verses 10-12 Love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. The Lord will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest. San Francisco, 17 Nov 2021: The Report Inhaled Nitric Oxide Delivery Systems Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Type (Pediatric, Adult), By Application (HRF, AHRF), By Product (Disposables, Systems), By End User, And Segment Forecasts, 2021 - 2028 The global inhaled nitric oxide delivery systems market size is estimated to reach USD 434.2 million by 2028 registering a CAGR of 6.9%, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. A rise in the cases of respiratory failure among neonates, increased pollution levels leading to lung diseases in adults, need for quick treatment response, and reduced complications are the factors driving the adoption of inhaled nitric oxide therapy. The presence of several small-scale manufacturers and research initiatives undertaken by major players to prove treatment efficacy against the SARS-CoV-2 virus further enhances market growth. Safe and effective treatment regimen, a rapid offset of action, reduced toxicity, high concentration of drug at the target organ, avoidance of systemic adverse reaction, and reduced dose of medication are some of the advantages of INO over other medications. This leads to the improved adoption of INO, potentially driving the market growth. Market leaders like Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals are providing fundings to conduct clinical trials of INO therapy to treat complications in COVID-19 patients. Such initiatives are said to boost the market growth during the forecasted period. Access Research Report of Inhaled Nitric Oxide Delivery Systems Market @ https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/inhaled-nitric-oxide-delivery-systems-market-report Inhaled Nitric Oxide Delivery Systems Market Report Highlights The pediatric type segment accounted for the largest revenue share in 2020 due to the rising usage of INO therapy on account of its efficacy and reduced complications The Hypoxic Respiratory Failure (HRF) application segment held the largest revenue share in 2020 Hospitals was the largest revenue-generating segment in 2020 owing to the presence of funds and well-established infrastructure in this end-user setting Asia Pacific was the largest regional market in 2020 due to the growing pediatric population, rise in the cases of respiratory diseases, and presence of local manufacturers of disposables Some of the prominent companies are Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals, Getinge, Vero Biotech, LINDE, Beyond Air, SLE, Nu-MED, Bellerophon Therapeutics, Air Liquide Healthcare, and Circassia Pharmaceuticals List of Key Players of Inhaled Nitric Oxide Delivery Systems Market Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals Getinge Vero Biotech LINDE Beyond Air SLE NU MED Bellerophon Therapeutics Air Liquide Healthcare Circassia Pharmaceuticals Access Press Release of Inhaled Nitric Oxide Delivery Systems Market @ https://www.grandviewresearch.com/press-release/global-inhaled-nitric-oxide-delivery-systems-market SINGAPORE, 17 November 2021 There are many individuals who are giving priority to their skin health because it is essential to have glowing skin to look younger and beautiful. 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With the help of the best acne scar treatment, people get desired results in an effective way. A recent report stated that different individuals have different kinds of skin, and every kind of skin requires a different treatment to get better skin health. As far as acne scars are concerned, several kinds of acne scars are experienced by people, for example, icepick scars, rolling scars, boxed scars, and hypertrophic scars. A number of individuals in Singapore are struggling with these scars, and they want better treatment. There is a most trustworthy clinic named Ozhean Zoey that has the potential to provide the best treatment. Better is to click here or visit our official website to know more about the acne scar treatment singapore. This clinic provides the best acne scar treatment to every individual and provides better results as soon as possible. It has highly skilled doctors who provide the best services to every person. 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Website : https://ozheanzoey.com/acne-scar-treatments/ Global Facial Fat Transfer Market: Information by Target Area (Naso-Labial Folds, Lips, Marionette Folds, Temples, Chin, Under-Eye Area), Treatment (Dermal Fillers, Fat Injection, Others), End-User (Hospitals, Cosmetic Surgery Clinics, Others) and Region (North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific & Middle East & Africa) Forecast till 2027 Avail Free Sample @ https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/sample_request/1780 Facial Fat Transfer Market is estimated to be valued at USD 7789.1 Million by 2025 and is expected to register a CAGR of 11.05% during the forecast period. Facial fat transfer is a minimally invasive surgical procedure to move fat from an area of the body where it is plentiful and transfer it to the face to restore lost volume. The fat is gently removed using modern liposuction techniques and is then prepared for injecting into the face. Several dermal fillers are available in the market, designed to improve different parts of the face. Segment Analysis The Global Facial Fat Transfer Market has been segmented based on the target area, Treatment, End-User, and Region. Based on the target area, the market has been divided into naso-labial folds, lips, marionette folds, temples, chin, and under-eye area. Based on treatment, the market is further sub-segmented as dermal fillers, fat injections, and others. On the basis of end user, the market has been divided into hospitals, cosmetic surgery clinics, and others. Regional Analysis Geographically, the Global Facial Fat Transfer Market has been segmented into the Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the Middle East and Africa. As per MRFR analysis, Americas were the largest market for facial fat transfer in 2018 and is expected to remain dominant during the review period. Increasing awareness regarding body aesthetics and the introduction of advanced technology in the facial rejuvenation industry are major factors that drive the growth of the facial fat transfer market in the American region. Europe accounted for a significant market share and is projected to be the second-largest market during the forecast period. The increasing demand for minimally invasive cosmetic procedures is fueling the facial fat transfer market growth in European countries. For instance, according to the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons, in London, 2019, over 28,000 cosmetic procedures took place in 2018. The market in Asia-Pacific is expected to register a significant growth rate during the forecast period. The majority of the companies in Asia-Pacific are committed to investing in research and development of facial fat transfer treatments, which will ultimately boost the growth of the market. The growth of the Middle East and Africa facial fat transfer market is majorly attributed to developing healthcare infrastructure, and continuously increasing demand for facial fat transfer products. Africa holds the least share of the market due to the limited availability of funds and medical facilities. Market Players Market Research Future (MRFR) recognizes DR. Korman (Israel), Galderma Laboratories, L.P. (US), Integra LifeSciences Corporation (Israel), Merz Pharma (Germany), Allergan (Ireland), SciVision Biotech Inc (Taiwan), Suneva Medical, Inc (US), Bausch Health Companies Inc (Canada), Teoxane Laboratories (Switzerland), Ipsen Pharma (France), Sinclair Pharma (UK) as the key players in the Global Facial Fat Transfer Market. Key Findings of the Study: The Global Facial Fat Transfer Market is projected to reach over USD 7789.1 Million by 2025 at an 05 % CAGR during the review period of 2019 to 2025. North America accounted for the largest market share, with the US being the major contributor to the growth of the market. Based on the target area, the naso-labial folds segment is projected to register the highest CAGR of 11.51% during the forecast period owing to the rising prevalence of facial fat transfer cases. On the basis of treatment, the dermal fillers segment accounted for the largest market share of 49.76% in 2018. Based on end user, the hospitals segment accounted for the largest market share of 49.20% in 2018 Access Report Details @ https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/reports/facial-fat-transfer-market-1780 About Market Research Future: At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), Raw Research Reports (3R), Continuous-Feed Research (CFR), and Market Research & Consulting Services. MRFR team have supreme objective to provide the optimum quality market research and intelligence services to our clients. Our market research studies by Components, Application, Logistics and market players for global, regional, and country level market segments, enable our clients to see more, know more, and do more, which help to answer all their most important questions. Market Highlights Global Epilepsy Devices Market is expected to register a CAGR of 6.56% during the forecast period and is expected to hit USD 551.2 Million by 2027. In epilepsy, the brain activity becomes abnormal, resulting in seizures or periods of unusual behavior, sensations, and sometimes loss of awareness. Although it could affect anybody irrespective of age and gender, its prevalence is significant and continuously increasing in the geriatric population. get free sample @ https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/sample_request/10427 Epilepsy Research, UK (ERUK) launched a Doctoral Training Centre (DTC) Grant Scheme with the aim of capacity building of the UK epilepsy research environment. ERUK is currently inviting applications from research institutes to apply for multiple linked Ph.D. studentships to commence 2021-2023. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), a part of the USS National Institutes of Health, had appropriated USD 154 million in 2017 for research on epilepsy. The appropriation rose to USD 188 million in 2019 and is estimated to reach USD 203 million by 2020. The notable studies and research institutes that NINDS has funded include The Epilepsy 4000 (Epi4K), The Center for SUDEP Research (CSR), The Epilepsy Bioinformatics Study for Antiepileptogenic Therapy (EpiBiosS4Rx), The Channelopathy-Associated Epilepsy Research Center (CAERC), and The Epilepsy Multiplatform Variant Prediction (EpiMVP). The Epilepsy Foundation awarded USD 200,000 to two of the finalists who competed in the 9th Annual Shark Tank Competition on August 27 at the 2020 Epilepsy Pipeline Conference, Maryland, US. This included a grant of USD 125,000 to a researcher for a medical-grade smart-mattress device known as Chorus to reposition individuals and stimulate them post-seizure to prevent Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP). Similarly, National Institute for Health Researchs (UK) Research and Innovation for Global Health Transformation (RIGHT) program has awarded USD 6.6 million to fund a project investigating epilepsy in sub-Saharan Africa in February 2020. Segment Analysis Global Epilepsy Devices Market has been segmented based on Product Type, Technology, Seizure Detection and Prediction Devices, and End Use. On the basis of product type, the global epilepsy devices market is segmented into wearable devices, conventional devices, and implantable devices. The wearable devices segment is further segmented into watches, bracelets, camera devices, mattress devices, anti-suffocation pillows, and others. On the basis of technology, the global epilepsy devices market has been classified as vagus nerve stimulation, responsive neurostimulation, deep brain stimulation and accelerometry. On the basis of seizure detection and prediction devices, the global epilepsy devices market has been classified as seizure detection and prediction devices, electroencephalogram, intracranial EEG, surface electromyography, electrodermal activity, electrocardiography, video detection systems, implanted advisory systems, and others. On the basis of end use, the global epilepsy devices market has been classified as hospitals & clinics, neurology centers, home care settings, and others. Regional Analysis Global Epilepsy Devices Market, based on region, has been divided into the Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and the Middle East & Africa. The Americas accounted for a larger share of the global epilepsy devices market. The large share is majorly attributed to the presence of key device manufacturers, increasing adoption of innovative software for detection of seizures, technological advancements, and high disposable income. Boost in the research funding in the European region, rising government initiatives, increasing number of patients suffering from epilepsy, an increasing number of manufacturers, improving economies, high disposable income per individual, and increased healthcare spending are resulting in the high the growth of the market in this region. The Asia Pacific region is anticipated to grow at a lucrative CAGR over the forecast period. A study funded by the Global Health Department of Sanofi and Grand Challenges Canada (grant number 032504) found that epilepsy affects more than 50 million people worldwide, 80% of whom live in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). n Southeast Asia, the prevalence was moderate (6%). Around 1012 million people with epilepsy reside in India. A significant number of patients do not receive appropriate treatment, leading to a large treatment gap. A high prevalence and incidence of epilepsy has been reported in onchocerciasis-endemic regions in Central and East Africa. There is compelling epidemiological evidence suggesting that this high burden is caused by onchocerciasis-associated epilepsy (OAE). Key Players MRFR recognizes the following companies as the Key Players in the Global Epilepsy Devices Market Boston Scientific Corporation, Medpage Ltd (Easylink UK), Cerbomed GmbH (TVNS Technologies GmbH), Liva Nova (Cyberonics), Compumedics, Nihon Kohden, MC10, Empatica, Inc, Medtronic Plc, Neuropace, Inc, and Natus Medical Incorporated. Browse Full Report Details @ https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/reports/epilepsy-devices-market-10427 About Market Research Future: At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), Raw Research Reports (3R), Continuous-Feed Research (CFR), and Market Research & Consulting Services. Market Highlights: The Global Cochlear Implants Market is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of 9.86% and is due to reach USD 3,203.8 Mn over the forecast period of 2017-2023, projects Market Research Future (MRFR) in a detailed report.Cochlear Implants are medical devices that are surgically inserted to provide a sense of sound to a person with hearing loss. The last few years have witnessed a significant increase in the demand for cochlear implants owing to the rise in a number of patients with hearing impairment who generate demand for diagnosis and treatment. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that by 2025, 900 Mn people are likely to suffer from hearing impairment.The rise in global geriatric population is also expected to be a positive factor influencing the growth of the global cochlear implants market. The aged populace is more susceptible to hearing loss which induces high demand for cochlear implants. There has been increased interest by medical device manufacturers to invest heavily in R&D activities which have led to the development of advanced cochlear implants. The increasing use of next-generation metals, polymers, ceramics and biomaterials in cochlear implants has resulted in enhancement of the value of surgery and improvement of surgical outcomes which has further accelerated the growth of the market.Other factors boosting the growth of the market include a rise in a number of clinical trials, improving reimbursement scenario in developing countries and an increase in the number of FDA approvals. Conversely, the cost of cochlear remains a significant hurdle to the growth of the global cochlear implants market. The estimated cost of a cochlear implant can go up to high amounts which might not be affordable to middle-class and low-income class population. Segmentation: Cochlear Implants Market Growth has been segmented based on product, type, and end user. By Product, the Global Cochlear Implants Market has been segmented into a cochlear implant system, and accessories & upgrades. By Types, the Global Cochlear Implants Market has been segmented into cochlear implant system, and accessories & upgrades. By End User, the Global Cochlear Implants Market has been segmented into hospitals & clinics, ambulatory surgical centers, research & academic institutes, and others. Regional Analysis: The Americas, Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), and the Middle East & Africa are the key markets for cochlear implants. The Americas represent a significant market for cochlear implants owing to the presence of a vast patient population. Rising geriatric population, increasing demand for advanced treatment options and affordability are key factors determining the growth of the Americas market.Europe accounts for the second largest share of the global cochlear market. The Europe market is driven by strong government support, availability of funds for R&D activities and high expenditure on healthcare. Asia Pacific follows Europe closely and is slated to be the fastest growing market over the forecast period. Rapid advancement in medical technology in the region and the presence of considerable patient pool in the region drives the market for cochlear implants. Also, improving reimbursement scenario, the growing need for better medical devices, and expanding expenditure on healthcare due to a rise in disposable income has created a conducive environment for the growth of the market. China and India are the key contributors to the APAC market.The MEA market accounts for the least share of the global cochlear implants market. Limited availability of medical facilities, poor economic conditions, and lack of awareness restricts the growth of the Africa market. Meanwhile, the well-developed economy in the Middle East offers growth opportunities for cochlear implants. Competitive Landscape: The notable players in the global cochlear implants market MED-El (Austria), Microson S.A. (Spain), Widex (Denmark), GAES MEDICA (Spain), Cochlear Ltd (Australia), William Demant Holding Group (Denmark), Advanced Bionics AG (Switzerland). Industry Updates: In August 2018, Advanced Bionics, a global leader in cochlear implants, announced FDA approval for its new HiRes Ultra 3D Cochlear Implant. The new cochlear implant is hassle-free and pain-free choice for patients and is equipped with a unique magnet technology. In November 2018, researchers at Asan Medical Center (AMC) developed artificial intelligence (AI)-based prediction platform for cochlear implant surgery. The platform can provide rapid diagnoses, treatment, and rehabilitation of hearing loss. Access Sample Report @ https://www.marketresearchfuture.com/reports/cochlear-implants-market-5256 RELATED REPORT Heart Pump Devices Market Research Report - Forecast to 2027 Picture Archiving and Communications Systems Market Research Report - Forecast to 2027 Medical Ceramics Market Research Report - Forecast to 2027 About Market Research Future: At Market Research Future (MRFR), we enable our customers to unravel the complexity of various industries through our Cooked Research Report (CRR), Half-Cooked Research Reports (HCRR), Raw Research Reports (3R), Continuous-Feed Research (CFR), and Market Research & Consulting Services Minister Gautam Reddy said that in order to support hybrid working models as well as work from anywhere for extended periods, AP is providing co-working spaces closer to employees homes with facilities like uninterrupted power supply, high speed broadband connectivity through leased lines, dedicated workstations and clean spaces. (DC Image) Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh is launching Work from Hometown (W@HT) centres for IT and ITeS employees /employers and freelancers in 29 locations on a pilot basis. AP Information Technology, electronics and communications department in coordination with APSSDC, APNRT, APIS, APSCHE would set up these centres in various engineering colleges and APIS facilities in Visakhapatnam, Kakinada and Tirupati. Minister for IT, Mekapati Gautam Reddy, launched the website of the project at an event here on Tuesday. He said AP is the first in the country to launch these centres to help those in these sectors who worked from home due to the Covid19 pandemic and are facing difficulty with critical requirements such as high-speed internet, uninterrupted power supply, dedicated work space etc. He said that as pandemic was seemingly receding, IT/ITeS companies are evaluating options like going back to the pre-Covid scenario of working from offices, letting employees work in a hybrid model by letting them work for a few days a week from anywhere and continuing to let them work remotely full time. Minister Gautam Reddy said that in order to support hybrid working models as well as work from anywhere for extended periods, AP is providing co-working spaces closer to employees homes with facilities like uninterrupted power supply, high speed broadband connectivity through leased lines, dedicated workstations and clean spaces. Work from Hometown pilot centres are being set up in locations across the state. Each centre shall have a seating capacity that could accommodate a minimum of 30 employees. Request from any IT/ITES company requiring a dedicated centre for itself will be considered, he said. Officials said, based on demand, the ITE&C department also plans to scale up and expand the Work from Hometown spaces by leveraging existing infrastructure in 102 CM Excellence Centres, 500 colleges, 20 engineering colleges, as also APIS and APIIC facilities in the near future. These could accommodate nearly 100,000 IT/ITeS employees. Interested IT/ITeS employees and employers may contact 9988853335 or visit www.apit.ap.gov.in/wfht/ for further information and registrations, officials added. This after the Telangana State government and the wholesale fruit commission agents and traders of Gaddiannaram Market stuck to their guns over the issue of shifting of the market from Gaddiannaram to Batasingaram by filing several petitions. (DC Image) Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court decided to ascertain facts about the facilities and infrastructure provided on a temporary basis at the Batasingaram fruit market till the Koheda Market premises works are completed for full-fledged trading. This after the Telangana State government and the wholesale fruit commission agents and traders of Gaddiannaram Market stuck to their guns over the issue of shifting of the market from Gaddiannaram to Batasingaram by filing several petitions. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Satishchandra Sharma and Justice Rajashekar Reddy on Tuesday appointed advocate K Vinaykumar as the Court Commission to report on the ground situation at the Batasingaram market. They would inspect the premises and take statements from traders, who have already commenced the business activities there. This directions were issued by the division bench while dealing with the contempt case and other appeals and petitions filed by the wholesale fruit commission agents association, complaining that they were not being allowed into Gaddiannaram market, despite the court orders dated October 4, 2021. In this order, the court had directed the state government and the agricultural market committee to allow the agents and traders to do trading activities at the Gaddiannaram market premises till further orders. The bench questioned the official respondents as to why they were disregarding the court orders and noted that there are no subsequent directions supporting the government decision in declaring a holiday for Gaddiannaram market. The court said trading activities must be allowed. The court responded positively to a request from government counsel Aandavelli Sanjeev Kumar to appoint a Court Commission and send it to immediately ascertain the ground situation at Batasingaram market premises before issuing any directions. Further, counsel submitted that the government will comply with the orders issued by the court once the report of the commission is received. He prayed before the court that facts will come out by evening if the commission would do an inspection immediately. He submitted that a group of traders who are not interested in the shifting of the market from Gaddiannaram is trying to buy time by filing the petitions. But, the government is firm that it would build a super specialty hospital in 22 acres of the Gaddiannaram market area and some of funds have been allocated. If there is a delay in shifting, the construction of the hospital would be delayed, he said. Gangaiah Naidu, senior counsel for traders, informed the court that the AMC officials with the help of the police are not permitting trade to take place at the Gaddiannaram fruit market despite court orders asking the officials not to force the traders to shift from there. He disputed the contentions of Sanjeev Kumar and said the facilities created at Batasingaram are not sufficient and it is not conducive for the traders and commission agents to shift to Batasingaram and perform the trading there. The petitioner traders have earlier submitted to the court that they were ready to shift the market to Koheda, which is a permanent place created by the government, after the works are completed there. But, they opposed shifting to Batasingaram, it being a temporary place. The government`s contention is that the works will be completed at Koheda in a years time. If it waited till then, the hospital project would be delayed. The team has completed its month-long training and will be deputed to drive the solid waste management vehicles in different Taluks. (Photo source: Arrangements with Zilla Panchayat) Karwar: For the first time in the region, a womens team is ready to drive the waste management vehicles in the rural areas of Uttara Kannada districts. Uttara Kannada district has 12 Taluks and major portion of the district is covered by villages. The Uttara Kannada Zilla Panchayat is concentrating on effective solid waste management in every Panchayat through the Self Help Groups (SHGs). In this effort, it is also concentrating on deploying women in the task. Ten women who expressed interest were provided training at Canara Bank RSETI at Haliyal. The team has completed its month-long training and will be deputed to drive the solid waste management vehicles in different Taluks. These women are not just drivers but will be in charge of head solid waste collection in their respective units. They will drive the solid waste collection vehicles, ensure segregation of the waste and also hand over the plastic, dry waste to the concerned vendors. All this needs proper training, which was provided at the RSETI. We identified 10 women from various SHGs and provided them free training for 30 days. They will be sent to respective Panchayats. We will start the training for the second set by this month-end. Looking at the first batch, we expect more women to express their interest, Zilla Panchayat CEO Priyanga M told Deccan Chronicle. The women will also be provided financial awareness, Yoga training, and packing system, she added. New Delhi: Determined on an impartial, fair and just investigation into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence, the Supreme Court Wednesday appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to monitor the probe by Uttar Pradesh SIT which will also get three IPS officers who are not the natives of the state. Observing that while investigating such offences, justice must not only be done, but also be seen and perceived to be done, a bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana ordered reconstitution of the SIT and ordered the induction IPS officers -- S B Shiradkar, Padmaja Chauhan and Preetinder Singh. Shiradkar, an IPS officer of 1993 batch from Maharashtra and presently serving as ADG Intelligence in Uttar Pradesh, will head the SIT, the apex court said in its order. We thus deem it appropriate to reconstitute the SIT hereinafter to preserve the faith and trust of people in the Criminal Administration of the Justice System. Further, to assure full and complete justice to the victims of crime, we are inclined to order that the ongoing investigation be monitored by a retired High Court Judge, who too may not have his roots in the State of Uttar Pradesh. We, therefore, appoint Justice (Retd.) Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to monitor the ongoing investigation so as to ensure transparency, fairness and absolute impartiality in the outcome of the investigation in the Lakhimpur Kheri incident which is to be conducted in a time-bound manner, said the bench which also comprised justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli, Stressing on the need of a fair and just probe, the top court said that given the nascent stage of the investigation, it was reluctant to make any observation on the merits of the case as that would have an impact on the parties involved and influence the prosecuting agency as well as the courts which would ultimately look into the case. This Court is equally concerned about guaranteeing an impartial, fair, just and thorough investigation into the incident which has resulted in such a tragic loss of lives of protesters as well as some other persons, it said while proposing to appoint the former Judge to monitor the probe and inducting new members in the SIT to conduct the investigation uninfluenced by any consideration. The UP government consented to the proposal leading to the appointment of the former judge and the reconstitution of the SIT which has been asked to make all efforts to conclude the investigation expeditiously and file the charge sheet. The State of Uttar Pradesh is directed to provide all perks, facilities, emoluments, secretarial assistance and any other related requirements equivalent to the post of a sitting High Court Judge (minus the pension) to the learned Monitoring Judge. Post the matter for hearing on receipt of a Status Report from the Monitoring Judge, after the charge sheet is filed, the bench ordered. The top court, which had expressed disapproval on the slow pace, manner and outcome of the investigation conducted so far, took note of the fact that the present SIT predominantly comprised middle level/subordinate level police officers posted in district Lakhimpur Kheri and ordered reconstitution. It appears to us that in spite of their perceived commitment and sincerity in carrying out the investigation, there may still be a lurking suspicion in respect of the fairness and independence of such an investigation. "We, therefore, deem it appropriate to direct reconstitution of the SIT infused with directly recruited IPS officers who do not hail from the State of UP though are allocated to UP Cadre. It goes without saying that the SIT shall utilise the latest forensic investigative methods to reach the truth, the order said. The newly constituted SIT shall be free to seek assistance or include local officers for taking the ongoing investigation to its logical conclusion under the continuous monitoring of Justice Jain, it said. The CJI had said earlier in the day that the bench had decided to appoint Justice Jain to supervise on a day-to-day basis the Uttar Pradesh SIT's probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in which eight people including four farmers were killed on October 3. The CJI had said that the detailed order will be passed later in the day. Now we have verified and contacted the concerned judge we had thought of. This is Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and he will monitor the ongoing investigation so as to ensure transparency and fairness, the bench said. The UP government on November 15 had agreed to the apex court's suggestion that a former judge of its choice may be appointed to supervise the state SIT's probe. Prior to this, the apex court had said it had no confidence and did not want the one-member judicial commission appointed by the UP government to continue the probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case. Retired Allahabad High Court judge Justice Pradeep Kumar Srivastava was named by the state government earlier to enquire into the eruption of violence on Tikonia-Banbirpur road in Lakhimpur Kheri district. We are inclined to appoint a former judge of a different high court to monitor the investigation on a day-to-day basis and then see how the separate charge sheets are eventually prepared, the bench had said. Speaking for the bench, Justice Surya Kant had suggested the names of justices Ranjit Singh and Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, both former judges of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and said that they are experienced in the field of criminal law and would oversee the probe of the SIT till filing of the charge sheets in the cases. The police have so far arrested 13 accused, including Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra's son Ashish Mishra, in connection with the case. The apex court was hearing the matter of the October 3 violence in Lakhimpur Kheri in which eight persons including four farmers were killed during a farmers' protest. Four farmers were mowed down by an SUV in the convoy at Lakhimpur Kheri when a group agitating against the Centre's three new farm laws was holding a demonstration against the visit of Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya on October 3. Two BJP workers and a driver were beaten to death allegedly by the angry protesters, and a local journalist was killed in the violence. Sanjay Kumar interacted with paddy farmers at Chivvemula paddy purchasing centre and assured them to fight for their problems.(DC Image) CHIVVEMULA (SURYAPET): BJP state president and MP Bandi Sanjay was confronted by ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) activists during his second day of visit to Suryapet district on Tuesday, while trying to visit paddy purchasing centres. Waving black flags, TRS activists raised slogans Bandi Sanjay go back at VK Pahad Crossroad in Chivvemula mandal. A few activists allegedly pelted stones on the convoy of BJP president at Chivvemula and Atmakur (S) villages. The police resorted to mild lathi-charge to disperse the unruly mob. Due to the protest of TRS activists, Sanjay Kumar was forced to sit in his vehicle for half-an- hour. As a result, vehicular traffic on Suryapet-Khammam road was disrupted. BJP leaders argued with the police officers to allow them to visit paddy farmers. Finally, Sanjay Kumar interacted with paddy farmers at Chivvemula paddy purchasing centre and assured them to fight for their problems. The police were deployed in large numbers during the BJP presidents visit and to prevent any untoward incident. Speaking on the occasion, Sanjay Kumar said for the last one month, farmers were waiting to sell paddy. On the pretext of moisture content and foreign matter, officials refused to purchase paddy, he alleged. Sanjay Kumar demanded that Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao should respond to the distress of paddy farmers and immediately take up paddy procurement. Meanwhile, speaking to Deccan Chronicle, Venkat Reddy, a farmer of Chivvemula village said they were waiting to sell paddy at Chivvemula primary agriculture cooperative society paddy purchasing centre. For the last two days, we have been trying to dry up the paddy to get the minimum support price, he said. There are no middlemen to purchase the paddy, we depend on Indira Kranthi Patham purchasing centres, he explained. YSRCP leaders and activists celebrating after winning the Municipality elections at the Central office near Tadepalli on Wednesday. (Photo:DC) Nellore: Showcasing its grip over the district once again, the YSR Congress recorded a spectacular victory in the Nellore Municipal Corporation and grabbed the Buchireddypalem Urban Local Body. The ruling party leaders are on cloud nine and its cadre is in a celebratory mood across the state. In Nellore, the party won all the 54 divisions. YSRC leaders especially Nellore city legislator and water resources Minister Anilkumar Yadav and Nellore rural legislator Kotamreddy Sridhar Reddy said they were confident of a clean sweep right from day one, after the filing of nominations for the civic polls. The two started identifying strong candidates for the 54 divisions two months before the notification and managed to woo many TD contenders into the YSR Congress fold. On the other hand, TD poll managers had a tough time identifying candidates and the selection process remained incomplete till about the eleventh hour. To their shock, some of the contesting candidates of TD withdrew from the fray after collecting B-forms. In spite of the setbacks, TD was hoping to win at least 5 to 10 divisions but drew a blank. In the backdrop of rumours over some TD leaders working against party nominees and joining hands with the ruling party, feelings are rife that the time has come for TD and its chief Chandrababu Naidu to introspect the reasons for the humiliating defeat. Notably, the TD had lost all the 46 ZPTC seats to the ruling party a few months ago. As a result, there is no opposition to the ruling party both in Nellore Municipal Corporation and the Zilla Parishat. Sources in YSRC said they are likely to pick Deverakonda Sujatha, Corporator from 53rd division, for the Mayor post and Roopkumar Yadav (40th division), a close associate of minister Anilkumar, for the deputy mayor post. The second deputy mayor post is likely to go to a Reddy. Meanwhile, the YSRC won 18 wards in Buchireddypalem Urban Local Body and the TD ended up with just two wards out of the total 20. Kovur legislator Nallapareddy Prasannakumar commended the local party leaders for the victory. A rendering of the early plan for the US 27 Corridor in Newport shows the one lane going each way with a turn lane down the middle. by Robi... This blog covers software patent news and issues with a particular focus on wireless, mobile devices (smartphones, tablet computers, connected cars) as well as select antitrust matters surrounding those devices. Joe Biden neglects the UK seeking a trade deal after the UK PM Boris Johnson has lobbied personally and supported the US president over several issues. This is what the so-called special relationship has come to, a big nothing which should force London to consider if the actions of the US president befit what amounts to a snub. How the UK will react in the apparent disinterest shown by a key ally depends on the PM. Instead of bolstering Downing Street, Washington let it down by choosing the European Union in the Northern Ireland protocol. Another is sustaining French leader Emmanuel Macron in the fishing rights and saying the AUKUS deal was terrible. US chooses trade deal with EU instead of Brexit only The US leader, according to sources, will push Brexit aside and go to the EU for a free trade deal, stated an expert about what could amount as appeasement to get bloc favor, reports the Express UK. Biden once again leaves Boris Johnson, but before this, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has secured more free trade deals with other nations. More than ever, the ties between London and Washington are one on geopolitical issues. But many US leaders have chosen a European bloc that included the UK, not just Britain only. Previously the White House told the British PM, who was looking for a trade deal in September, did not seem interested in free trade deal, cites AP News. But despite how the British PM made a top priority, Joe Biden ignored the UK, seeking a trade deal again. Read Also: Does the Special Relationship Still Hold Between the US President, UK PM After No Agreements Reached in Several Meetings? An expert's prognosis on free trade deal with US According to Professor Rob Singh, an expert in US politics and policy at Birkbeck, University of London, the Biden Administration wants a united Europe since World War Two, and Brexit is not preferred. If the UK were still a part of the EU, that would get it a trade deal, but that's not the case even with the special relationship. But Prof. Singh said there are still ties with Washington, but Britain going solo has been traumatic with Brussels, some chinks are showing. The White House may be very inclined to impose its will on the European nation like Article 16. On a sour note, the professor said that Downing Street might be seen as asking for scraps from Joe Biden. He added that Britain and the United States are not in synchronicity, and the current White House will not accord the particular relationship importance, noted News 7 Trends. One of the reasons to push for Brexit is that it will be easy to access free trade deals with Washington, but it was not so beneficial, especially in the case of Joe Biden. Prof. Singh remarked that an FTA (free trade deal) is a pipe dream, but he added if the White House gave one, it would not be suitable for Britain. Most of the trade deals that are still in effect are legacy agreements carried over from EU membership. He stressed that any trade deal is vital for Brexit though it's not that big. But the US wants the EU as its partner, so London is way sided. Joe Biden neglects the UK seeking a trade deal. As explained by Prof. Singh, maybe Brexit should move on and pursue other partners who would respect history like a special relationship, which is disregarded. Related Article: Joe Biden Abandons Britain in the North Ireland Protocol, Threatens Similar Appeasement in Favor of the EU @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Plain as day, Putin outfoxes NATO on the Ukraine Border with overwhelming forces that can move at a moment's notice. It would leave the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in an unprepared state that would be deadly for its troops. The EU has regarded Russian President Vladimir Putin as an adversary, especially the US using NATO allies to bait the Kremlin. Movement ordered by the Kremlin in exercises that have moved personnel and armor the Ukrainian border has defanged any timely reaction by the NATO forces. Kyiv and the Allies are shocked by the move of the Russian army. Kyiv can be taken? Jen Stoltenberg remark how the allies should be aware of the threat the Russian Army poses. A report by US intelligence claimed the Kremlin might be trying to start an invasion, like in 2014 when Crimea was annexed, reported the Express UK. This time, the immigrant surge continues close to the Belarusian and Polish border that has placed the EU at odds. Although they are saying in Brussels, it's all the handiwork of the Kremlin leader. Stoltenberg remarked to the military drills ordered by the Kremlin in the west part of Russia, where the last few weeks had a massive movement of troops that was not the usual. Russian mobilization in the town Kamensk-Shakhtinsky. ~14km away from the border with Ukraine. Tried to count. It's something about 2300 vehicles with a margin of + - 200#Russia #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/0y1JFIbNAM Amun (@Amun369) November 2, 2021 He added that Moscow is ready to deploy that kind of military capability to start aggressive actions directed at Ukraine, cited News 7 Trends. NATO is alert and keeping tabs on the situation, coordinating their movements with the European Union and Kyiv over the moves of Russian assets. Although mentioning that any sign of aggression is to be dealt with, Putin Outfoxes NATO on the Ukraine Border. #ALERT Hundreds of Russian tanks are now parked on the Ukrainian border, as #Russia continues aggressive military build-up on its border with #Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/7mOoMUqkDl Terror Alarm (@terror_alarm) November 12, 2021 Read also: Ukraine Fears Russian Reprisal After Drone Attack; Putin Deploys Armored Units To Protect Cities Close to Shared Border War fears on the border Ukraine's foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba met with the NATO chief and spoke about the threat of Moscow's advanced hardware and military organization; he is seemingly primed to overcome his nation's defenses. It is not comforting that satellite images show a massive Russian force that gathered close to the Ukraine border in the past weeks. Most of the advanced hardware is arrayed in the area close by the Donbass region, where the Ukraine secessionists are encamped for the meantime. Mr. Stoltenberg stated that the Kremlin be more transparent about how it deploys its forces in the region. Or there will be an undue escalation that should be vented off. He added that Ukraine has a friend in NATO. Also, NATO will not agree to the illegal annexation of Crime; another is to stop support for the separatists at Donbass, noted Euro News. NATO allies are together in condemning what Russia is doing on the border. Immediately, the Kremlin called the alliance too jumpy. It is not Moscow but NATO trying to provoke Russia, the reverse of everything. The Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko is charged with the influx of migrants to overload the Polish border and sow chaos with Latvia and Lithuania. He is under sanctions from Brussels too. Belarus from October 2020 has been under restricted measures as well. One of the reasons is the elections of 2020 where Lukashenko won were not legitimate. Lukashenko represses free speech against his regime; he contests the sanctions. Putin outfoxes NATO on the Ukraine Border that says keep out of Kremlin business. One more America cannot stop Russia either. It is using the alliance as cannon fodder. The EU is overloading at the Polish border that tells how ill-prepared for a war it is. Related article: Putin Says That the EU Should Recompense Belarus to Stem Migrant Flow Into Poland; Citing Turkey in 2016 @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Beachgoers in Crimea, Ukraine was shocked when they noticed bones stick out from the sand in what was assumed to be a Karaite Jewish cemetery. The scene would have come out of a horror movie from Hollywood, except this was the actual thing. Skeletons on a Crimean beach No one knows how old the Jewish ancient burial site is yet, so it's speculation for now. The police were informed of the human bones in the sand but later verified it came from an earlier undetermined burial date, so no further investigation was needed. It horrified beachgoers as the human remains were exposed by the erosion of the old beach site in Ukraine, reported the Sun UK. Images of the scene recorded on video showed human bones partly revealed by the crumbling cliff, including a spinal column, skull, and other bones protruding from the sand. Over time, the rain has eroded the bank that had several skeletons exposed, speculated to be those buried in the Jewish time. Alexander Shkonda, the local council chairman in Okunevsky, Crimea, spoke to the media about his request to keep the cemetery a protected area in 2015 but was not granted till now, cited Techno Trendz. One problem he encountered was that the beach was not public land, and the local authorities could not decide on the matter. Because of that, the skeletons and gravesite are vulnerable and cannot be protected, and now there are fears of the skeletons falling onto the beach below. Landowners are supposed to start building but halted upon discovering the old Jewish burial site in Ukraine, which they never expected to come across. They stopped the construction even after all the materials were ready. Read Also: Archaeologists Discover Almost 10,000 Skeletons in Hidden Medieval Graveyard in the City of Hull with Mysterious Finds Efforts in preserving the burial site Mr. Shkonda has started another appeal to the government to issue a protective edict for the graves. He added that scholars are not definite when the cemetery dates from, although there were other instances when eroded earth has revealed skeletons in Ukraine. Locals think it's a Karaite Jew graveyard, not too many remain of them. Most are found in Ukraine, the US, and Israel, where they live mostly. In other places like in the United Kingdom, a month ago, there were 80 skeletons discovered on a building site that sent an investigation rolling after, noted the Mirror UK. Many of the bodies found had their hands tied behind them. These bodies were dug up in a strip of farmland in Birmingham, thought to have laid there for several hundred years. Initially, it was thought to be a simple strip for erecting a structure that would have been a 72-bed home for the elderly. The developer was able to get an archaeological investigation for planning when it was uncovered a year earlier. everything was done, the human remains were taken from the West End Farm off Brackley Road. What was left was the hole where they dug up all the skeletons. However, the archeological report was not shown. Finding out all the bones were taken from the plot of land and no investigation on the site, one local councilor asked how the bones were taken by whoever. The Buckinghamshire Council is supposed to have a report on the incident. Looking at the sorry state of the Jewish burial site with bones sticking out in the beach located in Ukraine gave creepy horror vibes that need protection and preservation. Related Article: Deadman's Island Is Off-Limits to Visitors As Human Remains, Open Coffins Surround the Area Resembling Horror Movie Scenes @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The EU is caught in the center of turmoil, as Joe Biden is scoured for enabling Russia to use geopolitical weapons like gas and the pipeline used to make Brussel wince for energy, causing crisis for the bloc, while the Kremlin runs circles around the US and its allies. For Vladimir Putin, its just business as usual keeping the nation's interests, and the EU at bay. But his activities put US President Joe Biden in hot water with his allies, as his critics are not happy about the domino effect of his actions. Biden empowered Russia through the Nord Stream 2 Biden has been shellacked for allowing the gas pipeline to be used against the European Union that Putin has managed to its advantage, reported the Express UK. The source of the wave of criticism that should have been a top priority is the Nord Stream 2, which has been transformed into an effective geopolitical weapon. The Russian president has allegedly used it to control the EU. Building the pipeline from Russia to Germany is smart because it bypasses Poland and Ukraine, to avoid EU laws. However, Putin allegedly lessened the amount of natural gas through the system to starve Europe of gas supplies. Before Brussels realized that the Kremlin had controlled the supply of the natural gas market, came a high gas price that would be followed by an energy crisis. Tensions rise as gas prices skyrocket Amid the energy crisis, Vladimir Putin and Gazprom, Russia's biggest supplier of gas, acknowledged they were keeping up with the contracts with its client nations. But, the two came under fire from the international community. Read also: Russia Probes EU's Reaction in the Ongoing Migrant Crisis at the Poland-Belarus Border Brussels was angry that Putin was had used the Nord stream 2 and weaponized it against them as a geopolitical weapon, cited The Swift Headline. It gets overboard as the tension is getting sky-high, with natural gas hitting a trickle in Ukraine. More problems surface as a buildup of 100,000 Russian forces are knocking at Kyiv's doorstep, noted the DW. Russia-Ukraine war could break out Yuri Vitrenko, CEO of Naftogaz, had stated that a war between Ukraine and Russia is just close by, which sent shudders to NATO and the US, especially the unsuspecting benefactor in the White House. Vitrenko said that the worst that can happen is for the pipes in Ukraine to go dry, next is alleged blackmail that will follow to a full-on war. He added that the Kremlin can forego Crimea, get Donbass and the occupied regions. For Vladimir Putin who will add Ukraine as another annex to Russian territory. For many it is Joe Biden's weakness in doing something preventable but he allowed it to happen, which Trump would be more decisive by far. Biden was warned not to let up on the Kremlin but he allowed it. In the US, the GOP of Arizona that he is why gas prices are climbing fast, and he will shut down another pipeline, that is a big mistake. Joe Biden is scoured for enabling Russia to control the gas flow, then he blames Russia and OPEC for not increasing the supply. His energy policies do not seem not sound which leads the Kremlin getting the upper hand, which places the west in Putin's palms. Related Article: Moscow Calls UK Foreign Secretary Insincere, Blames the EU for the Border Mess @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. During a virtual meeting on Monday night, President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed tensions and deepening disputes over Taiwan. Despite escalating tensions with China over Taiwan, the US has restated its "rock-solid" support for the self-ruled island. Although the People's Republic of China (PRC) has never ruled Taiwan, it claims sovereignty over the island, which it regards as part of its territory under the "one China" principle. Biden reaffirmed US' commitment to Taiwan Last month, Biden surprised onlookers when he claimed the US was "committed" to protecting Taiwan from a Chinese military strike, Newsweek via MSN reported. Soon later, the White House pulled back the statements. During a news conference prior to the Biden-Xi summit, a senior administration official emphasized that US policy on Taiwan had been constant. The White House said that at the conclusion of the three-hour virtual summit, President Biden reaffirmed the United States' commitment to its own "one China" policy, which is distinct from China's "principle" policy and is guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances. Taiwan, or the Republic of China, has been self-governing since 1949, following a split at the end of the Chinese Civil War. Following the normalization of ties with China, formal diplomatic contacts between the United States and Taiwan were severed in 1979. Since then, though, Washington and Taipei have maintained a strong informal relationship. China wants to "reunify" Taiwan and has never ruled out a military invasion of the democratic island. The prospect of American military participation in the event of a conflict has remained a particularly complicated matter in US-Chinese relations. "Strategic ambiguity" refers to the purposeful opacity surrounding the American reaction. Read Also: Russia Starts Delivering Advanced Defense Missile Supplies To India Despite US Sanctions Risk US, China agree to cooperate on several issues Per SCMP, when they met for a virtual summit on Tuesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his US colleague Joe Biden both emphasized the significance of cooperation. While there is no full record of the meeting, which lasted over three hours and included a wide variety of issues, the Chinese foreign ministry and the White House have provided readouts summarizing the events. According to a White House statement, Biden expressed concern over China's "practices in Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong, as well as human rights more broadly." Xi again emphasized the significance of "respect" between the US and China, but he did not specifically address the Xinjiang, Tibet, or Hong Kong concerns. "Although it's not as good as a face-to-face meeting. I'm very happy to see my old friend," Xi said as the summit got underway, as per 7News. Given the deteriorating ties between Washington and Beijing and the reality, acknowledged by administration officials, that managing the US relationship with China will amount to Biden's most important international objective, it was an auspicious start to some of the most important talks of Biden's presidency. Biden also restated his commitment to working with allies and partners, including Australia, to "stand up for" the United States' "interests and values." Biden said the US government intended to "ensure the rules of the road for the twenty-first century promote an international system that is free, open, and fair," citing the need to unite with Australia and other international partners to take on the problems of our time. Related Article: Joe Biden, Xi Jinping Virtual Meeting: US To Focus More on Infrastructure Despite Questions Swirling Over COVID-19 Origins and Hunter @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. United States President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping recently held a virtual summit where they would discuss various international issues, including nuclear weaponry and Taiwan's independence amid rising tensions. As the talks began, Democratic Biden said that he had spent a lot of time discussing with Xi in previous meetings, expressing his hopes of having a meaningful summit with the Chinese president. Xi showed a similar demeanor while sitting inside the Great Hall of the People of Beijing. Biden-Xi Virtual Summit When the summit started, the Chinese president said that while he was disappointed he was unable to see Biden face-to-face, he was happy to see an "old friend." The talks marked a hopeful start to what many consider to be the most critical talks between the two leaders during Biden's presidency. In recent months, Washington and Beijing have suffered a deteriorating relationship due to various international issues. Administration officials acknowledged the situation while they were managing the U.S. relationship with China that they consider being the Democratic president's most crucial international goal, CNN reported. During their talks, the two presidents agreed to arms control talks as China is looking to boost its nuclear armament, said national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Tuesday. The virtual summit between Biden and Xi lasted for three hours and had the U.S. president raising the need for "strategic stability" as his relationship with the Asian nation continues to be on shaky grounds. Read Also: Joe Biden, Xi Jinping Seem To Disagree on Everything in First Summit; China Warns US is "Playing With Fire" Over Taiwan In a virtual panel with the Brookings Institute, Sullivan said that Biden and Xi were looking to develop this strategic stability. The official argued that it was only right for everyone to carry the process from here on out. Plans on having such talks were not announced by either the White House or China's foreign ministry after the virtual summit. However, the two parties' agreement to hold arms control discussions signals a turnaround of decision from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Fox News reported. International Issues One of the most controversial topics that Biden and Xi discussed during the virtual summit was Taiwan's independence and China's continued aggression to reclaim the island nation. Beijing sees Taiwan as a province that separated itself from the mainland and wishes to unify the two regions. While the United States recognizes and has formal ties with China, it has also committed to supporting Taiwan to defend itself in case of an attack. Amid the rising tensions between China and Taiwan, Beijing blamed the issues on "repeated attempts by the Taiwan authorities to look for US support for their independence agenda as well as the intention of some Americans to use Taiwan to contain China," said the China-run Global Times newspaper. The state-run media added that such moves were "extremely dangerous" and compared it to playing with fire, arguing that anyone who does so will only get burnt. In a statement, the White House said President Biden "strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait," BBC reported. Related Article: China Defends Joining India on Coal "Phase Down" Instead of "Phase-Out" as Beijing Hits Production at All-Time Highs @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Kim Jong Un, North Korea's leader, made his first public appearance in over a month, visiting a new state-developed alpine metropolis branded as a "model" communist "utopia," as he seeks to secure his legacy amid severe food shortages. Kim's journey to the northern city of Samjiyon, which was announced in state media on Tuesday, comes as he enters his tenth year as leader of a country, cut off from the rest of the world since the coronavirus outbreak began. With its ski slopes, commercial and medical facilities and housing for tens of thousands of people, the city on China's border paints a totally different picture than a country beset by great poverty. Kim Jong Un visits "model rural city" Per the Washington Post, experts say Samjiyon is a big economic initiative planned by Pyongyang to demonstrate that the country is flourishing despite international sanctions over its nuclear program. Kim claimed that the city's structures symbolize the "lofty allegiance, powerful will, and sweat of our people," as well as North Korea's "iron will" to "achieve prosperity our own way," according to the regime's official Korean Central News Agency. The city lies close to Mount Paektu, which is revered as the birthplace of North Korea and from which the Kim family claims descent. It was supposed to be finished by last year's 75th anniversary of the country's ruling Workers' Party, but the pandemic hampered work. Kim's visit coincided with the completion of the final phase of construction, which is expected to be completed by the end of the year. "As Kim Jong Un approaches his 10-year anniversary, this is all about consolidating his legacy," said Jean H. Lee, a Korea expert at the Wilson Center. "Kim wants to bolster the illusion that he is carrying out a divine mandate to govern." Kim Jong-un, North Korea's leader, has recently been the target of health-related speculations. Kim hasn't been seen in public since last month, when he delivered an address at a defense exhibition. On Tuesday, official media claimed that he had visited the building site of a new city near the Chinese border. North Korea has not provided an official reason for Kim's absence. His disappearances from official media have sparked speculation about his health and location in the past, as per Express.co. Read Also: Russia, US Reach Agreement To Continue Monitoring Emissions; What's Behind Kremlin's Shift in Tune on Climate Change? North Korea joins hypersonic missile race Last month, South Korea's spy service claimed that Kim was in good health. Kim vanished from public view for many weeks in April 2020. His disappearance sparked rumors that he was recuperating from heart surgery, had acquired COVID-19, or had died. Regardless, the North Korean leader reappeared in state media reporting, putting a stop to speculations of his illness. North Korea declared the launch of a hypersonic missile in September, possibly placing the Hermit Kingdom on the verge of deploying one of the world's most advanced offensive weapon categories. According to official media agency KCNA, the new missile, designated the Hwasong-8, is a major priority under the country's five-year military development program. The phrase "strategic" was used by North Korean authorities to describe the new weapon, implying that the Hwasong-8 is capable of carrying nuclear warheads. The missile's parameters are unknown at this time. The lone photo accompanying the testing shows, but does not prove, that the Hwasong-8 is a hypersonic boost-glide vehicle (HGV) system, according to analysts. HGVs are one of two types of hypersonic missiles, with hypersonic cruise missiles being the other. HGVs are launched from a conventional rocket booster before detaching and gliding toward their destination. Experts say these missiles are extremely difficult to intercept due to their extreme speed and unpredictable flight path. While the Hwasong-8 made the news on Wednesday, the KCNA article disclosed another "bombshell" that might just be as significant. North Korea's hypersonic goals have been in the works for years, National Interest reported. Related Article: Kim Jong Un's Longest Absence in Seven Years Sparks Fresh Health Rumors After North Korean Leader Disappeared for Over a Month @YouTube @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. In the coming weeks, millions of Americans will get surprise stimulus payments of $2,000 and $1,000. As part of their state-level COVID-19 rehabilitation program, a number of states aim to assist citizens who live there. The bonus money will be distributed to 14 different entities in 14 different states. Unemployed citizens in Arizona can take use of the state's back-to-work program. Those who return to part-time employment are entitled for a $1,000 stipend. Those who return to full-time employment may be eligible for a $2,000 bonus. Who's eligible in every state's stimulus checks? Per The Sun, California citizens who had to submit their 2020 tax returns by October 15 received the Golden State Stimulus. As of October 31, almost half of the nine million people have received their stimulus payments, with the remaining stimulus checks being mailed. California citizens earning $30,000 to $75,000 per year were eligible for $600 while those with children under the age of 18 were eligible for $1,100. Governor Ned Lamont of Connecticut launched the Back to Work program, which would provide $1,000 in stimulus checks beginning May 30, 2021 and running until December 31, 2021. Other states have more stringent criteria, including information on when citizens filed for unemployment and how long they have been unemployed. Residents must also have found work to be eligible for the stimulus payment. Teachers and principals in Florida will get $1,000 in stimulus money for their dedication to education throughout the pandemic. Teachers and principals in Georgia will get $1,000 in stimulus money for their dedication to education throughout the pandemic. While the prospects of a fourth stimulus in all US states are little to none, citizens of the New England state of Maine have been promised more assistance. The Maine State Tax Accessor will be mailing $285 payments to taxpayers sometime after November 15, resulting in 524,754 persons receiving a surprise check in the mail. The checks are available to those with an adjusted gross income (AGI) of less than $150,000 for married couples filing jointly, $112,000 for heads of household, or $75,000 for individuals. However, not everyone earning less than these amounts qualifies. You must have worked consistently during the outbreak in 2020, and dependents are not eligible, as per AS.com. However, not everyone earning less than these amounts qualifies. People classified as dependents are not eligible, and you must have worked constantly in 2020 throughout the pandemic. Consider them more akin to the hazard payments than other states, such as Florida, have been distributing than a uniform stimulus. As a n expression of gratitude for working during COVID-19, the southern state has awarded teachers an additional money. Through the Florida Heroes Initiative, the state of Florida is also providing financial assistance to first responders. Over the following six weeks, the state will issue 5,000 to 25,000 checks every day, with a $149.8 million budget set out for these payments. Read Also: Some Americans To Receive $1,400 Stimulus Checks in April 2022 With Others Getting $1,800 Child Tax Credit Payment Next Year Petition calls for more federal stimulus payments Per Newsweek via MSN, an online petition requesting $2,000 monthly stimulus checks throughout the length of the epidemic is just over 45,000 signatures short from reaching its target of 3 million. However, enthusiasm for the campaign has diminished in the final stretch as cases and fatalities continue to plummet across the country, following a summer increase in support amid a deadly wave of COVID-19 caused by the Delta variant. Stephanie Bonin, a Denver restaurant owner, started a Change.org petition calling for the US. The House and Senate should enact legislation that would offer "immediate payments of $2,000 for adults and $1,000 for children, as well as recurring checks for the length of the crisis." As of Saturday, the petition has received over 2,956,600 signatures, with just roughly 29,000 new supporters in the last month and 5,000 in the last week. If it fulfills its objective of 3 million signatures, it will become one of Change.org's most popular petitions. As families battled to withstand the economic consequences of the pandemic during the summer Delta wave, the campaign garnered enormous traction, reaching heights of over 100,000 new supporters in a week. Related Article: Find Out If You Will Get Up to $1,200 Surprise Stimulus Check as Millions of Americans Demand for Another Round of Federal Payment @YouTube @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Former United States President Donald Trump's lawyers urged a federal judge on Tuesday not to dismiss a lawsuit that aimed to block the Treasury Department and IRS's attempts to acquire the Republican businessman's tax returns and give them to the House Ways and Means Committee. In the more than three-hour-long courtroom arguments, Trump's attorneys said that committee chair Richard Neal's reasons for seeking the tax returns were simply a pretext to look for something embarrassing regarding the former president. On the other hand, U.S. District Court Judge Trevor McFadden was having difficulties with the issue. Trump's Tax Returns The official said that Trump's parties were able to get a variety of statements, including one from Chairman Neal, that could suggest that there was something other than legal proceedings that are going on. However, House officials said that the reason the committee was requesting the documents was a genuine legal reason. Lawyers said that federal courts had no authority or power to examine the motives of Congress to determine whether or not its actions that sought information of the former president were proper under the Constitution. "The committee had a valid reason to look at the IRS program for auditing presidential returns and considering whether it should be required by a statute," said a representative for the Ways and Means Committee, Douglas Letter, NBC News reported. Read Also: Joe Biden, Xi Jinping Seem To Disagree on Everything in First Summit; China Warns US is "Playing With Fire" Over Taiwan The situation comes as former President Trump is the first American leader in the last 40 years that has not publicly disclosed his tax returns. The Republican businessman's decision to withhold these documents is considered by some as his attempts to hide the details of his massive wealth and the activities of his family's company, the Trump Organization. In 2019, the House Ways and Means Committee sued Trump for a forced disclosure of his tax returns and continues despite the former president already having left office 10 months ago. Patrick Strawbridge, Trump's lawyer, was the one who told McFadden that the committee had no legitimate reason to acquire his client's tax return documents. Validity of the Requests McFadden argued that Democrats had contradicting statements about why the Ways and Means Committee wanted Trump's tax return documents. Some of the public statements suggest that the reason was that they wanted the former president's tax returns to consider legislation, Reuters reported. However, the judge said he was reluctant to second-guess Neal's motivations, suggesting that he may allow the case to move forward despite opposition. McFadden said he will issue a written decision in the next three weeks answering whether or not the lawsuit should progress. But in one instance during an exchange, McFadden questioned the Biden administration's Justice Department lawyer over the agency's reversal in the case. He asked that if Congress changed hands in the next few years and a Republican chairman sought Biden's tax returns, would they just simply hand over the documents. It remains unclear how McFadden, who was appointed by Trump, might rule in the case or whether or not he believes that Democrats' requests were valid, The Hill reported. Related Article: Corey Lewandowski Shares Shocking Detail Regarding Donald Trump's 2020 Election Fraud Claims @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Boston elected its first female Asian-American mayor when Michelle Wu was sworn in on Tuesday after the 36-year-old won against fellow Democratic candidate and city councilor Annissa Essaibi George. Before Wu's election in the city's general election and becoming Boston's first Asian-American mayor, there have only been white men elected into the mayoral office. After taking the oath of office, the new Boston mayor said that the city government was a special kind of service. New Boston Mayor Wu argued that city government officials were at the level of government that was the closest to the people of the region. She said that they had to do both the big stuff and the small stuff, arguing that every streetlight, pothole, park, and classroom laid the foundation for greater change. "After all, Boston was founded on a revolutionary promise that things don't have to be as they always have been, that we can chart a new path for families now, and for generations to come, grounded in justice and opportunity," said Wu, Business Insider reported. Just a few hours before swearing in as Boston's mayor, Wu had already named several key advisers who will make up her core staff for the next few weeks. The new mayor's campaign team said she revealed her choices to help ensure a "seamless" transition into office. Read Also: Joe Biden, Xi Jinping Seem To Disagree on Everything in First Summit; China Warns US Is "Playing With Fire" Over Taiwan Previously, Wu said that her vision of a complete administration will not be completed until January, which will be when she has a more formal inauguration with other City Council members. But because of the requirement for a more rapid transition after the Nov. 2 elections, she said that the new appointments will help her make up the core of her administration beforehand. Wu's list of new appointees includes Mary Lou Akai-Ferguson, who was the new mayor's campaign manager in her run for office. The official will be serving as the new Boston mayor's interim chief of staff, BostonGlobe reported. Several members of Wu's City Council staff will be coming to the new mayor's administration to serve as Wu's senior advisers. The list of individuals includes Brianna Millor, the former civic engagement director, Tali Robbins, the former policy director, and Dave Vittorini, the former chief of staff. Three Steps Wu faced a tough run for office despite her historic win to become Boston's first female Asian-American mayor. The new mayor said three steps became the threshold that she could never forget during her run for office. During the new Boston mayor's speech after swearing in, she spoke to attendees at the City Council chamber on Tuesday where she talked about the floor. The establishment's floor had a dropped floor with three steps down in the center. Wu said that the feature that included other architectural flair embedded in the building was striking. However, the three steps represented what she considered to be difficult and perhaps an insurmountable problem. The new mayor argued that the steps presented a challenge for people in wheelchairs and residents who had mobility challenges. Wu said that because they changed the structure of the building and reshaped it to be accessible to everyone, bringing the floor up three steps, Boston reported. Related Article: Corey Lewandowski Shares Shocking Detail Regarding Donald Trump's 2020 Election Fraud Claims @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. New information regarding Donald Trump and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot has just been released. In Jonathan Karl's new book, "Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show," the author revealed that the ex-POTUS recorded several messages addressed to his supporters and the Capitol rioters, but most versions were rejected. After all, Trump reportedly continued lying about the election result by telling the rioters that he should've won. And he also refused to urge the rioters to go home even though chaos was already taking place at the US Capitol at the time. The final version of the ex-president's video showed him telling his supporters that they need to have peace, so it's best if they go home. He also told them in the clip that he loves them and thinks they're very special. Trump also assured the rioters that he understood their pain. However, the previous versions of Trump's recorded message got rejected because the then-president refused to ask his supporters to go home. "A White House aide who was there as the president taped it told me that in the earlier rejected versions, Trump neglected to call on his supporters to leave the Capitol. He complained about the election. He empathized with their anger, but he didn't call on them to go home," Karl wrote via the Huffington Post. Read Also: Donald Trump's Final Attempt To Stay In Power Following Joe Biden's Presidential Win Exposed; Ex-POTUS' Efforts Likened To Murder-Suicide Pact Donald Trump accused of inciting violence Earlier this year, hundreds of Trump's supporters flocked to the US Capitol to prevent the Senate from declaring Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election. Prior to this, some of them attended Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally, where he urged Republicans to fight for what they think is right. Trump also said that they should go to war to reclaim the top stop. Investigations are currently ongoing as to whether Trump incident violence ahead of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. And he and his legal team are doing everything they can to ensure that the White House won't release the documents pertaining to the insurrection. Donald Trump doesn't want documents to be released Last week, Trump asked a federal appeals court to postpone the release of the White House documents to lawmakers investigating the incident. The files were supposed to be given to the House select committee on Friday, according to CNBC. Even though Trump has been out of office for almost an entire year, he still has not gotten over some of his lies regarding the election. Ex-POTUS calls Alyssa Farah a clown Earlier this week, former White House communications director Alyssa Farah claimed that Trump told her he knew he lost to Biden. Shortly after Farah's interview aired, the ex-POTUS released a statement calling his former staff a clown and a nobody, according to MSN. Trump also claimed that he never spoke to Farah following the elections, and it seemed as though she didn't even exist at the White House. Melania Trump's husband also went as far as saying that Farah was terrible when she appeared in "The View." Related Article: Donald Trump Accused of Lying After Saying Nov. 3 Is the Real Insurrection Due to 'Fake' Election Results, Not the Jan. 6 Capitol Riot @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A Georgia ambulance driver tried to give the patient that he was transporting CPR in an attempt to save his life but failed. According to reports, Kevin McCorvey picked up the 66-year-old patient, later identified as Wilton Thomason. The latter was being transported in a non-emergency capacity when McCorvey's ambulance overturned in a ditch. Reports also confirmed that Thomason was not properly restrained while inside the ambulance. Georgia ambulance driver fails sobriety test Investigations revealed that the 34-year-old ambulance driver was heavily intoxicated. McCorvey admitted to smoking marijuana, drinking beer, and taking Adderall while driving the ambulance. Following the incident, Fairburn police responded to the crash and said that they had to break the ambulance's windows to rescue another passenger. The latter did not sustain serious injuries, and their identity has not been released to the press. However, reports confirmed that McCorvey and his passenger - who was later identified as another ambulance staff - tried to flee from the accident scene via Uber, but they were stopped by the officers that responded to the accident, according to Fox News. McCorvey was arrested and taken to the Fulton County Jail, where he is being detained. The ambulance driver faces multiple charges, including first-degree homicide by vehicle, driving under the influence of various substances, and reckless conduct. According to Macon, McCorvey was subjected to a sobriety test at the crash scene, and results showed that he failed. Read Also: Former Raiders Wide Receiver Henry Ruggs III Kills 23-Year-Old Woman in Fatal Crash; Athlete's Blood-Alcohol Content Twice Nevada's Legal Limit Road accidents in Georgia are not uncommon Georgia is not alien to vehicular accidents. Last year alone, the state recorded 4,999 road accidents that killed 450 people. These figures considerably increased compared to the number of accidents in 2019 that were recorded at over 5,000. However, more deaths were reported two years ago at 481, according to Agenda.GE. Georgia arrests are becoming more rampant Other than the recent accident, Georgia also made headlines this week amid reports that a 22-year-old former youth pastor is facing charges of sexual exploitation and sexual battery. According to AJC, Steve Macallin Thomas served as a youth pastor at the Restoration Worship Center in Metter. He reportedly turned himself in amid claims of abuse. The same publication also reported the arrest of a former Evans High School teacher that allegedly sent his student sexually explicit images. Anthony Alberti sent the images to his student while he was the band director in April 2020. He resigned from his job months later, and his license was also suspended. During a recorded investigation, authorities asked Alberti if he had an inappropriate relationship with his student, and he said yes. When asked if he sent inappropriate text messages to the student, the former teacher said he was having a conversation with the unnamed girl. The investigator asked if Alberti was trying to deny that the text messages were sensual in nature, and he said no. Alberti was reportedly indicted by a grand jury two months ago and was arrested last weekend. However, he was able to post bail on the same day. Related Article: Georgia Police Officer Shot in the Neck While Sitting in His Patrol Car, Kills Suspect @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Uganda authorities reported that at least three residents were killed while dozens of others were injured after suicide bombers riding motorbikes targeted the region's capital Kampala and police headquarters. Officials are expecting the number of dead victims to increase as the powerful blasts sent human body parts flying across streets in the area. After the horrific attack, the Islamic State (IS) group took responsibility for the blasts that killed residents at the scene of the incident. IS Suicide Bombers Each of the explosions came within three minutes of each other and officials discovered more bombs in several other parts of the city. Fred Enanga, a spokesman for the police, said that bomb threats in the area were still active and that they were especially cautious of other suicide bombers. Police officials said that they believed there were still more suicide bombers lurking in the area, including the suicide bomb squad members created by the ADF. Authorities were able to arrest a fourth attacker who was found with an explosive vest. Officials said that two of the victims that were killed by the blasts were police officers, BBC reported. Read Also: Corey Lewandowski Shares Shocking Detail Regarding Donald Trump's 2020 Election Fraud Claims Media outlets broadcasted scenes from the area of the blasts that showed bloodied office workers running from the sites of the explosions. Officials reported that the powerful blasts occurred after 10:00 a.m., causing residents to empty the streets of Kampala in fear for their lives. The bombings mark the latest attacks in a series of deadly assaults in Uganda that were the works of regional terrorist groups. An explosion on Oct. 23 targeted a restaurant in a Kampala suburb and killed one resident and injured seven others. After two days, a suicide bomber triggered his bombs inside a bus but only killed himself. The ADF, also known as the Allied Democratic Forces, is an Islamist group that was founded in Uganda but have extended their reach and now mainly operates in remote areas of the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo. In recent years, a cooperative effort between Ugandan forces was able to suppress the militant group's activity in the country, the Washington Post reported. Uganda's Predicament Enanga said that a team of forensic experts were still trying to document the scene of the blasts and had not yet given a finalized number of victims. Police said that CCTV footage captured the moment an adult male carrying a backpack detonated a bomb he had on himself at 10:03 a.m. near the Central Police Station. The other two suicide bombers who were riding motorbikes triggered their explosives near Raja Chambers and Jubilee Insurance Building along the central Kampala Parliament Avenue. In a Twitter post, Ugandan state minister Kabbyanga Godfrey Baluku Kiime announced the events of the explosions on the social media platform. Enanga urged the public to remain aware and vigilant because of the potential threat of active bombers. Kampala residents struggled with traffic in the area following the blasts, with officials telling people to temporarily close down their businesses and leave the area, CNN reported. Related Article: Kyle Rittenhouse Claims Innocent of Murder in Kenosha as Self-Defense; Will It Be a Biased Verdict? @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. George Clooney believes that what happened on the set of "Rust" last month was a terrible accident. During a recent interview, Clooney said that he doesn't think Alec Baldwin intended to hurt anyone on set. The "Ocean's Eleven" actor also revealed that one of his good friends died after being accidentally shot on the set of "The Crow" in 1993. At the time, Brandon Lee was just 28, and he had just started his acting career. George Clooney is cautious when handling prop guns According to Clooney, the untimely passing of Lee encouraged him always to follow safety protocols when he's handling guns on set. And Amal Clooney's husband handled multiple guns onset between 1998 and 2010. "Every single time I'm handed a gun on the set, I open it, I show it to the person I'm pointing it to, I show it to the crew. Every single take, you hand it back to the armorer when you're done and you do it again," Clooney said via the Huffington Post. The actor also said that every time he holds a gun on set, he opens it and looks at the barrel and the cylinder to ensure that there are no live rounds inside the armor. George Clooney infuriated following 'Rust' shooting Clooney couldn't also believe that the people behind "Rust" hired producers and armorers with little to no experience. He said that this is what infuriates him about the accident. The "Up In the Air" actor also said that he's never heard of the term "cold gun" that was being used in the reports. And Clooney said that this is another thing that infuriated him, according to the New York Post. Read Also: Alec Baldwin Kills Cinematographer, Injures Director After He Discharged a Prop Firearm on the Set of His Movie in Mexico Investigation still underway following the accidental set shooting Last month, Baldwin accidentally shot and killed the assistant director of "Rust," Halyna Hutchins, and he also injured the movie's director, Joel Souza. After the incident, armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, who reportedly said she's holding a cold gun, is still being investigated. Her lawyers claimed that she had no idea where the live rounds came from. Hours before the incident, several camera crew members protested and left the set over unsafe working conditions. To push through with filming, the camera workers were reportedly replaced by non-union workers. Baldwin's lawyer banned him from releasing statements to the press following the accident. But his brother, Daniel Baldwin, recently came to the actor's defense. Alec Baldwin's brother comes to his defense Daniel said that they shouldn't blame his brother for what happened during his conversation with Domenick Nati. Instead, the armorer should be held responsible because she's the one responsible for the weapons. Daniel also said that the protocol exonerates his brother because the AD should've witnessed an empty weapon being handed over to the actor, according to CNN. The actor's brother is also convinced that he is being targeted because of his political beliefs. Baldwin is an outspoken liberal who has been making fun of Donald Trump for years. As of late, Baldwin has not been charged following the accidental death of Hutchins. Related Article: Unionized Hollywood Workers Complained About Safety on Set Before Alec Baldwin Accidentally Fired A Prop Firearm But No One Listened @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. United States Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen shifted her forecast of when the country could reach its debt ceiling, pushing it forward to Dec. 15, warning lawmakers on Tuesday but giving Congress more time to strike a deal from her initial estimate of Dec. 3. Yellen's latest projection gives an additional 12 days before the federal government could reach the debt ceiling. However, she still warned lawmakers to act quickly to raise the debt ceiling because there are scenarios in which the Treasury would have not enough resources to fund the operations of the government beyond her given date. Raising of Debt Ceiling In a statement, Yellen said that it was crucial for Congress to raise or suspend the debt limit of the government as soon as possible. In October, lawmakers voted along party lines in an attempt to raise the borrowing cap by a staggering $480 billion. The proposal was seen as a short-term fix that followed weeks of negotiations on Capitol Hill between officials. Republican lawmakers repeatedly prevented Democrats' attempts to raise the ceiling and demanded that the latter use the budget reconciliation process that is part of deliberations on U.S. President Joe Biden's sweeping social spending bill, Fox Business reported. Read Also: Joe Biden, Xi Jinping Seem To Disagree on Everything in First Summit; China Warns US Is "Playing With Fire" Over Taiwan If lawmakers fail to raise the debt ceiling in time, the United States federal government would default for the time in history. Yellen sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, telling the latter that the revised estimate was in part a result of Biden's enactment of the $1 trillion infrastructure plan signed into law earlier this week. In Yellen's letter, she noted that Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which appropriates $118 billion for the Highway Trust Fund. The Treasury Secretary added that the funds of the bill must be transferred into the Highway Trust Fund within a month after the legislation is enacted, which will happen on Dec. 15. "While I have a high degree of confidence that Treasury will be able to finance the U.S. government through December 15 and complete the Highway Trust Fund investment, there are scenarios in which the Treasury would be left with insufficient remaining resources to continue to finance the operations of the U.S. government beyond this date," said Yellen, CNBC reported. Risking Millions of Americans' Well-Being Despite the 12-day extension, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned after last month's vote that no Republican senator will be willing to cooperate with Democrats on "any future effort to mitigate the consequences of Democratic mismanagement." In a letter sent to Biden last month, McConnell said that the Democratic president's allies on Capitol Hill now had all the time they said they needed to address the debt ceiling crisis through standalone reconciliation. The senate minority leader added that opposing party officials now also had the tools to do it. McConnell argued that Democrats cannot make up another crisis and request his assistance. Last month, Yellen said that American lawmakers' failure to raise the debt ceiling would more likely cause a recession. The Treasury Secretary warned that if Congress were unable to act and address the issue, it would be putting Social Security payments at risk for 50 million American people and withholding paychecks for military members. She also argued that 30 million families would have their child tax credit payments placed in jeopardy, NBC News reported. Related Article: Corey Lewandowski Shares Shocking Detail Regarding Donald Trump's 2020 Election Fraud Claims @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Paul Gosar could reportedly be expelled after he insulted President Joe Biden and Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez online. Last week, Gosar uploaded an anime video on Twitter, and it depicted him killing Ocasio-Cortez and attacking Biden. The clip has since been deleted, but it did not sit well with Ocasio-Cortez, who called Gosar creepy. So while I was en route to Glasgow, a creepy member I work with who fundraises for Neo-Nazi groups shared a fantasy video of him killing me And hell face no consequences bc @GOPLeader cheers him on with excuses. Fun Monday! Well, back to work bc institutions dont protect woc https://t.co/XRnMAKsnNO Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 9, 2021 Nancy Pelosi waiting for the House's decision regarding Paul Gosar Days later, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that she would give the House floor to decide whether they should censure Gosar. Pelosi said that she came to this decision to allow a censure resolution to be in place because she believes that Gosar insulted the institution and endangered a fellow member of Congress. According to The Huffington Post, a censure is very seldom used because it serves as one of the most severe forms of discipline within the legislative branch. If the majority votes in favor of censuring Gosar, the latter would be asked to stand in front of the House as Pelosi reads a censure resolution denounces his actions. CNN published a copy of the three-page censure resolution against the GOP representative. It states that Gosar even defended the video as a symbolic cartoon even after he was slammed for posting it in the first place. Read Also: Joe Biden Announces New Policy for US Veterans That Links to His Late Son Beau Biden Paul Gosar's digital director comes to his defense Following its release, Gosar's digital director, Jessica Lycos, also came to his defense and urged the public to relax. "The left doesn't get meme culture. They have no joy. They are not the future. It's a cartoon. Gosar can't fly and he does not own any lightsabers. Nor was violence glorified. This is about fighting for truth," she told The Washington Post. The resolution also states that Pelosi has made it clear that threats against Congress and the president will not be tolerated. The speaker of the House also asked the Committee on Ethics and law enforcement to investigate the video. Before a decision is made, Ocasio-Cortez said that she supports the resolution to censure Gosar. Even though she thinks that the representative deserves to be expelled, she doesn't believe this will happen because the Republican Party and its leader are reportedly cowards. Democrats furious with Kevin McCarthy As of press writing, Gosar's posts have already been deleted. He also released a statement but has not directly apologized to Biden and Ocasio-Cortez. His statement resulted in Democrats urging House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to take action. Democrats initially wanted Gosar to be removed from his committees, but they eventually agreed with the censure resolution. A spokesperson for McCarthy later said that GOP leaders disagree that Gosar should be punished. This revelation angered Democrats who believe that punishment is necessary because of the violent nature of the anime videos that he posted, according to Politico. As of press writing, Biden has not directly responded to Gosar's anime video. Related Article: Donald Trump Recorded Multiple Messages Addressed to the Jan. 6 Capitol Rioters That Got Rejected, New Book Claims @ 2021 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Google is making its biggest ever investment in Australia, where the tech giant government threatened to shut down its search operations earlier this year. Sundar Pichai, the chief executive, announced on Monday that the company would invest 1 billion Australian dollars ($736 million) in Australia over the next five years. Part of the money will be used to launch the company first research center in Australia and help develop Australia cloud computing industry. Google (GOOGL) also plans to work with Australian government agencies on scientific research, including projects on clean energy and protecting the Great Barrier Reef. The company will also work with a local university on quantum computing. Google, which has been in Australia for 20 years and now employs nearly 2,000 people there, said the new scheme was expected to help create new jobs and spur innovation. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Tuesday praised the move, calling it a "billion-dollar vote of confidence" in Australia economic strategy. Mr. Morrison government has previously outlined plans to "turn Australia into a top digital economy by 2030" in an effort to strengthen its capabilities in areas such as artificial intelligence. "Our challenge is that in a challenging world, we emerge from this pandemic and secure Australia economic recovery," Mr. Morrison added. "This is the challenge we face going into 2022, and Australia digital strategy is critical to ensuring recovery." Tensions between the two sides came to a head in January, when Google threatened to pull out of its Chinese search engine if the new law went ahead. But as the vote on the bill neared, Google took a different tack. It tried to beat the legislation by announcing partnerships with some of the UK biggest newsrooms, including Rupert Murdoch News Corp and Seven West Media. Meanwhile, much of the attention is focused on Facebook. In February, Facebook abruptly banned news content in Australia because of the proposed law. Facebook later restored access to those pages after making some code changes in Australia. The bill was finally passed in February, and Google strategy was welcomed by media organizations and politicians. Morrison on Tuesday addressed some of the company past problems, saying: "Google decided to invest the way they did... Seal partnerships." "We are already working with the tech industry in many areas and we need to work in many more," he said. Google is making its biggest investment ever in Australia may be beneficial to the market of round lcd display . F or more information or get the latest price of round lcd display, feel free to send an email to: sales@risinglcd.com . The market trend of round lcd display Due to the impact of the global spread of COVID-19, the global MARKET size of LED display screens in 2020 is estimated to be $5.7 billion, down about 10% year-on-year. It is estimated that the global outdoor LED display market will reach 12.9 billion yuan in 2021, and 23.9 billion yuan in 2026, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.0%. However, certain application areas, such as outdoor transportation, advertising billboards, and some municipal-related application places, are expected to pick up in the second half, and round lcd display will also benefit from the government economic stimulus. Regarding the development of the next few years, if there are no big macroeconomic changes, it is expected that the global LED display will maintain a compound annual growth rate of 18% from 2021 to 2026, among which the small spacing display is still the biggest driving force for market growth. The world leading outdoor LED display manufacturers include Daktronics, Samsung, Unilumin and Leyard, etc. The top four manufacturers in the world account for more than 40% of the market share. At present, China is the world largest Outdoor LED Display market, accounting for more than 60% of the market, followed by North America, accounting for nearly 15% of the market. The market distribution of round lcd display In terms of regional market pattern, North America and EMEA are the most severely affected regions this year, which are expected to decrease by 7.7% to 6.7% respectively, and their share will also decrease accordingly. China is now slowly recovering from the impact of the epidemic, and stimulated by new infrastructure policies, the Chinese market round lcd display is expected to maintain the world fastest growth rate of about 3.8% this year. The markets most affected this year are mainly applications related to clustered events, such as cinemas and commercial and retail venues. However, for security monitoring or control room, it will benefit from the government new infrastructure policy this year. It is estimated that this will be the fastest-growing round lcd display application market this year, with the market share expected to increase from 13.3% to 13.9%. With the decline of LCD cost, size continues to enlarge, currently can see more than 80 inches of LCD TV, electronic whiteboard into commercial, coupled with the rise of LED display market, commercial projector in enterprise conference space shipment quantity will also decrease year by year. However, the outdoor LED display screen is different from the indoor LED display screen. Since it is applied to outdoor scenes, in addition to meeting the display function, the round lcd display screen needs to ensure the transmission quality under direct sunlight, so it needs to meet the requirements of a high brightness display. In addition, the outdoor environment is changeable and harsh, so the outdoor LED display should have strong weather resistance, fully adapt to all kinds of bad weather, and can be used for a long time. The high - quality round lcd display supplier -RISINGLCD Outdoor LED display module market classification There are currently two types of outdoor LED display module on the market: Architectural landscape: The hardware is grid LED, and most of them are displayed on the external facade of the whole building. The form of display is a mostly light show. Limited by the clarity of the display and the shape of the building, the display content is mostly text-based. Advertising LED screen media: The hardware is a large-area LED screen, and the display form is a regular brand advertising display. The display content is mainly pictures and videos. In terms of resource distribution, it is divided into urban commercial office district architectural landscape, urban commercial district architectural advertising media, and urban arterial road architectural advertising media. From the perspective of resource ownership, the site property rights, screen ownership, and screen management rights of resources are divided into several situations: The building owner holds the property rights of the site and the ownership of the screen: the owner builds the screen itself and owns the property rights of the site and the ownership of the screen. However, the owner does not necessarily hold the right to operate the screen. The operator holds the property rights of the site and the ownership of the screen: the operator and the owner sign a long-term lease or purchase the right to use the site, invest in the construction of the screen, own the ownership of the screen, and engage in independent operation. The operator holds the right to operate the screen: the operator buys the right to operate the screen from the owner of the screen, and only has the right to operate advertising. Outdoor LED display module resource management The operators of outdoor LED display module resources mainly have several forms of cooperation according to the situation of resource ownership: 1) The building owner builds its own screens, and the owner builds its own advertising media company to operate and is responsible for its own profits and losses, such as Jingcheng Media. 2) The building owner leases the right to use the site, the advertising media company invests in the construction of the screen and operates it independently, and the media company pays the owner for the use of the site, such as Phoenix City Media. 3) Screen equipment manufacturers hold the owners of the screens, operate by self-built advertising companies, and pay or not pay for the use of the venues, such as Lianjian Optoelectronics and Lianjian Cultural Media. 4) The screen owner outsources the operation to a professional advertising company, and the professional advertising company pays the screen owner to the screen owner. The resource-dependent building has architectural value and regional value, but it does not directly bring value to the media resource itself. The operator manages resources from the following aspects: 1) Management in the form of traditional outdoor advertising media The geographic location characteristics of the packaging point resources, and the revenue from the advertising time of the selling point resources. 2) Operate by way of video media The electronic outdoor LED display module possesses the technical capabilities of multi-terminal simultaneous release, selection, and control of advertising time slots. Operators operate screens in the form of video media or TV media and provide advertisers with diversified time products, that is, video websites and TV advertisements are copied to the big screen. Under this business form and philosophy, the operator is not considering the value of location but is doing traffic in front of this screen to enhance the traffic value of this media screen. For example, Phoenix Media combined with Phoenix Satellite TV\'s content to permanently broadcast the city network news content on its screen; Windows Internet uses video content operation to transplant common interactive forms on the mobile phone to the large screen, thereby enhancing the value of time. Outdoor LED display module advertiser Advertisers advertise on outdoor LED display module, essentially not because they want to market the people covered by the big screen, but because of the topic. These advertisements posted on large screens attached to landmark buildings have their own attention and topical hot spots. Passing audiences take pictures of these large-scale, fresh, and interesting advertisements and upload them to social networks, combined with various media platforms. Create momentum, which aroused the attention of the second spread. Advertisers placing advertisements on outdoor LED display module are not only a recognition of the geographical location of the large screen, but the large screen or the building attached to the large screen as a unique IP locally, even nationally, and globally. The display module application 1.Information display: passenger flow in the scenic spot, publicity in the scenic spot, event announcements, broadcast announcements, etc.; When there is a lot of traffic during holidays, the display module will play a bigger role. The RISINGLCD display module can show scenic spots, release warm reminders, real-time environmental monitoring information, temperature reports, etc., which not only allows scenic visitors to take the lead in enjoying the beauty of the scenery but also makes playing more convenient, safe and enjoyable. 2. Performing stage beauty: folklore art performances, presenting wonderful moments; Now the scenic spots will fully excavate local art and folk culture to produce rich programs to attract tourists. RISINGLCD display module makes full use of its excellent video playback function and color display effect. The stage is designed with a display module, a flexible and changeable background, and the sound and light effects of the stage are also true and magical. It brings a strong visual impact to the visitors, makes the audience feel immersive, and allows visitors to appreciate the strong Regional style stage performances. 3. Inquiry and interaction: practical interactive screens in scenic spots; For example, query maps, tour routes, watch introductions to scenic spots, conduct interactive visits, and other rich activities (query interaction). At present, the RISINGLCD display module has been widely used. Ticket collection machines, inquiry machines, etc. all use the Internet + cultural tourism to realize the conversion from offline to online and increase user retention. RISINGLCD display module relies on the advantages of excellent performance, ultra-high price, spot supply, and localized services. The installation of S-LCD displays in scenic spots has become a trend and trend in the development of smart tourism. In the future, S-LCD displays will undoubtedly have more room for development and penetrate into more application areas in scenic spots. The display module supplier RISINGLCD (WITH BRAND OF RISING STAR) is a professional highlight LCD manufacturer from China, as a superior global supplier, a modernized high-tech enterprise with 100 employees including 20 highly qualified and well-trained engineers. Due to our 2, 000 square meters factory and a monthly production capacity of 10, 000 pieces, we can meet your demands. Specializes in manufacturing and distributing all types of LCD modules, LCD monitors, LCD digital signage, Touch Screen, etc. Now our products have been widely used in games, finance, communication, electricity, transportation, hospitals, estates, travel and government lines, stations, 4S shops, museums, exhibitions, libraries, hotels, and entertainment KTV. Our markets cover Asia, North America, Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Central, and South America, and Oceania. For more information about LCD, welcome to contact us via: sales@risinglcd.com After installing an update on their Samsung device, a user complained about Samsung S21 freezing and crashing problems. The user also shared the same sentiments as other users. The user said via the Samsung forum: "Two updates in the past couple months have messed my phone up. The first one made my entire screen go black, I couldn't do anything to it and had to take time off work to drive 45 mins away to have it fixed. I'm thankful of the year warranty for covering it. This newest update has now started freezing videos in various apps." The user further stated that they did a factory reset, but it did nothing to solve the "annoying" issue. Finally, the user concluded that there is a bug on the new update and asked the tech giant to fix it and "leave [it] well enough alone." With that, here are the recommended action steps to take to undo the Samsung S21 freezing according to Samsung. Samsung S21 Freezing It can be really stressful when a phone freezes or crashes. The good news is that this is most likely fixable without sending the phone in for repair. Simple measures, such as rebooting and updating the program, are just a few of the things users may do to avoid future freezes and crashes. How To Fix Samsung S21 Crashing First, check your phone's battery life. Check to see if the users' phone has enough battery life. Check that the phone is at least 5% charged. The phone may not turn on after the reboot if the battery is below 5%. A completely depleted phone should be charged for at least 15 minutes with the included wall charger. Second, restart your phone. Depending on the phone a user has, rebooting it will be a little different. For devices with a Power key, simultaneously press and hold the Volume Down and Power keys for about 10 seconds. For devices having a Side key, simultaneously press and hold the Volume down and Side key for about 10 seconds. Third, Normal Boot is the option to choose. Users should be able to use their phones normally now. Use the Volume keys to go through the options if the Maintenance mode screen appears. Then, to select Normal Boot, hit the Power or Bixby keys. However, if these steps failed to fix the Samsung S21 crashing and freezing, users should try to update their Samsung Galaxy device or Samsung tablet, as advised by Samsung. Read Also: Why Is Samsung Not Downloading Apps From Google Play Store? 8 Ways to Fix the Issue How to update your Galaxy phone or tablet Manually download updates. Navigate to and open Settings on your device. Swipe to a Software update or System updates, then tap. It will differ depending on the model. Choose from two options: Download and install or check for system updates. If an update is available, it will begin downloading automatically, however certain devices may require you to press Download Now. When the download is complete, install the update by following the on-screen instructions. Smart Switch can also be used to check for updates. It will show the last time the phone or tablet checked for updates. To download an update, users must be connected to the internet. Whether you're having problems, make sure your device has enough space. Before installing a software update, make sure the phone or tablet is connected to the internet and has a battery charge of at least 50%. Some carriers will not allow you to update using mobile data unless you have access to a Wi-Fi network. Learn how to get out of a boot loop if an error occurs during a software update and your phone or tablet continues restarting. If your phone or tablet is running out of storage, you can use Device Care to free up some space. Users can also use Smart Switch or your Samsung or Google account to back up other files. After the update, check your phone or tablet. If you had problems before the software update, try using your phone or tablet normally to check if the issue has been resolved. Related Article: Is Your Samsung Phone Overheating? Possible Reasons and 10 Ways to Prevent Damage A Russian missile launch has reportedly destroyed a satellite in space, prompting astronauts on the International Space Station to seek safety. The conduct has been condemned by the US State Department, with NASA Administrator Bill Nelson describing it as "irresponsible" and "destabilizing." Russian Satellite Explosion A new, potentially catastrophic debris field formed by a Russian anti-satellite test forced seven crew members aboard the International Space Station to seek emergency refuge in a spacecraft linked to the ISS on Monday, Nov. 15. After a Russian missile exploded one of the country's dead surveillance satellites over the weekend, the astronauts hid inside the SpaceX Crew Dragon and Russian Soyuz spacecrafts. Russian Satellite Debris As stated by Radio Free Europe, France and NATO have joined the United States in condemning Russia for conducting a missile test that blew up a defunct Russian satellite, creating a debris cloud that endangered the ISS and its crew. The anti-satellite missile test generated more than 1,500 pieces of trackable orbital debris, and will likely generate hundreds of thousands of smaller pieces, the US officials said. According to NASA, the debris forced the crew aboard the space station, which includes four Americans, a German, and two Russians to shelter into their docked spaceship capsules for two hours as a precaution to allow for a quick evacuation had it been necessary. Russian Missile Test As reported by CNET, a spokeswoman for the US State Department denounced the anti-satellite test. "The Russian Federation carried out a reckless satellite test of a direct ascent and anti-satellite weapon against one of its own satellites," Ned Price told journalists. According to Price, the test "substantially increases the risk to astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station, as well as many other human spaceflight missions." Price's comments backed up earlier claims from the US Space Command of "a debris-generating event in outer space," which was thought to be the result of a Russian weapons test by the US authorities. Read Also: NASA Hubble Images: Online Tool Lets You Check What Space Telescope Saw During Your Birthday! NASA on Russian Anti-Satellite Missile NASA administrator Bill Nelson noted that it was "unthinkable" for the country behind the test to not only endanger international partner astronauts aboard the ISS, but also "their own cosmonauts." Nelson further called Russia's actions as "dangerous" and "reckless." Besides the ISS and its crew, the Chinese space station and its taikonauts on board were also nearly jeopardized by the said missile test. The debris cloud left behind from the test could be identical to that left behind by a Chinese weapons test in 2007 and could remain in low Earth orbit for years. The ISS narrowly avoided space debris from the 2007 test just a few weeks ago. The radar data from private space debris tracking company LeoLabs "confirm the presence of many objects near the estimated location of Cosmos 1408." Cosmos 1408, also known as Kosmos-1408, is a long-defunct Russian spy spacecraft launched in 1982. Fortunately, the astronauts in space in the International Space Station have safely been able to return to work in the main station and are now collaborating with NASA. The collaboration is meant to track the numerous debris in space. In an effort towards the astronauts' safety, they made an initiative to alter their sleeping patterns due to caution with the threatening debris still in orbit. Related Article: NASA Hubble Images: Space Telescope Celebrates Moon Night With Stunning Galactical Photos ByteDance's hit app TikTok has agreed to pay a fine of $92 million as a result of a TikTok class action lawsuit. With that, users in the United States may be eligible for a portion of the multi-million class-action lawsuit settlement against TikTok, as well as its sister app, Musical.ly. TikTok Class Action Lawsuit If any user were using TikTok or its sister app Musical.ly before September 30, they may be eligible to file a claim on behalf of themselves or minors who used the service with the representation of their parents or guardians. The District Court for the Northern District of Illinois filed a complaint against TikTok, alleging that the firm violated Illinois' biometric privacy rules by acquiring and exploiting users' personal data without "sufficient notice and consent." TikTok's Lawsuit Violation Plaintiffs alleged that the TikTok app infiltrated its users' devices and extracted a broad array of private data, including biometric data and content, which Defendants use to track and profile TikTok users for the purposes of, among other things, ad targeting and profit, according to the settlement agreement filed in February 2021. Despite the fact that TikTok rejected all of the allegations, the Chinese-owned company ByteDance agreed to resolve the matters on a settlement. A great result that came out from this is that in June, TikTok amended its privacy policy. TikTok sent a notification to U.S. users on Monday, November 15, announcing the settlement and providing a link to a website with instructions on how to file a claim. So, how do you go about applying? The hit short video app published a settlement notice within the apl, referring users to Tiktokdataprivacysettlement.com, regarding any concern about how to process their claims. Read Also: TikTok Live Gifts: How Can TikTokers Earn Diamonds, Exchange It For Money? How To File A Claim For TikTok Lawsuit Who Can Apply For TikTok Lawsuit Claim? According to Mashable, anybody using TikTok in the United States before September 30, 2021 is eligible to file a claim. Anyone who used the app or created films in it within Illinois before that date is also eligible. If users fall into the latter category, users may be eligible for a six-fold increase in their payments. This is due to the fact that certain claims in the case are only applicable to Illinois residents. In the case of minors, their parents or guardians can register on their behalf. When Can Users Apply To TikTok? According to court documents, to claim the TikTok settlement, users must be able to submit a claim form by March 1, 2022. So, there's still enough time for users to register for the ByteDance compensation. Furthermore, on May 18, 2022, a final approval hearing will be held, and payments will not be made until that time. How Do Users Claim Their Compensation? First, users must submit a legitimate claim form if they are eligible. Users can apply for a by completing out this online form or mailing it in - users can print the claim form here. If a user applying to the claims is a minor, the parent or guardian assisting the claim is required to provide proof and basic information for the child and themselves. Users' TikTok usernames and payment selections, such as PayPal, Venmo, a virtual prepaid card, or an actual check, are all stored here. Related Article: TikTok Famous: 5 Highest-Paid Stars 2021 and How Much They Are Making Rescuers in Pennsylvania have located a plane crash and the father and daughter riding it through the iPad of one of the survivors. In relation to this, it is worth noting that there is a possibility that the Find My app installed on an Apple devices might be the app used by rescuers. iPad Signal Helps Rescuer Locate the Plane Crash Survivors According to Pennsylvania State Police, a plane traveling from Wilkes-Barre Scranton International Airport in Pittston Township, Pennsylvania went missing on their radar shortly after takeoff, per CNN. The authorities added that the sole passengers inside the two-seat, single-engine Cessna 150 were the father who piloted the plane, a 58-year-old male, and his daughter, a 13-year-old girl. A five-hour general investigation was conducted in collaboration with the US Air Force Rescue Coordination Center. Shortly after, the plane, as well as its passengers, were discovered in a heavily wooded location seven miles southeast of Wilkes-Barre Scranton International Airport. Since it is a densely forested area, Chief James Serafin with the Bear Creek Volunteer Hose Company told CNN that from what he has seen and heard, locating the survivors was difficult especially in the area where the airplane crashed. "They had to go through trees and everything else. It definitely was a miracle," Chief Serafin furthered on CNN. With regards to how they were rescued, the rescuers relied first on the last known location, and approximately 30 other individuals began a grid search in the woods, though the rescue operation came up short, per 9to5Mac. Serafin furthered that once the pilot was identified, rescue teams contacted the pilot's wife, who had been waiting for her husband and daughter at their destination. Through this conversation, authorities have acquired the pilot's mobile phone number, in which authorities used it to ping the survivors' location. Read Also: Norton Research: Risky Habits of Gamers Exposed, Cyberattacks on Players Rampant "They (rescue team) were able to ping the cell phone and they found out that the daughter had an iPad and with certain iPads, you're able to ping signals to it and once we got that coordinate, that's where we located them," Serafin explained. In addition to this, Sgt. John Richards, with the Pennsylvania State Police, stated in an interview with News Nation Now that he believed that every responder was expecting the plane crash incident to be a recovery rather than a rescue, per People. Moreover, he was even more surprised when he discovered that the survivors were still alive. The two were discovered in a pre-hypothermic state, as they were huddled together trying to keep warm. They also sustained minor injuries. The Federal Aviation Administration is currently examining the crash, but no further information is available, per 9to5Mac. How Can an iPad Help Locate a Person? According to the blog post posted by the Cupertino-based technology company, Apple device owners can locate a missing device by using the Find My app. The feature enables them to view location, play a sound, mark as lost, remote erase, notify when found, and notify when left behind. In the case of the plane crash incident, it is worth noting that there is a possibility that rescuers utilize the view location feature, in which they can access the location through the installed map on the daughter's iPad. For those curious to know how it works, these are the following steps that Apple device owners must use to locate someone through the Find My app. Head to the "Find My" app option on the home screen. Once the Find My app was tapped, choose the device they wish to locate. Right after, select the gadget to view their location. Lastly, choose directions to open its location in Maps. Related Article: Concerned Your iPhone Touch Screen Is Not Working? Ultimate Trick Can Help You Save It American hedge fund manager, investor and entrepreneur Ken Griffin predicts big changes for Ethereum and Bitcoin. He believes Ethereum and its conceptual design might replace Bitcoin. But ultimately, both would be replaced by the next generation cryptos, which feature higher transaction speeds and lower costs. Just last week, many cryptocurrencies reached new all-time high. Bitcoin peaked at $68,530, while Ethereum reached $4,743. However, current market performance shows bearish trading. At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $59,030 and Ethereum is at $4,106, per Coindesk. On the recent DealBook Online Summit, Griffin explained his views on cryptocurrency market trend. Billionaire Issues Warning About Bitcoin Price Bitcoin is the largest cryptocurrency up to date. Its coin currently costs multiple times more than any other cryptocurrency available. However, Bitcoin has its weaknesses. Its system is expensive to manage, and its hardware is a major contributor to global warming. Because of this, Griffin said investors might take an interest in different cryptocurrency markets. Ethereum, on the other hand, uses a programmable ecosystem that features both smart contracts and proof-of-stake. It also features block-chain based decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible tokens (NFT) functionality. Both these industries are effective promotions to the digital payments lifestyle. This is why Griffin believes that ETH could overtake Bitcoin in the long run. Unfortunately, ETH also has its fair share of weaknesses. Transaction speeds are extremely slow, and the cost per transaction is expensive. If new generation coins could properly fix this issue, then they might quickly replace Ethereum in the market. Read Also: Shiba Inu Price Update: Cryptocurrency Value Declining; Does Elon Musk Have the Meme Coin? Bitcoin Price Prediction: The Future of Crypto However, regardless of which crypto coin emerges dominant, Griffin emphasized the security risks of cryptocurrency. He said, "a number of issues that haven't been addressed by crypto (is) how payments will be made more efficient," per Forbes. Griffin explained that the lack of security might discourage future businesses and customers from using the digital mode of payment. As an example, Griffin compared cryptocurrency to card companies like Visa and Mastercard. Based on the contract conditions, these companies said they are willing to cover costs against fraud and theft. On the other hand, cryptocurrencies offer no such benefit. This means investors and businesses have to be accountable for their own money and safety. Griffin pointed out that the pandemic-induced lockdowns might have boosted the financial systems temporarily. "(The pandemic) created a whole new class of savers because we couldn't spend money a year ago, like the meme stocks and like cryptocurrency. People are very focused on the world of new ideas and new creations. I worry that some of this passion is misplaced when it comes to cryptocurrencies," per Forbes. The last thing to note about cryptocurrency is its highly volatile market. Its values often rise and fall without any indication, so readers should take Griffin's prediction with some pinch of salt. Related Article: Crypto Will Rapidly Grow in 2022: Where to Invest Aside from Bitcoin, Ethereum Installation view of Georg Baselitz's solo exhibition, "Hotel garni," held at Thaddaeus Ropac in Hannam-dong, Seoul / Courtesy Thaddaeus Ropac gallery London, Paris, Salzburg, Seoul By Park Han-sol Having opened its doors last month in Hannam-dong, Thaddaeus Ropac Seoul is currently hosting an exhibition of the latest paintings and drawings by celebrated German artist Georg Baselitz. Named "Hotel garni," which refers to a small inn in French, the show features a series of paintings of female figures suspended upside down in an undefined, black void. Although they are inspired by his wife and frequent muse, Elke Baselitz, they are not her portraits; rather, they are abstracted representations of human forms and physicality, in general. The titles of the pieces provide a hint of where his subjects are supposed to be located: "Einzelzimmer, Einzelbett" (Single Room, Single Bed) and "Do not disturb." The series is his way of making a visual reference to the brothel-inspired scene captured in Picasso's iconic "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" (1907) painting. Baselitz's decision to invert his pieces in 1969 in an attempt to diverge from his earlier, more figurative works and highlight the form itself was a revolutionary one. To this day, he continues to expand new styles and practices most recently through what he calls "a transfer method." He first blackens the piece of canvas on the ground. The artist then brings a second canvas, onto which he paints human figures, and presses the two together while they are still wet. The resulting product is a "transferred" figure, the shapes of which vary depending on the degrees of pressure. "I do this in a very childlike, rather foolish way; however, I keep in mind how it will be transferred later," the 83-year-old artist said in an interview with the gallery. "This process is quick, and the simpler this model, the greater the prospect that it will succeed." With this exhibition, Thaddaeus Ropac, which operates in London, Paris and Salzburg, has joined the group of internationally renowned galleries that have noticeably begun expanding their presence in Korea. Pace Gallery, Barakat Contemporary, Lehmann Maupin, Perrotin and Konig Galerie are among some of the major players that have opened new outposts in Seoul in the last five years. "There is a burgeoning group of younger collectors who have the financial ability to collect art in Korea," John R. Stomberg, the Virginia Rice Kelsey 1961s Director of the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College, told The Korea Times during a recent interview. "The economy in Seoul is strong enough so that a significant population can now collect art. And that has always driven the galleries and the art market." The exhibition, "Hotel garni," runs through Nov. 27 at Thaddaeus Ropac Seoul. By Anna J. Park Local private equity companies are increasing their investment in Southeast Asian venture capital businesses, as they see further growth potential in the region. Vietnam, in particular, is one of their favored areas. Korea-headquartered STIC Investments recently decided to participate in the Series E round investment for Tiki, one of Vietnam's largest e-commerce businesses. The e-commerce company raised about $258 million in the Series E funding, boosting its corporate valuation to nearly $1 billion from the round. Mirae Asset-Naver Asia Growth Fund also participated in the fund raising, alongside global insurance firm AIA, Taiwan Mobile and Yuanta Fund. STIC Investments, which has diverse investment portfolios in the Southeast Asian region, including Vietnam and Malaysia, also stepped up as one of major shareholders of Carousell a Singapore-based online market place start-up a couple of months ago. The Korean PEF led the latest $100 million round of investment, bringing the start-up's valuation to over $1 billion. STIC Investments was also one of many Korean private equity funds Mirae Asset-Naver Asia Growth Fund, LB Investment and LINE Ventures that together invested $33 million in Indonesia's online grocery delivery service, HappyFresh. As Indonesia boasts a large population and a fast-growing market, the country has been one of the favorite investment locations among Korean PEFs. Korea Investment Private Equity also injected $200 million into Vietnamese conglomerate Masan Group the country's major food and beverage company taking a 2 percent to 3 percent stake in the company. IMM Investment invested in Vietnam's Masan Group in 2018; and Vingroup in 2019, along with SK Group. According to Preqin's alternative investment research report, the private equity and venture capital market in 10 Southeast Asian countries has more than doubled over the past five years. The amount of private equity and venture capital invested in the region stood at $37 billion, a 117 percent jump from $17 billion in 2015. Some market insiders say one of reasons why Korean PEFs are actively placing bets in Southeast Asian regions is the growing uncertainty regarding regulatory policies in China. The Southeast Asian countries' large populations along with booming e-commerce platforms looks promising to Korean PEFs in generating solid returns on investment. Woori Financial Group Chairman Son Tae-seung attends a meeting with Financial Supervisory Service Governor Jeong Eun-bo in Seoul, Nov. 3. Joint Press Corps-Yonhap By Lee Min-hyung Woori Financial Group Chairman Son Tae-seung is honing in on the United States for his first roadshow, if possible, amid growing hopes for the group's complete privatization by no later than the end of 2021, after state-run Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation (KDIC) completes the sale of its 10 percent stake in Woori to other investors. Details of his itinerary have not been fixed, but the Woori chief will soon head for the non-deal roadshow (NDR), according to a spokesman from the financial holding firm. "After a two-year hiatus, we decided to hold the event for overseas institutional investors amid eased COVID-19 lockdown restrictions," the Woori official said without elaborating further. The Woori chief is considering visiting New York and Boston if his intended trip to the United States becomes a reality. But chances are he would attend meetings in Asian countries just as he has done for the past few years. The Woori chief has been active in holding such overseas NDRs in Hong Kong and Singapore. Son held the event in the two countries in 2018. He was in Tokyo and Hong Kong for four days in 2019 on business centered on a series of meetings with officials from sovereign wealth funds and global asset management firms. Woori hopes to widen its appeal to foreign investors, as most financial holding firms including Woori here are relatively lesser-known to major investors overseas. The government's ownership in the financial holding firm has long been considered a negative factor holding back Woori's stock growth. But in light of its planned privatization, the lender is expected to tighten its internal management structure, allowing it to push for more aggressive investment and business expansion. Data showed that foreign investors' stake in Woori has been on a gradual rise since 2020. As of the end of 2020, the portion of foreign-held stakes in Woori reached 24.84 percent and rose to 25.91 percent at the end of June this year. The figure also increased to 29.17 percent as of the end of October. Woori's stock price is also showing signs of bouncing back to the previous level after a sharp fall coinciding with the pandemic shock early last year. The lender is widely expected to enhance its corporate valuation due to earnings growth. It reported a record net profit of 2.2 trillion won for the first three quarters combined, up 92.8 percent from the previous year. Medical workers at Seoul Medical Center monitor COVID-19 patients in an incentive care unit, Wednesday. Yonhap Emergency risk evaluation to be conducted when over 75% of ICU beds are occupied By Jun Ji-hye The government has decided to shorten the interval between regular COVID-19 vaccine doses and booster shots from six months to four months for elderly residents over the age of 60 as well as inpatients and employees at nursing homes and geriatric hospitals. This will also be applied to those working at medical facilities. The interval will be reduced from six months to five months for citizens over the age of 50 in addition to soldiers, police officers and firefighters. Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum announced the decision, Wednesday, as part of measures to cope with a continued increase in breakthrough infections involving people who are testing positive for COVID-19 even after having been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus. "Speeding up administering booster shots has become an urgent task to prevent further breakthrough infections," Kim said during a government meeting he presided over. "Under this plan, 13.78 million residents are expected to receive booster shots by the end of the year, nearly double the number of people who were on the initial list." Kim noted the decision is also aimed at protecting the elderly amid a rapid increase in the number of critically ill COVID-19 patients in recent weeks, as those over the age of 60 account for 82 percent of the critical cases and 97 percent of the deaths. Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum speaks during a government meeting on COVID-19 responses at the Government Complex Sejong, Wednesday. Yonhap Costa Rica's President Carlos Alvarado Quesada will make a state visit to South Korea next week to discuss a range of bilateral and global issues with President Moon Jae-in, Moon's office said Wednesday. The Costa Rican president will arrive in South Korea on Sunday for a four-day visit and hold a summit with Moon on Tuesday, presidential spokesperson Park Kyung-mee told reporters. The summit is aimed mainly at enhancing bilateral economic cooperation, particularly in the fields of space and hydrogen technologies, in the post-pandemic era, Park said. The two leaders are also expected to discuss ways to strengthen diplomatic cooperation and boost collaboration on global issues, including climate change, Park said. Costa Rica is an important partner in Central America, and the visit by the Costa Rican president is expected to help South Korea bolster its presence in the region, Park said. (Yonhap) A computer generated image of an envisioned light aircraft carrier released by the Republic of Korea Navy, Nov. 8. Courtesy of Republic of Korea Navy By Jung Da-min The Republic of Korea Navy's plan to launch a light aircraft carrier development project next year is in serious jeopardy following a major budget cut at the National Assembly. Although developing indigenous technologies for the carrier was one of President Moon Jae-in's election promises, the military has failed to persuade lawmakers of the necessity of the project. Considering Moon's term ends in May next year, it is uncertain whether the project will be revived under the new administration. On Tuesday, the Assembly National Defense Committee cut the related budget from the proposed 7.2 billion won ($6.07 million) by 93 percent to 500 million won. This was the second time the committee cut the budget related to the project. In November 2020, the committee reduced the proposed funding of 10.1 billion won to 100 million won only to be used to conduct research or hold debates on the feasibility of the project. After the failure of its first attempt to launch the project with a basic design process, the Navy reduced the project budget proposal by 30 percent to win the committee's approval, but has suffered another setback. While at least 4 billion won is needed for the basic design process of the light aircraft carrier, the 500 million won allocated for next year can be used only for data collection and research. Members of the committee, both from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), have said a careful approach is needed for the project when its necessity has yet to be proven. Rep. Shin Won-sik of the PPP said there has been no consensus on the need for the light aircraft carrier project and further cost analysis is needed. A computer generated image of a vertical take-off and landing aircraft taking off from an envisioned light aircraft carrier released by the Republic of Korea Navy, Nov. 8. Courtesy of Republic of Korea Navy By Bahk Eun-ji People in Seoul will be able to buy fresh produce and other products from various parts of the country at a farmers' market which will be running this Friday and Saturday. The annual event was canceled last year due to COVID-19. The Seoul Metropolitan Government said that the farmers' market will be held from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. in three locations around the capital Seoul Plaza in front of City Hall, Mallidong Square west of Seoul Station and Digital Media City in Mapo District. A total of 111 farms from 74 cities and counties will participate, offering fresh agricultural products recommended by local governments for up to 30 percent below supermarket prices. A special sale section will also be held at Seoul Plaza for agricultural and marine products that haven't been selling well due to the cancellation of local festivals where they are traditionally sold. This will include hairtail from Jeju Island, ginseng from Geumsan County, South Chungcheong Province, and rice from Cheorwon County, Gangwon Province. Hairtail will be sold at 6,000 won ($5.09), about 70 percent off the supermarket price. The city government will limit the maximum number of shoppers to 100 at all times, with fever checks and visitors' logs being recorded. Ahead of the winter kimchi-making season, a separate shopping event for kimchi ingredients will be held at Garak Market in Songpa District this Saturday. About 45 tons of kimchi ingredients, including pickled cabbage, radish, salted shrimp, garlic, chives and red pepper powder, can be purchased at the market at 30 percent below market price. "We hope this event will be an opportunity to help promote the healthy and fresh agricultural products by farmers who have had difficulty selling them due to COVID-19, so that it will revitalize the economy," a city government official said. The ruling Democratic Party (DP) has threatened to conduct a parliamentary investigation into the finance ministry for underestimating this year's surplus tax revenue, ratcheting up pressure on the government to endorse the DP presidential nominee's push to provide universal COVID-19 relief funds. DP floor leader Rep. Yun Ho-jung said during a YTN radio interview Tuesday that this year's excess tax revenue is expected to reach 50 trillion won ($42.2 billion), which is 19 trillion won more than the ministry's estimate of 31 trillion won in July. Yun said the extra 19 trillion won can be used to finance a package of COVID-19 relief measures, including universal handouts, and blasted the ministry for the accounting error. "(The ministry) must be held accountable for this," he said. "I believe they should apologize to the people." When asked if the discrepancy appeared intentional, Yun said, "If it was intentional, I think we should even conduct a parliamentary investigation, for example." DP presidential nominee Lee Jae-myung has proposed giving relief handouts of 300,000-500,000 won to all people despite the government's repeated opposition over concerns of fiscal soundness. The party recently revised the amount downward to 200,000-250,000 won in consideration of the estimated tax revenue surplus and has pushed to give the handouts in January. The ministry released a statement Tuesday afternoon acknowledging the mistake but denying it was deliberate. "An intentional underestimation of the tax revenue is unthinkable and we clearly state that we did not do so," it said, adding that the extra 19 trillion won in surplus tax revenue will first be used to compensate small merchants for their COVID-19 business losses and then be transferred to next year's tax revenue. The public discord between the DP and the government is expected to intensify as parliamentary deliberations on the government's 2022 budget proposal get under way. (Yonhap) Deutsch Motors Chairman Kwon Oh-soo, center, enters the Seoul Central District Court, Tuesday, for the court to review whether to issue an arrest warrant for him over him having allegedly rigged his company's stock price. The court issued one later that day. Yonhap By Nam Hyun-woo Kim Kun-hee, the wife of main opposition People Power Party presidential candidate Yoon Seok-youl, is seen during the ceremony at which Yoon was appointed the prosecutor general at Cheong Wa Dae, July 25, 2019. Joint Press Corps Korean Air B787-9 / Courtesy of Korean Air By Baek Byung-yeul Naver's new CEO Choi Soo-yeon, right, and new CFO Kim Nam-sun / Courtesy of Naver In this handout photo released by State Border Committee of the Republic of Belarus on Nov. 16, Polish officials use a water cannon during clashes with migrants at the checkpoint "Kuznitsa" at the Belarus-Poland border near Grodno, Belarus. AP-Yonhap Polish forces at the border with Belarus used water cannons and tear gas Tuesday against stone-throwing migrants, as Warsaw accused Belarusian authorities of giving smoke grenades and other weapons to those trying to cross the frontier. The events marked an escalation in the tense crisis on the European Union's eastern border, where the West has accused President Alexander Lukashenko of using the migrants as pawns to destabilize the 27-nation bloc in retaliation for its sanctions on his authoritarian regime. Belarus denies orchestrating the crisis. The Poland Border Guard agency posted video on Twitter showing water being sprayed across the border at a group of migrants who threw debris, and the Defense Ministry also said tear gas was used against the attackers. Polish authorities said nine of its forces were injured seven policemen, one soldier and a female border guard. Migrants from the Middle East and elsewhere gather at the checkpoint "Kuznitsa" at the Belarus-Poland border near Grodno, Belarus, Nov. 15. AP-Yonhap Some 2,000 migrants were at the frontier in makeshift camps in the freezing weather, but only about 100 were believed involved in attacking the Polish forces at the crossing near Kuznica, said Border Guard spokeswoman Anna Michalska. The crossing has been closed since last week. Police spokesman Mariusz Ciarka later said the migrants there had been ''pacified.'' He added that the attackers had been given smoke grenades by the Belarusians and threw stones at the Polish police, with the events monitored by the Belarusian services using a drone. The Polish Defense Ministry also said Belarus gave some migrants flash-bang grenades. Belarus' State Border Guard Committee and the Foreign Ministry said they would investigate Poland's actions. ''These are considered violent actions against individuals who are on the territory of another country,'' committee spokesman Anton Bychkovsky was quoted as saying by Belarus' state news agency Belta. Lukashenko on Tuesday again rejected accusations of engineering the crisis and said his government has deported about 5,000 illegal migrants from Belarus this fall. ''We're not collecting refugees all over the world and bringing them to Belarus, as Poland has informed the European Union. Those who come to Belarus legally, we accept here, the same way any other country would. Those who violate the law, even in the slightest, (we put) on a plane and send back (home),'' he told a government meeting dedicated to the situation at the border. In May, however, he had railed against the EU sanctions imposed on his country for its harsh crackdown on internal dissent, saying: ''We were stopping migrants and drugs now you will catch them and eat them yourself.'' On Tuesday, Lukashenko said he and German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed Monday by phone that neither Belarus, nor the EU would benefit from an escalation of the crisis. He said he proposed a resolution but did not elaborate, adding that Merkel is discussing it with other EU leaders. Some of the migrants have children with them at the border in their desperate bid to reach the EU. Most are fleeing conflict, poverty and instability in the Middle East and elsewhere. At least 11 deaths have been reported in recent weeks as the weather has turned colder and they are trapped in the dank forest between the forces of the two countries. While some have managed to get into the EU before Poland, Lithuania and Latvia bolstered their borders, passage appears to be much harder now. A man pulls down the fence during clashes with Polish border guards at the Belarus-Poland border near Grodno, Belarus, Nov. 16. AP-Yonhap Poland's Defense Ministry said Belarusian forces tried to destroy border fences, and its Interior Ministry posted video apparently showing migrants trying to tear one down. It said the migrants are using the smoke grenades and similar weapons given to them by Belarusian troops who no longer seem to be trying to conceal their involvement. Poland has taken a tough stand against the migrants' illegal entry, reinforcing the border with riot police and troops, rolling out razor wire, and making plans to build a tall steel barrier. The Polish approach has largely met with approval from other EU nations, who want to stop another wave of migration. But Poland also has been criticized by human rights groups and others for pushing migrants back into Belarus and not allowing them to apply for asylum. A man throws a stone during clashes with Polish border guards at the Belarus-Poland border near Grodno, Belarus, Nov. 16. AP-Yonhap U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is greeted by Kenya's Cabinet Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Raychelle Omamo, as he arrives at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, Kenya, Nov. 17. Reuters-Yonhap NAIROBI U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday urged Africans to watch out for rising threats to democracy as he began a three-nation tour of the continent where he is also seeking momentum to end Ethiopia's year-long war. Blinken, who will also visit Nigeria and Senegal, wants to demonstrate a new U.S. commitment to Africa with a focus on democracy, climate change and Covid-19 at a time when China is making steady inroads into the continent. The top US diplomat spoke for an hour and a half with Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta at a meeting that was originally scheduled for 10 minutes. Kenyatta paid a surprise trip to Addis Ababa on Sunday in the hope of pushing peace efforts, adding to a flurry of international diplomatic activity over the conflict. Blinken also held talks with civil society leaders and asked for ideas on how to stop the "bad actors" who test democratic institutions and threaten a free media. "We have seen over the last decade or so what some call a democratic recession," he said. "We have seen the same challenges here that we see in many parts of the world misinformation, political violence, voter intimidation, voter bribery." President Joe Biden has vowed to pay attention to Africa and draw a distinction with his predecessor Donald Trump, who made no secret of his lack of interest in the continent. Kenya's Foreign Minister Raychelle Omamo called on Blinken to seek concrete progress, especially on security concerns. "There are important signposts to erect so that the whole world knows that the US is indeed back and interested in the advancement of our continent," she said. In his remarks to civil society, Blinken acknowledged that threats to democracy also existed in the United States, where a mob loyal to Trump attacked the US Capitol on January 6 in a bid to overturn the election result. "The United States is hardly immune from this challenge," Blinken said. "We've seen how fragile our own democracy can be." (AFP) A view of the preparations at a Christmas market in Hamburg, Germany, Nov. 16. Reuters-Yonhap DRESDEN, Germany (AFP) The mulled wine is brewing and the chestnuts are ready to roast, but with Covid-19 cases soaring the festive season is hanging in the balance for Germany's famous Christmas markets. As the government scrambles to respond to a dramatic rise in infections over the past two weeks, some of the traditional markets have already been cancelled while others are still waiting nervously for decisions. The Striezelmarkt in Dresden, the oldest Christmas market in Germany which draws around three million visitors annually, is due to open on Nov. 22. Stallholders have already built their wooden huts and are busy hanging decorations and assembling wooden figures. But they might have to take it all down again at any moment. "I can't describe what we are going through at the moment," Karin Hantsche, who has been selling traditional gingerbread at the market for 32 years, tells AFP. "We are not sleeping at night, we are so nervous and tense." The state of Saxony has said the markets can go ahead, but local authorities in Dresden are due to meet on November 25 and could take a different view. The central government and the leaders of Germany's 16 states are also due to meet this week to discuss new national measures. With the country's seven-day incidence rate striking a new record high for the 10th day in a row on Wednesday, Chancellor Angela Merkel described the situation as "dramatic." "The fourth wave is hitting our country with full force," she said. "The number of daily new infections is higher than ever before... and the daily death toll is also frightening." For Hantsche, whose company brings in 50 percent of its income over the Christmas period, the closure of the market would be a disaster. "Not everyone will survive this, and for me I can't say yet," she says. A screen at a restaurant in Beijing, China, shows Chinese President Xi Jinping attending a virtual meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, Tuesday. Reuters-Yonhap China and the U.S. have agreed to ease restrictions on each other's journalists amid a slight relaxation of tensions between the two sides. The official China Daily newspaper said Wednesday that the agreement was reached ahead of Tuesday's virtual summit between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and President Joe Biden The agreement represents a degree of progress on an issue that has long aggravated relations, but details remain to be ironed out. COVID-19 travel restrictions and long-standing obstacles faced by foreign media within China are also factors standing in the way of a major breakthrough in media relations. Under the agreement, the U.S. will issue one-year multiple-entry visas to Chinese journalists and will immediately initiate a process to address "duration of status" issues, the China Daily said. Beijing will reciprocate by granting equal treatment to U.S. journalists once the U.S. policies take effect, and both sides will issue media visas for new applicants "based on relevant laws and regulations," the report said. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian gave no information on a timeline for implementation, but called the agreement a "hard-won achievement that is in the interests of both sides and should be cherished." "We hope that the U.S. will keep its promise to put the relevant measures and policies in place as soon as possible and work with China to create favorable conditions for both (nations') media to continue to work and live in each other's countries," Zhao said at a daily briefing. In a statement to The Associated Press late Tuesday, the U.S. State Department said China had committed to issuing visas for a group of U.S. reporters "provided they are eligible under all applicable laws and regulations." "We will also continue issuing visas to (Chinese) journalists who are otherwise eligible for the visa under U.S. law," the statement said. China also committed to increase the length for which U.S. journalist visas are valid from the current 90 days to one year. "On a reciprocal basis, we are committing to increase validity of U.S. visas issued to PRC journalists to one year as well," the State Department statement said, referring to the People's Republic of China. Not mentioned in either statement were press conditions in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory of Hong Kong, where both local and international media have come under increasing pressure. The Economist said last week that Hong Kong refused a visa renewal for its correspondent Sue-Lin Wong. Authorities have not explained the rejection. Limits on journalists have fueled tensions between the two countries for more than a year after the U.S. cut 20 visas issued to Chinese state media journalists and required those remaining to register as foreign agents, among other changes. China responded by expelling journalists working for U.S. outlets and severely restricting conditions for those continuing to work in the country. The new agreement "was the result of more than a year of difficult negotiations over the treatment of media outlets in both countries," China Daily said. "It is hoped that more good news is ahead for the two countries' media outlets through further China-U.S. cooperation," the newspaper added. The State Department said it has "remained in close consultation with the affected outlets, as well as other outlets facing personnel shortages due to PRC government policy decisions, and we are gratified their correspondents will be able to return to the PRC to continue their important work. We welcome this progress but see it simply as initial steps." It added that it would continue to work toward expanded access and better conditions for U.S. and foreign media in China, where they face considerable obstacles ranging from questioning by police, harassment preventing them from doing their work, personal threats and lawsuits brought by people they interview. "We will continue to advocate for media freedom as a reflection of our democratic values," the U.S. State Department told the AP. Asked about Wong's case, Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said the issuing of visas is at the "autonomy and the discretion of any government." Lam added that the authorities do not comment on individual cases but will continue to facilitate the operation of overseas media based in Hong Kong "in a legitimate manner" according to the city's mini-constitution, known as the Basic Law. The city's Foreign Correspondents' Club said it was "deeply concerned" over the denial of Wong's employment visa. "We again call on the government to provide concrete assurances that applications for employment visas and visa extensions will be handled in a timely manner with clearly-stated requirements and procedures, and that the visa process for journalists will not be politicized or weaponized," the club said in a statement last week. Wong is the latest in a string of journalists in Hong Kong to be denied visas. In 2018, Hong Kong authorities refused to renew the work visa of Financial Times senior editor Victor Mallet after he chaired a lunchtime talk at the Foreign Correspondents' Club with the leader of a now-banned pro-Hong Kong independence party. The authorities did not say why Mallet's application was rejected. In 2020, Hong Kong did not renew a work visa for Chris Buckley, a New York Times reporter who had been working in Hong Kong after being expelled from China, as well as for Irish journalist Aaron Mc Nicholas, who was then an incoming editor for the independent media outlet Hong Kong Free Press. (AP) Description Children's Home & Aid invites you to join our team of mission-driven staff who share a common vision: an equitable world where all children and families thrive in strong communities. As a leading child and family service agency with more than 20 locations across Illinois, our mission is to advance the well-being of children by investing in families to disrupt the systemic and multi-generational cycle of racial, social and economic inequality. Our full-time staff receive competitive salaries and a generous benefits package, including a paid leave accrual rate that starts at two weeks annually and grows to more than five weeks of paid time off each year. We hold ourselves and each other accountable for fostering an inclusive work culture where we can be our authentic selves, where we create and have equitable opportunities, and where our voices are supported and encouraged. The Home Visitor is a critical member of the Early Head Start team, providing comprehensive home-visiting services within a strength-based, family-centered model to expectant Spanish-speaking parents and families with young children. As a Home Visitor, you will assess the strengths and needs of children and families, partner with parents to establish family and child development goals, and support families in expanding their support systems. Staff are be required to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and to submit proof of their vaccination status before their start date unless they have an agency approved medical or religious exemption. Staff with an exemption will need to provide proof of weekly testing. For more information about our COVID-19 safety practices, please . What you'll do: Meet weekly with expectant parents and families with young children in their homes to complete assessments, develop goals, and provide services aligned with the strengths and needs of the child and family. Provide observations of parent-child interactions, including assessing for effective communication and empathic responses, and engage parents in reflective dialogue on the developing parent-child relationship. Work closely with other Early Head Start program staff, including Family Support Specialists, to link families with appropriate referrals and community supports. Who you are: You have at least an Associate's Degree in Early Childhood Education or a closely related field with at least five courses that include life plan or infant development and family relations. You are at least 19 years old per state and federal guidelines. You are adept at communicating effectively in both English and Spanish - both in writing and verbally. Experience working with children and families preferred. You are able to attend in-person family visits and meetings, and you have a valid driver's license, insurance, and a reliable vehicle. You enjoy working autonomously but also value working with a team to reach shared goals. You collaborate effectively and enjoy developing relationships with colleagues and stakeholders. You value data and rely on it to drive meaningful change and improved outcomes. The details: Location: Hybrid (on-site/community-based/remote): Work is completed at home-based and other community-based locations in and Counties, with the need to work from the 2-3 times per week for team meetings and other program needs. Some opportunities for flexible/remote work options. Schedule: Full-time, hourly; general business hours with some flexibility required for evening family visits and special projects. Salary: Range starts at $16/hr; offers are commensurate with experience and bilingual candidates may receive additional financial compensation. Noncash benefits: Medical/dental/vision insurance, paid time off plus 11 paid holidays, supplemental insurance options, 401(k) with match () Where you work matters. You're considering a new position, so no one knows better than you that where you work matters. We believe that by building diverse teams of passionate advocates for youth and families, we can continue to show up for Illinois families, putting those families at the center of every decision, and strengthening the communities where we all work, play, and live together. () We invite you to become an active member of a team that supports, inspires, and challenges each other, and grow your career in an organization that celebrates emerging leaders and provides development and training opportunities aligned with your individual goals and aspirations. If you are looking for an opportunity to do meaningful work, including raising your voice to disrupt the status quo, we encourage you to apply today. Review our agency's blueprint for impact: Review our agency's blueprint for impact: Education Bachelors of Early Childhood Education (preferred) Associates of Child Development (required) Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities The contractor will not discharge or in any other manner discriminate against employees or applicants because they have inquired about, discussed, or disclosed their own pay or the pay of another employee or applicant. However, employees who have access to the compensation information of other employees or applicants as a part of their essential job functions cannot disclose the pay of other employees or applicants to individuals who do not otherwise have access to compensation information, unless the disclosure is (a) in response to a formal complaint or charge, (b) in furtherance of an investigation, proceeding, hearing, or action, including an investigation conducted by the employer, or (c) consistent with the contractor's legal duty to furnish information. 41 CFR 60-1.35(c) Category Preschool Teachers, Except Special Education Education Associate's Degree Job type Full time In Defence of Marxism is committed to safeguarding your privacy. At all times we aim to respect any personal data you share with us, or that we receive from other organisations, and keep it safe. This Privacy Policy (Policy) sets out our data collection and processing practices and your options regarding the ways in which your personal information is used. This Policy contains important information about your personal rights to privacy. Please read it carefully to understand how we use your personal data. We may update this Policy from time to time without notice to you, so please check it regularly. The provision of your personal data to us is voluntary. However, without providing us with your personal data, you will be unable to (as appropriate): contact us; subscribe to our mailing list; subscribe to any of our publications; or receive information about In Defence of Marxism. We collect information about you: (1) When you give it to us DIRECTLY You may give us your personal data in order to subscribe to a newsletter or publication, when you contact us by phone, email or post, when you sign a petition / statement, and/or when you donate money to us. 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Please let us know if you have any queries or concerns whatsoever about the way in which your data is being processed by emailing the Data Protection Manager at webmaster@marxist.com State ASER 2021: Enrolment in Govt schools decline in Nagaland DIMAPUR, NOV 17 (NPN) | Publish Date: 11/17/2021 12:48:03 PM IST Contrary to all-India trend, enrolment in government schools in Nagaland has declined from 46.2% in 2018 to 34.8 % in 2021, even as enrolment in private schools increased. Further, there has been an increase in proportion of children currently not enrolled from 1.8% in 2018 to 19.6% in 2021 in the State. These facts came to light in the 16th Annual Status of Education Report (Rural) 2021 or ASER that was released online on Wednesday. As per the report, there has been a clear shift from private to government schools at an all-India level. For children in the age group 6-14, enrolment in private schools declined from 32.5% in 2018 to 24.4% in 2021. This shift has been seen in all grades and among both boys and girls. The national increase in government school enrolment was driven by large northern States like Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana, and southern States like Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. In contrast, government school enrolment fell during this period, while the proportion of children not enrolled in school increased in many North-eastern States. Among older children (15-16), there was an increase in government school enrolment from 57.4% in 2018 to 67.4% even as the proportion of out-of-school children in this age group declined from 12.1% in 2018 to 6.6% in 2021. Meanwhile, as smartphones became the predominant source of teaching-learning as schools were shut down due to Covid-19 pandemic, smartphone ownership too almost doubled during this period. Interestingly, while the availability of smartphones increased from 36.5% in 2018 to 67.6% in 2021 across the country, in Nagaland, this increased from 50% to 92.9%. At an all-India level, more children in private schools had a smartphone at home (79%) as opposed to government school-going children (63.7%). The report however noted that smartphone availability does not translate into access for children. Although over two thirds of all enrolled children have a smartphone at home (67.6%), over a quarter of these have no access to it (26.1%). Also, more children in higher classes have access to a smartphone as compared to children in lower grades. What is worrisome is that the proportion of children in 6-14 age group not currently enrolled in schools increased from 1.4% to 4.6%. The period under review also witnessed a big increase in children taking private tuition. As per ASER, less than 30% children took private tuition classes at an all-India level in 2018, which jumped to almost 40% in 2021. In Nagaland, this proportion increased from 27.9% to 47% during the same period. The incidence of tuition has increased across all States except Kerala. The proportion of children with parents in low education category taking tuition increased by 12.6 percentage points, as opposed to a 7.2 percentage point increase among children with parents in high education category. Fewer children whose schools reopened were taking tuition, while tuition classes were more common among children whose schools were still closed at the time of the survey. On the other hand, the proportion of enrolled children who received learning support at home decreased from three quarters of all enrolled children in 2020 to two thirds in 2021, though learning support for children in Nagaland slightly increased from 73.1% in 2018 to 75.4% in 2021. Conducted in 25 States and three Union Territories, ASER 2021 reached 76,706 households and 75,234 children in the age group 5-16 years, besides teachers or head teachers of 7,299 government schools offering primary grades. With the pandemic extending into another year, field-based survey operations were still not possible on a national scale. As a consequence, ASER 2021 followed the same format of a phone-based survey. Conducted in September-October 2021, 18 months after the first lockdown, the survey explored how children in the age group 5-16 studied at home since the onset of the pandemic and the challenges that the schools and households now face as schools reopen across States. National Lakhimpur: ex-judge Jain appointed to monitor SIT probe NEW DELHI, NOV 17 (PTI) | Publish Date: 11/17/2021 1:01:34 PM IST The Supreme Court Wednesday appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to supervise on day-to-day basis the Uttar Pradesh SITs probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in which eight people including four farmers were killed on October 3. A bench comprising Chief Justice N V Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli also took note of the names of the IPS officers provided by the state government, and appointed three officials as part of the state SIT. Now we have verified and contacted the concerned judge we had thought of. This is Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and he will monitor the ongoing investigation so as to ensure transparency and fairness, the bench said. The apex court further said that the UP SIT will have to be re-constituted to accommodate the three IPS officers including the IG rank police officer Padmaja Chauhan. The investigation will be continued by the SIT under the supervision of the former high court judge and the matter will be listed again after the charge sheet and the status report filed by the learned judge, the bench said. The CJI said that a detailed order will be passed shortly. The UP government on November 15 had agreed to the apex courts suggestion that a former judge of its choice may be appointed to supervise the state SITs probe. Prior to this, the apex court had said it had no confidence and did not want the one-member judicial commission appointed by the UP government to continue the probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case. Retired Allahabad High Court judge Justice Pradeep Kumar Srivastava was named by the state government earlier to enquire into the eruption of violence on Tikonia-Banbirpur road in Lakhimpur Kheri district. We are inclined to appoint a former judge of a different high court to monitor the investigation on a day-to-day basis and then see how the separate charge sheets are eventually prepared, the bench had said. Speaking for the bench, Justice Surya Kant had suggested the names of justices Ranjit Singh and Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, both former judges of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and said that they are experienced in the field of criminal law and would oversee the probe of the SIT till filing of the charge sheets in the cases. The police have so far arrested 13 accused, including Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishras son Ashish Mishra, in connection with the case. The apex court was hearing a matter about the October 3 violence in Lakhimpur Kheri in which eight persons including four farmers were killed during a farmers protest. Four farmers were mowed down by an SUV in the convoy at Lakhimpur Kheri when a group agitating against the Centres three new farm laws was holding a demonstration against the visit of Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya on October 3. Two BJP workers and a driver were beaten to death allegedly by the angry protesters, and a local journalist was killed in the violence. Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 01:29:49|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A man walks past a closed restaurant in Athens, Greece, on Nov. 16, 2021. Restaurants and cafes across Greece remained closed on Tuesday while a demonstration was held in Athens demanding further state support under the new COVID-19 restrictions introduced by the government this autumn to tackle the latest surge in infection rates. (Xinhua/Marios Lolos) ATHENS, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Restaurants and cafes across Greece remained closed on Tuesday while a demonstration was held in Athens demanding further state support under the new COVID-19 restrictions introduced by the government this autumn to tackle the latest surge in infection rates. The restrictions have drastically reduced the revenues of thousands of businesses and further state support is urgently needed, the Panhellenic Federation of Restaurants and Related Professions (POESE) said in a press release. The POESE has called for a 24-hour strike. "Catering stays closed throughout Greece," read banners on the closed doors of restaurants and cafes. The protesters demanded a reduction of value-added tax (VAT) rates from 24 or 13 percent to six percent, as well as rent subsidies, exemptions from municipal taxes and other measures to ease the pressure on businesses, avoid closures and the loss of thousands of jobs. "We are here to unite our voice with other small professionals to claim substantial measures for our health and our income," labor union activist Iro Genetzaki told Xinhua during the protest. Under the latest set of measures in effect since Nov. 9, in order to be served at cafes and restaurants, either indoors or outdoors, customers are obliged to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination or of recovery from the virus. Unvaccinated individuals must present a recent negative rapid or PCR (polymerase chain reaction) test to be allowed to enter retail shops, hair salons, public services or banks. Claims that the government has failed to support the real economy, and in particular catering, are unfair, Adonis Georgiadis, minister of development and investments, told the local Open TV channel on Tuesday, adding that the state has provided as much aid as possible to all professionals since the start of the pandemic. Protesters should be angry with the unvaccinated, who do not help with their stance to end the pandemic, he said. To date, some 6.4 million people in Greece have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Since the announcement of the new restrictions, about 200,000 appointments for a first vaccine dose have been made. Meanwhile, the number of new coronavirus cases continues to hit record highs in Greece, exceeding 7,000 per day, putting a lot of pressure on hospitals and staff. According to the Health Ministry, on average nine out of ten of those hospitalized are unvaccinated. In a public statement issued on Tuesday, Health Minister Thanos Plevris called on the country's doctors working in private clinics to volunteer their services in state-run public hospitals, else the authorities would be forced to assign them as an order. Enditem A man walks past a closed restaurant in Athens, Greece, on Nov. 16, 2021. Restaurants and cafes across Greece remained closed on Tuesday while a demonstration was held in Athens demanding further state support under the new COVID-19 restrictions introduced by the government this autumn to tackle the latest surge in infection rates. (Xinhua/Marios Lolos) People walk past a closed restaurant in Athens, Greece, on Nov. 16, 2021. Restaurants and cafes across Greece remained closed on Tuesday while a demonstration was held in Athens demanding further state support under the new COVID-19 restrictions introduced by the government this autumn to tackle the latest surge in infection rates. (Xinhua/Marios Lolos) A man walks past a closed restaurant in Athens, Greece, on Nov. 16, 2021. Restaurants and cafes across Greece remained closed on Tuesday while a demonstration was held in Athens demanding further state support under the new COVID-19 restrictions introduced by the government this autumn to tackle the latest surge in infection rates. (Xinhua/Marios Lolos) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 07:33:19|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Abdulla Shahid, president of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly, addresses the UN Security Council meeting "Peace and Security Through Preventive Diplomacy: A Common Objective to All UN Principal Organs," at the UN headquarters in New York, Nov. 16, 2021. (Manuel Elias/UN Photo/Handout via Xinhua) UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Preventing conflicts requires closing development gaps, reducing inequality, and offering hope to people around the globe, senior UN officials said at a Security Council meeting on Tuesday. "History has shown that conflicts do not emerge out of thin air, nor are they inevitable," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. These problems are caused either by a lack of access to basic services and life staples such as food, water, and health care - or by gaps in the security, laws, and governance systems. Conflicts can also be sparked by gaps in public trust, both in institutions and in one another, he added. "These gaps are potential flashpoints for violence and even conflict," the UN chief stressed. The solution means not only defusing tensions through dialogue, but also ensuring that no mother is forced to skip a meal to feed her children. Closing development gaps and giving people hope can help stabilize societies and reduce inequalities that stoke conflict. The UN chief noted that for 76 years, the UN has provided a platform for dialogue as well as tools and mechanisms needed for peaceful dispute settlement. Citing the judicial dimension of prevention - provided by the Hague-based International Court of Justice - as well as the Economic and Social Council's work to advance sustainable development, he also recalled his own calls for a surge in diplomacy and conflict prevention efforts. These efforts have included the review of all tools comprising the UN's peace architecture, a better integration of prevention and risk management, and more innovation and foresight. Moreover, the UN's growing partnerships with regional and subregional groups, including the African Union, provide in-depth knowledge of dynamics on the ground. The top UN official highlighted the Our Common Agenda report, which takes a holistic approach to global security and proposes a new social contract. Abdulla Shahid, president of the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly, said that over the decades the UN has learned more about the link between socioeconomic factors and conflict. Among the most critical emerging challenges of the 21st century, he cited the COVID-19 pandemic, which exacerbated socioeconomic struggles and inequality; the climate crisis, which threatened displacement; and ineffective institutions which left people without hope. Meanwhile, the absence of democratic participation, political freedoms and equality deprives entire populations of their human rights. While global security will always fall under the Security Council, he maintained that it can be complemented by the Assembly and the Economic and Social Council's (ECOSOC) efforts to build more resilient and prosperous communities. ECOSOC President Collen V. Kelapile recalled that the organ's mandate to promote the economic and social advancement of all peoples, protect human rights and oversee the UN's development and humanitarian systems - drawing links to conflict prevention. Suffering continues in Africa's Sahel region "because of the failure to appreciate the complex interplay of human survival, in a very fragile and culturally diverse environment," he said. And extreme poverty in South Sudan is rooted in over 50 years of conflict, while Haiti's vast challenges stem from historical and structural inequality, governance deficits and vulnerability to climate change. However, despite the UN's interlinked mandates to address such crises, interactions between them have remained sporadic and ad hoc. "Today's complex challenges require more institutionalized collaboration," Kelapile underscored. Joan E. Donoghue, president of the International Court of Justice, also spoke to the council about how the body can contribute to conflict prevention. According to her, the court may be used to defuse tensions over resources, land or water borders, or other sources of potential conflict. She explained that while the circumstances and requirements of each case vary, all the principal UN organs have the opportunity within their respective remits to help implement the court's judgments and contribute to the promotion of peace, security, and justice. "The court itself stands ready to receive any requests for advisory opinions that relevant UN organs and specialized agencies may make," she stressed. Enditem Collen Vixen Kelapile, president of the Economic and Social Council, addresses the UN Security Council meeting "Peace and Security Through Preventive Diplomacy: A Common Objective to All UN Principal Organs," at the UN headquarters in New York, Nov. 16, 2021. (Manuel Elias/UN Photo/Handout via Xinhua) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 10:18:17|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Yue Yuewei) BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Political experts and scholars around the world view the virtual meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart, Joe Biden, as a strong signal that would enhance positive expectations of the international community on bilateral ties. The two heads of state had a virtual meeting on Tuesday. The two sides had thorough and in-depth communication and exchanges on issues of strategic, overarching and fundamental importance shaping the development of China-U.S. relations and on important issues of mutual interest. Robert Lawrence Kuhn, chairman of the Kuhn Foundation, told Xinhua that the virtual meeting is an applauding step in navigating the bilateral relationship to the right direction. Noting that the meeting was "exceedingly important" and "a small uptick in the right direction, he said the importance of the online meeting has been "significantly elevated" as the world is facing serious challenges that could hardly be tackled without the U.S.-China cooperation. Kenneth Quinn, president emeritus of the World Food Prize Foundation and former U.S. ambassador to Cambodia, told Xinhua that close collaboration between the two sides is "absolutely essential" to enable humankind to meet the great challenges in the future, including food shortage, the negative impact from climate change, and public health risks. Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with U.S. President Joe Biden via video link, in Beijing, capital of China, Nov. 16, 2021. (Xinhua/Ding Lin) Calling the meeting "very encouraging," Lyazid Benhami, vice-president of the Paris Association of French-Chinese Friendship, said that the two countries have obligation not only to their peoples but also to the rest of the world. Cavince Adhere, an international relations scholar in Kenya, said that the world expects to see more stable and sustainable relations between the two countries. This raises prospects for a more stable international system which can facilitate global cooperation for the benefit of mankind. "The rest of the world can make little progress in addressing the international challenges without full participation and cooperation of China and the United States," he said, referring to such issues as the COVID-19 pandemic, and climate crisis. Herman Tiu Laurel, founder of Philippine-BRICS Strategic Studies, said that China and the United States, two major powers on earth, shoulder the hope of the entire world for a safe, secure and healthy place attaining prosperity for all, which can only be achieved by the partnership of the two. Faced with common challenges, the commitment and efforts towards durable and permanent peace, as well as stable international political and diplomatic environment is paramount for the major powers to promise and pursue, Laurel added. Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 10:36:31|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close A medical worker prepares a dose of COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination site in Pingxiang City, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Nov. 16, 2021. Pingxiang recently launched a COVID-19 vaccination campaign for children aged 3 to 11. (Xinhua/Cao Yiming) BEIJING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese mainland on Tuesday reported eight new locally transmitted COVID-19 cases, the National Health Commission said in its daily report on Wednesday. All of the new local cases were reported in Liaoning, said the commission. Also reported were 23 new imported cases, according to the commission. Two new suspected cases arriving from outside the mainland were reported in Shanghai on Tuesday, said the commission. No new deaths related to COVID-19 were reported on Tuesday, it added. A total of 9,919 imported cases had been reported on the mainland by the end of Tuesday. Among them, 9,541 had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, and 378 remained hospitalized. No deaths had been reported among the imported cases. The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases on the mainland had reached 98,368 by Tuesday, including 1,257 patients still receiving treatment, 18 of whom were in severe condition. A total of 92,475 patients had been discharged from hospitals following recovery on the mainland, and 4,636 had died as a result of the virus. A total of 15 asymptomatic cases were newly reported, of whom 14 were from outside the mainland. There were a total of 500 asymptomatic cases, of whom 352 were imported, under medical observation as of Tuesday. By the end of Tuesday, 12,388 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 213 deaths, had been reported in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), while 77 cases had been reported in the Macao SAR, and 16,498 cases, including 848 deaths, had been reported in Taiwan. A total of 12,099 COVID-19 patients in the Hong Kong SAR had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, while 76 had been discharged in the Macao SAR, and 13,742 had been discharged in Taiwan. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 12:40:22|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) MANILA, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- A Philippine government official thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, told reporters at the airport in Manila that the fresh delivery completes the vaccines the Philippines purchased from the Chinese vaccine maker. "Sinovac has truly been a very reliable partner of the Philippine government," said Galvez. He said it was the China-donated Sinovac vaccines that helped his country kick-start a national vaccination program. China has sustained the COVID-19 vaccine supply to the Philippines since the first delivery on Feb. 28. The Southeast Asian country kicked off its vaccination drive on March 1. "We will not forget your kindness and compassion. You are really a friend who helped a friend in need," Galvez told China's Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian, who was also at the airport to receive the vaccines. With the arrival of the latest batch of Sinovac vaccine, Galvez said the Philippines is closer to achieving population protection by year end. In a brief statement to reporters at the airport, Huang expressed hope that the newly delivered vaccines will further bring down the infections in the Philippines and pave the way for the country's early recovery from the pandemic. Philippine Presidential Assistant on Foreign Affairs Robert Borje, who represented President Rodrigo Duterte, lauded the partnership between China and the Philippines. "As we can say, this is a partnership that works under Duterte's independent foreign policy," he said. The Philippines has administered nearly 71 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines as of Tuesday. More than 31.8 million people have been fully vaccinated. The government aims to vaccinate up to 70 percent of its 110 million population this year. To date, the Philippines has received more than 124 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from different vaccine makers. More than 40 percent of the country's vaccine stockpile came from China. As of Tuesday, the Philippines has more than 2.8 million confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 45,808 deaths. Enditem Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) A staff member transports a cargo containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) China's Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian (R) and Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of Philippine government's measures to combat COVID-19, are seen in front of cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Staff members transport cargos containing Sinovac vaccines in Pasay City, the Philippines on Nov. 17, 2021. Carlito Galvez, the chief implementer of the government's measures to combat COVID-19, thanked China for the "steady and timely delivery of the life-saving vaccines" after the country received on Wednesday one more batch of the Sinovac CoronaVac vaccines. (Photo by Rouelle Umali/Xinhua) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 15:48:30|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Photo taken on Feb. 5, 2021 shows the China-Laos Railway's Luang Prabang bridge across the Mekong River in northern Laos. (Photo by Pan Longzhu/Xinhua) KUNMING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Law enforcement authorities from China, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand joined forces on Tuesday to conduct the 111th joint Mekong River patrol. Two Chinese vessels departed for the patrol at 9 a.m. Tuesday from Jingha Port in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture of southwest China's Yunnan Province, said the Yunnan public security department. Prior to the operation, the law enforcement authorities held video conferences to jointly analyze the current COVID-19 pandemic and public security situations in the river basin. During the patrol, the four countries will carry out joint law enforcement activities in key waters of the river, and make every effort to ensure the security and stability of the river basin. The Mekong River, known as the Lancang River in China, is a vital waterway for cross-border shipping. China, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand have been carrying out joint patrols of the river since December 2011. Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 20:15:54|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Photo taken on Nov. 17, 2021 shows a traffic jam on Norodom Boulevard in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. (Photo by Phearum/Xinhua) by Mao Pengfei, Nguon Sovan PHNOM PENH, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Traffic jam, usually a kind of annoying experience in modern big cities, now signals vigor and hope of the recovering Phnom Penh, capital of Cambodia. It took half an hour more time on Wednesday morning by driving from downtown to the Phnom Penh International Airport, than months ago when the Southeast Asian country struggled to curb COVID-19 with strict restrictions on social and business activities. With China's timely and regular vaccine supply during the past months, Cambodia has reached herd immunity earlier than planned and has recently reopened all sectors in the kingdom. Chheang Lida, a 34-year-old fruit vendor at the Old Market in the Cambodian capital, is swamped with clients on Wednesday as her sales have almost returned to the pre-pandemic era after the country has fully reopened, buoyed by its high vaccination rates. Selling fresh fruits such as bananas, oranges, persimmons, grapes and strawberries, Lida said sales have recovered after the government allowed wedding ceremonies and religious functions to be resumed, which resulted in the growing demand for fresh fruits. "During the pandemic restrictions, there was no even a client in an hour, and sales were on the sharp decline, earning only 70 U.S. dollars in revenue a day, but the sales have now recovered around 80 percent, making around 500 dollars in revenue a day," she told Xinhua. "I'm elated to see the reopening of all sectors in the country after disruptions caused by COVID-19 for nearly two years," she said. "We hope that our economy will rebound soon." Lida and all of her family members, with the youngest aged five, have been fully vaccinated with two doses of China's COVID-19 Sinovac vaccine. "We are totally confident in the efficacy of the Chinese vaccine in protecting us from the COVID-19," she said. Cambodia has so far administered at least one dose of vaccines to 14.08 million people, or 88 percent of its 16-million population. "Cambodia has become one of the most fully COVID-19 vaccinated countries in the region and around the world, that has achieved a solid herd immunity," Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen said at the capital's airport while receiving a new batch of 2 million doses of China-donated Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday. "Cambodia's success in its COVID-19 vaccination campaign is inseparable from China's vaccine supply," he added. The Southeast Asian nation has so far received a total of 40 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from three sources through bilateral procurement, the World Health Organization (WHO)'s COVAX Facility, and donations. Of them, over 90 percent were bought from or donated by China. Hun Sen said Chinese jabs have protected public health and saved the lives of the Cambodian people, as well as helped restore Cambodia's economy in the new normal. "China is a true ironclad friend who always provides timely support to Cambodia in difficult times without any strings attached," he said. "China's vaccine supply to Cambodia and other countries is a testament to China's commitment to promoting COVID-19 vaccines as the global public goods and to campaigns against COVID-19," he added. Yon Saosopheap, a teacher at the Tuol Svay Prey High School in Phnom Penh, said Chinese vaccines have helped Cambodia achieve herd immunity and reopen its borders to all fully vaccinated international travelers. "They not only help protect people from COVID-19, but also enable the kingdom to reopen its social and economic activities in all sectors, especially in education and tourism sectors," he told Xinhua. "China's help will undoubtedly lift our two countries' ties to a new high, and we will keep this kind support in mind forever," he said. Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia Wang Wentian said he is pleased to see Phnom Penh has regained its former vigorous scene, as businesses have been reopened, and he hoped that the kingdom's socio-economic development would recover soon. "I'd like to reiterate that our assistance to Cambodia will not stop until the pandemic is finally defeated," he said. "The Chinese people will always stand with the Cambodian people to fight against this pandemic." Cambodia reported 51 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, pushing the national total caseload to 119,687, the Ministry of Health said, adding that five new fatalities were confirmed, bringing the overall death toll to 2,881. Enditem People drive vehicles on Norodom Boulevard in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Nov. 17, 2021. (Photo by Phearum/Xinhua) A vendor prepares fruits at a market in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Nov. 17, 2021. (Photo by Phearum/Xinhua) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 20:21:33|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Photo taken on Sept. 7, 2021 shows the inauguration ceremony of the BRICS Partnership on New Industrial Revolution Innovation Center in Xiamen, southeast China's Fujian Province. (Xinhua/Lin Shanchuan) XIAMEN, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Enterprises from BRICS countries are strengthening ties and finding more cooperation opportunities despite COVID-19, partly thanks to an innovation center launched last December in the Chinese city of Xiamen. Benefited from the BRICS Partnership on New Industrial Revolution Innovation Center, Xiamen Rockwise Information Service Co., Ltd., a stone trading platform, has attracted around 30,000 stone suppliers, including over 700 dedicated to stone imports from other BRICS countries. Despite COVID-19, stones worth more than 60 million yuan (about 9.4 million U.S. dollars) were imported from Brazil, India, and South Africa to China in the first ten months of this year through the platform, said Lu Ni, one of the partners at the company. Lu said the establishment of the innovation center, which focuses on policy coordination, talent cultivation, and project development, has enhanced their confidence to expand the stone business with other BRICS countries. BRICS is the acronym for an emerging-market bloc that groups Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. It is home to over 40 percent of the world's population and about a quarter of the world economy. The BRICS Partnership on New Industrial Revolution Innovation Center was launched in Xiamen in December last year. At the center's inauguration ceremony in September, 28 projects with a total investment of over 13.4 billion yuan were inked by BRICS enterprises. It has provided a foothold for companies to use technological innovation and digital transformation brought by the new industrial revolution. Huanchuang (Xiamen) Technology Co., Ltd. is a high-tech enterprise specializing in the disposal of solid waste and service operations. Its customers are in Russia, India, and South Africa. "The innovation center provides a new communication channel for BRICS enterprises and helps us expand overseas markets," said Li Xuefeng, deputy general manager of the company. "And the local government offers us more services involving talent and technology support." Li's company plans to launch more high-tech products and promote their equipment and production lines. They also want to provide integrated solid waste disposal solutions to other BRICS countries. In early November, the BRICS Partnership on New Industrial Revolution Innovation Center held a virtual meeting with Russia's "Silicon Valley" Skolkovo innovation center to seek cooperation opportunities. Yuri Saprykin, vice president of the Skolkovo Foundation, said the Skolkovo innovation center attaches importance to and looks forward to deepening cooperation with Xiamen's innovation center. The center expects both sides to speed up collaboration and promote the development, operation, and market expansion of Russian and Chinese entrepreneurs in the two places. Alessandro Golombiewski Teixeira, distinguished professor of public policy at Tsinghua University, said Xiamen's innovation center is an excellent example of building the industrial revolution partnership between BRICS countries, which was meaningful not only for BRICS but a positive experience for the world. Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 21:10:19|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Balloons are released during a ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Li Gang) BEIJING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The sixth plenary session of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), held in Beijing from Nov. 8 to 11, has adopted a landmark resolution on major achievements and historical experience of the Party over the past century. It is the century-old Party's third resolution on historical issues. Seventy-six years have passed since its first resolution on historical issues and 40 years since the second. Noting that learning from history is a vital characteristic in Chinese culture, Xi Jinping, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, has stressed that the Party has consistently attached great importance to reviewing its historical experience. From that consideration, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee in March decided that the sixth plenary session would focus on a comprehensive review of the Party's major achievements and experience in its century-long history. A working group was established, with Xi as its chief, to draft the document. Xi also chaired the first meeting of the group in April, officially starting the drafting work. At that meeting, Xi stressed that the drafting of a document of high quality on the Party's history is arduous but glorious work since this process would build a broader consensus and stronger unity in will and action among all Party members. It would also rally and lead Chinese people of all ethnic groups in achieving new and great success in building socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era. When the framework of the draft document was taking shape, Xi presided over another plenary meeting of the group on the drafting work. A ceremony marking the centenary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is held at Tian'anmen Square in Beijing, capital of China, July 1, 2021. (Xinhua/Peng Ziyang) On July 1, members of the drafting group came to Tian'anmen Square in downtown Beijing to listen to Xi's speech at a grand gathering celebrating the CPC centenary, which has become the key basis of the drafting work. Xi has reiterated the need to promote democracy and draw on collective wisdom during the drafting process to make the draft resolution a solid document, epitomizing collective wisdom and consensus. As early as April 1, the CPC Central Committee issued a circular to conduct discussions and solicit opinions on the agenda of the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee from both within and outside the Party. In more than 20 days, 109 views and suggestions from various regions, departments, and sides were gathered, and the drafting group compiled a summary of 753,000 Chinese characters accordingly. On Sept. 10, Xi chaired a symposium to solicit non-communists' views and suggestions on the draft resolution, at which non-communists voiced their opinions and submitted 10 written materials. Xi gave specific instructions that all pertinent suggestions should be absorbed and embodied in the resolution. During the drafting process, Xi convened a series of meetings of the drafting group, the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, and its Standing Committee. He also studied and edited each draft of the resolution and offered concrete suggestions and requirements. On behalf of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Xi delivered a work report at the plenary session on Nov. 8 and explained the draft of the resolution to the session. Plenum attendees were divided into 10 groups for deliberation on the draft documents. They offered 138 suggestions, based on which 22 revisions were made to the draft. On Nov. 11, the resolution, with over 36,000 Chinese characters, was unanimously endorsed. This landmark resolution sounded the clarion call for the century-old CPC marching towards the future, which will lead the Chinese nation to its great rejuvenation. Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 16:38:49|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- China and Africa have maintained robust economic and trade cooperation, despite COVID-19, as their bilateral trade has set a record high in the January-September period. Trade between China and Africa rose 38.2 percent year on year to 185.2 billion U.S. dollars in the January-September period, reaching the highest level in history for the same period, Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Qian Keming said Wednesday. China's direct investment in Africa hit 2.59 billion U.S. dollars in the first nine months, up 9.9 percent, year on year. The growth rate is 3 percentage points higher than China's overall outbound investment, Qian said, adding that the growth rate outperformed the pre-pandemic level in the same period of 2019. Chinese enterprises signed 53.5 billion U.S. dollars in new contracts in Africa in the period, up 22.2 percent year on year, with a turnover of 26.9 billion U.S. dollars, up 11.6 percent year on year. These figures fully demonstrated the confidence of Chinese enterprises in Africa's future development, Qian said. The Eighth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) takes place in Senegal at the end of November. Against the backdrop of COVID-19, the 55 FOCAC members will gather again, which shows the strong willingness of China and Africa to deepen cooperation, Qian said. Qian believes the conference will boost the China-Africa comprehensive strategic and cooperative partnership and chart the course for sustainable and high-quality development of China-Africa cooperation. He also said it would play a positive role in building a China-Africa community with a shared future in the new era. China has maintained its position as Africa's largest trade partner for 12 years straight. The bilateral trade defied pandemic pressure to hit 187 billion U.S. dollars in 2020. Ever since the establishment of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in 2000, trade between China and Africa and China's direct investment in Africa have increased 20 and 100 times, respectively, said Xu Bu, president of the China Institute of International Studies, at a forum in October. China-Africa trade is generally balanced from a long-term perspective. Since 2000, China has imported 1.2 trillion U.S. dollars of goods from Africa and exported 1.27 trillion U.S. dollars of goods to Africa, Qian said. Regarding sustainable development, Qian said China is ready to strengthen policy coordination with Africa. China would boost green, low-carbon, and clean energy cooperation and conduct technology exchanges to support Africa in enhancing its capacity to adapt to climate change and achieve sustainable development. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 18:48:18|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Investigators collect samples from the scene of a bomb blast at the parliamentary avenue in Kampala, Uganda, Nov. 17, 2021. At least six people were killed and 36 others injured in twin suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital here, according to government figures. The blasts took place on Tuesday near a police station and on a street near the parliament building. The area has been cordoned off following the bombings. (Photo by Hajarah Nalwadda/Xinhua) KAMPALA, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- At least six people were killed and 36 others injured in twin suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital here, according to government figures. The blasts took place on Tuesday near a police station and on a street near the parliament building. The area has been cordoned off following the bombings. President Yoweri Museveni issued a statement hours later, assuring the public that security agencies will handle renewed threats. He said the blasts were carried out by two suicide bombers and the third suspected bomber had been arrested. Museveni blamed the attacks on a sleeper cell of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), an affiliate of the Islamic State in central Africa. "We are working with the neighbors to deal with those operating from outside. They have exposed themselves when we are more ready for urban terrorism. They will perish," Museveni said. According to the police, the attackers belong to the same cell as those who launched attacks last month. Fred Enanga, the police spokesperson, said the war on terror can only be won by joint actions between security agencies and the public. "We have managed to counter several bomb threats, and neutralized several suspicious packages and device-related incidents across the nation," said Enanga, calling for public vigilance as bomb threats remain. The twin suicide bombings have aroused worldwide condemnation. United Nations (UN) Secretary General Antonio Guterres described the attacks as despicable, noting that the perpetrators must be swiftly brought to justice. Moussa Faki Mahamat, chairperson of the African Union Commission, said that the continental body stands with Uganda and condemned the bombings in the strongest terms. Enditem Investigators collect samples from the scene of a bomb blast at the parliamentary avenue in Kampala, Uganda, Nov. 17, 2021. At least six people were killed and 36 others injured in twin suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital here, according to government figures. The blasts took place on Tuesday near a police station and on a street near the parliament building. The area has been cordoned off following the bombings. (Photo by Hajarah Nalwadda/Xinhua) Investigators inspect the scene of a bomb blast at the parliamentary avenue in Kampala, Uganda, Nov. 17, 2021. At least six people were killed and 36 others injured in twin suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital here, according to government figures. The blasts took place on Tuesday near a police station and on a street near the parliament building. The area has been cordoned off following the bombings. (Photo by Hajarah Nalwadda/Xinhua) An investigator collects samples from the scene of a bomb blast at the parliamentary avenue in Kampala, Uganda, Nov. 17, 2021. At least six people were killed and 36 others injured in twin suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital here, according to government figures. The blasts took place on Tuesday near a police station and on a street near the parliament building. The area has been cordoned off following the bombings. (Photo by Hajarah Nalwadda/Xinhua) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 19:28:30|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close by Xinhua writer Ding Lei NAIROBI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The relationship between Africa and China is expected to strengthen further through various cooperation mechanisms and the future looks bright for such cooperation, a former senior African Union (AU) Commission official told Xinhua recently in Nairobi. In an exclusive interview with Xinhua ahead of the forthcoming Eighth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), Erastus J.O. Mwencha, ex-deputy chairperson of AU Commission, noted that the partnership between the largest developing country and the youngest continent has led to remarkable outcomes in the past two decades since FOCAC was established in 2000. "Trade and economic cooperation between Africa and China have grown tremendously. China is becoming a driving force in promoting Africa's industrial capacity. And people-to-people exchange has become stronger as China is now one of the largest countries providing human resource training and capacity building support to Africa. China is also offering more scholarships to African students than western governments. We must keep doing what we're doing and continue to scale it up," he said. The career diplomat, who held a top role within the pan-African bloc for two terms from February 2008 to January 2017, gave infrastructure development as an example of the highlights of close ties between the two economies. "China has been a big supporter of Africa's infrastructure. If you look at countries like Kenya, (you will see) the implementation of the SGR (Standard Gauge Railway). The same as the Tanzania-Zambia railway, the Ethiopia-Djibouti railway, the SGR in Nigeria, and the Light Rail Transit under construction in Egypt. The same thing has also happened in many other countries in ports, air transport, roads and other infrastructure," said Mwencha. According to him, China is the second largest financier of African infrastructure after African nations, while international development finance institutions and other bilateral countries lag some way behind. Infrastructure remains one of the biggest obstacles to Africa's investment, economic diversification and growth. Estimates by the African Development Bank Group (AfDB) put the continent's infrastructure needs between 130 billion U.S. dollars and 170 billion U.S. dollars annually, with a financing gap in the range of 68 billion U.S. dollars to 108 billion U.S. dollars. "The Chinese saying that if you want to prosper, build roads. We have truly seen it. With strong infrastructure, you attract investment and improve the lives of people in general and can become competitive in the world," he said. When asked about how he would view some negative tones about Africa-China friendship, Mwencha observed that Africa has become a battlefield for global conflict and yet Africa has not stopped any country from investing in its territory and there is a lot of space on the continent. "Africa needs investment and trade. They just want China to stop. But there is no solution offered," he added. "If you look at the attendance of the upcoming FOCAC, African leaders know, and they are not moved in any way. We believe that in the long run, the reality will prevail," he said. The COVID-19 pandemic has been an unprecedented threat to Africa's hard-earned achievement. According to an AfDB report in March, real gross domestic product in Africa is projected to grow by 3.4 percent in 2021 after contracting 2.1 percent in 2020. Despite the headwinds, trade and economic cooperation between China and Africa has maintained dynamic momentum. Newest data from China's General Administration of Customs showed that China-Africa trade rose 37.5 percent year-on-year to 207.07 billion U.S. dollars in the first ten months of 2021. "It really shows how strong the ties are between China and Africa and how the two economies are now getting interlinked," said Mwencha. In the face of the severe shocks of COVID-19, Mwencha acknowledged the importance of global cooperation and dialogue as solutions to global problems must involve all countries and all regions, especially Africa. "If we are going to be able to have global harmony, global peace, and address global pandemics, we must work together to support each other. Africa cannot do it alone and the rest of the international community cannot exist in an island. So there is a mutual responsibility for all of us to work together for global harmony and development," he added. In late September, Chinese leader proposed a Global Development Initiative in steering global development toward a new stage of balanced, coordinated and inclusive growth. Mwencha expressed support for the initiative as it advocates the spirit of open and inclusive partnership, which is extremely vital to Africa against the current backdrop of rising anti-globalization and protectionism forces. On future cooperation, Mwencha said he expects China and Africa to further enhance engagement in the areas of COVID-19 pandemic management, post-pandemic recovery, infrastructure, technology, particularly technology related to digital economy, human resources development, industrialization, inclusive growth, poverty alleviation, food security, climate mitigation, and peace and security. The Eighth Ministerial Conference of the FOCAC, an important platform for collective dialogue and effective mechanism for practical cooperation between China and Africa, is slated to take place between November 29 and 30 in Dakar, Senegal, with the theme of "Deepen China-Africa Partnership and Promote Sustainable Development to Build a China-Africa Community with a Shared Future in the New Era". Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 23:27:49|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NAIROBI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Nairobi on Wednesday to begin his three-nation tour in Africa. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta and Blinken held a talk in Nairobi over regional peace and security, according to a brief statement issued by the Kenyan presidency. The two countries are working together to address regional priorities, particularly ending the crisis in Ethiopia, fighting terrorism in Somalia, and restoring the civilian-led transition in Sudan, according to the U.S. State Department. Before his talk with Kenyatta, Blinken also met with local civil society leaders in Kenya, the U.S. top diplomat said in Nairobi. After his stop in Kenya, Blinken is scheduled to travel this week to Nigeria and Senegal. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 23:52:40|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close WINDHOEK, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Namibia's President Hage Geingob on Wednesday said the country has a unique opportunity to lead the discourse on combatting climate change globally as well as reap the substantial economic rewards that come with it. While giving a briefing on his trip to the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference, Geingob said these ambitions are matched by the highest levels of political commitment domestically. "As the most vulnerable country in Sub-Sahara Africa to climate change, adaptation is a priority in our updated Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC). But clearly given our natural endowment for renewable energy, we need to do more to reduce our own emissions which are a mere 0.003 percent of global emissions. We are not the main culprits when it comes to warming the earth's atmosphere, but we suffer the consequences, nonetheless," he said. This is why I have explicitly included the development of a green and blue economy, as well as a green hydrogen industry, as cornerstones of the Second Harambee Prosperity Plan (HPP-II), Geingob said. While at the conference, Namibia announced the winner of the Green Hydrogen project which will see the country aiming to generate about 5 gigawatts of renewable energy. According to Geingob, the announcement signaled Namibia's commitment to accelerating the development of green hydrogen that could be used to decarbonize hard-to-abate sectors regionally and globally. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 23:58:40|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NAIROBI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta on Wednesday sacked top prison commander following the escape of three terror convicts who were serving jail terms for terrorism-related crimes. Kenyatta, in a statement, replaced Wycliffe Ogalo as the Commissioner-General of the Kenya Prisons Service with John Kibaso Warioba, a retired army brigadier. "It is also notified that the president had earlier today revoked with immediate effect the appointment of Wycliffe Ogalo as the Commissioner-General of Kenya Prisons Service, paving way for the new appointment," the presidency said. The new appointment follows the briefing Kenyatta received from senior ministry of interior officials responsible for Correctional Services regarding the security breaches at the heavily guarded Kamiti Maximum Security Prison that led to the escape of three inmates. The Kenyan leader also directed the Cabinet Secretary for Interior and all security formations to take all actions necessary and pursue the Kamiti escapees with all the available resources. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-18 00:04:47|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NAIROBI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The fourth edition of the Shandong Export Commodities Expo opened in Kenya's capital city Nairobi on Wednesday to help deepen China-Kenya commercial ties. Zhang Yijun, Minister-Counselor at Chinese Embassy in Kenya said that the three-day event will provide a broad platform to showcase Chinese advanced manufacturing and machinery to Kenyan companies. "The expo will also establish a long-lasting thriving avenue leading to a bright trade and economic cooperation future between China and Kenya," Zhang said. According to the organizer, Afripeak Expo Kenya, altogether 103 companies are participating in the exhibition, amongst which 83 are foreign exhibitors mainly from China. The fourth edition of the exhibition will adopt a virtual and physical event model and showcase modern Chinese made agricultural machinery, construction machinery, hardware and tools, solar and new energy products, auto parts, chemical products and medical equipment. Zhang said that enhancing unity and cooperation with Africa has always been high on China's diplomatic agenda. The Minister-Counselor observed that China is the largest trade partner and project contractor of Kenya. He noted that through the first nine months of 2021, the total trade volume between China and Kenya jumped by 29.9 percent to reach 560 billion shillings (about 5 billion U.S. dollars) despite the COVID-19 pandemic. According to Zhang, last year, the Chinese direct investment in Kenya reached 172 million dollars and the amount of newly signed contracts reached 3.2 billion dollars. Zhang added that China is willing to work with Kenya to share growth opportunities and draw up a growth blueprint in pursuit of a better tomorrow. Gao Wei, CEO of Afripeak Expo Kenya, said that the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the global economy, and in order to promote local industry, a Kenyan pavilion was added to the Expo in order to provide 20 local companies with an opportunity to showcase their products and link up with potential Chinese buyers. Erick Rutto, first vice president of Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KNCCI), said that the exhibition is a fitting launch-pad for growing trade cooperation between China and Africa. "It is an important signal to the world that China remains open for business despite the growing wave of trade protectionism," he added. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-18 00:46:07|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close NAIROBI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Kenya plans to promote the creation of green jobs in order to achieve sustainable development, a senior government official said on Wednesday. Simon Chelugui, cabinet secretary of Ministry of Labor, said in Nairobi that the labor sector must play its role in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases so as to mitigate against climate change. "My appeal to all leaders in the labor sector is that they promote the creation of decent green jobs," Chelugui said during the launch of the third generation decent work country program for Kenya (2021-2024). Chelugui said that the program has also outlined key priorities, outcomes and outputs to mitigate the negative effects of COVID-19 on the labor market and ensure an employment-oriented post-COVID-19 recovery. According to the ministry of labor, preserving the environment has a direct impact on economic growth and employment creation. "As leaders in the labor sector, we must be at the forefront in promoting the nexus between inclusive economic growth and better employment opportunities that ensures greater economic security for all, without compromising environmental protection," Chelugui said. He added that sustained and inclusive economic growth can drive progress, and create decent green jobs that will improve the living standards for all. The official revealed that Kenya will ensure that its economic growth generates green jobs that result in employment opportunities with fair income, workplace security and social protection, and allow flexibility of working arrangements and hours. Chelugui observed that green jobs ensure that individuals have disposable income which they can spend in the local economy. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-18 00:49:31|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close DAR ES SALAAM, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The East African Community (EAC) is making strides in conforming to trading requirements under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), with plans underway to finalize the EAC tariff offer, the EAC said in a statement on Wednesday. The EAC Sectoral Council on Trade, Industry, Finance and Investment (SCTIFI) has directed the EAC secretariat to convene meetings with experts by Dec. 15, 2021, to finalize the EAC tariff offer, said the statement issued by the EAC headquarters in Tanzania's safari capital Arusha. The statement said the EAC secretariat was directed to undertake an assessment of the number of additional tariff lines that have been moved by each member state from various categories. Peter Mathuki, the EAC secretary general, said that a lot needs to be done to kick off trading under the AfCFTA agreement. "Regional economic communities are major building blocks in the realization of the AfCFTA. EAC is keen on implementing policies, decisions, and directives, to ease trading under the agreement set to widen integration and increase intra-Africa trade," he said. African countries began officially trading under the AfCFTA on Jan. 1, 2021, in a pact connecting 1.3 billion people across Africa. The EAC member states are Burundi, Kenya, South Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 09:16:58|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close Container ships berth at the Pasir Panjang container terminal in Singapore on Nov. 17, 2021. Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) grew by 17.9 percent in October, compared to the revised 12 percent growth in the previous month, Enterprise Singapore, a government agency, announced on Wednesday. (Photo by Then Chih Wey/Xinhua) SINGAPORE, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) grew by 17.9 percent in October, compared to the revised 12 percent growth in the previous month, Enterprise Singapore, a government agency, announced on Wednesday. The electronic NODX expanded by 14.9 percent year on year in October, extending the 14.1 percent increase in September. Meanwhile, the non-electronic NODX grew by 18.9 percent, following the 11.4 percent rise in September. On a month-on-month seasonally adjusted basis, Singapore's NODX increased by 4.2 percent in October to 16.4 billion Singapore dollars (about 12.09 billion U.S. dollars), following the previous month's 1 percent rise. Singapore's non-oil re-exports (NORX) grew by 17.8 percent year on year in October, following the 16.4 percent rise in September. Both electronic and non-electronic NORX grew. Enditem Container ships berth at the Pasir Panjang container terminal in Singapore on Nov. 17, 2021. Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) grew by 17.9 percent in October, compared to the revised 12 percent growth in the previous month, Enterprise Singapore, a government agency, announced on Wednesday. (Photo by Then Chih Wey/Xinhua) Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 12:53:49|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close DHAKA, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Bangladesh has begun administering COVID-19 vaccines to slum dwellers in capital Dhaka. Thousands of dwellers took their first shots of the COVID-19 vaccine at Dhaka's mega Korail slum on Tuesday morning. Md Selim Reza, chief executive officer of Dhaka North City Corporation, told journalists that the campaign to vaccinate slum residents began at 25 booths, with the aim of inoculating 15,000 people on the first day. After the vaccination at Korail slum, which houses around 300,000 people, he said the campaign will be expanded to inoculate other slum dwellers in the city. Bangladesh launched the vaccine rollout in January. However, it had to suspend the operation in April after India halted export due to a supply crunch. The vaccination drive resumed in June with China-donated Sinopharm vaccines, after the drug regulator authorized emergency use of the Sinopharm vaccines. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 14:03:30|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KABUL, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- A trader was freed from a kidnapper gang's custody and four suspects were arrested in Afghanistan's southern province of Helmand, authorities said on Wednesday. "The personnel of General Directorate of Intelligence (GDI) freed Noor Ahmad, a local trader, from kidnappers' clutch and arrested four suspects, including three women, following an operation in Helmand province," GDI, the country's national intelligence agency, said in a statement. The trader was kidnapped a couple of days ago in surrounding areas of the province, 555 km in the south of Afghanistan's capital Kabul, according to the statement. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 14:37:15|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close ISLAMABAD, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- One person was killed and six others including children were injured in a gas cylinder explosion in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi on Wednesday, the police said. The incident happened inside a multi-storey building in Lyari area of Karachi, the provincial capital of southern Sindh province, police officials in the area told local media. The residential building was also partially damaged due to the cylinder blast, said the police, adding that the cause of the blast has not been ascertained yet, but it might happen due to gas leakage. The injured people were shifted to a nearby hospital and being treated for severe burn injuries. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 17:22:22|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KABUL, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Afghanistan's acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi has written an open letter to U.S. Congress, calling on the United States to unfreeze Afghanistan's assets, the ministry confirmed in a statement on Wednesday. "Despite the fact that following the signing of the Doha Agreement in February 2020, we no longer find ourselves in direct conflict with one another nor are we a military opposition, what logic could possibly exist behind the freezing of our assets?" Muttaqi was quoted in the statement as saying. "At a time when we have an excellent opportunity for positive relations, reaching for the option of sanctions and pressure cannot help improve our relations," he said. The Afghan economy after the Taliban's takeover in mid-August has suffered from the U.S. freezing of over 9 billion U.S. dollars in assets belonging to the Afghan central bank as well as a halt in funds by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). "It is necessary for both sides to take positive steps in order to build trust," Muttaqi said. Afghanistan is concerned that with no change in the current situation, the Afghan people will face greater difficulties and the country will become a source of mass migration in the region and the world, which will create more humanitarian and economic problems for the world, he noted. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 18:43:42|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BAKU/YEREVAN, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Azerbaijan and Armenia on Wednesday announced their respective casualties in clashes that broke out along the border on Tuesday. The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said in a statement that seven Azerbaijani soldiers were killed, and 10 others wounded in the clashes. Meanwhile, the Armenian Defense Ministry said one Armenian soldier was killed, and 24 others missing in the clashes, adding that 13 Armenian soldiers were captured by the Azerbaijani forces. Two Armenian military positions were taken by the Azerbaijani side, said the Armenian Defense Ministry. Both sides have accused each other of launching provocative attacks. Hours after the clashes, the two countries reached a Russia-brokered ceasefire agreement. Both confirmed on Wednesday that the clashes had stopped, and that the border situation was stable since the ceasefire. The last round of major armed clashes between the two South Caucasian countries broke out in late September last year, causing heavy casualties and property losses. It ended with a Russia-brokered truce in November 2020. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 19:36:11|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close HO CHI MINH CITY, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam's pandemic hotspot Ho Chi Minh City on Tuesday announced that people who have received at least one shot of COVID-19 vaccines or recovered from the disease are permitted to engage in socio-economic activities. This is part of the temporary measures adapted for the flexible, safe and effective control of COVID-19 issued by the city's administration on Tuesday. Children who haven't reached the age eligible for vaccination can also take part in socio-economic activities, but they have to be accompanied by inoculated adults. The activities include participating in large gatherings such as festivals, cultural and sport events, using public transport, working at public workplaces, and attending classes, among others. The activities themselves can also be subject to certain restrictions depending on the COVID-19 risk levels of each area, which are classified mainly by vaccination rate and the number of infections among population. The city has also allowed non-essential businesses like bars, night clubs, and karaoke parlors to resume full operation in low-risk areas and at half capacity in medium-risk ones starting from Tuesday. These services cannot operate in places still classified at "high" or "very high" risk. After over six months of closure as part of COVID-19 restrictions, these are among the last services to reopen in the southern Vietnamese city. Most of the normal activities and services have been resumed since early October after months of stringent social distancing measures. Ho Chi Minh City remains Vietnam's largest pandemic hotspot with more than 1,000 new cases reported per day. It has so far logged over 446,000 COVID-19 infections in the latest wave of infection which started in late April, according to the municipal center for disease control. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 19:52:37|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KABUL, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- At least four civilians were killed and two others wounded in a bomb attack targeting a public mini-bus in the western part of Kabul, capital of Afghanistan on Wednesday, an eyewitness said. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 20:08:52|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close PHNOM PENH, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- An aircraft carrying 2 million more doses of the Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine donated by China arrived in the Cambodian capital on Wednesday. The vaccine arrival was greeted by Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen at the Phnom Penh International Airport. The event was livestreamed on the prime minister's official Facebook page, the state-run National Television of Cambodia (TVK), Fresh News, the kingdom's largest online news provider, and several other TV channels. Speaking at a ceremony held at the airport, Hun Sen said that with China's timely and regular vaccine supply, Cambodia has achieved herd immunity earlier than originally planned and recently reopened all sectors in the country. From Monday, the Southeast Asian country allowed quarantine-free travel for fully vaccinated international travelers. Under the new scheme, the travelers will be free to visit anywhere in the country if they test negative for COVID-19 72 hours prior to departure and have a negative result of a rapid test upon arrival. "Cambodia has become one of the most fully COVID-19 vaccinated countries in the region and around the world, that has achieved a solid herd immunity," Hun Sen said. "Cambodia's success in its COVID-19 vaccination campaign is inseparable from China's vaccine supply." The Southeast Asian country has so far got a total of 40 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from three sources, through bilateral procurement, the World Health Organization (WHO)-led COVAX Facility, and donations. Of the total, over 90 percent were bought from or donated by China. The prime minister added that to date, Cambodia has administered at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine to 14.08 million people, or 88 percent of its 16-million population. Of them, 13.2 million, or 82.6 percent of the total population, are fully vaccinated with two required shots, and 2.07 million, or 13 percent, have got a third or booster shot. Hun Sen said Chinese jabs have protected people's health and saved the lives of Cambodians, while helping Cambodia recover its economy in the new normal. "China is a true, ironclad friend who always provides timely support to Cambodia in difficult times without any strings attached," he said. Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia Wang Wentian said it was the seventh batch of COVID-19 vaccines donated by China to Cambodia. "Now, we're pleased to see that Cambodia has achieved one of the highest vaccination rates in world, and the number of confirmed cases has dropped to double digits, and most of them are mildly ill," he said. The ambassador said he was elated to see Phnom Penh has returned to its energetic former self as businesses have reopened, and that he hoped the kingdom's socio-economic development would be back on course soon. Lim Heng, vice president of the Cambodia Chamber of Commerce, said the Chinese donation is a new testament to the ironclad friendship between the two countries. "A friend in need is a friend indeed," he told Xinhua. "Cambodia-China joint COVID-19 fight is a good example for cooperation between countries. Undoubtedly, it will help raise bilateral relationship to a new high and our people-to-people bonds will be further strengthened." Thong Mengdavid, a research fellow at the Phnom Penh-based Asian Vision Institute, said China's vaccine donation highlighted a close friendship between the countries, promising support and joint efforts in combating COVID-19 as well as in post-pandemic economic recovery. "With China's vaccines, Cambodia is able to accomplish the nationwide vaccination program, achieve a strong herd immunity and reopen the country to fully vaccinated foreigners," he told Xinhua. "Cambodia is now safer to conduct business activities and traveling in the new normal." Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 21:34:17|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close KABUL, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The Ministry of Refugee Affairs of the Taliban caretaker government in Afghanistan has signed agreements with three leading aid agencies in a bid to support hundreds of thousands of displaced families ahead of winter, the ministry confirmed on Wednesday. The ministry said in a statement that it has recently signed three memorandum of understandings with ACTED-Afghanistan, Organization for Relief Development (ORD), and International Rescue Committee (IRC). The total budget from the three aid organizations reaches more than 9 million U.S. dollars to provide aid for the war-displaced families, according to the statement. Since the start of the year, over 634,000 people have been forcibly displaced by conflict. About 5.5 million people have been displaced since 2012, according to official figures. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 22:56:47|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close HANOI, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Vietnam's central Quang Nam province on Wednesday welcomed 29 foreign tourists, the first quarantine-free international travelers to the country in 20 months, amid efforts to revive tourism post-COVID-19 restrictions. The arrivals came from Australia, France, South Korea, and the United States, and will go on a package tour covering flights and accommodation in Quang Nam as part of a quarantine waiver for visitors fully vaccinated against COVID-19, local media VnExpress reported. The province is scheduled to welcome some 300 other foreign tourists in the next few days under the vaccine passport program which is being piloted by the Vietnamese government. All tourism staff at resorts and tourist facilities chosen for the trial program have been fully vaccinated, according to provincial authorities. The central province, home to popular tourist spot Hoi An ancient town, is one of the first five localities allowed to welcome back fully vaccinated tourists from November onwards along with the northern Quang Ninh province, the central Da Nang city and Khanh Hoa province, and the southern Kien Giang province. Also under the program, the island city of Phu Quoc in Kien Giang will welcome some 200 foreign tourists on Saturday, the first international visitors to the island after nearly two years of tourism freezing due to COVID-19, Vietnam News Agency reported. Vietnam closed its border and grounded all international flights in March last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, only allowing entry for Vietnamese repatriates, foreign experts and highly-skilled workers with certain quarantine requirements. The Southeast Asian country hosted just more than 3.8 million international arrivals in 2020, plunging 78.7 percent from a record number of over 18 million in 2019, the last full year before the COVID-19 broke out, according to its General Statistics Office. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-16 01:21:07|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close THE HAGUE, Nov. 15 (Xinhua) -- The first full Dutch version of the "Dream of the Red Chamber," a Chinese Romeo-and-Juliet love story masterpiece in the country's classical literature, has recently hit the bookstores in the Netherlands following 13 years of hard work by three Dutch sinologists and translators. The 2,160-page, four-volume book, which includes all 120 chapters of the original Chinese epic novel, is the result of a long-lasting partnership between Silvia Marijnissen, Mark Leenhouts and Anne Sytske Keijser. "It was a longer and more difficult process than we had imagined," Keijser told Xinhua. The "Dream of the Red Chamber," one of Chinese literature's Four Great Classical Novels, was written by Cao Xueqin in the middle of the 18th century during the Qing Dynasty. Initially, the three co-translators had planned to complete the work in about eight years. "But obviously, that wasn't enough. We really wanted to create a translation that would read well in Dutch," Keijser said. The Dutch sinologist said the translated version is aimed at the general public. "The strength of this novel is that it can speak to its readers, even across time and place. Even though Dutch readers will be unfamiliar with many aspects of life and society depicted in the novel, we will be able to identify with the main characters on an emotional level," she said. This novel is "the epitome of Chinese classical literature and culture," she said. "We were overjoyed when (the publishing house) Athenaeum said it was interested in publishing the novel." In a favorable and enthusiastic review in the widely read Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant, scholar Henk Propper thanked the translators for their effort. "Cao Xueqin's Chinese has become delicious, sparkling Dutch," he wrote. The Dutch version of the masterpiece, entitled "De Droom van de Rode Kamer," is available in bookshops across the Netherlands and in online bookstores. "We are convinced that historical masterpieces should be made available for today's readers, as these are the stories that had, and still have, a strong influence on today's literature, art and life in general," Sander van Vlerken, publisher of Athenaeum-Polak & Van Gennep, told Xinhua. "Cao Xueqin is a classical writer that can't be missed," van Vlerken said. "It is my strong opinion that the Dutch interest in Chinese culture in many of its forms is quite keen and that one of the appealing aspects of the 'Dream of the Red Chamber' for the Dutch reader is the theme of Buddhism/Taoism in contrast with the everyday life of the main characters in their noble lives, and how Baoyu will find his way," he said. Baoyu refers to Jia Baoyu, one of the principal characters in the book. "And isn't that the process we all have to go through: how to make the right choices in life, no matter what the circumstances?" the publisher commented. The book will be formally launched in early December at Amsterdam's SPUI25 academic and cultural center. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 16:04:52|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close SOFIA, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Bulgaria's head of state will be decided in a runoff on Sunday, according to the country's election commission. According to the final results of the first round on Nov. 14, Bulgaria's incumbent President Rumen Radev received 49.42 percent of the votes and will head to a runoff with Anastas Gerdjikov who received 22.83 percent, the country's Central Election Commission said on its website on Wednesday. Radev and Gerdjikov were the top two candidates among 23 contenders. The total number of eligible voters was 6,691,150 but only 2,687,307 cast their ballots, the commission said. No president was elected because fewer than half the number of eligible voters cast a ballot, and none of the candidates received more than half the actual votes cast, the commission said. The runoff winner is the candidate who secures the most votes, with no regard to voter turnout, according to the Bulgarian Constitution. In the first round, 58-year-old Radev was backed by several political formations such as Continue the Change, Bulgarian Socialist Party and There Is Such A People, while his opponent was supported by Bulgaria's centre-right GERB party. The president of Bulgaria is the commander-in-chief of the country's armed forces and has prerogatives such as appointing a caretaker government and dissolving parliament. The president is elected directly by the people for a period of five years. Radev's term will expire at the end of January 2022. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 22:00:28|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close LONDON, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- British Brexit Minister David Frost said Wednesday that Britain and the European Union (EU) are likely to reach a deal by Christmas on changes to the Northern Ireland Protocol to smooth post-Brexit trade. "I think it can be done, whether it will be done is a different question," Frost told the BBC, after Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said the issues with the protocol could be resolved "before Christmas". "I would like to progress this as fast as we possibly can, I'm glad there's ambition on the EU side from what Simon says," Frost was quoted by the BBC as saying. The question of how goods move from Great Britain into Northern Ireland is obviously at the heart of the talks and there is no reason why goods going to stay in Northern Ireland need to go through processes, Frost said. 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 Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Britain and the EU view changing the protocol as a long-term solution to post-Brexit trade disruption in Northern Ireland. Britain outlined its proposals in a government paper in July, which observers interpreted as an intention to renegotiate the protocol. In response, the EU published its own package to facilitate the movement of goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland, including cutting customs formalities, simplified certification, and an 80 percent reduction of checks on retail goods for Northern Ireland's consumers. It said it would guarantee an uninterrupted supply of medicine to the people of Northern Ireland, by changing EU rules. However, the two sides remain poles apart on the more challenging issue of the oversight role of the European Court of Justice in Northern Ireland. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 23:20:36|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close MOSCOW, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- Russia's leading TASS news agency signed a memorandum of cooperation with the state space corporation Roscosmos on Wednesday to open a permanent representation on the International Space Station (ISS). "The first correspondent in space will be Hero of Russia, Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin," TASS head Sergei Mikhailov said after inking the document with Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin. Misurkin is scheduled to leave the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for the ISS on Dec. 8 together with a Japanese billionaire and his business assistant onboard the Soyuz MS-20 spacecraft for a commercial mission. "It is an incredible honor for us to call our Russian cosmonauts colleagues. We look forward to news and amazing footage from space," Mikhailov said. Rogozin said at the ceremony that the idea is not "extravagant" because many Roscosmos cosmonauts have already been actively documenting their activities in orbit. Following a thorough discussion, the state space corporation decided to accept Mikhailov's interesting and important proposal, he said. "We really want everyone in our country and abroad to understand that space exploration is about overcoming fear, disbelief and ignorance. When a few very courageous people engage in it, I would like this to be for the sake of all mankind, our entire society, showing space as it is," said Rogozin. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-18 01:19:22|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close MINSK, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- The President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko and Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel on Wednesday held another telephone conversation about the problem of migrants at the borders of Belarus with EU countries. According to a Belarus Today report, the politicians agreed that the problem would be brought up to the level of Belarus and the EU, and officials would immediately enter into negotiations to resolve the existing problem. Refugees' wishes to obtain asylum in Germany would be addressed in the same context. Thousands of refugees, with most of them coming from the Middle East, are trying to enter Poland, Lithuania and other EU countries from Belarus. On Nov. 8, thousands of refugees seeking asylum in Germany camped on the border with Poland. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-17 18:54:59|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close BEIJING, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- A foreign ministry spokesperson on Wednesday confirmed that China and the United States have reached three consensuses, including one on the issuance of one-year multiple entry visas to journalists, to create favorable conditions for the media representatives of both countries. "After multiple rounds of consultations, China and the United States have recently reached three consensuses based on the principles of mutual respect, reciprocity and mutual benefit," spokesperson Zhao Lijian said at a daily press briefing when answering a media inquiry. The two sides agreed to ensure that journalists from either country currently based in the other country can enter and leave that country normally on the premise of strictly observing laws and consular regulations, he said. The two sides also agreed to issue one-year multiple entry visas to journalists from the other country, and the U.S. side pledged to immediately initiate domestic procedures to address the "duration of status" issues for Chinese journalists. The Chinese side promised to give equal treatment to American journalists in China after the U.S. policies enter into force, Zhao said. Additionally, both parties will approve visas on an equal footing for new journalists who meet application requirements in accordance with laws and regulations, he said. "This achievement was hard-won, meets the interests of both sides, and is worth cherishing," Zhao said, expressing hope that the United States will honor its words, implement the relevant policies as soon as possible, and work with China to continue creating favorable working and living conditions for the media of both countries. Enditem Source: Xinhua| 2021-11-18 04:18:24|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close LOS ANGELES, Nov. 17 (Xinhua) -- A pilot died after his single-engine air tanker crashed Tuesday night while responding to a wildfire in the U.S. state of Colorado, authorities said. The Larimer County Sheriff's Office said in a release that the incident was reported approximately 6:37 p.m. Tuesday local time and resources were immediately deployed to search the area near the wildfire dubbed Kruger Rock Fire. "At approximately 9:49 p.m., the plane crash site was located near the south end of Hermit Park. We are sad to report that the pilot and only occupant of the aircraft did not survive," said the Sheriff's Office. The Kruger Rock Fire, burning in very steep terrain, was first reported Tuesday morning southeast of Estes Park, a town near the Rocky Mountain National Park, and spread quickly. It had burned 133 acres with 15 percent containment as of Tuesday evening. The flight was believed to be the first time in the United States that a fixed-winged aircraft was being used to fight a fire at night using night vision goggles, KUSA, an NBC-affiliated television station licensed to Denver, reported. The plane departed from Northern Colorado Regional Airport in Loveland and was reportedly sent to monitor the fire, according to another news outlet based in Colorado, CBS owned-and-operated KCNC TV station, adding that an aerial attack on the blaze didn't happen Tuesday because of the high winds, but fire managers used one or more planes to survey the fire activity. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said in a tweet Wednesday that the small plane is an Air Tractor AT-802A and the agency is investigating the crash. Enditem PRESIDENT Emmerson Mnangagwa yesterday said by-elections would go ahead even if the opposition boycotts them to protest his failure to implement reforms that would guarantee free and fair polls. Mnangagwa made the remarks while addressing about 6 000 party supporters in Dulivhadzimo Stadium in Beitbridge. Most of the supporters were bussed from different parts of the province. Mnangagwa claimed victory was certain for the ruling party. We are going to have by-elections in 2022 and tinovasvasvanga (we will trounce them). In 2023, we will then have general elections tovarakasha (we will beat them), Mnangagwa boasted as the crowd cheered. The opposition has hinted that they will boycott the elections, but we will hold them all the same. Mnangagwa has said the by-elections will be held during the first quarter of next year. There are 133 vacant Parliamentary and local government seats following the recall of MDC Alliance legislators and councillors. Mnangagwa, who was in the border town to preside over the commissioning of 28 houses for civil servants, accused opposition-run councils of failure to provide efficient service. We expect local authorities to take the leading role in the provision of houses. We expect them to address housing, but we have no local authorities, they are dead. They should be complementing government in the provision of houses, but both rural and urban local authorities fail, he said. While Mnangagwa was addressing the Beitbridge crowd, his spokesperson George Charamba went on Twitter, to claim that the announcement of by-elections by Mnangagwa caught the MDCs by surprise, and unprepared. Not only are they unprepared and broke; they mortally fear that a thorough thumping by the ruling Zanu PF will remove the benefit of the doubt on which they hoped to fundraise ahead of 2023, Charamba said. By-election results, particularly margin of defeat and inability to rouse their apathetic supporters will make them un-bankable in the eyes of their Western sponsors. Further, I made the point that those pretending to agitate for the opposition by demanding by-elections, were not only out of touch with the thinking in the opposition; they were actually singing a hymn the opposition does not find melodious. At Kopa in Chimanimani, the President called the bluff and hinted by-elections will come in the first quarter of 2022, he said. MDC Alliance spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere said a clear roadmap of reforms was non-negotiable. The consistent position thats been taken by the MDC Alliance is that any proclamation for elections must be accompanied by a clear reform roadmap that paves the way for an undisputed election. The bad governance and legitimacy crisis that continues to plague Mr Mnangagwas regime is a direct result of the disputed election of 2018, Mahere said. She said the MDC Alliance was unwavering in its call for the alignment of electoral laws with the Constitution, adding that there was need to disband the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission. MDC-T spokesperson Witness Dube said: It is regrettable that he (Charamba) chose to be verbose to mask Zanu PFs fear for electoral reforms while totally misrepresenting our position on the same to mean that we are scared of by-elections. Mnangagwa was accompanied by Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga, former Vice-President Kembo Mohadi, Defence minister Oppah Muchinguri and several senior government officials. Newsday THE MDC Alliance Bulawayo province has intensified its voter registration campaign by providing transport to prospective registrants to travel to the main provincial registration offices in Belmont ahead of by-elections slated for early next year. Revelations are that the opposition party is targeting 500 000 voters in Bulawayo during the 21-day Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) registration window period. The campaign is being undertaken at a time when Zec warned that the city stands to lose two or three constituencies in the next delimitation exercise as the number of registered voters falls far short of the minimum threshold. The opposition partys provincial MDC Alliance spokesperson Swithern Chirowodza yesterday told Southern Eye that they were mobilising eligible people to register as voters during the by-elections and 2023 plebiscite. We are targeting to register 500 000 voters. We have registered big numbers and do not intend to intimidate our competitors by revealing exact details. We are offering transport to the registration offices, Chirowodza said. The only time we will not be providing transport is when Zec sets up voter registration kiosks in Bulawayos districts. There are huge numbers of prospective registrants who will get an opportunity to register to vote once Zec sets up voter registration kiosks in Bulawayos districts. Recently, MDC Alliance youths launched a pilot door-to-door voter registration campaign targeting to register 90 000 new voters ahead of the delimitation exercise. In June, government announced that a population census will be held in April next year with results expected in August. It said the delimitation exercise and creation of new electoral boundaries would begin in October and end in December 2022. Newsday New York, US (PANA) - Preventing conflicts requires closing development gaps, shrinking inequality and bringing hope to people around the globe, senior UN officials told the Security Council on Tuesday Accra, Ghana (PANA) - Ghana's Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) Tuesday gave approval for the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine to be administered to children aged between 15 and 17 years, local media reported Oil production at biggest U.S. shale field set to hit new record By Jessica Resnick-ault / Reuters NEW YORK Petroleumworld 11 16 2021 Crude oil production from the Permian Basin, the largest U.S. oil field, is set to surpass its pre-pandemic record in December, a swift turnaround that has not been replicated in the country's other oil regions. Oil output from the Permian, located in Texas and New Mexico, is forecast to reach a record 4.953 million barrels per day (bpd) in December, as output has come back with the surge in economic demand. The Permian is the primary driver of U.S. output, but its percentage of U.S. overall production is even more than at the end of 2019, when the United States was producing 13 million barrels a day. December's forecast production will surpass the previous record of 4.913 million bpd set in March 2020, according to a monthly forecast from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. U.S. total oil output dropped by more than 2 million barrels a day in 2020 due to coronavirus-induced demand destruction. Production has returned gradually, with numerous other oil fields, such as the Bakken in North Dakota, still far from their peak production levels. "Permian Basin wells tend to be the most prolific wells compared to other basins, so if you have more limited capital, you would go there first," said Andrew Lipow, president of consultancy Lipow and Associates in Houston. The Permian's importance is augmented by its proximity to major pipeline hubs and connections to export centers, making it more advantaged than other basins. Overall shale production across seven major shale regions is forecast to rise by 85,000 bpd to 8.316 million bpd, with the bulk of the increase seen in the Permian, where output is expected to rise 67,000 bpd. Gas production from the seven shale regions is expected to rise 0.2 billion cubic feet per day to 89.4 bcf/d in September. ____________________________________________ Kremlin says 'patient' after Nord Stream 2 approval delay Pjotr Mahhonin Spirit of Europe Sign Nord Stream - The new gas supply route for Europe. By AFP MOSCOW Petroleumworld 11 17 2021 The Kremlin on Wednesday said it would be patient following the latest setback to Russia's controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline after Germany temporarily halted its approval process. "The certification of Nord Stream 2 is a fairly complicated process and this was known from the start," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "From the very start it was clear that we needed to be patient." He added that the Kremlin is "convinced that the project is important for Europe." "It is important for us and for European consumers," Peskov added. Germany's energy regulator on Tuesday said it was suspending the certification process of the Baltic Sea pipeline over a legal hurdle. To resume the approval process, the Switzerland-based operator of Nord Stream 2 will need to create a German subsidiary that will own and operate the German segment of the pipeline. The regulator's approval is one of the final steps before the commissioning of the pipeline that is expected to double Russian gas supplies to Germany. The delay comes as Europe, which receives a third of its gas from Russia, is battling surging energy prices ahead of winter. But critics say the recently completed pipeline will increase Europe's energy reliance on Russia, with some Western countries calling it a geopolitical weapon. The pipeline also bypasses Ukraine's gas infrastructure, depriving the Western ally of much-needed transit fees. ______________________________________ Oil-exporter UAE accepts future is not oil: US delegation Getty The UAE announced net zero carbon goals at the COP26 event By Talek Harris / AFP DUBAI Petroleumworld 11 17 2021 The United Arab Emirates accepts that oil is not its future despite being one of the world's top exporters, a visiting delegation of US politicians told AFP on Friday. The UAE's leaders "recognise that their future is not going to be in oil", Senator Ben Cardin said at the end of a trip that also included the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow. Both the UAE and neighbouring Saudi Arabia, the number one oil exporter, announced net zero carbon goals in the build-up to the UN environmental meeting, which ends on Friday. The targets were set despite plans to ramp up oil production. Net zero refers to emissions created within a country, not by products sold and consumed abroad. But UAE officials "recognise reality", delegation member and House of Representatives Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said after talks with Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum. "They know the world is working very hard not to be in a position to buy their product anymore, because they're going to alternative energy," he said at the Dubai Expo world fair, which has sustainability as one of its major themes. "So I think they also want to make sure that they diversify at this point in time because they know their economy cannot be based long-term on a product that the world thinks is harmful to use." Hoyer said the UAE's hosting of COP28 in 2023 shows it is committed to clean energy, and would provide an extra "incentive" to move away from fossil fuels. "The crown prince (Sheikh Mohammed) made it very clear that yes, they were a country that was advantaged by fossil fuels, but that they believe that fossil fuels was yesterday and alternative energy will be the future," he said. Cardin led a team that also included Senator Bob Casey and Representative Emanuel Cleaver. They also visited Israel before the UAE, their final stop. The visit comes just over a year after the UAE broke with Arab consensus and normalised ties with Israel, with Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan following suit under a series of US-brokered agreements known as the Abraham Accords. The UAE and Bahrain are currently engaged in naval exercises with Israeli and US forces in the Red Sea, where Iran has been accused of carrying out attacks. "What I think the Abraham Accords have done is take us to another level psychologically (in) the relationship between the Arab world and Israel," Hoyer said. ______________________________________ 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 A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind. The Supreme Court on Wednesday appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of Punjab and Haryana High Court, to monitor the Lakhimpur Kheri violence probe and to ensure fairness and independence in the investigation. A bench headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana said: "We appoint Rakesh Kumar Jain (retired judge of Punjab and Haryana High Court)...to ensure absolute impartiality in the investigation of the case." The top court also ordered the Uttar Pradesh government to include three senior IPS officers, which includes a female officer Padmaja Chauhan, present IG of Uttar Pradesh, on the SIT, which it said would continue with the investigation, under supervision of Justice Jain. The top court said it will list the matter after the charge sheet is filed in the case, and a detailed order will be uploaded on it. On November 15, the Supreme Court had said it will also consider the names of some retired apex court judge or high court judge to monitor day-to-day investigation in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence incident. The top court also directed the Uttar Pradesh government to upgrade its task force investigating the matter with some high-ranking officials. Senior advocate Harish Salve, representing the Uttar Pradesh government, submitted that the top court can appoint a retired judge to monitor the SIT probe. The top court said, "Now, we have a lot of freedom for a retired SC or HC judge. Let us see..." The bench had noted that it will find out a judge who is willing to take up the assignment. During the hearing, the top court emphasized that the UP government should upgrade the task force investigating the matter. It said the officers must be high-ranking officers, currently there are local Lakhimpur Kheri, sub-inspector level and DSP level officers on the task force. The bench told Salve that it needs one more day's time to finalize the name of the judge. "We are considering Rakesh Kumar Jain (former Punjab and Haryana HC judge) or others. We have to consult them", said the bench. Salve submitted, "Judge can be appointed from any other state". Earlier, the top court had said it wanted to appoint a judge outside of Uttar Pradesh. Concluding the hearing, the top court asked the UP government to look into grievances of victim's families, who have not been paid compensation. Additional advocate general Garima Prasad submitted that the state would take necessary steps. The violence occurred on October 3, resulting in the killing of eight persons, including four farmers who were allegedly mowed down by the vehicles in the convoy of Ashish Misra, the son of Union Minister and BJP MP Ajay Kumar Misra. The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notice to the Tripura government on a plea against its decision to invoke the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against two lawyers, and a journalist. A bench of Chief Justice N.V. Ramana and Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Surya Kant said: "Issue notice. No coercive steps..." Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioners, submitted that the FIR was lodged against them after the advocates went for a "fact finding" job in connection with the violence in the state. The bench decided to seek response from the state, but declined for now, the request by Bhushan to tag the matter with a pending plea against constitutional validity of the provisions of the UAPA. On November 11, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a plea challenging the Tripura Police's decision to invoke the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) against several lawyers, activists and journalist Shyam Meera Singh. Initially, the top court asked advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing the petitioners, to move the concerned high court in the matter, but later agreed to hear the matter. Bhushan submitted before the bench that the petitioners are also challenging the constitutional validity of certain widely misused provisions of UAPA and the wide definition of 'unlawful activities'. The petitioners said the present petition is being filed under Article 32 of the Constitution in relation to the targeted political violence against the Muslim minorities in Tripura during the second half of the month of October, 2021. "The subsequent efforts by the State of Tripura to monopolise the flow of information and facts emanating from the affected areas by invoking provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, (hereinafter, UAPA) against members of civil society including advocates and journalists who have made the effort to bring facts in relation to the targeted violence in the public domain", said the plea. Recently, the Tripura Police had booked a journalist and other activists for offences punishable under the UAPA. The petitioners - Mukesh, Ansarul Haq Ansari, and Shyam Meera Singh -- moved the Supreme Court seeking to quash the first information report (FIR) registered against them. According to the petition, the fact finding report titled as "Humanity Under Attack in Tripura #Muslim Lives Matter," published on November 2, by Lawyers for Democracy, on the findings of a four member fact finding team comprising advocate Ehtesham Hashmi (Supreme Court), advocate Amit Srivastav (member, coordination committee , Lawyers for Democracy), advocate Ansar Indori (National Secretary, NCHRO), and advocate Mukesh (Member, PUCL Delhi) has brought on record evidences into the orchestrated and targeted violence perpetrated by political right wing forces on the minority Muslim community in Tripura in October - purportedly as a counter to violence perpetrated on minority the Hindu community in Bangladesh, which continued until October 26. Pakistan will be providing professional training to Afghanistan's aviation staff in areas of security, traffic controlling, firefighting, air forecast, and airport management, Khaama Press reported. A statement by the Afghan embassy in Pakistan said that the bilateral agreement in this regard was reached during the visit of Afghanistan's foreign minister to the country. Kabul and Islamabad also agreed to be conducting ten flights every week between both capitals, among them two would be carried out by large planes and the rest by small ones. "The number of seats will be increased from 1,000 to 1,500 and planes will be able to fly from any airport of Pakistan to Kabul, Mazar-e-Sharif, and Kandahar," reads the statement. In the meantime, Afghanistan's planes will also be allowed to fly to the airports of Islamabad, Quetta and Peshawar, the report said. Northbrook, IL -- (SBWIRE) -- 11/17/2021 -- The report "Composite Film Market by Resin Type (Epoxy), Curing Type (Autoclave, Out-of-autoclave), Function (Lightning Strike Protection, Surface Protection), End-use Industry (Aerospace & Defense, Automotive), and Region - Global Forecast to 2025" The global composite film market size is expected to grow from USD 245 million in 2020 to USD 328 million by 2025, at a CAGR of 6.0% during the forecast period. Due to the increase in the demand for high-performance materials with properties such as high strength to weight ratio, good tensile strength, electrical conductivity among others, the global composite film market is expected to witness significant growth during the forecast period. Download PDF Brochure @ https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=232995579 Epoxy resin film comprises a major share of the composite film market in terms of value and volume. Epoxy resins are thermoset resins known for their excellent mechanical, electrical, and high-heat resistance properties. They are available in a wide range of curing-agent variations. They have better physical, mechanical, adhesion, and low shrinkage properties in comparison to other resin films. High strength and resistance to moisture are obtained when these epoxy resin films are applied to composite panels. The autoclave curing type accounted for the largest market share in the global composite film market during the forecast period in terms of value and volume. Autoclave curing type produces denser, and void-free molding because high heat and pressure are used for its curing. Autoclaves are in high demand as it helps in producing high-value composite films, and are widely used in the aerospace industry to fabricate high strength-to-weight ratio parts for aircraft. This curing type method generally uses high-temperature matrix resins, such as epoxy, which has higher properties than conventional resins. Thus, autoclave curing is widely used in aerospace & defense, automotive, and other end-use industries. Speak to Analyst @ https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/speaktoanalystNew.asp?id=232995579 The lightning strike protection function holds a significant revenue share in the global composite film market during the forecast period. The aerospace & defense end-use industry caters to the high demand for lightning strike protection composite film. Every airplane in the US commercial fleet gets struck by lightning more than once a year, according to Lightning Technologies Inc., which increases the demand for the lightning strike protective composite film on composite panels. Also, Airbus and Boeing's forecast for the next two decades has clearly stated that there would be an increase in passenger traffic, resulting in the manufacturing of new aircraft, which would require a huge amount of composite film. The aerospace & defense end-use industry accounted for the largest market share in the global composite film market during the forecast period in terms of value. The aerospace & defense industry is a major consumer of composites, which in turn increases the demand for composite films. Leading aircraft manufacturers such as Boeing and Airbus are increasing the use of carbon composites, and composite films in their commercial aircraft. Composite films are also used in fuselage, wings, tail, tail fin, wing box, trailing edge, engine nacelles, engine, and other structural parts of an aircraft. Growing environmental concerns and search for high strength lightweight materials to increase fuel efficiency has put composites and simultaneously composite films under the limelight in the automotive industry. As, the composite structures used on automotive would require Class A protection from extreme climates, and scratches. North America accounted for the largest market share in the composite film market during the forecast period. North America holds the largest market for the composite film market. The key reason for this includes the demand for composite films in the aerospace & defense industry in the region. The demand for composite film in aerospace & defense, automotive, and other industries is projected to improve due to product innovation and technological advances made in this sector. According to the 24/7 Wall St. a Delaware corporation, in the US, parts of Florida experience an average of 100 thunderstorm days annually, making Florida the most likely place in the country for lightning strikes. Also, along the US West Coast, annually, an average of 10 thunderstorms is experienced. These factors drive the demand for composite films during the forecast period. Key players in the market include 3M(US), Henkel AG Co. KGaA(Germany), Hexcel Corporation(US), Gurit (Switzerland), Solvay(Belgium), Toray Industries, Inc. (Japan), Socomore(France), Park Aerospace Corp.(US), and Axiom Materials Inc.(US), among many others. These companies are involved in adopting various inorganic and organic strategies to increase their foothold in the composite film market. Get 10% Customization on this Report @ https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/speaktoanalystNew.asp?id=232995579 About MarketsandMarkets MarketsandMarkets provides quantified B2B research on 30,000 high growth niche opportunities/threats which will impact 70% to 80% of worldwide companies' revenues. Currently servicing 7500 customers worldwide including 80% of global Fortune 1000 companies as clients. Almost 75,000 top officers across eight industries worldwide approach MarketsandMarkets for their painpoints around revenues decisions. Our 850 fulltime analyst and SMEs at MarketsandMarkets are tracking global high growth markets following the "Growth Engagement Model GEM". The GEM aims at proactive collaboration with the clients to identify new opportunities, identify most important customers, write "Attack, avoid and defend" strategies, identify sources of incremental revenues for both the company and its competitors. MarketsandMarkets now coming up with 1,500 MicroQuadrants (Positioning top players across leaders, emerging companies, innovators, strategic players) annually in high growth emerging segments. MarketsandMarkets is determined to benefit more than 10,000 companies this year for their revenue planning and help them take their innovations/disruptions early to the market by providing them research ahead of the curve. MarketsandMarkets's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "Knowledgestore" connects over 200,000 markets and entire value chains for deeper understanding of the unmet insights along with market sizing and forecasts of niche markets. Contact: Mr. Sanjay Gupta MarketsandMarkets INC. 630 Dundee Road Suite 430 Northbrook, IL 60062 USA : 1-888-600-6441 sales@marketsandmarkets.com Northbrook, IL -- (SBWIRE) -- 11/17/2021 -- The crane and hoist market size is projected to reach USD 33.0 billion by 2026 from an estimated USD 26.0 billion in 2021, at a CAGR of 4.8% from 2021 to 2026. Significant demand from construction industry, expanding mining industry, increased use in shipping industry are among the factors driving the growth of the crane and hoist market. Mobile cranes segment is projected to register the highest CAGR from 2021 to 2026 The growth of the mobile cranes segment is majorly driven by their features such as high mobility, high traveling speed, and requirement of less time to set them up on construction sites. The use of mobile cranes in the mining, construction, aerospace, shipping & material handling industries has gained popularity, where lifting and lowering activities require extensive displacements of objects, materials, or equipment. Download PDF Brochure: https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownloadNew.asp?id=31538625 Hybrid operations segment is projected to register the highest CAGR from 2021 to 2026 Hybrid-powered cranes are advanced cranes that use both hydraulic and electric power for the operation. These cranes are more efficient and are used for customized solutions. Hybrid cranes are powered using an electrical supply and diesel generators. Some hybrid cranes are equipped with a large battery energy storage system (ESS) to store electricity. The cranes' operation is based on the principle of regenerative power. The energy generated while lowering the load is used to charge ESS and supplied as additional power for lifting and hoisting activities. Hybrid cranes are designed to reduce fuel consumption and operating cost. Construction segment is projected to register the highest CAGR from 2021 to 2026 The construction industry is expected to hold the largest share of the crane market during the forecast period. The construction industry has undergone substantial changes in recent years because of the global recession, which has led to the downsizing of the industry in developed markets. However, the investments regarding construction in most emerging markets have continued to grow at a moderate rate despite the global crisis. Earth-moving equipment is mainly used for construction works such as digging the earth, lifting, loading and unloading weight, and leveling. Applications of cranes in earth-moving equipment include heavy loading, high cycle rating, and accurate movement. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the global construction industry by delayed projects and decreased investments in the infrastructure sector. With the development of vaccination against COVID-19, the real estate and infrastructure projects across the globe are expected to slowly gain pace and lead to the growth of the construction industry. China has already launched the "New Infrastructure" campaign to offset the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. These factors are expected to result in a high growth rate of the crane market for the construction industry. APAC to lead crane and hoist market in 2020 Asia Pacific is the most rapidly growing market and offers high opportunities for the construction industry, which is driven by the growing population. Construction and material handling industries have boomed rapidly and consequently have driven the market for cranes in India, China, and Australia. The growing awareness related to automation and the increasing emphasis of leading economies such as China and Japan on construction and material handling industries are some of the primary factors contributing to the largest market share of APAC. Besides, the rapid growth of the automotive, construction, and aerospace & defense industries in emerging economies, such as China and India, is also supporting the growth of the crane market in APAC. Key Market Players Konecranes (Finland), Liebherr (Germany), Tadano (Japan), Terex (US), Zoomlion (China), Ingersoll Rand (US), Palfinger (Austria), Columbus McKinnon (US), Kito (Japan), Kobelco (Japan), Sumitomo Heavy Industries (Japan), ABUS Kransysteme (Germany) are among a few major players in the crane and hoist market. Berlin, Germany -- (SBWIRE) -- 11/17/2021 -- The International Procurement Instrument was first proposed back in 2012 but it has taken until this year for its intention to be put into effect. Finally, after nine years of negotiating, the ambassadors of 27 member states reached an agreement in June of this year, allowing the International Procurement Instrument to go ahead. This will allow European companies to have access to third countries' procurement markets, in the same way as foreign companies currently have access in Europe. The instrument is basically a trade offensive tool that should provide Europe with some negotiating leverage to ensure that there is reciprocity when it comes to access to procurement markets and to defend European businesses against restrictive and discriminatory practices. The International Procurement Instrument still has a number of hoops to jump through before it can be fully effective, in particular that the European Parliament still has to adopt a position on it. Procurement careers are continuously going through evolution thanks to the impact of technology and digitisation, as well as changing regulatory landscapes. DSJ Global is well placed to provide expert support to talented people in procurement careers looking to take a positive next step towards a brighter future. The firm also has a wealth of expertise in hiring for other connected areas, including supply chain, technical operations and logistics roles. DSJ Global was established in 2008 and now has a nationwide presence that extends to major hubs including Berlin and Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich and Cologne. It is also part of an international workforce of 1,000+ that is a major asset given the global nature of end-to-end supply chain and procurement careers today. A combination of permanent, contract and multi-hire solutions ensures that the firm can cater to every need and it is also well resourced, for example thanks to the database of more than a million mid-to-senior professionals that the firm has built up over the years. DSJ Global isn't just a robust presence in procurement careers in Germany, as the firm's international reach is extensive. This is partly due to bebing the recruitment partner of choice to hundreds of world-leading companies as a member of the Phaidon International group, which operates across six countries. A truly cross-border approach to hiring has been perfected at DSJ Global where the team has always sought to streamline the recruitment process to make it more mutually beneficial and simple for all those involved. The internal team at the firm is a vital asset in this mission. Consultants are trained on an ongoing basis and the firm invests heavily to ensure that all work with best-in-class technology and strategies so that the highest standards can always be maintained. There are currently many different roles available via DSJ Global including Team Leader Production Planning, Senior Warehouse Manager, Supply and Demand Planning Expert and Logistics Director [Automotive]. "Like for many sectors, 2020 marked a defining moment for recruitment. Challenged by uncertainty, but unwavering in our commitment to our clients, we have endured through 2021 with a sense of duty to clients and candidates" commented Matt Wood, Director at DSJ Global. He went onto say, "as we reflect on the challenges of virtually securing and retaining talent, we're inspired by a team who have demonstrated a remarkable ability to adapt and continue to help all our clients secure top talent on a global scale." To find out more about Procurement careers in Germany visit https://www.dsjglobal.de For any media enquiries please contact Gary Elliott at Iconic Digital 020 7100 0726. For all other enquiries please contact DSJ Global DE: +49 30 72 62 11 444. - For more information about DSJ Global services, please go to https://www.dsjglobal.de. - DSJ Global DE is transforming the process of recruitment to make it more agile and adaptable to the challenges that businesses in the logistics and supply chain industry face today. Calcium silicate perovskite (CaSiO 3 ) is arguably the most geochemically important phase in the Earths lower mantle, because it concentrates elements that are incompatible in the upper mantle. No one has ever successfully retrieved this high-pressure compound from the lower mantle before. This is because CaSiO 3 -perovskite is unquenchable, meaning that it cannot retain its structure after being removed from its high-pressure environment. In a new study, U.S. geologists have finally found the first calcium silicate perovskite from Earths lower mantle in a diamond from the Orapa kimberlite pipe in Botswana. Calcium silicate perovskite is among the most geochemically important minerals in the lower mantle, largely because it concentrates elements that are incompatible in the upper mantle, including rare-earth elements and radioactive isotopes that make an important contribution to the heat of Earths mantle, said lead author Dr. Oliver Tschauner from the Department of Geoscience at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and his colleagues. Although theorized for decades, to date, no one has ever successfully retrieved a high-pressure phase silicate from the Earths lower mantle, largely because they cannot retain their mineralogical structure after being removed from a high-pressure, high-temperature environment. The only other high-pressure phase silicate mineral confirmed in nature, bridgmanite, was found inside a highly shocked meteorite. In the new study, the researchers identified and characterized an inclusion of the high-pressure CaSiO 3 -perovskite within a deep-earth diamond using synchrotron X-ray diffraction. The unique diamond was unearthed from Botswanas Orapa mine the worlds largest diamond mine by area in the 1980s. A gem dealer sold the diamond in 1987 to a mineralogist at the California Institute of Technology. For jewelers and buyers, the size, color, and clarity of a diamond all matter, and inclusions those black specks that annoy the jeweler for us, theyre a gift. I think we were very surprised. We didnt expect this, Dr. Tschauner said. The crystalline compound the researchers found was named davemaoite in honor of the prominent experimental high-pressure geophysicist Ho-kwang (Dave) Mao and confirmed as a new mineral by the Commission of New Minerals, Nomenclature, and Classification of the International Mineralogical Association. This honor is a fitting tribute given the profound impact Daves work has had throughout the geosciences, said Dr. Richard Carlson, director of the Earth and Planets Laboratory at the Carnegie Institution for Science. His contributions have shaped our understanding of our world and now a piece of the world will forever bear his name. The structural and chemical analysis of davemaoite showed that it is able to host a wide variety of elements in its structure, including potassium, thorium and uranium three of the major heat-producing elements. The findings support the existence of compositional heterogeneity within the lower mantle and, given the minerals overall abundance, suggest that davemaoite likely influences heat generation in the deep mantle. We believe davemaoite originated between 660 and 901 km (410-560 miles) below the Earths surface, Dr. Tschauner said. The discovery of davemaoite inspires hope for finding other difficult high-pressure mineral phases in nature, said Dr. Yingwei Fei, a researcher in the Earth and Planets Laboratory at the Carnegie Institution for Science. Being able to obtain more direct samples from the inaccessible lower mantle would fill in our knowledge gap regarding the chemical composition and variability of our planets depths. The discovery of davemaoite is described in two papers in the Mineralogical Magazine and the journal Science. _____ Oliver Tschauner et al. 2020. Davemaoite, IMA 2020-012a. Mineralogical Magazine, 84; doi: 10.1180/mgm.2020.93 Seed germination a crucial stage in the development of all plants normally occurs in the soil after the seed has fallen from the mother plant. In some infrequent instances, precocious germination a type of viviparity or vivipary occurs when the seed sprouts while still within the fruit. In a new paper published in the journal Historical Biology, Oregon State Universitys Professor George Poinar Jr. described the first case of precocious germination of a fossil plant involving a number of seeds that have germinated in a pine cone embedded in a piece of 40-million-year-old (Eocene epoch) Baltic amber. Crucial to the development of all plants, seed germination typically occurs in the ground after a seed has fallen, Professor Poinar said. We tend to associate viviparity embryonic development while still inside the parent with animals and forget that it does sometimes occur in plants. Most typically, by far, those occurrences involve angiosperms. Angiosperms, which directly or indirectly provide most of the food people eat, have flowers and produce seeds enclosed in fruit. Seed germination in fruits is fairly common in plants that lack seed dormancy, like tomatoes, peppers and grapefruit, and it happens for a variety of reasons. But its rare in gymnosperms. Precocious germination in pine cones is so rare that only one naturally occurring example of this condition, from 1965, has been described in the scientific literature. Thats part of what makes this discovery so intriguing, even beyond that its the first fossil record of plant viviparity involving seed germination, Professor Poinar said. I find it fascinating that the seeds in this small pine cone could start to germinate inside the cone and the sprouts could grow out so far before they perished in the resin. At the sprouts tips are needle clusters, some in bundles of five, associating the fossil with the extinct pine species Pinus cembrifolia, which was previously described from Baltic amber. According to the scientist, viviparity in plants typically shows up in one of two ways. Precocious germination is the more common of the two, the other being vegetative viviparity, such as when a bulbil emerges directly from the flower head of a parent plant, he said. In the case of seed viviparity in this fossil, the seeds produced embryonic stems that are quite evident in the amber. Whether those stems, known as hypocotyls, appeared before the cone became encased in amber is unclear. However, based on their position, it appears that some growth, if not most, occurred after the pine cone fell into the resin. Research on viviparity in extant gymnosperms suggests the condition could be linked to winter frosts. Light frosts would have been possible if the Baltic amber forest had a humid, warm-temperate environment as has been posited, Professor Poinar said. This is the first fossil record of seed viviparity in plants but this condition probably occurred quite a bit earlier than this Eocene record. Theres no reason why vegetative viviparity couldnt have occurred hundreds of millions of years ago in ancient spore-bearing plants like ferns and lycopods. _____ George Poinar Jr. Precocious germination of a pine cone in Eocene Baltic amber. Historical Biology, published online November 8, 2021; doi: 10.1080/08912963.2021.2001808 Today NZME Limited (NZX: NZM , ASX: NZM) (NZME) will deliver its 2021 strategy update through a virtual Investor Day. The NZME 2021 Investor Day Presentation is attached to this announcement. NZMEs Chairman Barbara Chapman highlights NZMEs significant transformation into a digitally focussed media business, supported by strong brands, platforms, and people. Digital audience and revenue transformation are illustrated across all three of NZMEs strategic pillars Audio, Publishing and OneRoof. Ms Chapman also attributes NZMEs achievements during 2021 to a commitment across the business to its key strategic priorities and to the Boards guiding principles introduced during 2020. These principles are now firmly established, ensuring NZME delivers to the expectations of its customers, and through them to NZMEs shareholders: Customer First Win with Quality Digital Acceleration Audience Expansion Top Performance CEO Michael Boggs outlines how NZMEs focus on its three strategic priorities has supported NZMEs achievements across 2021 including revenue market share growth across all platforms and audience growth to record levels especially across NZMEs digital platforms. NZMEs strategic priorities are: New Zealands Leading Audio Company New Zealands Herald OneRoof Your Complete Property Destination In the presentation NZME executives provide performance and achievement updates across NZMEs Audio, Publishing and OneRoof business units. The presentation also includes the following Outlook Update: Despite the restricted operating environment, 4th Quarter revenues have been encouraging Real Estate markets have shown signs of a positive recovery over recent weeks Our audiences have been at record levels particularly on our digital platforms nzherald.co.nz and iHeartRadio as we Keep Kiwis in the know NZME has been adapting to the economic and operating environment as the Covid-19 restrictions have continued. NZME continues to expect to deliver EBITDA1 in the range of $63m to $67m for the full year 2021 (2020 EBITDA1 of $67.3m) We are engaging with Google and Facebook with regards to them accessing and supporting editorial content Please see the links below for details Digital acceleration delivering on NZME's 2023 strategy NZME Investor Day 2021 Presentation.pdf Source: NZME Limited Comments from our readers No comments yet Add your comment: Your name: Your email: Not displayed to the public Comment: Comments to Sharechat go through an approval process. Comments which are defamatory, abusive or in some way deemed inappropriate will not be approved. It is allowable to use some form of non-de-plume for your name, however we recommend real email addresses are used. Comments from free email addresses such as Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc may not be approved. Anti-spam verification: Type the text you see in the image into the field below. You are asked to do this in order to verify that this enquiry is not being performed by an automated process. Related News: 10th December 2021 Morning Report Ebos Group Limited (NZX: EBO) EBOS Announces Successful Placement Pacific Edge Limited (NZX: PEB) PEB Announces Agreement with Northern Health in Australia AFT Pharmaceuticals Limited (NZX: AFT) AFT welcomes Australian Federal Court appeal success 9th December 2021 Morning Report Ebos Group Limited (NZX: EBO) Acquisition of LifeHealthcare, Equity Raising Livestock Improvement Corporation Limited (NZX: LIC) Special Dividend 8th December 2021 Morning Report New Zealand King Salmon Investments Limited (NZX: NZK) Market Update Scales Corporation Limited (NZX: SCL) Market update A first quarter update was released for Vital Healthcare Property Trust today. The attached report will be sent to unitholders by email and mail over the coming week. Key achievements over the start of FY22 (including October 2021) include: 1. Continued Deployment of 5-Year Portfolio Strategy Vital acquired a Cancer Centre of Excellence in Adelaide known as Tennyson Centre for ~A$93m in mid-October 2021. Tennyson Centre is located between Adelaides Airport and CBD and is ~300m from Ashford Hospital. Tenants are primarily engaged in the identification, assessment and treatment of cancer through oncology, radiotherapy, imaging and consulting with tenants such as ICON Cancer, Genesis Care, Sonic and Nexus Day Hospitals. Also in mid-October, Gold Coast Surgery Centre was sold for ~A$13m (before costs) ~5% above its book value. The sale removes an asset with persistent vacancy from the portfolio. 2. Delivering Value for Unitholders Vitals development of Playford Health Hub in Adelaide has recorded success across all three stages: Stage 1: ~A$22m multi-deck car park and retail suites is due for completion in mid-Nov 2021. The project was anchored via a long-term lease to SA Health for ~50% of the car park with the retail component now substantially pre-leased. Stage 2: ~A$39m Specialist Medical Centre is ~60% pre-leased and design work has significantly progressed. Construction is expected to commence in mid-2022. Stage 3: ~A$50m (plus expected capital contribution from operator in excess of $25m) for 100+ bed private hospital advanced discussions underway. ~NZ$74m of new and extended brownfield developments were approved across five of Evolution Healthcares facilities in New Zealand: Grace Hospital, Tauranga (which Evolution operates in a joint venture with Southern Cross); Royston Hospital, Hastings; Royston Day Surgery Unit, Hastings; stage 2 of Wakefield Hospital, Wellington (stage 1 opened during the quarter); and Bowen Hospital, Wellington. Full details of current developments are included in the attached release. 3. Balance Sheet Strengthened Further A$315m of new debt facilities were secured increasing funds available to support the activities noted previously, diversifying lenders (syndicated banks increased from two to six) and extending weighted average debt term from 2.5 years to 3.9 years (pro forma as at 30 June 2021). NZ$142.8m of new equity capital was raised primarily from existing unitholders via a NZ$115m placement and a NZ$27.8m unit purchase plan with all of Vitals unitholders who opted to participate able to do so at or above pro-rata. The proceeds will support the developments and acquisitions referred to above. FY22 guidance Vital remains on track to achieve FY22 earnings guidance of at least 11.8 cents per unit (at least 2.0% above FY21) and distribution guidance of 9.5 cents per unit (7.0% above FY21). Please see the link below for details Vital First Quarter Update FY22 Source: Vital Healthcare Property Trust Comments from our readers No comments yet Add your comment: Your name: Your email: Not displayed to the public Comment: Comments to Sharechat go through an approval process. Comments which are defamatory, abusive or in some way deemed inappropriate will not be approved. It is allowable to use some form of non-de-plume for your name, however we recommend real email addresses are used. Comments from free email addresses such as Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc may not be approved. Anti-spam verification: Type the text you see in the image into the field below. You are asked to do this in order to verify that this enquiry is not being performed by an automated process. Related News: 10th December 2021 Morning Report Ebos Group Limited (NZX: EBO) EBOS Announces Successful Placement Pacific Edge Limited (NZX: PEB) PEB Announces Agreement with Northern Health in Australia AFT Pharmaceuticals Limited (NZX: AFT) AFT welcomes Australian Federal Court appeal success 9th December 2021 Morning Report Ebos Group Limited (NZX: EBO) Acquisition of LifeHealthcare, Equity Raising Livestock Improvement Corporation Limited (NZX: LIC) Special Dividend 8th December 2021 Morning Report New Zealand King Salmon Investments Limited (NZX: NZK) Market Update Scales Corporation Limited (NZX: SCL) Market update India has managed to upstage China in Maldives but the situation is very fluid due to internal political dynamics and religious extremism by Ashok K Mehta Maldives is the worlds ninth smallest country at 90,000 sq km, geographically dispersed with four lakh people inhabiting 200 of its 1,192 islands, with some used for agriculture and tourism. Its pivotal location in Channel 8 enables command over shipping routes from the Gulfs of Aden and Hormuz to Malacca Straits. Maldives belongs to the Sunni Shafi school wherein Islam is central and laws based on Shariah. It has the dubious distinction of having exported per capita highest numbers of Maldivians to the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria but all are believed to be dead. The ISs front organisation, Idharaa Khidmat-e-Khalq, established a toehold and sleepers might still be there. Its economy is tourism-based, contributing 56 per cent of the GDP. Maldives follows an India First policy since 2018 before it was considered lost to China. Beijing is still heavily invested in Maldives and owns Finalu island, where it is building hotels. Former President Abdullah Yameen had changed the Constitution for this. Maldives signed the first FTA with China and owes it $1.4bn. Beijing is on the lookout for atolls where Chinese expertise in land reclamation adds to space for strategic posts. Chinas String of Pearls was effectively demonstrated in Maldives as was the extension of Maritime Silk Route. It was due to Chinese pressure that Indias GMR contract for building Male airport was cancelled. The contract was given by President Nasheed of Maldivian Democratic Party, which tilts towards India. But China has a strong base among the Opposition parties. Internal developments will determine whether Maldives will be China or India First. While Yameen is in jail for corruption, the main Opposition Progressive Party of Maldives has been taunting MDPs president Solih for selling Maldives to India and started an India Out campaign. The rift between Solih and Nasheed is a power struggle as the latter returned last month from Berlin and London after treatment following a terrorist assassination attempt. Nasheed, who has asked Solih to course correct before it is too late following his pandering to religious extremism, has also been advocating the parliamentary system. Unity within MDP (there were reports of a likely split) will influence the outcome of the September 2023 elections. The Opposition has been attacking the Government for allowing India a consulate in Addu atoll, calling it a possible safehouse for Indian spies. Indias refusal to take back two Dhruv helicopters based in Addu had caused an outcry. Addu is the second largest city with a population of 30,000 and a strategic outpost. Maldivian sensitivities on Indias presence are interpreted as boots on the ground. The decision on Addu Consulate appearing in Indian media first also irked Maldivians. India is building a police training facility and Coast Guard harbour. The Solih Government does not share details of agreements with India, citing national security. The India First policy has led to anti-India rhetoric and even a threat to blast the Indian High Commission. The India-Maldives relations are ancient with ups and downs. Indias Operation Cactus (1988) to prevent PLOTE mercenaries seizing Male, New Delhi being the first responder during tsunami 2004, Indian naval ships providing drinking water during the water crisis of 2014 and ongoing medical and vaccine supplies during the pandemic are some highlights. Nearly 85 per cent of the population is now double-jabbed. India has become the biggest donor with projects worth $800mn being implemented across 34 islands. Total investment is now valued at a significant $1.3bn. The Greater Male Connectivity project is the largest-ever Indian enterprise in Maldives. It consists of a 6.4km bridge and causeway which will connect three populated islands. An air bubble has been created between the countries, involving 60 direct flights from five cities with Indian tourists being maximum and Chinese nearly zero. This has boosted receipts by 104.5 per cent after COVID had contracted the economy by 33.2 per cent. Defence cooperation is central to bilateral relations. Political uncertainty in an environment of religious extremism will likely breed radicalisation. Arms and drugs smuggling, terrorism, piracy and environmental fragility are threats. Besides signing defence protocols with India, Maldives recently committed to the US and Japan for the Maritime Research and Coordination Centre. The India-Maldives-Sri Lanka maritime pact will soon include Mauritius, Seychelles and Bangladesh. Indian Dorniers, Dhruv helicopters and coastal radars are suitably located for surveillance and maritime rescue operations. Maldivian military personnel train in India. Maldives recently hosted the Indo-Pacific Intelligence Conference with US Pacific Command and was attended by 17 countries where Maldivian Chief of Defence Forces, Maj Gen Abdulla Shamal, praised India for providing assistance and expertise to meet military challenges, including non-traditional ones. A Maldivian officer is now posted at the Maritime Fusion Centre in Gurgaon. Interestingly, India has submitted a DPR on the erstwhile British strategic base at Gan island that the Chinese have been eyeing for long. After being edged out by China, India is back in business. But the situation is fluid due to political dynamics and religious extremism. India has to play its cards carefully to maintain its primacy in the face of Maldivian Opposition and Chinese opportunism. (The writer, a retired Major General, was Commander, IPKF South, Sri Lanka, and founder member of the Defence Planning Staff, currently the Integrated Defence Staff. The views expressed are personal.) System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28: 29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:951 /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 129 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 160 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe7170308)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 951 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7238bd0)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe7170308)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1305 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 958 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7238bd0)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe716f858)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1303 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 436 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7238bd0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7238bd0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe685c650)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe71d9428)') called at (eval 487) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe71d9428)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0 System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28:
29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:951 /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 129 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 160 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6d0bce8)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 951 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7138868)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6d0bce8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1305 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 958 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7138868)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6d838d0)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1303 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 436 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7138868)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe7138868)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe682bba0)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe7115a30)') called at (eval 487) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe7115a30)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0 System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28:
29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:951 /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 129 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 160 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe7194e58)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 951 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe71905f8)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe7194e58)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1305 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 958 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe71905f8)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe7190268)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1303 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 436 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe71905f8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe71905f8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe682b480)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe705a790)') called at (eval 487) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe705a790)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0 System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28:
29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:951 /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. Trace begun at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Exceptions.pm line 129 HTML::Mason::Exceptions::rethrow_exception('Can\'t call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25.^J') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 160 HTML::Mason::Component::run_dynamic_sub('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6cfe5c8)', 'main') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 951 HTML::Mason::Request::call_dynamic('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe6c1c118)', 'main') called at /var/cache/mason/obj/1784076917/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj line 17 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6cfe5c8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1305 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 958 HTML::Mason::Request::call_next('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe6c1c118)') called at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html line 149 HTML::Mason::Commands::__ANON__ at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Component.pm line 138 HTML::Mason::Component::run('HTML::Mason::Component::FileBased=HASH(0x7f3fe6d4f9f8)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1303 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 1295 HTML::Mason::Request::comp(undef, undef, undef) called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 484 eval {...} at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm line 436 HTML::Mason::Request::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe6c1c118)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 165 HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler::exec('HTML::Mason::Request::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe6c1c118)') called at /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/ApacheHandler.pm line 831 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handle_request('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler=HASH(0x7f3fe682b5d0)', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe682b180)') called at (eval 487) line 8 HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler::handler('HTML::Mason::ApacheHandler', 'Apache2::RequestRec=SCALAR(0x7f3fe682b180)') called at -e line 0 eval {...} at -e line 0 Karl Meinzer DJ4ZC made DARC honorary member Former AMSAT-DL President Prof. Dr. Karl Meinzer, DJ4ZC, who was first licensed in 1957 aged 17, has been named a new DARC honorary member A translation of the DARC post reads: This was announced by DARC chairman Christian Entsfellner, DL3MBG, at the virtual conference of the amateur council - in replacement of the canceled general meeting - on November 13th. OM Meinzer developed an enthusiasm for amateur radio at a young age. At the age of 17 he obtained his amateur radio license in 1957. He passed the Abitur [educational qualification] along with a degree in physics and graduated with a doctorate. He spent his professional life at the University of Marburg, especially in the development laboratory for electronics until his retirement in 2005. The rooms of the ZEL were also the headquarters of the AMSAT-DL. Numerous OSCAR satellites were created in the laboratories in Marburg: AO-10, AO-13, AO-21, AO-40. Phase 3E is de facto finished, but is still waiting for a suitable start. A special operating system works in all satellites built by AMSAT-DL, on which Meinzer played a key role. Meinzer doesnt skimp on sharing his expertise and so he is still in close contact with the board of AMSAT-DL today. It is not surprising that DJ4ZC was one of the first radio amateurs to work on QO-100. In addition, Prof. Dr. Karl Meinzer carried out further technical radio tests. He was obsessed with testing whether radio signals could be reflected off the planet Venus. In fact, he succeeded in doing this with 5 kW at 2.4 GHz, including a water-cooled magnetron. He had a special permit from the Federal Network Agency [BNetzA] specifically for these experiments. But even in earlier years he achieved amazing things: In 1964 he set a course record of 70 cm between his home town of Iserlohn and Switzerland. And even then he was QRV on 433 MHz EME and contacted Puerto Rico. "He is one of the few old-timers who keeps pace with modern technology," explains Christian Entsfellner, DL3MBG. "There are only three Keplerian laws, everything can be done in them," said Meinzer once, according to DL3MBG. "Unfortunately, he is reluctant to present his skills, but the AMSAT board always likes to refer to his expertise," said the DARC chairman, who later wishes him a happy 82nd birthday. The DARC has unanimously decided to award you honorary membership for your services. I am happy to welcome you as a new honorary member, concluded DL3MBG. DJ4ZC expressed his thanks. My life has always been shaped by amateur radio. Some of the services were only made possible by other people, explains Meinzer. I hope to continue to contribute something for amateur radio and DARC in the future. Unfortunately, communication behavior in society has changed. So it's a challenge for the DARC. However, I have the hope that technology will gain more importance again. Ultimately, amateur radio has to prove that it is useful for society, said Prof. Dr. Meinzer in conclusion. Source DARC https://darc.de/ Radio amateurs assist in rescue of firefighters buried in cave On Sunday, October 31, the State Network of Emergency Radio amateurs REER-SP provided support in the care of the disaster that occurred in Altinopolis / SP A translation of the LABRE post reads: Twenty-eight civilian firefighters were carrying out an exercise in the Two Mouths Cave when part of the cave collapsed, leaving nine deaths among the victims buried. The search and rescue operations were carried out by the Fire Department of SP, with the support of the State Civil Defense. THE REER-SP had important participation providing communication between the Command Post, installed about 800m from the basement, and the rescue area, difficult to access. To overcome this distance, it took between 30 and 40 minutes of narrow trail walking in dense forest. The volunteers of REER-SP involved the work in the early hours of the morning, continuing until 8 pm. The participation of the radio amateurs was effective, providing infrastructure and radio equipment to enable communication between the Operation Command and the rescue teams, who were without contact due to lack of telephone signal or internet. The support of the radio amateurs brought greater agility to the operations, enabling the command to receive and transmit messages directly to the rescue team. We're sorry for the nine fatalities, we offer condolences to the family members. In this operation, these were directly involved: REER SP - Sao Paulo State Radio Amateur Emergency Network. PY2GMG Gilmar de Moura Gaspar (Regional Coordinator of REER-SP), coordination of activities of radio amateurs at the disaster site. PY2ALA Rafael Malagutti Silva, availability and assembly of the local disaster communication structure. PY2PCR Ricardo da Costa Paschoali, transport logistics, provision and assembly of communication structure at the disaster site. PY2VGG Julio Cesar Valera, radio operator on the analogue link digital PY2KAO - PY2KAR - DMR / Zello application / WhatsApp application PU2UMF Mauricio Rogerio Falsarella, in support of the analogue digital link PY2KAO - PY2KAR - DMR / Zello application / WhatsApp application PU2XGA Gabriel Mendes de Castro, for supporting the assembly of the link between the Zello application and the PU2KAO 146.930MHz analog repeater (Altinopolis/SP) PY2BBQ Hilton Telles Libanori - General Coordinator of REER SP and RENER Brazil. PU2YZS Rodrigo Coelho Salvatori - Operations Coordinator REER SP. PY2IV Igor Vicente Munhoz, assistance in TG8 clusters and monitoring of the Brandmeister DMR network. PY2LY Fabio Poli Rosa da Cruz, assistance in TG8 clusters and monitoring of the Brandmeister DMR network. PY2KAR 146.670MHz Repeater - Ribeirao Preto /SP (House of Radio Amateur of Ribeirao Preto). PY2KAO 146.930MHz Repeater Altinopolis/SP (Home of the Amateur Radio of Ribeirao Preto and the maintainers of this repeater). We also have the support of dozens of radio amateurs, who have been supplying the teams with information and technical data. Source LABRE https://IARU-Brazil Sino-Bangladesh relations, started in 1976, were limited to trade deals until the first decade of the 21st century. by Hussain Shazzad Bangladesh, the second highest recipient of Chinas investment in South Asia after Pakistan, imports the highest volume of goods from China making it Bangladesh's largest trading partner. This is the beginning of the story where China offers Bangladesh financial assistance and development experience for its big-ticket megaprojects to fulfill its vision-2041- a well-crafted dream to be a developed country. The overwhelming funding from China makes the critics pessimistic to ask a question, citing the example of Hambantota in Sri Lanka, Is China trying to bait Bangladesh with its debt-trap diplomacy? Debt-Trap Diplomacy, a widely used narrative against China, is thought to be originated from infrastructure war between China and Western Allies. It's an apple of discord if China really has any Machiavellian Strategy as Chinese projects in Bangladesh are too fragmented to achieve such cunning strategic objectives. Once The Sleeping Giant now the Second Economic Superpower, China follows socialist ideology in political affairs but adopts open market policy with the name market socialism. The historical data demonstrates that China always has strong affiliation with South Asian countries because of the regions Big Bazar. The geo-political eminence & commercial noteworthiness of Bangladesh has made China pay special heed to catch this money-making market. To utilize the potential of becoming economic hub of South Asia, Bangladesh needs external funding for its flagship development programs financing of which goes beyond domestic affordability. This leads Bangladesh to look for external funding options with conducive conditions. Bangladeshs loss of substantial financial assistance from global lenders in the recent years e.g., World Banks rejection to finance the Padma Bridge, and the attractive nature of Chinas investment created a gateway for China to step into Bangladesh's economy. On the other hand, China, as a part of its external orientation, comes closer to Bangladesh by affiliating the country with different China-led regional platforms e.g., AIIB, BRI etc. Sino-Bangladesh relations, started in 1976, were limited to trade deals until the first decade of the 21st century. The bilateral relations have experienced two different phases before and after the initiation of the BRI. The cozy relations turned into strategic partnership after 2010 when the countries signed a number of trade, transit and defense procurement agreements. Both countries are working to alleviate the huge trade-deficit by establishing the Free Trade Zones. China is trying to prove itself as Bangladesh's time-tested friend by entwining diplomatic, defense and economic ties. Though China and Bangladesh have distinct political and social status quo but collaborative efforts brought them closer. China's non-intervention principle to the domestic affairs of its partners leads Dhaka to welcome more and more investment from Beijing. As an emerging economy, Bangladesh requires hefty investment to tackle its socio-economic problems which is clinched by China. On the other hand, Bangladesh is all-important in Chinas strategic calculus since it can connect the southeastern landlocked province of China. Besides, the cheap workforce of Bangladesh offers China an opportunity to relocate its sunset industries. Yet, critics give a contentious look on this relationship by denouncing Chinas role in resolving Rohingya crisis. According to the World Bank and IMF, that a country will cross the danger mark if its external debts exceed 40% of GDP ensures Bangladesh is in safe zone as its total foreign loan is less than 15% of GDP. Flow of External Resources into Bangladesh, a publication of the Ministry of Finance, reported total foreign loan outstanding of the country was $4409.51 crore depicting per capita loan is around $278 in 2019-20 fiscal year. This shows clearly how reality begs to differ from the misconception that Bangladesh is overburdened with external debts. Another misreading that Bangladesh is going to be a victim of Chinas debt trap pointing finger to the growing Chinese investment also doesnt reflect the ground reality. Bangladeshs total external debt, in the fiscal year 2019-20, consists of 38% from WB, 24.5% from ADB, 17% from JICA, 6.81% from China, 6.14% from Russia and 1.3% from India. This self-explanatory data shows that Bangladesh is travelling along the right trajectory in contrast to aforementioned misconceptions. The strategic advantage of cross-border trade tilted Bangladesh exponentially towards China which leads critics say that too much reliance on China's money will make the country beholden to China. But Bangladeshs diplomatic maneuvers of the last few decades demonstrate that the country has been striking a fine balance among the donors. By pumping money to Bangladesh, China is actually trying to take the longstanding relations to a new height. Albeit, there is a narrative that Bangladesh is going to be a victim of 'payday loan diplomacy, but the counter narrative explains how Chinese soft-loan reduces the pressure of western donors for economic and political reforms. Bangladesh perceives Chinese investment as a welcome addition to existing sources along with creating a competitive environment. Before reaching to foregone conclusion by tagging China's debt trap with Bangladesh, it needs to be kept in mind that the funding options for Bangladesh are very limited. Besides, a loan becomes burden if it is not optimally utilized. To date, all the Chinese-funded projects in Bangladesh have been proved to be financially viable. There is no such instance where Bangladesh has accepted all the diktats, while signing financial agreement, blindfolded. The current stronger position of Bangladesh, in terms of external debt from China, will alter with the rise of Chinese investment, but long-run return will be more attractive if funds are effectively utilized. Bangladesh needs to negotiate carefully before inking any financial agreement, focus more on soft-loan and ensure timely implementation of projects. Along with taking funds for infrastructural boost, Bangladesh may also leverage the development experience of China to create win-win situation. Not to mention, the macro-economic management policy of Bangladesh is prudent enough to avoid Chinas Debt-Trap, even if there is any. Writer's Bio: Hussain Shazzad, a strategic affairs and foreign policy analyst, completed his M.B.A from the Department of International Business, University of Dhaka. He can be reached at pksf.shazzad@gmail.com By Libby Eggert eggertli@grinnell.edu Dr. Tamara Beauboeuf and Feven Getachew `24 spent the summer organizing the rededication of Smith Gallery to properly recognize its namesake and the first Black woman to graduate from Grinnell College, Mrs. Edith Renfrow Smith. Beauboeuf and Getachew wanted to reconcile the lacking recognition from the College to the pioneer, who is still alive at age 107. Beauboeuf said, The institution [Grinnell College] has neglected this woman for much of its history. Feven and I were trying to correct that a little bit. But I dont think this should be the end of attempts to recognize her. Gretachew was in Beauboeufs tutorial last year, Beyond the Little Mermaid. Getachew reached out to Beauboeuf with the idea of doing something for Mrs. Smith when Getachew stayed on campus over the summer. After researching and learning more about Mrs. Smith, Beauboeuf and Getachew got in contact with Professor Emeritus Dan Kaiser, history, who wrote the book Grinnell Stories: African Americans of Early Grinnell, which includes stories of Mrs. Smith. He connected them to her, Alice Frances Smith. Beauboeuf and Getachew traveled to Chicago in the summer of 2021 to meet Mrs. Smith, where she lives now. There are no good words. You know, the word remarkable is useful, but it doesnt get to it, said Beauboeuf about first meeting Mrs. Smith. I felt honored. I felt empowered, inspired, disappointed, disappointed that I didnt know about her [Mrs. Smith] before I came, said Getachew. On Thursday, Oct. 28, there was a ceremony in the Smith Gallery attended by Mrs. Smith and her family to formally rededicate the space. The gallery was filled with photos discovered by Getachew during the summer spent researching with Beauboeuf. My idea was to be able to make the exhibition as wholesome as possible and represent different points in her life at different times, said Getachew, who chose the photos to highlight in the exhibit. The exhibit ran from Thursday, Oct. 28, until Nov. 6. There were photos of Mrs. Smiths family, her high school years, her life in Grinnell and her life in Chicago where she now resides. During the event on Thursday, Beaubeouf opened the ceremony. Getachew spoke about designing the exhibit, meeting Mrs. Smith and why she embodies the idea of A True Grinnellian, referencing the title of the exhibit. President Anne Harris officially rededicated the space. Finally, Mrs. Smith spoke and expressed her gratitude, saying it was one of the most beautiful tributes she had ever received. The rededication revealed a new plaque on the wall outside the gallery describing the life and legacy of Mrs. Smith, which replaced the former plaque that read The Smith Gallery, so future students can learn and understand who Mrs. Smith is and celebrate her life. The rededication was both of us working together to say, can we understand the namesake for the space because everyone refers to that gallery as the Smith Gallery and may assume all sorts of people, none of whom were Edith Renfrow Smith, said Beauboeuf. Mrs. Smiths grandparents were born into enslavement. She was born to Eva Craig and Lee Renfrow in Grinnell. Mrs. Smith graduated from Grinnell College in 1937 with a major in psychology and a minor in economics. She was the only Black student at Grinnell during her four years on campus and no Black students attended the school for 10 years after she graduated. Getachew described how Mrs. Smiths time at Grinnell College as the only Black person on campus demonstrated her perseverance. I cant imagine graduating and being a pioneer, it takes a lot of labor. You know, it takes a lot of active choice to love a place that really is saying that theyre not fit for you, said Getachew. Beaubeouf and Getachew reported having no difficulty receiving approval for the exhibit. The Department of Humanities provided funding for the project, and the Art Department helped set up use of the gallery, which they operate. Getachew found most of the pieces from Mrs. Smiths family members, and from Grinnells Digital Archives. She also had help from Drake Community Library and Justin Hayward in finding and displaying the photographs. Mrs. Smith also met with other parts of the community during her visit, such as the middle school, high school and community members in town. I felt really strongly that that needed to happen because shes never had the opportunity to speak as one Grinnellian to another Grinnellian, said Beauboeuf. Beauboeuf said the failure of the college to recognize Mrs. Smith means there are other firsts we could be ignoring or missing history on. What is the actual history of including Black students, Black and brown students, indigenous students, different international groups of students? I would hope our students start to get curious about and do research to find who they are. Mrs. Smith is my hero, said Getachew. I believe she is an embodiment of the core values Grinnellians have in my opinion, and I aspire to be a Grinnellian like her. By Eleanor Corbin corbinel@grinnell.edu With three challengers winning over the incumbent candidates, the Grinnell-Newburg School Board has undergone drastic turnover. Tyler Harter was elected as School Board chair and Chris Starrett and Roger Belcher were elected as Grinnell School Boards newest at-large directors. Starrett and Belcher gained publicity for their positions against mask mandates and the Culturally Responsive Scorecard in Grinnell schools. The close results have reminded members of the College community how important their vote is. Nat Jordan `21, co-chair of the campus Democrats, worked to encourage Grinnell students to vote in the days approaching November 2. He saw a clear distinction between the candidates running, and the possible implications that could have on the local community. Local politics are crucial, he said, and I think, unfortunately, a lot of students failed to realize that. Seeing that two of the challengers were running on only a couple of issues, like mask mandates and critical race theory, Jordan worries about their capability to effectively serve on a school board. These worries intensified after he watched the League of Women Voters forum with the candidates. I thought it was pretty concerning that there was a question asked about budgeting and they [Starret and Belcher] basically both said oh I know nothing about budgeting, he said, and thats the number one job of a school board. The close margins of the election solidify Jordans stance that student involvement is more important than ever, with only 39 votes deciding a victory for Tyler Harter over Helen Redmond. Essentially, Grinnell students alone could have changed the results. Going forward, Jordan hopes to continue to encourage students to vote in local elections, and deeply believes that students do have a role in shaping the Grinnell local community. He argues that Grinnell is a students home for four or five years and that professors and staff make decisions on where to work based on factors like local politics and quality of the school district. He also hopes that the administration will play a larger role in making the voting process easier for students. There is a dearth of voting information on the [Grinnell College] website, he said, which is startling. If you look up basically any other peer institution, they will have voting information on their website. Ross Haenfler, beyond being the department chair of sociology, is a parent to a 3rd grader and 7th grader attending Grinnell local public schools. As such, he is directly affected by the outcome of the schoolboard elections. While he does not think that there will be immediate radical changes within Grinnell schools as a result of the elections, he does fear for the way the new directors could affect how the School Board is conducted. It could make School Board meetings, which are typically non-partisan, more contentious, he said. Similar to Jordan, Haenfler also feels that the two-issue nature of these candidates could affect their actual ability to serve on a School Board. It [Starrett and Belchers victory] could embolden other challengers that Im not sure have the best sense of what the School Board does in terms of budgets and oversights and are really just honing in on some of these hot-button cultural issues, he said. That being said, while he will continue to stay informed politically and financially contribute toward candidates that he supports, Haenfler also recognizes the importance of staying engaged with those he may not agree with. According to Haenfler, the issues that became hot button topics in the Grinnell election is part of a larger national pattern. I try to strike a balance between holding people in my community accountable, and at the same time knowing that its bigger than us, he said. This was a manifestation of a broader pattern: this sense of frustration and anger and backlash. Belcher and Starrett both did not respond to requests for comment on this article. By Lilli Morrish morrishl@grinnell.edu Multicultural organizations from across campus convened to introduce a funding change proposal specific to groups of the MLC (Multicultural Leadership Council) at a Student Government Association (SGA) senate session on Nov. 7. The member groups proposing the change in funding allotment are the South Asian Student Organization (SASO), the Chinese Student Association (CSA), Grinnell QuestBridge Scholars, the International Student Association (ISO), Concerned Black Students (CBS), the Asian American Association (AAA), the Japanese Cultural Association (JCA) and the Student Organization of Latinxs (SOL). The proposed budget change is to have a portion of the Interim Allocation Committee (IAC) budget that is, the budget that funds events in the period between the start of the school year and the development of the Senate reserved every year for MLC member organizations so that they can proceed with programming and events early in the semester, regardless of the state of SGA or Senate. The groups proposal comes out of some organizations inability to secure timely funding for events earlier in the current semester. Budgets over $1,000 need approval from the Senate, but this semester, the Senate was not formed until October, leaving the IACs budget to cover five weeks of programming in the interim when it was only meant to cover two. This led to one of the major impetuses for the creation of the budget proposal, which was the CSAs struggle to get funding for their Mid-Autumn Festival event. The reserved amount would be determined and approved at the end of the previous school year. This change would allow MLC member organizations to bypass IAC approval for student welcome programming, which student representatives at the Senate meeting emphasized as critical to marginalized students sense of safety and community at a predominantly white institution like Grinnell. It [MLC welcome programming] helps to know who we can bond with, said ISO treasurer Evaan Ahmed `23. Who are the upperclassmen who have been through the difficulties we have faced, you know? Who have learned the reality the hard way so that we dont have to do that. In addition to funding welcome programming, this reserved interim budget would ensure that MLC member organizations have access to the funds they need to host date-specific cultural events that take place earlier in the semester. One example of the need for this interim funding came with the delay of the CSAs Mid-Autumn Festival event this year. The Mid-Autumn Festival is one of the most significant Chinese holidays and takes place on the 15th day of the 8th month of the Chinese lunar calendar, which this year fell on Sept. 21. We first applied for funding about early September, around Sept. 1 or Sept. 2. It wasnt until early October that we received our funding, said CSA president James Chen `24. Its caused us to celebrate our Mid-Autumn Festival a month later than the actual right date, said Chen. Its like celebrating Christmas in late January or something. Representatives from SASO said that they were worried the same delays would affect the organizations Diwali funding, but ultimately the Senate was formed in time for them to get funding. Several representatives from other organizations also expressed that they had not been reimbursed for past event expenses, with one student saying that they had not been reimbursed for an event as far back as March 2021 under last years SGA administration. Regarding what shes looking for out of this proposal, incoming ISO treasurer Jivyaa Vaidya `23 said she wants a mutually acceptable solution that works for all of us and doesnt put undue pressure on both the multicultural organizations and SGA. Many SGA members and Senators seemed in favor of exploring the proposal further, with SGA President Fernando Rodriguez `22 saying to the groups present, I completely support this and Im also so, so sorry. For the budget change to become a reality, the proposal will need to go to the Financial Committee and then the Reform Committee, where, if approved, the SGA Constitution and By-Laws will be revised to include it. A vote of Senate endorsement for the proposal to be passed on to the SGA Financial Committee resulted in 14 senators voting in support, none voting against, and two senators voting to abstain. Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro said the depth of the Bahraini-Brazilian relations and their strength and development, and pointed out that they are destined for further growth in various areas and at different levels. President Bolsonaro said he was pleased and honoured to be the first Brazilian president to visit Bahrain, reported Bahrain News Agency (BNA). After the opening of the Brazilian embassy in Bahrain, we look forward to strengthening cooperation on multiple levels, especially in light of the common base shared by the two countries, President Bolsonaro said in a speech at the King Hamad Global centre for Peaceful Existence. His Highness Deputy Prime Minister Shaikh Mohammed bin Mubarak Al Khalifa, Shura Chairman Ali bin Saleh Al Saleh, Minister of Justice, Islamic Affairs and Endowments Shaikh Khalid bin Ali Al Khalifa. Minister of Foreign Affairs Dr Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani, , Chairman of King Hamad Global Center for Peaceful Coexistence Dr. Shaikh Khalid bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, senior officials and guests attended the event. In 2020, the King Hamad Global Center for Peaceful Coexistence chose Brazil to announce the Memorandum of Understanding for South American countries, and the opening of the Brazilian embassy will strengthen the prospects of cooperation and partnership between Brazil and Bahrain, President Bolsonaro said. During my visit to the Kingdom, a number of agreements were signed, including the agreement on peaceful coexistence and freedom. religious and human rights, he added. The president valued his visit to the Kingdom and commended the delegation accompanying him and all the officials who contributed to the success of the visit. "We are peoples who seek to promote peaceful coexistence and harmony among all segments of society and its components. Perhaps this is one of the most important things that Brazil and Bahrain share together. The near future will witness more features of cooperation between the two countries, and we welcome everything that would deepen cooperation and participation for the benefit of the two friendly countries, he said. Deputy Chair of the Centre Betsy Mathieson said it was an honour to welcome President Bolsonaro to Bahrain. We thank you Mr. President for the heartfelt speech you made during our National Day Celebrations held in Brasilia and the beautiful tribute you paid to His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and the People of Bahrain, when the Statue of Christ The Redeemer was bathed in the National Flag of The Kingdom of Bahrain whilst our National Anthem was being played, she said in her remarks. His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and His Excellency President Jair Bolsonaro are two inspiring leaders and that is why Brazil feels like home to Bahrainis and we are thrilled to welcome our Brazilian brothers and sisters to their second home, the Kingdom of Bahrain. The official opening of the o Brazilian embassy in Manama and the signing of several important accords between our countries are very welcome beginnings, she concluded. Malaysia is showcasing the country's extensive capabilities in managing a global halal ecosystem and simultaneously, attract global players to use the country as a viable hub at Expo 2020 Dubai. For this the Halal Development Corporation Berhad (HDC) and the Malaysia External Trade and Development Corporation (Matrade) are hosting the Halal Cluster Week from November 15 to 20, 2021 at the Malaysia Pavilion. At the Halal Cluster Week, HDC is organising daily thought leadership and pocket talks sessions, networking engagements and business meeting sessions throughout the five-day business mission to drive investor interest, raise awareness and initiate potential partnerships and collaborations. HDC also announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) exchange between HDC and the Chartered Institute Logistics and Transport (CILT) International, which will culminate in the development of the Halal Supply Chain Management System (HSCMS). "The Halal Cluster Week in Dubai is an opportunity for us to increase global awareness of Malaysia's capabilities in halal production and promotion, be it for halal funding with Islamic finance, or for halal integrity and traceability in the logistic industry which is today one of the key sectors that is ripe for further development and investment," said HDC's CEO Hairol Ariffein Sahari, during the launch of Halal Cluster Week. Matrade will be hosting its Halal Business Showcase, featuring business meetings and business matching sessions via the Export Acceleration Mission (EAM) on Digital Halal Ecosystem, where a total of 19 Malaysian halal-certified and export-ready companies to be physically showcasing and offering various halal products and services for the global marketplace. UAE is a key economic partner for Malaysia and has consistently been Malaysia's major trading partner in the West Asia region. In 2020, amongst the West Asia countries, UAE has been Malaysia's largest trading partner, largest export destination and second largest import source. From the first eight months of 2021, Malaysias total trade with UAE was valued at RM13.97 billion ($3.39 billion), increasing 8.6% as compared to the corresponding period last year. Malaysia's total exports was valued at RM6.44 billion (1.56 billion) increasing by 17.8% while total imports similarly increasing by 1.8% to RM7.53 billion ($1.83 billion). Malaysia will conclude its partnership with key trading partners through knowledge sharing, logistics and supply chain connectivity and market expansion through digital platform. These include HDC's partnership with the African Institute of Islamic Finance (AIIF), Halal Supply Chain & Logistics training sessions and Malaysia's Halal Digital platform showcase that features the Halal Integrated Platform (HIP) and Digital Augmented Reality Showcase (Dash). On Islamic Finance, the launch of the Financial Assistance Facility Fund by Standard Chartered Saadiq, in collaboration with HDC is expected to benefit both Malaysian companies expanding overseas and foreign companies planning to establish commercial presence in Malaysia's Halal Industrial Parks.-- TradeArabia News Service Islamic finance industry is projected to reach $4.94 trillion in 2025 according to the Islamic Finance Development Indicator (IFDI) 2021 released by Refinitiv, a London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) business. The report highlighted new trends this year, including the expansion of the fintech industry and digital banks led by Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the UAE. The Southeast Asian nations Malaysia and Indonesia retained their top rankings for the second year in a row. According to the report, global assets for the industry maintained double-digit growth, rising 14% to $3.374 trillion in 2020. Sukuks, the second-biggest sector in Islamic finance, grew by 16% in 2020 driven by the GCC and Southeast Asia. The report indicated that Saudi Arabia's Islamic finance assets soared by 18% in 2020 to $826 billion. With developments in governance as well as its leading position on the corporate social responsibility (CSR) indicator, Saudi Arabias IFDI score rose from 64 in 2019 to 74 in 2020, pushing it from fifth into third place behind Malaysia and Indonesia. Ventje Rahardjo, Executive Director of National Committee for Islamic Economy and Finance (KNEKS), Indonesia, said: Indonesia successfully maintained its second place on the IFDI 2021. The country managed to get higher scores in most indicators mainly education, research, awareness and government support. We will continue growing the Islamic financial industry as part of our strategy to strengthen our national economic resilience." The Islamic finance industry will contribute to the implementation of the Saudi Economic Vision 2030. We believe that this industry provides substantial support to the growth and sustainability of the private sector in Saudi and across global markets, said Ahmed Mohmmed Asery, Director of Islamic Finance Division, Saudi Central Bank. Nor Shamsiah Mohd Yunus, Governor of Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM), said: One of the key drivers of Malaysia Islamic finance development is the adoption of the Value-based Intermediation (VBI) by Malaysian Islamic banks since 2017 and more recently by the Takaful operators. We believe that Islamic financial institutions will leverage on this experience and continue to roll out sustainability initiatives." The Islamic finance industry continues to attract new players and evolve its products and services to become a more active participant in the world's march towards achieving climate goals, said Mustafa Adil, Head of Islamic Finance, Refinitiv, a London Stock Exchange Group business. The key Islamic finance jurisdictions are focused on sustainability and environment, social and governance (ESG) policies. Looking back at 2020, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia were notable actors as they leveraged Sukuks to finance social and green projects, he added. Moving forward, we expect to see more developments as the central banks of Malaysia and Saudi Arabia award their first digital banking licenses. Islamic fintechs coming out of the UK and USA also continue to attract attention and we expect to see newer entrants from Pakistan and Central Asia, Adil noted. The report derives its analysis from the Islamic Finance Development Indicator (IFDI) based on statistics from 135 countries around the world. As a barometer of the state of the global Islamic finance industry, the report measures country scores across knowledge, governance, corporate social responsibility, and awareness metrics. TradeArabia News Service Bahrain-based Axa Gulf, recently acquired by GIG (Gulf Insurance Group), has formed a new board of directors, bringing together a diverse range of skills and expertise along with a wealth of experience in the insurance profession. The new board, approved by the Central Bank of Bahrain, is led by Jamal Al Hazeem as Chairman, Khalid Saud Al Hassan as Vice Chairman and Paul Adamson, Bijan Khosrowshahi, Jean Cloutier, Farid Saber, and Osama Kishk, as members of the Board of Directors. Commenting on his appointment, Axa Gulf Chairman, Jamal Al Hazeem, said: Axa Gulf has enjoyed a presence in the region for more than 70 years. I look forward to building on these solid foundations and establishing Axa Gulf as Menas largest and most successful insurer. The prospect of collaborating with a new board of directors to help create the next chapter in the Axa Gulf story excites me, and their experience, insight and knowledge will be invaluable in ensuring we achieve our strategic goals. Axa Gulf Vice-Chairman, Khaled Saoud Al Hasan, said: The new board is expected to usher in a new future for the company and play a pivotal role in helping shape the strategy and direction of the insurer following its acquisition by GIG in September. The Gulf Insurance Group will support Axa Gulfs operations in all the markets of its presence in order to achieve the best services for customers and partners. Paul Adamson, CEO of Axa Gulf and one of the new board members, said: Axa Gulf serves the needs of over 1 million customers across UAE, Oman, Bahrain and Qatar, offering a wide range of insurance products and services for corporates, SME and individual customers. With the GIG acquisition behind us, we are working hard to improve our products and services, enhance our digital capabilities, and expand our support for the local businesses and communities we serve under the strategic direction of the new board of directors." TradeArabia News Service UAE and Bahrain ministers discussed ways to enhance prospects for cooperation in the space sector as well as the latest developments in joint space projects in their meeting today during the Dubai Airshow 2021. The meeting took place between Sarah bint Yousef Al Amiri, UAE Minister of State for Advanced Technology and Chairwoman of the UAE Space Agency, discussed with Kamal bin Ahmed Mohammed, Minister of Transportation and Communications and Chairman of the National Space Science Agency in Bahrain. Sarah bint Yousef Al Amiri said: The UAE cherishes the longstanding ties with the Kingdom of Bahrain. Under the guidance and support of the leadership, The UAE Space Agency gives special importance to strengthening constructive cooperation and exchanging experiences and knowledge with the National Space Science Agency in Bahrain. We are pleased to see the remarkable development in bilateral relation between the two agencies. The meeting also covered the UAE Space Agencys participation in the upcoming Bahrain International Airshow to be held late next year. The two parties also signed a letter of intent expressing the UAE Space Agencys interest to participate in the event, marking a reflection of the distinguished partnership between the UAE Space Agency and the National Space Science Agency in Bahrain. She added that the constructive cooperation between the UAE and Bahrain is moving forward in order to achieve the ambitions and plans of the two countries in the space sector, while joint projects, led by the Light-1nanosatellite, are witnessing rapid developments that confirm the determination of the two countries to raise their cooperation to new heights. Kamal bin Ahmed Mohammed said: We are focused on supporting and strengthening the deep, special and longstanding ties between Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. Space, science and technology have a profound impact on our daily lives and both nations are determined to enhance collaboration and leverage the social and economic benefits these knowledge-based industries offer. It was a pleasure to speak to Her Excellency Sarah Bint Yousef Al Amiri today to discuss the latest progress on our joint nanosatellite Light-1 project as well explore ways we can contribute to the growth of our respective space industries in the future. During the meeting, several topics were discussed, most notably the latest Light-1 nanosatellite developments. Built and designed in collaboration between Khalifa University, New York University Abu Dhabi, NSSA and UAE space agency. The nanosatellite will monitor and study terrestrial gamma ray flashes (TGFs). It is scheduled to launch on board SpaceXs Falcon 9 rocket which will travel to the International Space Station in December 2021. The meeting also dealt with the most prominent developments in the national space sector in countries, as well as the latest future plans, initiatives and upcoming projects. The two parties also reviewed a number of aspects of cooperation between them in accordance with the previously concluded memorandums of understanding, praising the distinguished role of the Khalifa University of Science, Technology and Research in training of members from Bahrains National Space Science Agency. It has served to upskill them on space technologies and involving them in the implementation of several projects, which contributed to their qualification and experience in the space sector. TradeArabia News Service The Israel National Cyber Directorate, which is responsible for all aspects of cyber defence in the civilian sphere, led an international drill on November 16, in Dubai, simulating a multinational cyber attack on the aviation industry. The event was held in the Israeli Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai, in partnership with the Cybersecurity Council of the UAE. Yigal Unna, Director General of the Israel National Cyber Directorate, and Dr. Mohammed Al-Kuwaiti, Managing Director of the National Data Centre, were in attendance. Participating in the event were representatives from airports, airlines, aircraft manufacturers, civilian aviation authorities, cyber authorities and cybersecurity companies from countries including Israel, the United States, Germany, Greece, Morocco, Bahrain and the UAE, according to a statement from the Cyber Directorate. This was the first time that representatives from a number of countries gathered to simulate a cyber attack of this kind and worked together on how to handle it. According to Tamir Goren, Director of Special Technologies in the Technology Unit of the Israel National Cyber Directorate and a former pilot, "International organisation and collaboration on this issue is necessary, as over the past decade, we have seen an upswing in the number of attempted attacks on the aviation sector around the world at different levels of sophistication. "Aviation has become more digitally advanced, and communications between various threats has significantly increased the possibility of attacks. There have not yet been any attacks that have damaged aviation safety, nevertheless, the aviation sector and cyber authorities are intensifying efforts in this field in order to ensure the continued safety of aviation and functional continuity. "The Israel National Cyber Directorate and the Civil Aviation Authority are leading these efforts in Israel."-TradeArabia News Service Afghanistan urges US to unfreeze its central bank assets Kabul, Nov 17 (UNI) Afghanistan's Interim Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi in a letter to the US Congress has urged for the release of its central bank assets that were frozen by the American government. TOLOnews quoted the minister as saying that following the signing of the Doha Agreement, the Islamic Emirate and the US is no longer neither in direct conflict or in military opposition. It is quite surprising that with the announcement of the new government, the administration of the United States of America slapped sanctions on the assets of our Central Bank. This goes against our expectations as well as the Doha Agreement, the letter reads. New Delhi, Nov 17 (UNI) The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on Wednesday approved a project to provide mobile connectivity to over 7,000 villages in 'Aspirational Districts' across five States - Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Odisha. The Cabinet also gave its approval to the proposals for continuation of Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana-I and II upto September 2022 for completion of balance road and bridge works. The Project envisages to provide 4G based mobile services in the 7,287 uncovered villages of 44 Aspirational Districts across the five States at an estimated cost about Rs 6,466 crore including operational expenses for five years. The project would be funded by Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF). The project will be completed within 18 months after the signing of the Agreement and likely to be completed by November 23. The work related to provision of 4G mobile services in identified uncovered villages will be awarded through open competitive bidding process as per extant USOF procedures, an official statement said. The CCEA also approved continuation of Road Connectivity Project for Left Wing Extremism Affected Areas (RCPLWEA) upto March 2023. "The present proposal for provisioning of mobile services in the remote and difficult uncovered areas of Aspirational Districts across five States will enhance digital connectivity useful for self-reliance, facilitate learning, dissemination of information and knowledge, skill upgradation and development, disaster management, e-Governance initiatives, establishment of enterprises and e-commerce facilities, provision of adequate support to educational institutes for knowledge sharing and availability of job opportunity and fulfilling the vision of Digital India promoting domestic manufacturing and fulfilling the objectives of Atmanirbhar Bharat," said the statement. On the extension given to projects under the PM Gram Sadak Yojana, an official statement said najority of pending works under PMGSY-I and II are in the North-East and Hill States due to factors such as COVID lockdown, extended rains, winters, forest issues. The States have been requesting the Central Government for extension of time to complete these crucial works related to rural economy. Extension of time upto September, 2022 is being granted to help these states to complete the balance works. Construction of 32,152 km roads to connect far-flung areas would be undertaken. Roads would be built in villages in LWE districts, and the tribal areas across the country. These projects would cost Rs. 33,822 crore. Center would spend Rs. 22,978 crore. UNI AO SHK1722 Jhansi, Nov 17 (UNI) Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday called for achieving "strategic" freedom through promoting indigenous defence manufacturing, as he paid tribute to Rani Lakshmibai and highlighted the increasing participation of women in defence forces on the first day of a three day defence festival being held here. The Defence Minister, speaking at the Rashtra Raksha Samarpan Parv which culminates on Rani Lakshmibai's birth anniversary on November 19, said the queen of Jhansi, a hero of the first war of independence of 1857, rejuvenated "woman power" in the country and is an inspiration for all. "The courage of Rani Lakshmibai rejuvenated woman power. Being a woman was never a barrier for her in the battlefield. Many in our society believe women are weak, but they should remember heroes like Rani Lakshmibai, Jhalkaribai, Avantibai. They proved women can play a decisive role in security," the Defence Minister said. "Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose also had a Rani Lakshmibai regiment in the INA. Unfortunately after independence, women did not get to play a role in national security, but now the situation is changing fast," the minister said. He said since PM Narendra Modi has taken charge, women's participation is increasing in all forces. "When I was the Home Minister I had issued an advisory to have at least 33 per cent women in police. Number of women in paramilitary forces increased after this advisory was issued. I am also happy to say the number of women is increasing in the police forces as well. Doors of the three forces are also being opened for women," he said. "Now doors of NDA are also open for women, this is the true tribute to Rani Lakshmibai. In the recent exam of NDA, over two lakh girls gave the exam across the country," he said. He also said that women are also being granted permanent commission. The Minister pushed for indigenous defence production. He said the meaning of independence has changed over years, and quoted Mahatma Gandhi saying freedom cannot be complete without 'swadeshi'. "At one point 'independence' was about freedom from a foreign nation... The meaning today is that we have to be 'atmanirbhar'. Just as India got political independence, we now need to get 'strategic' independence and within a decade half, all weapons that have been imported so far will be manufactured in India. We want 'strategic independence' so we have adapted the path of Swadeshi," he said. "Respectable Bapu had the view that independence does not mean freedom on paper. As long as 'purna swaraj' and 'swadeshi' are not achieved, independence is incomplete," the minister added. He also said that ensuring national security is a big challenge which cannot be met without enhancing indigenous defence production. "As an independent country, securing our independence, sovereignty and unity is a challenging responsibility. Having a strong armed force is important, but it is also important to have a self reliant defence industry to fulfill all needs of the forces. We have decided the weapon and platforms used by Indian forces, there are 209 items that were being imported, but would be made in India now," he said. The three day festival being held in Jhansi will see launch of 100 new Sainik Schools, schemes and programs for NCC, laying of foundation stone of a Rs 400-crore project in the Uttar Pradesh Defence Corridor. PM Modi will address and launch several projects on Friday. He will also handover to the Indian Air Force the Light Combat Helicopter, designed and developed by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). UNI AO SHK1745 New Delhi, Nov 17 (UNI) India did not introduce the term phase down of coal in lieu of phase out in the final COP26 text, but it was a compromise text agreed to by all countries, and Indias Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav was asked to read out the amended text by the COP26 chair, and countries are now pointing to India as the fall guy for that, said sources. India is planning to officially protest the criticism levelled at it by COP26 chair Alok Sharma over inclusion of the term phase down for coal used in the final COP26 declaration text, sources said. COP26 chair Sharma has said that China and India will have to explain themselves to climate-vulnerable nations over the change from "phase out" to "phase down" in the deal agreed to in Glasgow. The chair Alok Sharma chose to ask one of the members, in this case Indias Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav, to read out the compromise text. And our minister was quite clear when he read it out that this is not Indias national position, and that this is what everybody had agreed to, but it got drowned out in the din of it, said sources in the know of the deliberations at the Glasgow climate summit. The compromise text by everyone there was articulated by our minister. India did not ask for phase down to be introduced; it was a proposal that came to us, and we agreed to the final text. We were trying to achieve a consensus, to find a language that would ensure an outcome for the COP26, the sources added. In fact, the sources said, the term phase down is part of the US-China Joint Glasgow Declaration issued on November 10, which says China will phase down coal consumption during the 15th Five Year Plan, which the climate negotiators used in the final text. On the issue of phasing out of coal and fossil fuel subsidies, the sources emphasized that India is dependent on coal for its energy needs. We do have concerns regarding coal, but you cant tell us to shut down our main energy source. Countries (developed ones) that are done with using coal are now using natural gas, and oil, which too are fossil fuels, the sources pointed out. If you (developed countries) tell us phase out coal, phase out fossil fuels, we have a problem with that. We are dependent on coal. We will have to enhance the goals, we dont have an immediate solution to it. On subsidies, the sources said the government is providing LPG subsidy to help people move away from biomass, to help them have a basic subsistence level. And to compare that with 20 times the level of usage that is happening in developed countries (using gas and oil) is unfair, the source added. The LPG subsidy is helping people move away from biomass to cleaner fuel, but developed countries want India to phase it out without targeted support, the sources said. India is okay with removing fossil fuels, but there needs to be equity in that. Indias energy requirement is going to go up in per capita basis and aggregate basis, but developed countries are picking and choosing what they want to phase out. For coal they say phase it out, but for other fossil fuels, like gas and oil, they say yes, because they are using it en-mass. India said that if the final text has to include the term phase out then it should be subject to the inclusion of phrases like National circumstances, poor and vulnerable. That was the kind of language we wanted to put in. According to the sources Whenever there are disagreements over text, they go back to the last agreed text, and in this case it was the US and Chinas Glasgow Declaration, which used phase down. So phase down came out of that. But the Small Island Developing States wanted phase out for the inefficient fossil fuel subsidy, and we were okay with that. So it was not Indias proposal, but it was a way to close the COP26 after one day of delay, the sources said. But towards the end it turned out to be a blame India game". India had mentioned its concerns about phasing out coal right through the deliberations, the sources said. UNI/RN New Delhi, Nov 17 (UNI) The Supreme Court on Wednesday reconstituted the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the Lakhimpur Kheri violence. A three-Judge bench of the Apex Court, headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana and also comprising Justices Hima Kohli and Surya Kant, passed the order for reconstitution of SIT, which will comprise of three senior IPS officers, namely SB Shirodkar, Deepinder Singh and Padmaja Chauhan. The top court of the country had heard the arguments from the petitioner, respondent and from the Uttar Pradesh government in the case. The Court said it will hear the case next after the charge sheet is filed and a report is received from the retired judge. The apex court also in its order appointed Rakesh Kumar Jain, former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court to monitor and supervise the investigation to ensure transparency, fairness, and absolute impartiality in the case. The Supreme Court had earlier suggested former Punjab and Haryana High Court Judges - Justices Ranjit Singh/ Rakesh K Jain) to supervise the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probe into the alleged October 3 Lakhimpur Kheri incidents mowing down of 4 farmers, lynching of 3 accused and murder of a journalist. SC was hearing the petitions seeking a CBI probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence wherein 8 people had lost their lives, including farmers, who were allegedly mowed down by a four-wheeler belonging to Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra Teni, in Uttar Pradeshs Lakhimpur Kheri district on October 3. The Apex Court registered the petition on its own, on the basis of letters written by two lawyers, seeking investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the brutal incident. Eight people lost their lives, including farmers, after being allegedly mowed down by a four-wheeler belonging to Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra Teni, in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri district on October 3. UNI SM RJ Pak to train Afghan's aviation staff in security, traffic controlling, firefighting, air forecast Islamabad, Nov 17 (UNI) The Afghanistan embassy in Pakistan has said Islamabad will be providing professional training to Kabul's aviation staff in security, traffic controlling, firefighting, air forecast, and airport management. According to a statement issued on Tuesday, a bilateral agreement was signed btween the two countries during the visit of Afghanistan's Interim Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi to Islamabad. Kabul and Islamabad also agreed to be conducting ten flights every week between both capitals among them two would be carried out by large planes and the rest by small ones, The Khaama Press reported. UWs Educational Opportunity Centers Awarded Five-Year Federal Grants Two federal grants have been awarded to the University of Wyomings Educational Opportunity Centers (EOC) program, housed in the office of Student Educational Opportunity, to help encourage higher education. The U.S. Department of Education awarded five-year TRIO grants totaling $852,000 annually. UWs EOC program was selected among 289 proposals submitted in the grant competition to help individuals in Wyoming who are less likely to enter or succeed in college. UWs 10 EOC staff members across Wyoming serve more than 2,600 adult learners and other underserved populations statewide. The program also reaches Big Horn, Carbon and Yellowstone counties in Montana. The latest program funding supports those served by EOC to successfully seek higher education degrees. Included are first-generation and limited-income individuals; adults wishing to begin a degree program; adult learners who left college and wish to return; high school students who need assistance preparing to apply to college; students who left school before earning their high school diploma; and other groups traditionally underrepresented in higher education, such as homeless youth and youth aging out of foster care. The many services provided by EOC staff include completing college admission and scholarship applications; high school and college course advising; career guidance; financial and economic literacy information and workshops; FAFSA completion assistance; preparation and financial assistance completing alternative high school credentials, such as GED and standardized tests; college visits; and assistance transferring from a two-year to a four-year degree program. Congress established the EOC program in 1972, and it is part of the group of federal educational opportunity programs known as TRIO. TRIO programs are funded to ensure that low-income and first-generation students, adult students and students with disabilities have the capacity to enroll in, persist and complete college, and are prepared to successfully enter fulfilling careers. For more information, call Christina Millemon, EOC project director, at (307) 766-6189 or email cirion@uwyo.edu. remaining of Thank you for reading! On your next view you will be asked to log in to your subscriber account or create an account and subscribepurchase a subscription to continue reading. The 20th Meeting of the Administrative Committee for the Convention on Temporary Admission (Istanbul Convention) and the 17th Meeting of Contracting Parties to the Customs Convention on the ATA Carnet for the Temporary Admission of Goods (ATA Convention) were held jointly on 15 and 16 November 2021 in a hybrid mode allowing for remote participation with the KUDO application and on-site participation at World Customs Organization (WCO) headquarters in Brussels. Due to the unprecedented situation marked by the COVID-19 pandemic, the adoption of the report will be done via the CLiKC! platform and by email in the coming days. Delegates from 33 Contracting Parties to the Istanbul Convention and 34 Contracting Parties to the ATA Convention, as well as 14 observers and 5 international organizations registered, and the meeting was attended by approximately 80 delegates. In his opening remarks, Mr. Pranab Kumar Das, WCO Director of Compliance and Facilitation, welcomed Contracting Parties and observers to the joint Meeting of the ATA/Istanbul Convention Administrative Committee. He thanked the International Chamber of Commerce World Chambers Federation (ICC WCF) for playing a leading role in the implementation of the electronic ATA Pilot Project, stressing the importance of digitalization of the Admission Temporaire/Temporary Admission (ATA) Carnet for simpler, safer, cheaper and more efficient ATA Carnet procedures both for Customs and private sector stakeholders. He welcomed the electronic Carnet de Passages en Douane (CPD), developed by the Federation Internationale de lAutomobile (FIA) for greater facilitation of the temporary management of vehicles. He informed the Meeting that the Russian Federation had accepted Annex D of the Istanbul Convention in June 2021 and the Republic of Peru had acceded to the Istanbul convention with acceptance Annexes A, B.1 and B.2, becoming the 73rd Contracting Party in July 2021. The Committee elected Mr. Dmitry Subochev (Russian Federation) as Chairperson of the Meeting, and Mr. Ofri Orenstein (Israel) as Vice-Chairperson. The Committee took note of the work progress concerning the development of the eATA Carnet and eCPD system, which had been discussed at the Meeting of the eATA Working Group held on 31 August 2021. Even though the schedule had been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Committee confirmed that the production period of the eATA system, which had been prepared by the ICC, would start in 2023 with more participation in Pilot project and the collection of more test results. The Committee was also informed of the first issuance of an eCPD carnet managed by the FIA, and of the recent cooperation between the FIA and the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) in support of the digitization of the relevant UN Conventions on temporary importation of vehicles. The Committee shared recent progress on the eATA system, including the experiences from the Russian Federation and the European Union, and discussed an interpretation issue of the Istanbul Convention regarding the pre-arrival notification function. The Committee agreed to update the ATA and Istanbul Convention Handbooks and E-learning course on the CLiKC! platform, which would help to facilitate the application and implementation of the Conventions on temporary importation. Fort Polk, LA (71446) Today Overcast. High near 80F. Winds S at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Scattered thunderstorms early, then mainly cloudy overnight with thunderstorms likely. A few storms may be severe. Low 63F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Source: Xinhua| 2021-03-22 19:35:06|Editor: huaxia Video Player Close THIMPHU, March 22 (Xinhua) -- Bhutan received the second consignment of 400,000 COVID-19 vaccine from India on Monday. As per the government sources, the consignment comprise of 400,000 doses of Covishield COVID-19 vaccines. Covishield is the Oxford-AstraZeneca-developed vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India. This consignment of vaccines was brought to Bhutan by DrukAir, a state-owned airline. In January India has gifted Bhutan with 150,000 doses of Covishield vaccines. The Indian Air Force delivered the first consignment of vaccines at Paro airport on Jan. 20. The Indian Ambassador to Bhutan Ruchira Kamboj will officially hand over the vaccines to Bhutan's Foreign Minister as part of the protocol, local news sources said. Bhutan has recorded a total of 869 positive COVID-19 cases, of which 867 were declared recovered, one still active and one died due to the virus. The Health Ministry is urging every citizen to register for COVID-19 vaccination, which will be rolled out from March 28. As of Monday, more than 495,028 people have registered for vaccination, stated the ministry. Enditem Microsoft Joins the Java Community Process You'd think I'd have seen it coming. All the signs were there. There was the day Microsoft announced that it had joined the OpenJDK project back in 2019. Then there was the company's decision to upgrade its status at the Eclipse Foundation to Strategic Member in August of this year. And when Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella proclaimed in September that "We use more Java than one can imagine," I just should have known that Redmond would soon be joining the venerable technology standards and specifications organization behind the evolution of the Java language and platform, the Java Community Process (JCP). Bruno Borges, Principal Program Manager for Microsoft's Java Engineering Group, revealed that the company had signed the Java Specification Participation Agreement (JSPA) to officially join the JCP in a blog post earlier this month. "As we have collectively learned since the announcement of the Microsoft Build of OpenJDK in April 2021," Borges said, "Java usage within Microsoft has grown way beyond Minecraft. We have more than 500,000 JVMs in production running hundreds of internal Microsoft systems. In addition to significant internal Java usage, there are many customers and developers coding and running Java on Microsoft Azure and GitHub. Joining the JCP is a major, yet natural step forward for Microsoft in helping shape the future of the Java Platform." And the Chair and Director of the JCP, Heather VanCura, gave the new member her blessing: "For the past 23 years, the JCP program has guided the specification of the Java platform in cooperation with the international Java developer community. The JCP program welcomes participation and membership from corporate, open source, individual, and Java User Group participants. We are delighted to welcome Microsoft to the JCP program; it continues to represent the vibrant Java ecosystem. We look forward to seeing their contributions. I sent her an email, but she hasn't gotten back to me. When she does, I'll try for a less PR-sculpted comment. To be fair, the JCP has been through the ringer over the past decade, and VanCura helmed that troubled ship through some treacherous waters. She helped developers and vendors adapt to the faster Java release cadence, spending most of 2019 demonstrating, teaching, and working with developers and teams. She also led the JCP through the often-painful process of untangling that JSPA Nadella and company just signed, which was notoriously byzantine, and which her predecessor, Patrick Curra,n once described to me simply as "big and scary." Then there's that other Bruno, Mr. Souza, the one in South America who founded the Brazil-based SouJava, largest Java User Group (JUG) in the world. He was one of the initiators of the Apache Harmony project to create a non-proprietary Java virtual machine. He serves on the Executive Committee of the JCP, and was one of my first guests on "The WatersWorks Podcast." "The JCP is the place where we define and discuss the future of Java, and where we need the collaboration of all the Java community," Souza said. "Microsoft has been an important part of this community, with their involvement in OpenJDK but also supporting Java User Groups and community events. Because of all that, Microsoft has become a strong partner of SouJava, and we are excited to have them go even deeper on their commitment with the Java community." RedMonk analyst James Governor sees this development as further evidence of Microsoft's commitment to a future in which Java continues matter. "Java remains a key context for IT today and for the foreseeable future," Governor said. Boy howdy. Circulan rumores falsos en redes sobre las razones del cierre de la Embajada en 2a mitad del 2022. El cierre se debe al proceso normal de adaptacion del servicio exterior de #Suecia. #Peru seguira siendo un socio apreciado. Mas info https://t.co/fYDnCpj14M "The Government has the best of intentions. We do not pursue a repression policy. We have pursued a way to channel this conflict through dialogue. Today we are taking an important step to solve underlying problems and to make you believe in the State again," she added. The gathering featured Environment Minister Ruben Ramirez, as well as Energy and Mines Minister Eduardo Gonzales. Also participating in the meeting were deputy ministers from the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF), the Ministry of Agrarian Development and Irrigation (Midagri), the Ministry of Education (Minedu), and the Ministry of Housing, Construction, and Sanitation (MVCS), as well as mayors of Coata, Caracoto, Huata, population centers, and provinces of Puno and San Roman de Juliaca. En el segundo dia de dialogo, la premier @MirtyVas y las autoridades y dirigentes de las comunidades afectadas por la contaminacion del rio Coata, suscribieron un acta de acuerdos para atender demandas socioambientales y se comprometieron a levantar sus medidas de fuerza. pic.twitter.com/HrrrQeBGEA Director General de America, Emb. Felix Denegri, recibio hoy a la Directora General de Sudamerica y Asuntos Interamericanos en @GAC_Corporate, @SaraDCohen, con quien abordo los principales asuntos de la agenda de trabajo bilateral entre Peru y Canada. ??https://t.co/EPclHSBS3g pic.twitter.com/ogzZqGK6kR " " Who's a good boy? Who wants a treat? Who randomly gets called Fido ... and why? Hero Images/Getty Images You may have met a furry Ace, Bandit, Jack or Sparky. You may have even met a Bella, Max or Cinnamon but the chance of being introduced to Fido are much, much lower. These days Fido doesn't even make the top 100, but the once-popular name for male dogs has become a generic shorthand for "dog" itself, much like Kleenex has for tissues or Dumpster has for large trash bins. So just why is the dog name Fido such a part of the American lexicon? The credit goes to Abraham Lincoln, America's 16th president. While he was still a pre-commander-in-chief and still living in Springfield, Illinois, Lincoln's household included several dogs and cats. Lincoln's law partner, William Herndon, wrote about the dog's role in Lincoln's life, musing about Honest Abe that "if exhausted from severe and long-continued thought ... he would get down with a little dog or kitten to recover." Advertisement " " Before moving to the White House, the Lincoln family allegedly had several photographic portraits made of their beloved dog Fido, though historical research calls the timeline specifics into doubt. nostri-imago/Flickr/CC BY 2.0 One particularly therapeutic dog was Fido, a mixed-breed dog of yellow hue whose name is Latin for "faithful." Fido became Lincoln's near-constant companion about five years before the then-lawyer became president. According to the Presidential Pet Museum, Fido enjoyed scraps from Lincoln's plate at meals, patiently waited outside the barber shop or any other establishment Lincoln patronized, and generally became well known as a good-natured "dog around town." In 1863, as he prepared to move to the White House, it became apparent that Fido was a little too friendly, and perhaps ill-mannered, for high office. (A 1954 profile of Fido published in Life magazine called him a "frisky mongrel.") The Lincolns also worried that the bustle and noise of life in Washington, D.C., might upset the dog. Upon moving to the White House, the Lincolns welcomed a dog named Jip, as well as goats named Nanny and Nanko, into their lives. To ensure Fido had a good life back in Springfield, Lincoln decided to have John Roll, a local carpenter, and his family take care of Fido, leaving them detailed instructions for the dog's proper care and spoiling. Fido was never to be chided for having muddy paws in the house and he was to be given scraps from the table at mealtime. Lincoln even gave the Roll family a couch he built himself; an outsized sofa custom-made to accommodate the 6'4" lawyer, it was Fido's favorite couch to sleep on. And to help soothe the sense of loss his sons and presumably, he himself felt, Lincoln had Fido's formal portrait taken with the relatively new photographic technology. " " A vintage Civil War-era print shows Abraham Lincoln pictured in front of his former Illinois home, riding on horseback as a crowd cheers. The inscription reads: "Abraham Lincoln's Return Home, After His Successful Campaign For The Presidency Of The United States, In October, 1860." John Parrot/Stocktrek Images/Getty Images (Or so the story goes. Historian Dr. James Cornelius, the curator of the Abraham Lincoln Collection at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, uses local historical research to call into question the date Fido's portrait was actually taken, and points to the Life magazine profile as the first mention of that specific motivation for the picture's creation.) Regardless of its provenance, the photo made its way into numerous newspaper and, shortly thereafter, Fido both the dog and the name skyrocketed in popularity. The name's meteoric rise continued during Lincoln's presidency and was further fueled by his assassination in 1865. As mourners flocked to Springfield for the president's funeral, Roll returned to Lincoln's home with Fido and let the mourning public meet the dog. One person later wrote that petting Abraham Lincoln's former companion "brought me comfort in this time of grief, as touching this dog must have brought the President comfort during his life." Just as Fido's master was killed by another man, so too did Fido meet an unfortunate end at the hands of another. In 1866, a year after Lincoln's assassination, Fido ever the trusting and people-loving dog came across a man apparently sleeping on a sidewalk. Fido started to lick the man's face, which prompted the man, who was drunk at the time, to awaken, panic and pull a knife at the sight of the dog's mouth so close to his face, stabbing Fido in self-defense. With the popularity of the name peaking in the late 1800s, Fido made its way into the public consciousness during an era when mass media was taking hold in the country, and remained there for years to come. While Fido met a tragic end, his name lives on in popular culture, signifying the Platonic ideal of a friendly, faithful pooch. Now That's Interesting Over the years, the presidential residents of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. have kept all sorts of pets in the White House, from bears and horses to hyenas, sheep and, allegedly, even alligators. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. On November 16th Lilit Makunts, Ambassador of the Republic of Armenia to the United States of America, held a virtual meeting with Senator Chris Van Hollen (D Maryland), the Embassy of Armenia in US said in a statement on social media. Ambassador informed Senator about the aggression unleashed by the Azerbaijani armed forces and the infiltration into the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia. Ambassador Makunts stressed the importance of condemnation of the provocative actions of Azerbaijan by the international community. Senator Van Hollen expressed his concern over the situation and noted that he will bring the issue to the attention of his colleagues in the Senate. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken made a statement following the November 16 Azerbaijani attacks on Armenia at the eastern parts of the border. The United States is deeply concerned about reports of intensive fighting today between Armenia and Azerbaijan. We urge both sides to take immediate concrete steps to reduce tensions and avoid further escalation. We also call on the sides to engage directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation. As noted in the Minsk Group Co-Chairs statement on November 15, the recent increase in tension between Armenia and Azerbaijan underscores the need for a negotiated, comprehensive, and sustainable settlement of all remaining issues related to or resulting from the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, the statement says. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. US Congressman Frank Pallone expressed his concern about the latest Azerbaijani aggression against Armenia. Azerbaijan's escalation of violence on Armenian soil is unacceptable. This increase of deadly violence against Armenia will only continue unless the US Mission to the OSCE, the State Department and the international community take immediate and decisive diplomatic action. Claims that both sides are at fault ignore the fact that Azeri troops are attacking within the sovereign territory of Armenia and terrorizing innocent civilians. This is a purposeful violation of international law that will only further embolden Aliyev if he is not stopped, Rep. Pallone said on Twitter. WASHINGTON D.C., NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. United States Congressman and Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff condemned the November 16 Azerbaijani attack on Armenia. I am deeply disturbed by todays reports of Azerbaijani forces attacking Armenian soldiers at the border, including the reported murder or illegal detainment of more than two dozen Armenian soldiers, Congressman Schiff said in a statement released on social media. This unprovoked attack is in direct violation of Azerbaijan and Armenias ceasefire agreement, and a grave reminder that the United States must be doing everything we can to deter Azerbaijans ongoing aggression. I urge the State Department to act immediately to use every diplomatic channel and lever available to avert another mass humanitarian disaster and show our unwavering support for the Armenian people and their sovereignty. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Parliament passed at second reading the government-authored bill on cutting the number of New Year holidays. Before, Armenia had a week-long holiday starting December 31st (New Year holidays until January 2nd, then until January 5th pre-Christmas holidays, January 6th Christmas, and the 7th of January was observed as Merelots (Day of Commemorating the Dead). By the new law, only December 31st, January 1st and 2nd , as well the January 6th will be non-working days. The law passed with 57 votes in favor. The Armenian Church had recommended January 5 (Christmas Eve) and January 7 (Merelots) to remain non-working days, but the proposal was not approved. The recommendation on cutting the number of holidays was brought forward by Economy Minister Vahan Kerobyan, who says that the week-long holidays negatively impact the GDP and production volumes in different branches of the economy, as well as foreign economic activities and the implementation of contract relations with domestic and foreign organizations. Kerobyan said earlier that the move would lead to economic benefits and GDP growth. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. On 16 November, the Permanent Representative of Armenia to the United Nations Mher Margaryan delivered a statement at the United Nations Security Council open debate on Peace and security through preventive diplomacy, the Permanent Mission of Armenia to the UN said on social media. In his statement Mher Margaryan drew the attention of the Security Council to the armed attacks by Azerbaijan against the territorial integrity of Armenia in recent days in breach of the UN Charter, the international law and the provisions of the Trilateral Statement of 9 November 2020. He stressed that the aggressive actions of Azerbaijan are detrimental to the efforts of the international community to de-escalate the situation and are severely undermining the prospects of peace in the region. The Permanent Representative of Armenia underlined the need for urgent and effective steps by the international actors aimed at prevention of the further escalation and ensuring unconditional and complete withdrawal of the Azerbaijani armed forces from the territory of Armenia. The UN Secretary-General, the President of the General Assembly, the President of the ECOSOC, and the President of the International Court of Justice made presentations during the meeting presided by Mexico. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The Armenian Parliament is debating the 2022 state budget draft during todays session. The budget draft set security issues, education system and inclusive infrastructure development as a key target for 2022, Minister of Finance Tigran Khachatryan said during the debate. The solution of these issues must create grounds for the high economic results of the coming years, which in turn will ensure conditions for programs directed to health and social insurance, settlement of public life and other key issues, the minister said. Minister Khachatryan said that the government is targeting long-term high economic growth, at least 7% annually, and in case of a favorable external environment 9%. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia has informed the President of the United Nations Security Council about the November 16th attack of Azerbaijan on Armenias sovereign territory, MFA spokesperson Vahan Hunanyan said in a statement, in response to the questions of media outlets. The Armenian Foreign Ministry has already informed the President of the UN Security Council about the current situation. We would like to note that the use of all tools of international law and diplomatic practice is being considered for protecting Armenias territorial integrity and sovereignty, he said. The spokesperson also added that Armenia is in direct and multi-level contact with its ally Russia. Mr Hunanyan reminded that yesterday the Armenian Prime Minister and the Russian President held a telephone conversation during which Nikol Pashinyan presented the situation to Vladimir Putin. In this context, the leaders of the two countries discussed the possible joint steps the implementation of which is enshrined by a bilateral legal-contractual base and is in accordance with the allied relations, Vahan Hunanyan said. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan MOSCOW, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Despite the situation having stabilized at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border it cant be ruled out that Armenia could still apply to the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) for help, the Armenian Ambassador to Russia Vardan Toghanyan told RIA Novosti. Its difficult to say, it depends on how the situation will develop, we have what we have, he said when asked whether or not Yerevan intends to request help from the CSTO. Lets see how the developments will unfold. The situation in the eastern border of Armenia, which came under attack by Azerbaijani armed forces on November 16, is relatively stable as of 10:00 November 17, the Armenian Ministry of Defense said in a statement earlier on November 17. It said that the ceasefire agreement is mostly holding. The Ministry of Defense also issued information on casualties of the Azerbaijani military in the November 16 actions. The Azerbaijani military suffered up to 70 casualties of personnel, including KIAs and WIAs, as well as significant materiel losses, namely 4 BTR armored personnel carriers, 1 Sandcat vehicle and 5 other automobile vehicles (Kamaz, Ural, UAZ). 1 Armenian soldier was killed in action and 13 others were taken captive by the Azerbaijani military. Another 24 Armenian troops are missing-in-action after contact with them was lost during combat. Intensive works are underway to find the servicemen. Two military positions have gone under adversary control. Russian-mediated negotiations are ongoing over resolving the situation and returning the captured Armenian servicemen. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Minister of Healthcare of Armenia Anahit Avanesyan sees a tendency of decline in the new cases of COVID-19 in the country, but she notes that the high mortality rate is still being maintained. We hope that the number of new cases will decline also in the coming week. The decline in the new cases allows us to provide the citizens with hospital resources, as we do not have any person waiting for hospitalization. All persons, who need to be hospitalized, are being hospitalized at this moment, which is very important in terms of providing proper and timely medical care, she said. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The Central Bank of Armenia says the governments 2022 state budget draft is quite ambitious. According to the CBA, there will be a certain decline in the debt burden in 2022. Overall, it can be said that the 2022 state budget draft is quite ambitious, compared to the governments medium-term expenditure program, it supposes significant acceleration of the economic growth and potential, CBA President Martin Galstyan said during todays debate of the budget draft in the Parliament and reminded that 7% economic growth has been forecast for 2022. He said that the economic growth of 2022 will be based on large-scale state investments in infrastructure and human capital development areas. The quick restoration of gross demand, connected with the increase in both the domestic and external demand, will continue in 2022, he said, while presenting the CBA conclusion on the budget draft. As a result of economic recovery, tax administration and legislative reforms, it is expected that the taxes-GDP rate in 2022 will have a 0.9% growth, in case of which the state budget revenues will have a restraining effect on the gross demand. On the other hand, the 2022 state expenditure policy will be directed to growth promotion, targeting the significant increase in share of public investments and management of the efficiency of spending, at the same time returning to the set fiscal rules, he said. Cut in state budget deficit is expected in 2022, by 1.6 percentage point against GDP. According to our estimations, it will comprise 3.1%, a 0.7% decline in government debt-GDP rate, which will comprise 60.2%, Martin Galstyan said. It is estimated that the smooth consolidation behavior and the preservation of the fiscal rules as enshrined by the 2022 state budget draft will contribute to reducing Armenias state debt burden and ensuring macro-economic stability. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Russia will continue the mediation efforts to settle the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Russian presidential spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. In any case we think that the only way for the stabilization of the situation is the implementation of the trilateral agreements. And we think that all countries must first of all follow their commitments, which will become a guarantee for non-repetition of such incidents, Peskov said. On November 16, the Azerbaijani armed forces launched a major attack on Armenia from the eastern border. The Azerbaijani military deployed artillery, various caliber firearms and armored equipment in the attack. The fighting stopped through a Russian-mediated ceasefire later in the day. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan MOSCOW, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Holding a trilateral summit between Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan will be a necessity at some point, but this would require consent of all three sides, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters, according to RIA Novosti. Definitely, at some phase such contacts will be a necessity, and the consent and readiness of all three sides is required for that to be possible, he said. On November 16, the Azerbaijani armed forces launched a major attack on Armenia from the eastern border. The Azerbaijani military deployed artillery, various caliber firearms and armored equipment in the attack. The fighting stopped through a Russian-mediated ceasefire later in the day. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The Armenian authorities expect that Russia, as a strategic partner, will help resolve the issues pertaining to the situation which was created at the border as a result of Azerbaijans actions, the Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigoryan told Kommersant newspaper in an interview when asked what specific assistance Yerevan expects from Moscow as part of the 1997 treaty. Grigoryan, who is in Moscow for the CIS Secretaries of Security Council meeting, noted that now the Azerbaijani armed forces are located on sovereign Armenian territory. This is an act of aggression. In 1997 Armenia and Russia agreed to help one another in such cases. This is exactly why we applied to Russia, he said. Asked if Armenia expects military or diplomatic assistance, Grigoryan elaborated: We are in favor of a diplomatic solution to the issue. But if this wont be possible to do diplomatically, then the issue must be resolved militarily. Grigoryan said that in this matter Armenia prioritizes Russia and the CSTO. But if a solution isnt found we will start considering other opportunities too, he said. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. According to the data updated in October 2021 of the Investigative Committee, the death toll in the 2020 war stands at 3788, which includes 3712 servicemen and 76 civilians, the Armenian Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Narek Mkrtchyan said in parliament in response to a question from Hayastan faction. Another 222 servicemen are missing-in-action, and 21 civilians are also missing. The total number of Armenian prisoners of war held in Azerbaijan is 40, 37 of whom are servicemen and 3 are civilians, he said. Mkrtchyan added that 114 servicemen and civilians were returned to Armenia from Azerbaijan during this period. Editing and Translating by Stepan Kocharyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. President of Armenia Armen Sarkissian met with President of Singapore Halimah Yacob, the Armenian Presidents Office reports. The two Presidents discussed the current agenda of the bilateral relations. President Sarkissian presented information about the current situation following the 2020 Nagorno Karabakh war, the humanitarian problems and Azerbaijans continuous aggressive actions, including the latest incursion into the sovereign territory of Armenia. The meeting sides also discussed the development potential and opportunities of the Armenian-Singaporean partnership. President Armen Sarkissian said Singapore is a good example of rapidly developed successful state for many countries, including Armenia. The President of Singapore said they are ready to assist Armenia with their experience in a number of fields. The two presidents also praised the Armenian community of Singapore, highlighting its significant role during the history of Singapore, contribution to trade, economy, culture and other areas. Editing and Translating by Aneta Harutyunyan YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. Russia is in contact with both Azerbaijan and Armenia for bringing the situation to a peaceful level, ARMENPRESS reports official representative of the Russian MFA Maria Zakharova said in a weekly briefing. She reminded that on November 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin had a telephone conversation with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, and Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu had telephone conversations with his Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts. As a result of these mediation efforts, the fights and clashes stopped last night. Joint efforts to defuse tensions continues. We call on both sides to show restraint, not to allow new incidents, to resolve all disputes exclusively through political-diplomatic means," Zakharova said. She noted that Russia is ready to further assist these countries in establishing peace and stability in the region. Recent events confirm the need for an immediate start of the demarcation and subsequent delimitation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, as well as the commencement of the work of the relevant commission on the basis of previously submitted Russian proposals, Zakharova said. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The regular meeting of the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council will be held in Yerevan on November 18-19, in connection with which the Heads of the Governments of the EEU member states will arrive in Armenia. As ARMENPRESS was informed from the Office of the Prime Minister, a number of issues related to the development and strengthening of integration processes in the Eurasian space will be discussed at the narrow and then expanded-format sessions. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. President of Armenia Armen Sarkissian, who is in Singapore, had a conversation with Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Hsien Loong. They referred to the current level of the relations between Armenia and Singapore and the development prospects of those relations. As ARMENPRESS was informed from the press service of the Presidents Office, the President of Armenia presented information to the Prime Minister of Singapore about yesterdays provocative and aggressive actions of Azerbaijan on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. "President Sarkissian and Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spoke about the development of bilateral cooperation in a number of areas. It was noted that there is a great potential for cooperation, especially in the fields of high technology, artificial intelligence, science and education. According to President Sarkissian, the development path of Singapore is a good example for Armenia and the Singaporean experience in a number of spheres can be useful for our country, reads the statement. Referring to the development opportunities of small countries in the modern rapidly changing world, the interlocutors agreed that in the new realities, small and smart countries have great opportunities for development and success. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The EPP is greatly concerned by recent military hostilities at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. We strongly condemn the violations of the internationally recognised border between Armenia and Azerbaijan. We unequivocally reject the use of force or threat of force as a means to achieve political goals in the region. We underline the vital need for international prevention mechanisms and for an international investigation of military clashes, including meaningful relevant sanctions against aggressors. Long-lasting peace in the region is possible through comprehensive and negotiated resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, grounded on the Basic Principles proposed by the OSCE Minsk Group Co-chairs. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. U.S. congressman Jim Costa condemned Azerbaijans military actions against the sovereign territory of Armenia, ARMENPRESS reports he made a note on his Facebook page. I condemn Azerbaijan's aggressive actions against Armenia. I urge the State Department to help de-escalate this situation before more lives are lost. America must stand against human rights violations, he wrote. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. U.S. Democratic Rep. Jackie Speier assesses the military operations unleashed by Azerbaijan against the eastern borderline of Armenia as another attempt of Aliyevs regime to grab new lands, ARMENPRESS reports Speier wrote on her Twitter page. Azerbaijans attacks on Armenian territory are yet another sign of how far Aliyevs regime will go to seize Armenian land and spread violence and hate. Were witnessing Aliyevs attempted land grab in real time. We must act now to prevent further bloodshed and destabilization, she wrote. Despite the situation having stabilized at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border it cant be ruled out that Armenia could still apply to the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) for help, the Armenian Ambassador to Russia Vardan Toghanyan told RIA Novosti. November 17, 2021, 12:50 Armenian Ambassador to Russia doesnt rule out applying to CSTO for assistance STEPANAKERT, NOVEMBER 17, ARTSAKHPRESS-ARMENPRESS: Its difficult to say, it depends on how the situation will develop, we have what we have, he said when asked whether or not Yerevan intends to request help from the CSTO. Lets see how the developments will unfold. The situation in the eastern border of Armenia, which came under attack by Azerbaijani armed forces on November 16, is relatively stable as of 10:00 November 17, the Armenian Ministry of Defense said in a statement earlier on November 17. It said that the ceasefire agreement is mostly holding. The Ministry of Defense also issued information on casualties of the Azerbaijani military in the November 16 actions. The Azerbaijani military suffered up to 70 casualties of personnel, including KIAs and WIAs, as well as significant materiel losses, namely 4 BTR armored personnel carriers, 1 Sandcat vehicle and 5 other automobile vehicles (Kamaz, Ural, UAZ). 1 Armenian soldier was killed in action and 13 others were taken captive by the Azerbaijani military. Another 24 Armenian troops are missing-in-action after contact with them was lost during combat. Intensive works are underway to find the servicemen. Two military positions have gone under adversary control. Russian-mediated negotiations are ongoing over resolving the situation and returning the captured Armenian servicemen. The Secretary General of the 47-nation Council of Europe, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to remain committed to solving conflict by peaceful means. November 17, 2021, 15:04 Council of Europe stands ready to facilitate dialogue between Armenia and Azerbaijan Secretary General STEPANAKERT, NOVEMBER 17, ARTSAKHPRESS: I am concerned about reports of on-going incidents between Armenia and Azerbaijan that have already cost human lives. News of a ceasefire is welcome and I call on both sides to maintain it. When joining our organization more than twenty years ago, both Armenia and Azerbaijan committed themselves to solving conflict by peaceful means. This commitment remains unchanged and must be strictly respected, the CoE Secretary General said. Marija Pejcinovic Buric stated that the Council of Europe reiterates its full support to the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group in their continuing efforts to help Armenia and Azerbaijan find a peaceful solution to their differences. We stand ready to facilitate dialogue between these two member states, with a view to building confidence and promoting reconciliation, Marija Pejcinovic Buric said. According to the data updated in October 2021 of the Investigative Committee, the death toll in the 2020 war stands at 3788, which includes 3712 servicemen and 76 civilians, the Armenian Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Narek Mkrtchyan said in parliament in response to a question from Hayastan faction. November 17, 2021, 15:58 2020 war death toll is 3788, another 222 missing-in-action STEPANAKERT, NOVEMBER 17, ARTSAKHPRESS-ARMENPRESS: Another 222 servicemen are missing-in-action, and 21 civilians are also missing. The total number of Armenian prisoners of war held in Azerbaijan is 40, 37 of whom are servicemen and 3 are civilians, he said. Mkrtchyan added that 114 servicemen and civilians were returned to Armenia from Azerbaijan during this period. By Tom Balmforth MOSCOW (Reuters) -A former U.S. Marine serving a nine-year jail sentence in Russia has ended a hunger strike after nearly a week, lost a lot of weight and is ill, according to a message he sent his family. Trevor Reed, a university student from Texas, was convicted last year of endangering the lives of two policemen in Moscow while drunk on a visit in 2019. He denies the charges and the United States called his trial a "theatre of the absurd". His family said last week he had begun a hunger strike in protest at his incarceration and alleged violations of his rights. The prison service denied he was refusing food or that his rights were being abused. In Nov. 15 comments shared by his family, Reed said he ended the strike on the morning of Nov. 9, having refused food and drunk only water since the evening of Nov. 3. "They (prison staff) were ALL aware of my hunger strike. They asked me on video every day if I wanted food and I refused. They did not weigh me or give me a medical inspection," he said. In a statement to Reuters, the prison service in Mordovia region where Reed is in jail again denied he had stopped eating or that he had told them he had started a hunger strike. Reed said he had a cough, headache, congestion, mucus in his lungs and back pain, and that a doctor had given him vitamins. He said he was due to be moved from his cell to a punishment cell but did not say why. A family spokesman said: "Trevor's new complaints about his health are alarming and it's quite clear Russian authorities aren't taking them seriously. The Reeds continue to urge the (U.S.) Administration to make a deal to bring their son home." Reed and Paul Whelan, an American jailed in Russia on spying charges he denied, have been touted as possible candidates for a prisoner swap. (Reporting by Tom Balmforth, Editing by Peter Graff and Timothy Heritage) Womens advocacy group and party-list Gabriela condemned bogus election paraphernalia, allegedly planted by the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the Criminal Investigation Detection Group (CIDG), in an effort the group called a desperate attempt to red-tag (Gabriela and other progressive groups). The dead giveaway? A typographical error of the word babae (Filipino for woman) in the groups slogan, spelled as babe. Earlier local reports surfaced that the PNP and CIDG arrested supposed members of communist groups Communist Party of the Philippines, New Peoples Army, and the National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF), and found cash and explosives in their possession. They reportedly also unearthed supposed election paraphernaliaincluding banners, stickers, and T-shirtsrepresenting Gabriela and Bayan Muna. Both are legitimate partylists elected to Congress and belong to the Makabayan bloc, a progressive coalition in the House of Representatives. Gabriela denied that any election materials with the misspelled slogan were theirs. We categorically disown the tarpaulins with the slogan Para sa Babe, Bata at Bayan, as such slogan digresses from our original slogan Para sa Babae, Bata at Bayan,' the womens group wrote on Facebook. Maybe the police officers have been so accustomed to using babe in their flirtatious relations with several women, or they were rushing to print the fake tarps ahead of our own printing without diligent proofreading, Gabriela added, calling the PNP and CIDGs actions a desperate attempt at red-tagging the group. Being professional in planting evidence and peddling disinformation, the PNP and CIDG elements has once again conducted black propaganda tactics against progressive electoral groups, Girls For Peace, a campaign network for young women, wrote. This strategy is clearly a part of their attempt to legitimize the Duterte administrations harassment, intimidation, and attacks against groups and institutions critical of its anti-people and anti-democratic policies, the network wrote. Story continues This incident comes after the Senate finance committee slashed earlier this month the proposed budget of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), the Duterte administrations counter-insurgency body, by P24 billion, leaving the task force with P4 billion for 2022. Senators said that the bulk of the NTF-ELCACs proposed budget was realigned to fund crucial pandemic response programs, including the compensation of health workers. In an earlier statement, Gabriela welcomed the Senates move but said that bringing it to zero would be better, adding that the P24 billion can be reallocated for cash aid programs, and called attention to a separate P2 billion NTF-ELCAC fund tucked under different agencies and urged lawmakers to realign the budget for government-run hospitals in 2022. These red-tagging gimmicks, while not new, seek to place the lives and safety of our members and leaders on the line. We strongly condemn these publicly funded gimmicks and assert our firm stance against red-tagging and fake news, Gabriela said. The group added that they will explore possible legal remedies after gathering more information on the incident. READ: PCOO wants a P1.91-billion budget for 2022, and the Senate says but why? The first use case will target one million existing consumer and small business customers with an instant issue Visa card REDWOOD CITY, Calif., November 16, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--i2c Inc., a leading provider of digital payment and banking technology, today announced a partnership with Omise, a leading online acceptance and payments platform serving Thailand, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia. The deal, part of a broader collaboration between the two companies, has already confirmed partnerships to instant issue Visa cards for approximately one million consumers and small business customers. As a result of this collaboration, Omise will be able to help its clients design and deploy virtual and card-based payment programs for a burgeoning Southeast Asian payments market, helping local banks, fintechs and others to launch and manage their own modern card programs throughout the region. Omise plans to launch this service in the first quarter of 2022. "Were proud to partner with i2c to address the unprecedented hypergrowth that our markets are currently experiencing," said Ezra Don Harinsut, CEO of Omise. "i2cs complementary tech stack, reach and reliability will allow our clients to deploy robust new payments capabilities and help us improve cashflow for millions of consumers and small businesses very soon," he added. "Omise is a true pioneer and leader in a key region and were delighted to have them as partners," said Kevin Fox, EVP, Americas Sales for i2c, citing reports that last year Southeast Asia added 40 million new internet users and is poised to grow to over $300 billion in gross merchandise value by 2025. Fox further relayed, "With our combined platforms and Omises impressive client roster, we believe this partnership will help extend and modernize issuing for the region in a meaningful way." About Omise Established in 2013, Omise is a payments platform which provides businesses with a modern end-to-end infrastructure to accept, process and send payments online. Working with Omise, merchants have access to powerful payment tools, comprehensive risk management solutions, as well as connection to card networks and consumers' preferred payment methods. Omise enables revenue growth and seamless payment experiences across online, in-store and in-app. Story continues Omise is present in Southeast Asia and Japan. The company is the payments platform of choice for thousands of brands today. For more information, please visit www.omise.co About i2c Inc. i2c is a global provider of highly-configurable payment and banking solutions. Using i2c's proprietary "building block" technology, clients can easily create and manage a comprehensive set of solutions for credit, debit, prepaid, lending and more, quickly and cost-effectively. i2c delivers unparalleled flexibility, agility, security and reliability from a single global SaaS platform. Founded in 2001, and headquartered in Silicon Valley, i2c's next-generation technology supports millions of users in more than 200 countries/ territories and across all time zones. For more information, visit www.i2cinc.com and follow us at @i2cinc. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211116005010/en/ Contacts Heather Clifton Chief Marketing Officer media@i2cinc.com Philippines group seeks to bar Marcos from presidency over tax evasion FILE PHOTO: Demonstrators hold protest following Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr's presidential bid in Quezon City By Karen Lema MANILA (Reuters) - The son of late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos, an early frontrunner for the May election, is facing a second petition seeking to bar him from the presidential race, centred on a tax evasion conviction nearly three decades ago. The complaint, filed on Wednesday at the election commission by a group called the Campaign Against the Return of the Marcoses and Martial Law, argued the conviction should have perpetually disqualified Ferdinand Marcos Jr from holding or running for office. He was found guilty in 1995 of failing to file income tax returns from 1982 to 1985 while governor of Ilocos Norte province, a verdict upheld two years later by an appeals court. "He has continuously neglected his penalty and disrespected the rule of law by running and filing his candidacy knowing in fact that he is a convicted criminal," lawyer Howard Calleja told reporters after the filing. Marcos's spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The internal revenue code states that a public officer convicted of a tax crime will be barred for life from holding public office, voting and participating in any election. Since his conviction, however, Marcos has been elected governor, congressman and senator and ran unsuccessfully for the vice presidency. The Marcos family is one of the most famous dynasties in the Philippines and despite its fall from grace after a 1986 "people power" revolution, it has retained its wealth and far-reaching and powerful connections. Sara Duterte-Carpio, the president's popular daughter, will be the running mate of Marcos. Antonio La Vina, a law and politics professor at the Ateneo de Manila University, said election authorities would typically only disqualify a barred candidate if a complaint is made first. "People will only complain if you are winnable," he said, adding the case against Marcos could go either way. Asked if Marcos had ever faced a disqualification case, election commission spokesperson James Jimenez said: "Not that I can recall, no." Story continues Marcos, whose father ruled the Philippines for almost two decades, much of that a harsh era of martial law, led an opinion poll conducted last month on preferred presidential candidates. The poll body has scheduled a preliminary conference for Nov. 26 on an earlier disqualification complaint against Marcos filed by a group representing political detainees, human rights and medical organisations, who has said that petition "is without merit and has no legal basis". (Reporting by Karen Lema; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan, Martin Petty) The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) put the kibosh on VanEcks latest attempt to launch a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF). Youre reading State of Crypto, a CoinDesk newsletter looking at the intersection of cryptocurrency and government. Click here to sign up for future editions. When (spot) ETF? The narrative Staffers at the SEC shanked yet another spot bitcoin ETF application last Friday, ending VanEcks hopes to one-up those shiny new futures ETFs with a physically backed product. Why it matters Investors have long seen a spot bitcoin ETF as a milestone in cryptos breakthrough to mainstream investing. Octobers rack of futures-linked ETF launches may have already captured headline pizazz (and billions of dollars to boot) but that ultimate goal, and its promise of more efficient returns, remains elusive. The reason? SEC staffers are just as skeptical of market manipulation on spot bitcoin as ever. Breaking it down Was anyone surprised that the SEC denied another bitcoin ETF application? I certainly wasnt. When the the SEC rejected VanEcks application last Friday, it followed a longstanding tradition of stonewalling any and every physically backed crypto ETF product. That history began in summer 2018 with the Winklevoss twins falling flat. Three plus years later and the song remains the same. Has it, though? Not quite. For starters, other countries like Brazil have jumped ahead of the U.S. by green-lighting their own bitcoin ETFs; Canada even has an ether product. And there are any number of crypto exchange-traded products in Europe. U.S. investors havent been left entirely in the dark. Last months bitcoin futures ETF launches capped a multi-year battle to bring bitcoin exposure to the investing masses. All it took was a crypto-savvy SEC chair spelling out exactly what kind of product could hope to make it through. But the war is far from won. Critics of the bitcoin-linked ProShares and Valkyrie funds by happenstance VanEck launches its own today, too will argue the products are inefficient and expensive mechanisms through which investors gain bitcoin price exposure. Quirks of the futures market and regulatory concerns hamstring their usefulness. In short, theyve got nothing on the real thing. Story continues Something is better than nothing, though. Getting even an inefficient and pricey bitcoin vehicle through the SECs gates is a watershed for crypto. It shows the regulator slowly warming to the reality that people want bitcoin exposure. It shows a regulator accepting that it can make that reality happen and still exercise super-tight control. Last weeks rejection shows a true blue bitcoin ETF is far, far from approval for all the same reasons It represents a lack of control. The SEC spelled it out in the VanEck denial letter: Bitcoin markets are too prone to market manipulation to let an ETF tracking spot prices go live. Theyve said it all before; their arguments have not changed. Like a vindictive professor flunking a student, the SEC gave VanEcks latest spot application which the regulator at times called repetitive, illogical and poorly sourced a resounding F. Its doubtful that another hopeful issuer could soon succeed where VanEck floundered. The SEC is simply too suspicious of the bitcoin markets and their potential for manipulation to let it slide. Anyone arguing that bitcoins decentralization makes the token uniquely resistant to funny business (proving this quality is one way around the blockade) takes on a Sisyphusian task. Avenue 2 establishing a surveillance sharing agreement seems equally unlikely to win any time soon. For a bitcoin ETF to win the day its issuer must establish what the SEC calls a surveillance sharing agreement with another major, compliance-minded market upon which the asset trades. Its a simple argument, really. Any would-be manipulator would need to influence one market to reap gains on the other. If both those markets share data, then better the chances to catch the crook. CMEs bitcoin futures market would seemingly fit this model. Trading over one billion dollars in bitcoin futures contracts daily, its a major, heavily regulated outpost for the crypto markets. But its a drop in the bucket of bitcoins global footprint. According to the SEC, its far too small to matter; it doesnt lead the market. Spot ETF application DENIED. And yet here we are mid-November 2021 with a rather odd assortment of facts. CME futures contracts are good enough to be an ETF benchmark, but not good enough for a separate products behind-the-scenes role. It all makes you think: How much longer will the largely pliant crypto industry play nice? I wonder how long before one of the spot bitcoin ETF sponsors gets sick of arguing with a brick wall & decides to sue the SEC for an APA violation, tweeted Jake Chervinsky, a crypto law veteran who is now head of policy for industry lobbyist The Blockchain Association. I get why nobody did this before, but the case is stronger now with futures ETFs live, & the incentive to play nice is much weaker. Bidens Rule Key: (nom.) = nominee, (rum.) = rumored, (act.) = acting, (inc.) = incumbent (no replacement anticipated) Its been a quiet week in Bidenland with no confirmation movement of note. Elsewhere Solana Throws a Three-Day Party for Itself : Over 2,000 trading degens, venture backers and project devs descended on Lisbon to celebrate one of the hottest tokens of 2021. CoinDesk was there to capture the debauchery. I Think Were Doing This: Inside One DAOs $20M Plot to Purchase the US Constitution: A crazed idea to crowdfund the purchase of a first-edition copy of the U.S. constitution is fast gaining steam with ConstitutionDAO channeling its 8,000 strong discord on a mission that would make Nick Cage proud. Outside CoinDesk: ( WSJ ) Bitcoin mining farms are driving their neighbors nuts in this clear-eyed look at the human downside to thousands of whirring fans next door. (Politico) All those Substacks and CoinDesk inbox fodder kinda make you wonder: Have we reached peak newsletter? Probably not, argues media columnist Jack Schafer in a recap of where the industry can fly next. #RIP Infrastructure Week jokes, we had a good run Sean Tuffy (@SMTuffy) November 15, 2021 If youve got thoughts or questions on what I should discuss next week or any other feedback youd like to share, feel free to email me at nik@coindesk.com or find me on Twitter @nikhileshde. You can also join the group conversation on Telegram. See yall next week! Mr Kotick has been involved in Activision for two decades Workers at game-development titan Activision Blizzard have staged a walkout, after reports chief executive Bobby Kotick had long been aware of harassment allegations. The Wall Street Journal published an extensive investigation into the company, alleging Mr Kotick had "intervened" in at least one case. Mr Kotick called the report "inaccurate and misleading". He has not been personally accused of any misconduct amid the scandal. Senior staff The scandal erupted in July, when the company, which makes Call of Duty and World of Warcraft, was sued by the state of California over its "frat boy" culture. And in the months since, the company has lost several key senior staff, including the namesake of one of its popular characters. Separately, Blizzard head J Allen Brack stepped down in August, in the immediate aftermath of the revelations and following an initial staff walkout. The newspaper's investigation said Mr Kotick had been aware of sexual-misconduct claims "for years", including at least one rape allegation as far back as 2018, but failed to report the matter to the board of directors. It also alleged when a senior figure at one of the publisher's studios was accused of sexual harassment, and an internal investigation launched, Mr Kotick "intervened to keep him". Mr Kotick is also accused of leaving a voicemail, in 2006, threatening to kill a female member of staff. The Wall Street Journal also covered a previously reported incident, from 2007, when he was accused of firing a flight attendant on his private jet after she complained of sexual harassment by the pilot. Both cases were settled out of court. After the report was published, the ABK Workers Alliance - an employee's group for Activision's umbrella of companies - tweeted it was staging a walkout later that day and calling for Mr Kotick to step down. Story continues We have instituted our own Zero Tolerance Policy. We will not be silenced until Bobby Kotick has been replaced as CEO, and continue to hold our original demand for Third-Party review by an employee-chosen source. We are staging a Walkout today. We welcome you to join us. ABetterABK ABK Workers Alliance (@ABetterABK) November 16, 2021 Supporters estimated 150 people had gathered outside one of the main offices in Irvine, California, despite the short notice. Games journalist Jason Schreier, whose reporting specialises in internal industry mechanics and working conditions, tweeted the turnout was "an impressive number, considering it was called two hours ago (and most employees are working from home)". The Wall Street Journal's extensive report also alleged Jennifer Oneal, who stepped in to lead Blizzard amid the scandal, had sent an email, in September, detailing her personal experience of sexual harassment and expressing a lack of faith in the company to change its culture. She also recalled a 2007 company event involving strippers, which Mr Kotick attended, the newspaper said. Earlier this month, Activision announced Ms Oneal would leave the company at the end of the year. 'Inclusive workplace' Mr Kotick pre-empted publication of the Wall Street Journal's report by sending a video message to all employees, on Tuesday, stressing his efforts to reform the company amid the scandal. "There will, of course, be continued media attention about us and our industry over the next few months," he said, according to an official transcript. "In fact, there's an article today that paints an inaccurate and misleading view of our company, of me personally, and my leadership. "Anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming, inclusive workplace doesn't really appreciate how important this is to me." 'Zero-tolerance policy' Activision said it was "disappointed in the Wall Street Journal's report, which presents a misleading view of Activision Blizzard and our CEO". "Instances of sexual misconduct that were brought to his attention were acted upon," a representative said, alleging changes being made currently were being ignored. "The constant desire to be better has always set this company apart. "Which is why, at Mr Kotick's direction, we have made significant improvements, including a zero-tolerance policy for inappropriate conduct." The board of directors also issued a statement, saying: "The board remains confident that Bobby Kotick appropriately addressed workplace issues brought to his attention. "The goals we have set for ourselves are both critical and ambitious. "The board remains confident in Bobby Kotick's leadership, commitment and ability to achieve these goals." The reason that so few people know about President Millard Fillmore is because there never was a biography written about our 13th president not until 1995. The author of the Fillmore biography was Robert Scarry, a retired history teacher (now deceased) who taught in Moravia's high school. Prior to Scarry's book, it was only the residents of that village where Fillmore grew up that knew anything about him, and that's still true today. If asked, most Auburnians would not be able to state any of President Fillmore's accomplishments! Among the more notable accomplishments was his ordering the War Department to do the survey work for the transcontinental railroad, a feat completed during Lincoln's administration. It was Fillmore who first opened trade between the U.S. and Japan when Commodore Perry sailed his three ships into Tokyo's harbor. He was opposed to slavery during the time he was in office, but the federal government had no control over it at the time of its enforcement. When he was comptroller in New York state in 1847, he was instrumental in ending imprisonment for debt with the passage of the bankruptcy bill. President Fillmore's wife, Abigail, died while he was in the White House. Their daughter died tragically within the first decade after his leaving office. He also witnessed his son's death. Just about all presidents of the United States have buildings dedicated to them except President Fillmore. However, there does exist a collection of his personal effects, memorabilia and papers in two rooms of the History House, the headquarters of the Cayuga-Owasco Lakes Historical Society in Moravia. (It's because visiting hours vary, depending on the time of the year, that visitors are asked to call [315] 497-3906 and make an appointment if they want to view the collection.) There exists on the campus of Buffalo University a full-sized statue of Fillmore in front of the administration building. He was a founder and first chancellor of the eight-year college. This past year, a hardback copy of Scarry's biography of Fillmore was donated to Seymour Library in Auburn so it can be checked out by the public. Likewise, paperback copies of his biography were donated to 10 high school libraries in the Cayuga County area. Although an essay contest was scheduled for last year, it was postponed due to the fact students would not be in school as usual due to COVID-19. This year's seniors will be asked to participate in an essay contest about President Fillmore. The best essay from each school will be the beneficiary of a wristwatch. The overall best winning essay will be the recipient of a cash scholarship that (is hoped) may rise to $1,000 from the sale of raffle tickets. Over the past year, a donated handmade quilt (made by the Piecemakers Quilt Guild of Moravia) has been displayed at several local businesses, where $1 raffle tickets were sold. At this time, the new Quilts By Commission store in the Nolan Block will be selling raffle tickets through the forthcoming holidays. Judges that will read the essays include Cayuga County Historian Dr. Ruth Bradley and past presidents of the Cayuga-Owasco Lakes Historical Society Sue Stoyell and Esther Thornton. I am the organizer of the contest, and also a descendant of President Fillmore. I felt it important to become involved in this effort because of the lack of reliable information about him. I also felt the urgency that the biography of Fillmore be in the local school libraries, and an essay contest about him be made possible so that the seeds of information about him might be implanted in the minds of the young about this little-known president. It certainly might also raise some awareness that this man was also someone who contributed to the growth of this nation! The Rev. Joyce Hackett Smith, N.D., is an ordained minister who also believes in natural healing and holds a doctorate degree in naturopathy. Love 1 Funny 0 Wow 0 Sad 0 Angry 0 They are there from within the first few days of a newborn's life through early childhood, elementary school and into adolescence. They are tr Maserati took to the streets to spread the energy of its upcoming Grecale SUV that is set to make a global debut next year. The Italian brand created a 100-metre long outline of its Trident logo using 80 prototypes of the SUV. While the base of the logo was formed by cars camouflaged in blue, the top three arrows were created by cars in white, yellow and black. Similar Cars The initiative was taken in order to maintain people's interest in the smaller crossover which was earlier scheduled to launch on November 16. The delay has been caused because of the ongoing semiconductor crisis and supply chain issues. The vehicle has technology that requires microchips to be used. The exact new date of unveiling of the vehicle has not yet been revealed. Currently, 250 Grecale SUVs are being tested in countries like Japan, the US, the United Arab Emirates, China, Finland and Italy. (Also read | Maserati aims to tap into demand in Tier II, Tier III cities of India) The new SUV from Maserati is expected to feature large and bold looking mesh front grille with the Trident logo at the centre. It will likely get LED headlamps with integrated LED DRLs, large and aggressive looking alloy wheels, and LED taillights, among other design upgrades. As evident from the camouflaged prototypes, the SUV's front end gets a sporty appearance with large openings in the grille. Its rear seems to be rounded. On the inside, the Grecale SUV is expected to come with the brand's analog clock on the center stack while the infotainment screen will likely sit below it. Under the hood, the SUV is expected to get a 2.9-litre twin-turbo V6 engine of the Stelvio Quadrifoglio which is capable of producing a maximum output of 510 hp and 600 Nm of peak torque. It could also get the 3-litre V6 twin-turbo engine that debuted on the MC20, which can churn out 630 hp of power and 730 nm of peak torque. With Gasgoo Daily, we will offer daily important automotive news in China. For those we have reported, the title of the piece will include a hyperlink, which will provide detailed information. Baidu Apollo L4 test surpass 10 million miles Apollo L4 has accumulated over 10 million test miles, up 189% year over year, and has received 411 autonomous driving permits, Baidu said in its third-quarter financial report. JiDu to unveil first concept car in 2022 JiDu, joint venture between Baidu and Geely, will launch its first concept car at the Auto China 2022 in Beijing. It aims to realize mass production in 2023. Photo credit: Baidu Daily passenger vehicle sales fall 23% YoY in second week this month According to the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA), daily retail sales of passenger vehicles in the second week of November dropped by 23% from a year ago to 46,000 in China. Thanks to the production improvement, the retail sales in November are expected to see obvious growth. CATL buys stake in battery related company CATL has become the largest shareholder of a Shenzhen-based company with a stake of 70%. The Shenzhen company, founded in 2018, has a business scope covering the development of lithium battery production technology and the design of integrated circuit. Shalong unveils more about first model Shalong, a premium brand from Great Wall Motor, today unveiled more information about its first model. The new model will be equipped with dual MDC intelligent driving computing platform. SGMWs Wuling NanoEV goes on sale, starting at 49,800 yuan SAIC-GM-Wuling (SGMW), General Motors' joint venture with Chinese partners SAIC Motor and Guangxi Automobile Group, saw a new Wuling-branded full-electric mini car model, the NanoEV, hit the market on Nov. 17. The new model comes with two common trim levels and one limited edition, whose guidance prices stand at 49,800 yuan ($7,800), 54,800 yuan ($8,590), and 59,800 yuan ($9,370) respectively. Pony.ais automaking project said to stall Chinas high-profile autonomous driving startup, Pony.ais recently announced automaking project is stalled, according to local media 36kr. Trunk.Tech bags hundreds of millions of yuan investment Chinas commercial vehicle autonomous solution developer, Trunk.Tech announced today that it has raised hundreds of millions of yuan in the latest round of financing. HT Aero to have European test flights in H1 2022 HT Aero, an UAM (urban air mobility) company and an affiliate of XPeng Inc., plans to start trial flights for the Voyager X2, the company's fifth-generation flying car in Europe in the first half of 2022, Zhao Deli, founder and president of HT Aero, said on Nov. 16 at the 2021 European Rotors. NavInfos Cennavi partners with HollySys for intelligent highway development Chinas location big data provider Cennavi partnered up with HollySys, automation and IT solutions provider, to co-develop products and solutions for intelligent traffic systems. LONDONPineapple Support will host Community Collaboration UK," a free, online roundtable discussion with leading European organizations that provide resources to the adult industry. The event, which is sponsored by AdultWork, will take place tomorrow, Thursday at 6 p.m. GMT/11 a.m. Pacific/2 p.m. Eastern. The roundtable discussion is free for members of the adult industry and will feature representatives from London-based sexual health clinic 56 Dean Street, FSC Europe and non-profit community interest company Support Network for Adult Professionals (SNAP). Pineapple Support was founded by British performer Leya Tanit in 2018, after the death of several performers in the adult industry due to depression and other mental illnesses. Join us for this important discussion to find out what resources are available to you and how the impact of the last 18 months has affected change within the industry, Tanit said. The Community Collaboration UK roundtable discussion will take place via Zoom. To register and for more information, visit PineappleSupport.org or click here. For specific questions for any of the speakers listed above, email [email protected]. Al Ahram Weekly, by Nevine El-Aref (Link: Luxor: The great Procession) Plans are afoot for Luxor to bathe in the international spotlight, and hopefully attract large numbers of tourists, as the city prepares to recreate an ancient festival with a modern twist. Luxor is receiving a massive facelift in preparation for the launch of a major campaign promoting the city as the worlds greatest open-air museum. It is hoped that the celebrations marking the launch of the campaign will focus the worlds attention on Luxors awe-inspiring Theban monuments, the dazzling Nile, the charming traditional market and horse-drawn carriages, and host of other tourist attractions. The centrepiece of the launch will be a re-enactment of the ancient Egyptian Opet festival, which is being resurrected with a contemporary twist. The serenity of Karnak and Luxor temples has been disturbed by workers installing lights, extending cables, erecting wooden stages and fixing backdrops for the festivities. Conservators and archaeologists, armed with brushes, sticks, trowels, sieves, hand-held blowers and buckets, stand on scaffolding brushing accumulated debris from the temples columns and walls, revealing long concealed colours. Or else they sift the sands along the Avenue of Sphinxes where huge banners are being installed, ready to host an exhibition of archive photographs, the majority taken in the 19th century, documenting the history of the excavation of Luxor and Karnak temples and the major discoveries that occurred during the process, and illustrating finds connected to the royal kings and queens who participated in the construction of the avenue and the ancient festival. Excavation work on the Great Processional Path, known as the Avenue of Sphinxes, began seriously in 1949 when Egyptian archaeologist Zakaria Ghoneim unearthed the first eight ram-headed statues, explained Mahmoud Mabrouk, advisor to the minister of tourism and antiquities. Ghoneims pioneering work was then taken up by other archaeologists who plotted the course of the ceremonial way. Beyond the archaeological sites, workers are busy in streets and squares upgrading Luxors infrastructure. New street lighting is being installed, squares are being tidied up, shop fronts polished and streets repaved. The whole city has become a hive of activity. A promenade along the Nile has been constructed, major streets and squares are being newly landscaped, and information boards erected to inform pedestrians of the ancient sites past which they are walking. While the date of the launch is shrouded in secrecy, a source at the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, speaking on condition of anonymity, revealed that the upcoming celebrations will include a modern riff on the Opet festival and showcase all of Luxors attractions, from traditional felucca rides and luxury cruises on the Nile to hot air balloons over the Valleys of the Kings and Nobles, and performances of traditional music. Zahi Hawass, former minister of antiquities, said that during the annual Opet festival ancient Egyptian priests would process from Karnak to Luxor along the Avenue of Sphinxes carrying a wooden barque holding the shrine of the Theban triad of deities, Amun-Re, Mut and Khonsu, in a celebration intended to recreate their marriage. The ritual was held annually from the New Kingdom onwards. The rituals associated with the Opet festival, pointed out Hawass, are detailed in Luxor Temple where inscriptions reveal many features of the feast, including music, dance, military marches, the presentation of offerings, and horse shows. Hangovers from the ancient festival can still be witnessed in Luxor, not least in the celebration of Moulid Sidi Abul-Haggag. Abul-Haggag was a 13th-century Sufi sheikh whose mosque was built next to a Coptic church, both of which lie within the confines of Luxor Temple. The magnificent Avenue of Sphinxes, along which priests and Pharaohs once walked in procession, connected the temples of Luxor and Karnak. Many of the 1,350 sphinxes, human heads with the bodies of lions, that once lined the avenue have been restored. The 2,700-metre-long avenue was built during the reign of the 13th-Dynasty Pharaoh Nectanebo I. It replaced an earlier processional way, as queen Hatshepsut recorded on the walls of her red chapel in Karnak Temple. Hatshepsut built six chapels dedicated to the god Amun-Re on the route of the avenue during her reign. The avenue was originally lined with sphinxes with ram rather than human heads, sitting on sandstone plinths opposite one another along the course of the ceremonial route. Over the centuries the avenue was lost. Some of the sphinxes were destroyed, and the road eventually obliterated beneath sand on which, in may areas, random housing was built. Within the framework of plans to restore the citys ancient Egyptian monuments and develop the entire Luxor governorate into an open-air museum, work began on uncovering the lost sections of the avenue. The sphinxes were restored, and while the attempt to restore the ceremonial way was very much a stop-start affair, contingent on the political upheavals of recent years, work is now complete and visitors to Luxor can explore most of the sacred route. Mustafa Al-Saghir, director general of Karnak Temple, revealed that excavations carried out along the avenue had unearthed not only fragments of the sphinxes but many other objects. A wall dating to the Roman Period was found, together with the foundations of Roman buildings and workshops for the manufacture of clay pots, amulets and statues. A number of bas reliefs were uncovered, as were pots for plants which, in the New Kingdom, were placed between the statues. Wine presses from Roman times were also discovered, and the excavations, said Al-Saghir, had revealed much about the economic and social life of the residents of Thebes. Restoration work at Karnaks Great Hypostyle Hall is now complete, with many of the intricate bas reliefs showing traces of their original painting. The open court of Karnak has been developed and visitor facilities upgraded with new sunshades, seats and signage. Both Karnak and Luxor temples also boast new lighting systems. *A version of this article appears in print in the 18 November, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Birthday wishes Call 281-422-8302 or email david.bloom@baytownsun.com to wish someone a happy birthday. We will print your birthday wish on Page 2 of The Sun. Happy Birthday Wishes At this year's Singles' Day shopping spree, domestic brands filled up the shopping cart of Wang Xinyi, a college student from southwest China's Chongqing Municipality. "Most of us choose domestic products nowadays because they are cost-effective and high in quality," said Wang, who purchased daily necessities, clothes and digital products made by local brands during last week's shopping festival. Wang is among many young Chinese who increasingly opt for domestic brands that understand consumer needs and incorporate traditional Chinese style and culture. According to a report released in September by Aurora Mobile, a big data solutions platform, nearly 70 percent of post-90s and around 80 percent of post-00s generations prefer to buy domestic brands for their daily consumption. A similar report jointly released by Internet giant Baidu and an institute under People.cn also showed that Chinese people's interest in domestic products soared by 528 percent compared with 10 years ago. Improvements in quality and branding have injected impetus into domestic products in growing sectors, including clothing, automobiles and cosmetics, with their popularity triple that of foreign counterparts this year, said the report. Mumu (a pseudonym), a postgraduate from Beijing Foreign Studies University, became attracted to a locally-made coffee brand for its quality and environmental awareness. "After saving a certain number of coffee boxes, you can exchange them for some other products. It's really encouraging for people like us who care about the environment," she said. Besides good quality and customized products, domestic brands have become a rage among young consumers due to their innovative use of traditional Chinese elements and culture, Mumu added. To woo young customers, the Palace Museum, one of the most visited museums in the world, has launched a collection of cosmetic products inspired by traditional Chinese architecture and astrology. "Some designs with traditional Chinese elements like the crane and phoenix or embossed patterns always stick with me," said Pu Dongfang, a student from Chongqing University. The robust enthusiasm has driven the growth of domestic brands during this year's Singles' Day shopping spree. The turnover of Anta Sports, China's largest sportswear company, exceeded 4.65 billion yuan (US$728 million) by the end of November 11 on various e-commerce platforms, up 61 percent year on year, the company said. Experts say the rise of domestic brands is not limited to the growth in consumption data but more about recognizing the country's growing strength in culture, technology and the economy. Young consumers, represented by post-00s who grew up when the country's economy and wealth were taking off, boast stronger confidence and a higher sense of national identity than those of other groups, according to a report on post-00s generation released by Chinese Internet giant Tencent. Mumu hopes local brands can continue to improve the design and quality of their products and keep innovating to meet Chinese customers' evolving needs. If theres something Lutherans are known for other than great hymnody and potluck dinners, its keeping their heads down. Lutherans typically are a staid bunch, not big on revivals or drum kits in the sanctuary. And they havent exactly produced many celebrity preachers (to their everlasting glory). Theyre also not known for taking prominent, which is to say public, roles on social issues. Preaching is for proclamation, and by proclamation, Lutherans mean the gospel. Youll rarely if ever hear politics coming from confessional (aka orthodox) Lutheran pulpits, nor will you see them marching in the streets (the one glaring exception being the annual March for Life). But that doesnt mean traditional Lutherans dont have opinions or care about whats going on in the culture around them. Take as one great example the Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty. Part of the Lutheran ChurchMissouri Synod (LCMS), the largest confessional Lutheran church body in the United States, the Center in its own words provides input, education, advice, advocacy, and resources in the areas of life, marriage and religious liberty and seeks to engage in discussions in Washington, D.C., to establish partnerships and resources in our nations Capital for the sake of our churches, schools, universities, and seminaries. I asked Dr. Gregory Seltz, the Centers director, to talk about contemporary religious-liberty issues. Dr. Seltz has been in involved in urban ministry in places like New York City, Dallas, and Los Angeles for more than 30 years. From 2011 to 2017, Seltz was also the voice for The Lutheran Hour, a Christian outreach radio program with over 1 million listeners, airing on more than 1,600 stations across North America, as well as on the American Forces Network. Seltz holds a bachelors degree in New Testament/biblical languages from Concordia University in Ann Arbor, Mich., a master of divinity in systematics/New Testament, a master of sacred theology in systematics, and a Ph.D. in theology and culture from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis (his thesis: Black Liberation Theology and Its Challenge to LCMS Urban Ministry). He was also awarded the doctor of divinity degree from Concordia University Irvine. Youve had a varied and rich career in academia, church startups, The Lutheran Hour. What motivated you to enter the world of religious liberty issues? My initial foray into liberty issues started with dealing with the political reality of New York City as it pertained to launching ministries in the city. As an urban church planter in the 1990s in one of the most exciting yet politically challenging cities in the country, I found it maddening to discover that church work that empowered the neighborhood often conflicted with the citys politics of dependency. We had to discover ways to deal with real issues such as preschool, childcare, even working with the poor, etc., as an extension of being the Church in the community for the sake of the community. Another impulse had to do with Obamacare and its federal demand that we provide abortifacients as part of our private healthcare, which was clearly against our teaching and against the consciences of our members. What are the biggest religious liberty issues facing churches today? With the federalization of virtually every aspect of healthcare, the government is intricately woven into issues from the beginning of life to its end. The temptation of the government to stand against clear moral teachings that are fundamental to many Christians and religious people of the country is one thing, but the coercive capability of such an expansive intrusion into areas of conscience is another. Weve seen that in the Obamacare mandates and more recently in the COVID-19 restrictions on the Church, virtually reclassifying it as a secondary institution. Such a reclassification stands in stark contrast to the constitutional protections of religious liberty enshrined in the First Amendment. While those issues are troubling, the most pressing issue is the reclassification of gender identity as a protected class like race, sex (male/female), ethnicity, or religion. Differences of opinion are one thing, but the notion that the Church must change its teaching regarding marriage and the healthy, biblical directives for sexual expression within the marriage bond now stands not merely as a different understanding of sex, sexual practice, and intimacyit may become hate speech, defining one side of the equation as constitutional and the other as not. We are seeing this already in Europe with the prosecution of Bishop Juhana Pohjola and Paivi Rasanen in Finland merely for publicly teaching that marriage is defined as the lifelong union of a man and woman and sex is part of the marriage bond. To what extent have the COVID lockdowns and mandates affected religious liberty? How might they continue to affect it even post-COVID (assuming there ever truly is a post-COVID era)? Again, the big concern was the governments reclassification of the Church as a secondary institution. Doctors and nurses were vital. Grocery store workers were vital. Yet ministers and spiritual leaders and the worshipping/serving body of the churches were not. Worship services and hospital calls by pastors were deemed unnecessary. If doctors and nurses could be masked up for their service, surely pastors could as well. With people literally dying from COVID early on, the voice of the pastor sharing the gospel with them, praying with them, offering Communion to them especially at the possible moment of their death was much more vital than the mere physical issues associated with the pandemic. Even worse was the politicization of health issues whereby free citizens were literally deprived of their right to work, to worship, and to deal with the risks of life on their own terms, faithful to their families, to their church, and yes, to their communities. The notion that one governing person has the power to make those kinds of decisions for 330 million was and remains ridiculous. Lutherans have a reputation for political quietism, standing on the sidelines during the great social churnings, focusing strictly on gospel proclamation. Is that reputation deserved? If so, do you see yourself as trying to alter that image, opening up a space for Lutherans as Lutherans to enter the political arena? Im biased here, of course, but I think that the representation isnt well deserved. Some would point to the German Lutheran state church and Hitler, but there were plenty of churches speaking out and even acting against the secular takeover of the state church and the state itself. Here in America, many of the foundational Supreme Court casesHosanna Tabor, Trinity Lutheran, and othersare the result of Lutheran churches standing up to government encroachment when the time is right. I think the label of quietism comes from a misunderstanding of our teaching of Two Kingdoms. Richard Niebuhrs book Christ and Culture is a good example. There the Lutheran position is defined as Christ and culture in tension rather than in the proper differentiation of God the Fathers preserving work (through Caesar, through peoples vocations) and Gods unique saving work in Christ for all. Differentiation does have a limited view of what good government can do, and that may be why we are not leading the charge on many of the political issues of the day. Such a view also supports a healthy limitation of what government should do. But that doesnt imply nonaction. I think my work in D.C. is trying to bring more clarity of that engagement strategy for the sake of the culture and the mission of the Church. So, yes, it is a change in what most people view the Lutheran position is vis-a-vis the culture in some sense. But it is also a needed response to the secularizing of our culture and our institutions. What kind of response have you received from Lutherans in the pew to Center activities? Weve been very well received. There are a few people, of course, who think that were getting more political, which they think confuses people about the Churchs main work. But in reality were trying to depoliticize many of the issues of the day so the Church can bring its unique message to the people in ones community. When the government can limit the moral and gospel voice of God at a time of overt trial and suffering (like with COVID), that is the issue that concerns us most. How receptive have folks been on the Hill to Center initiatives and concerns? There are many people who share not only our concern for government intrusion into issues where it doesnt belong but also our view of the moral issues foundational for a civil, humane society, issues like the sanctity of all life, religious liberty/assembly, equal justice under the law, the dignity/equality of all people rooted in our being created by God and not defined by government. Of course there is another religious position on the Hill that tends to fuse the commands of the Bible to deal kindly with the poor and marginalized, not with the personal actions of believers in community, but with government action. Such a fusion of the gospel with government benevolence programs is not only bad preaching; its also bad government, since the governments coercive capability undermines its benevolence. Those who hold that fusion view on the Hill dont tend to receive our voice very well. Most religious-liberty cases have been resolved in favor of churches, yet attempts to suppress the free exercise of religion continues. Is this more a hatred for religion, for Christianity, or is it a genuine concern for church-state violations? People often argue that America is not a Christian culture because the Constitution isnt overtly Christian. Thats an odd argument because the Constitution is a limiting document, not an expansive document. To limit the government to very specific things does not argue against the religious nature of the culture; it argues against the notion of an expansive state. The moral framework of the Ten Commandments is essential to self-government, and the key idea of our politythat of universal, human dignityis rooted in the allegiance to the God who created us, not the government that organizes us. That said, there is a secularizing move in our culture and in all cultures of the West that seeks to supplant the Church and the biblical worldview as essential and foundational presuppositions for freedom and liberty. James Davison Hunters books (The Culture Wars, To Change the World, The Death of Character) are helpful in this regard. As one example, however, of the vitriol toward religion today, this Robert Reich quote is instructive: The great conflict of the 21st century will not be between the West and terrorism. Terrorism is a tactic, not a belief. The true battle will be between modern civilization and anti-modernists; between those who believe in the primacy of the individual and those who believe that human beings owe their allegiance and identity to a higher authority; between those who give priority to life in this world and those who believe that human life is mere preparation for an existence beyond life; between those who believe in science, reason, and logic and those who believe that truth is revealed through Scripture and religious dogma. Terrorism will disrupt and destroy lives. But terrorism itself is not the greatest danger we face. I believe that Reich, former labor secretary for Bill Clinton, is still teaching public policy at UC Berkley. Its amazing that such vitriol exists for the Christian worldview today when the secular, benevolent state, often expressed in socialist and communist polities, were the centerpiece ideologies of the most brutal regimes in the most brutal century in human history, the 20th century. If you could affect one key piece of legislation to secure religious liberty, what would it be? Side-tracking the so-called Equality Act. That legislation is the greatest threat to religious liberty in the U.S. presently. The uncoupling of gender from its biological reality redefines the States coercive power in quasi-religious terms. The ruling of Obergefell v. Hodges and Bostock created a right to marriage that is not in the U.S. Constitution (neither for different-sex nor same-sex couples). The Churchs fundamental teachings on marriage, sex, and sexuality are now technically unconstitutional. The narrow perspective of the rulings is already being set aside for the greater goal of either changing the Churchs teaching or legislating its influencing voice out of the culture. The Equality Act overturns First Amendment protections of religion, of conscience, and dismisses the Religious Freedom Restoration Act as well. Making sure that the Equality Act does not become law is the key to securing religious liberty anew, then challenging the narrative that our identities are all wrapped up in race, sexual practice, and group identity rather than being in the image of God. We must also fight the caricature that moral, biblical limitations on the notion of sex and healthy sexual practice are hateful when they are in fact, directives from the loving God who created and redeemed us. Thats the work we must attend to now because legislation by itself will not ensure religious liberty if we lose the narrative battle in the culture. Shit got downright biblical in Egypt in recent days. Storms and flooding destroyed homes led to several deaths near Aswan, Egypt. The catastrophic weather was immediately followed by an onslaught of so-called "deathstalker" scorpions scurrying into mountainside villagers' homes. According to local reports, more than 500 people were bitten by the scorpions on Friday night alone. From the New York Times: There were hundreds, if not thousands: yellowish four-inchers with as many as six pairs of eyes and a tail full of venom so toxic that the species is known, unscientifically, as the deathstalker[] Scorpion experts said the flooding in Aswan had probably driven them from the mountainous desert that surrounds the area and into the villages[] Hospitals around Aswan were forced to dig into their antivenom stashes, and a Health Ministry graphic circulating on Facebook over the weekend warned of the most common symptoms of scorpion stings: severe pain at the sting site, high fever, sweating, vomiting and diarrhea[] "Professionals can catch the scorpions from the tail by hand," [Suez Canal University scorpion researcher Mohamed] Abdel-Rahman said. "But I don't recommend doing that." Christopher Belter, now 20, raped several younger teens and was convicted in 2018. This week Niagara County Judge Matthew Murphy, sympathising with his plight from the bench, told him he would not be going to jail. "It seems to me that a sentence that involves incarceration or partial incarceration isn't appropriate, so I am going to sentence you to probation." The judge issued a lengthy list of probation rules for Belter, who now lives in the City of Lockport. He also had a stern warning about following the rules. This despite the judge admitting Belter failed to follow those already placed upon him and presents an "above average risk" to reoffend. Judge Murphy said of Belter "we now know from his documented failure to to follow the rules imposed by the Court about abstinence from pornography that this defendant does not hesitate to ignore the rules when they compete with his own carnal appetites." Judge Murphy recently went as far as to order local media not to publish Belter's name, despite the fact he is now an adult. From this reportage it isn't even clear just how many girls Belter raped. This story in the Buffalo News says four. He plead guilty to two counts of second degree sex abuse, third degree attempted abuse and third degree rape. Local news coverage implies local support for Belter, including from his fancy school and his affluent community. This item from 2018 reports the original allegations of booze-on-tap parties thrown at his parents' vast McMansionand outrage among their rich friends that he (and they) would even be charged. The charges against the teenage son and the detailed allegations listed in the criminal complaint against his guardians have rocked the affluent community where they live, as well as Canisius High School, the elite private boys school he attended. The now-former student's friends were stunned when news of the charges came out on November 7th , according to a Canisius staff member who spoke to 7 Eyewitness News on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from school officials. "No boy knows where the hammer might fall next," the staffer said. The blithe admission that rape is business as usual for the rich kids of Lewiston, N.Y. notwithstanding, what hammer? Here's the lawyer of one of Belter's victims: Cohen represents one of the victims and is outraged with the sentence. Cohen says there were "zero consequences" for violating his previous probation. "He is privileged. He comes from money. He is white. He was sentenced as an adult, appropriately for an adult to get away with these crimes is unjust," Cohen remarked. Cohen noted how difficult it was for his client to hear Belter will not go to jail. "I believe she's in the bathroom throwing up, right now" Judge Murphy said he "agonized" and prayed over the sentence. So you can consider its leniency God's will. France has urged Armenia and Azerbaijan to respect a 2020 ceasefire, saying it was worried by new border clashes erupting between the two foes. Armenia reported that some of its troops had been killed and that it had lost control of two military positions near the border with Azerbaijan, which accused Armenia of provoking the clash. "France expresses its deep concern over the worsening of the security situation along several stretches of the border," a foreign ministry statement said. "France calls on all parties to respect the ceasefire to which they committed after the trilateral declaration of November 9, 2020" signed between both countries and Russia, the statement said. France said it was particulary alarmed by reports of use of heavy weaponry "which has caused many deaths, especially on the Armenian side". The statement said any changes to the border needed to be negotiated, and could not be imposed by military action on the ground. France is home to the largest Armenian community in the European Union. (with AFP) FILE PHOTO: Iranian flag flies in front of the UN office building in Vienna DUBAI (Reuters) - A top delegation from the United Arab Emirates will visit Tehran soon as the Gulf state works to de-escalate tensions with Iran, senior Iranian and Gulf officials told Reuters on Wednesday. A Gulf official said a high-level delegation is expected to visit Teheran soon but they declined to confirm whether UAE's top national security adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan would lead the visit. Sheikh Tahnoon is a brother of the countrys de facto ruler Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed and chairman of state investor ADQ. A senior Iranian official said an Emirati official would visit soon but declined to give more details. Anwar Gargash, diplomatic advisor to the UAE president, said on Monday that his country was "taking steps to de-escalate tensions with Iran as part of a policy choice towards diplomacy and away from confrontation." Gargash said the UAE remained deeply concerned about Iran's behaviour in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon. Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, are closely watching talks between global powers and Iran to revive a 2015 nuclear pact. They believe the deal was flawed for not addressing Iran's missile programme and network of regional proxies. (Reporting by Parisa Hafezi, Aziz El Yaakoubi, Writing by Dubai Newsroom; Editing by Toby Chopra and Bernadette Baum) CMMB Kenya reached 23,557 children under-five-years old and 5,222 pregnant women with health and social services in 2021. Improving Newborn Health through Health Systems Strengthening and Kangaroo Mother Care CMMB Kenya reached 23,557 children under-five-years old and 5,222 pregnant women with health and social services in 2021. CMMB Kenya reached 23,557 children under-five-years old and 5,222 pregnant women with health and social services in 2021. NEW YORK, NEW YORK, Nov. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- An estimated 2.8 million pregnant women and newborns die every year, or 1 every 11 seconds. Kenya has a very high maternal mortality rate, and over 90 percent of all newborn deaths are preventable. In response, CMMB has increased investments in health system strengthening to address maternal and child health inequities and to reduce preventable deaths. This year, CMMB built, equipped, and staffed three maternity wards with delivery rooms and postnatal care rooms in Kitui County, Kenya. CMMB also equipped and staffed two newborn unitsdoubling the capacity of the entire county for immediate newborn care. In addition to investments in infrastructure, training healthcare workers has been crucial. CMMB Kenya has trained 220 healthcare workers to build their skills in emergency obstetrics and in early essential and newborn care. We know that skilled care before, during and after childbirth can make the difference in health outcomes. It is critical for reducing maternal and newborn illness and deaths, said Dr. James Kisia, Country Director of CMMB Kenya. Skilled birth attendants are saving lives, often through low-cost and high impact interventions. For example, babies born prematurely typically need help with temperature regulation. These infants often go into traditional incubators, but CMMB Kenya also employs another intervention called kangaroo mother care. Our healthcare workers teach new mothers to hold their babies on their chest skin-to-skin and to exclusively breast feed, when possible. This naturally helps regulate the babys temperature and improves their chances of survival, said Dr. Kisia. Story continues Research shows that starting kangaroo mother care immediately after birth can save up to 150,000 more lives each year. Growing evidence also indicates it can save more lives than traditional incubator care. In Kenya and around the world, women and newborns are dying of diseases that we can treat, said Mary Beth Powers, president and CEO of CMMB. Globally, most maternal and newborn deaths can be prevented through access to basic health services and emergency obstetric care when needed. To save more mothers and babies, we need to address the root causes of health inequity by creating health facilities and training staff to respond to community concerns and needslife saving practices only work when people are willing and able to use them. Kangaroo mother care is an intervention that is low cost and integrates well with local cultural practices. The early effects of CMMBs work for women and newborn children in Kenya are promising. But decades of progress are at stake right now. Recent research shows the COVID-19 pandemic is leading to a rise in maternal deaths and stillbirths. We need to redouble efforts now or the world will not be able to meet the sustainable development goals for maternal and child health, said Ms. Powers. CMMB has worked in Kenya since 2006. The country office has a strong track record of strengthening health systems, implementing maternal and child health programs, and providing quality HIV prevention care, treatment, and support services. CMMB Kenya supports Our Lady of Lourdes Mutomo Mission Hospital in Kitui County. Opened in 1964, the hospital is the only referral hospital in the region and serves over 195,000 people in the county. Dr. James Kisia and Mary Beth Powers are available for a limited number of interviews. For questions about the information contained within this press release or about CMMB and its programs, please contact the Director of Communications, Luke Dougherty at LDougherty@cmmb.org About CMMB CMMB (Catholic Medical Mission Board) provides long-term medical and development aid to communities affected by poverty and unequal access to healthcare. Focusing on womens and children health, we deliver sustainable health services in Peru, Haiti, Kenya, South Sudan, and Zambia. For over a century, we have worked to strengthen and support communities through healthcare programs and initiatives, the placement of volunteers, and the distribution of medicines and medical supplies. CMMB has delivered over 3,000 shipments to 88 countries over the last ten years, with a total value of more than $4 billion worth of medical aid. Learn more at: https://cmmb.org/ Attachment CONTACT: Luke Dougherty Catholic Medical Mission Board 212-609-2582 LDougherty@cmmb.org FILE PHOTO: Pro-democracy protesters attend a rally to demand the government to resign in Bangkok BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thailand's legislature shot down on Wednesday a draft bill aimed at strengthening democracy, in which its backers sought to scrap or overhaul of key institutions they said had been hijacked by the military elite. A joint session of the lower house of parliament and the Senate voted 473-206 to reject the bill, with six abstentions, which called for a constitution passed under a military junta in 2017 to be changed to ensure a clear separation of powers. Thailand's government is still led by the architects of a 2014 coup, who remained in power after a 2019 election that its rivals say was stacked in the military's favour. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, the coup leader, has denied that. The draft was backed by 130,000 petitioners and sought to abolish the 250-seat, junta-appointed Senate, and restructure the Constitutional Court and key state agencies. The government's critics, including a formidable student-led protest movement that emerged last year, say democracy has been subverted by the military and its royalists allies, who wield influence over independent institutions. "The 2017 constitution protects and enables General Prayuth to extend his power by providing mechanisms of control through the Senate and independent agencies," one of the bill's proponents, Parit Wacharasindhu, told legislators. Since 2019, 21 bills have been proposed to parliament seeking constitutional amendments, only one of which has passed, which sought changes to the balloting system. Pro-government lawmakers defended the constitution, reiterating that it was endorsed in a referendum and that the coup was necessary to address a political crisis. "To only fix the problem of coup and its consequences without addressing the political problems that came before that, will that lead to a perfect democracy?" lawmaker Wanchai Sornsiri said during the debate. Thailand has seen 20 constitutions and 13 coups since the end of absolute monarchy in 1932. (Reporting by Panarat Thepgumpanat and Panu Wongcha-um; Editing by Martin Petty, Robert Birsel) Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Senator Richard Gordon on Wednesday questioned the supposed attempt of a Pharmally lawyer to hide his previous connection with Malacanang. Gordon, who heads the Senate probe into the governments allegedly anomalous deals with Pharmally, said Atty. Daryl Valles denied being from Malacanang when he visited on Tuesday his detained clients, the firm's executives Mohit and Twinkle Dargani. We do not understand why there was a need for the subterfuge, why there was a need to hide an important fact, the senator said in a statement. According to Gordon, the Senate looked into Valles background and found out that per Office of the President directory, he is a Director IV at the Office of the Special Assistant to the President, the position then occupied by Senator Bong Go. Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles confirmed Valles employment under the Office of the President, but added that the lawyer resigned in March. Upon quitting, he then worked for an office under the House of Representatives, Nograles added. Valles only admitted he held a Palace post when asked again by the Senates sergeant-at-arms after his visit, Gordon said. Here, the attempt to hide a fact raises more questions as a result, the senator wrote, adding that in the first place, the Darganis are entitled to hire whichever lawyer their money can buy. Earlier, Gordon said the Pharmally issue all leads to Malacanang. He noted it was President Rodrigo Duterte who appointed ex-Budget Undersecretary Lloyd Christopher Lao and former economic adviser Michael Yang, both of whom have been involved in the controversy. After previously defending Lao and Yang, Duterte, in his more recent public addresses, denied protecting Pharmally, saying he doesnt care what happens to its officials as a result of the probe. Mago leaves House custody Meanwhile, Pharmally official Krizle Grace Mago is now out of the protective custody of the House of Representatives after more than a month. Rep. Michael Aglipay, chairman of the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability, said on Wednesday that Mago left the House premises on Monday morning. Mago was placed under protective custody in October upon her request, following her bombshell admission that Pharmally may have swindled the government by tampering with the expiration dates of face shields bought by the government for healthcare workers. On the Pharmally probe committee report, Aglipay said they now have the first draft and are eyeing completion by year-end. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) President Rodrigo Duterte has endorsed Senator Bong Go and Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte for the 2022 polls, according to a lawmaker. DIWA party-list Rep. Michael Aglipay told reporters on Wednesday that Duterte pushed for the tandem during a meeting with House leaders in Malacanang this week. Standing order [Senator Bong Go] Sara [Duterte] for 2022, Aglipay said, citing Dutertes speech during the dinner event Tuesday which he attended along with over 90 other solons. But Aglipay noted that House Majority Leader Martin Romualdez who leads Lakas-CMD, the party of Sara Duterte was not present. RELATED: Sara Duterte accepts Lakas-CMD chairmanship The Palace earlier confirmed Dutertes dinner meeting, saying it was an informal and relaxed gathering with lawmakers. With active COVID-19 cases now on a steady decline and now that we are feeling the positive impact of the government's vaccination, we expect the President to join similar gatherings with friends and allies in the future, Dutertes acting spokesperson Karlo Nograles said. Go, who joined the meeting, thanked the House officials for their support and reiterated his plan to continue the current administrations programs should he get elected next year. The former aide of the chief executive is seeking the presidency under the Pederalismo ng Dugong Dakilang Samahan, an allied party of the PDP-Laban faction which he is a part of. Meanwhile, Duterte's daughter Sara decided to vie for the vice presidential seat, filing her candidacy over the weekend as the substitute bet for Lakas-CMD. Go earlier expressed hope that the Davao City mayor will consider being his running mate for the upcoming polls. But the camp of fellow presidential aspirant Bongbong Marcos said his tandem with the younger Duterte is already official. CNN Philippines' Xianne Arcangel contributed to this report. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 18) Reelectionist Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian will push for the inclusion of more schools in the pilot implementation of in-person classes in the country amid the COVID-19 pandemic. "I am pushing to increase the number of pilot schools, hopefully more than a thousand across the different parts of our country," he told CNN Philippines. One hundred public schools in low-risk areas finally reopened on Nov. 15 as the Department of Education launched its pilot run of limited face-to-face classes. Thousands of kindergarten, Grades 1 to 3, and senior high students returned to their classrooms after almost two years of online learning. Gatchalian said the resumption of in-person classes this week was successful, as seen by efforts of school administrators to ensure health protocols are followed. But in order to improve the country's education system, Gatchalian said it is important to invest more on teachers. This can be done by providing additional support through better benefits, salaries, and training, the senator noted. (CNN) Violence erupted at the Poland-Belarus border on Tuesday, as migrants desperate to cross into the European Union threw stones at Polish border guards who responded with water cannon and tear gas. Polish and Belarusian authorities have blamed one another for the ratcheting of tensions on the border, where thousands of people have traveled in the hope of making it into the EU only to find themselves stuck in freezing conditions. There were chaotic scenes on the Bruzgi-Kuznica border crossing, where crowds of migrants could be seen breaking up concrete blocks and gathering tree branches to throw toward the Polish side. Loud bangs rang out over the crowds and a dense cloud of smoke hung overhead. Belarusian state media BeITA reported that the water cannons used by Polish forces sprayed a yellow liquid that caused burning, and that people were suffocating and feeling sick from the smoke. A CNN team was hit by the water fired by Polish guards. According to BelTA, the deputy head of the Belarusian Armed Forces' Department of Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection and Ecology, Igor Malyk, told reporters that Polish security forces had used "toxic chemicals" against refugees. "Today we have witnessed how the Polish security forces on the Belarusian-Polish border used special means containing toxic irritating chemicals against refugees, including women and children," Malyk said. Seven police officers were injured after being hit by projectiles, according to the Polish police. Women and children who, just a day before, had been camped out in tents near the border fence had moved back, and men, many of them voicing their anger about being left in limbo in awful conditions, were amassing in the most dramatic clashes to date. "We are fighting to stay alive," one man told CNN. The Polish Border Guard said Tuesday that migrants camped out near the Bruzgi-Kuznica checkpoint were behaving "aggressively," throwing stones and various objects at the Polish services. "In order to prevent illegal border crossing, water cannons were used against aggressive foreigners," the security agency said on Twitter. Poland's Ministry of Defense shared footage on Twitter showing Polish officers and soldiers standing shoulder-to-shoulder with riot shields as rocks were lobbed over the barbed wire border fence, describing the scene as an "attack of migrants." The ministry also accused Belarusian services of equipping migrants with "stun grenades." The spokesperson for Poland's security services, Stanislaw Zaryn, wrote on Twitter on Tuesday about the clashes, congratulating Polish forces for successfully repelling the "first wave of attacks on the border." BelTA reported "an aggravation of the situation" on the border on Tuesday, as migrants try "by all means to get to Poland" and Polish authorities respond with tear gas, stun grenades and water cannon, "pouring water on people in the cold." "People say they are tired of waiting and are ready to break through," according to BeITA. 'We're going back to Iraq' Anton Bychkovsky, a spokesman for Belarus's State Border Guard Committee, told BelTA that the agency was launching an investigation into the "incident" on Tuesday. It's unclear what sparked Tuesday's confrontations but there is a growing sense of frustration among migrants that Europe is not welcoming them. They're now facing conditions the United Nations has called "catastrophic," suffering from hunger and hypothermia camped out in flimsy tents in makeshift camps at the border. Rumors have been swirling over the past 48 hours in the camps that the Polish government might open the border and allow a humanitarian corridor through to Germany. Poland has adamantly denied this and people amassed in the area have received text messages from Polish authorities saying the information was a "total lie and nonsense." The SMS message, also received by members of the CNN team in the area, reads in part: "Poland won't let migrants pass to Germany. It will protect its border. Don't get fooled, don't try to take any action." Polish forces appeared to have dispersed crowds from the border checkpoint as night fell on Tuesday, with some returning to a camp in the woods while other vulnerable people were being taken indoors. Belarus's border agency told CNN that some migrants -- including women, children and those with medical conditions -- were being moved 1.5 kilometers to a processing center, where they will receive shelter, food and medical treatment. Officials also told CNN a decision will be made on whether to deport them back to their home countries. Most of those gathered on the border are from the Middle East and Asia. Families could be seen walking away from the scene of clashes, with exhausted children in tow, some carried aloft on their parent's shoulders. Asked by CNN where he was going, one man said: "Back to Iraq. Goodbye Belarus." BelTA also reported on Tuesday night that Lukashenko had instructed the local governor of Grodno to help prepare a logistical center to receive refugees. Lukashenko putting migrants lives 'at risk' The crisis has led the EU to prepare fresh sanctions on Belarus, which it accuses of manufacturing the crisis on the bloc's eastern frontier. President Alexander Lukashenko's government has repeatedly denied such claims, instead blaming the West for the crossings and accusing it of poor treatment of migrants. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Tuesday said the military alliance is "deeply concerned about the way the Lukashenko regime is using vulnerable migrants as a hybrid tactic against other countries, and this is actually putting the life of the migrants at risk." He was speaking ahead of a meeting with EU defense ministers on Tuesday, and a day after warning Moscow that NATO would support Ukraine against "potential aggressive actions" amid a large concentration of Russian troops near Ukraine's borders. Ukraine is not a member of NATO or the EU. The military moves continue to test a fragile political order in the region and deepen concerns over the potential for a wider geopolitical crisis. Lukashenko spoke Tuesday with ally Russian President Vladimir Putin about the situation on Belarus' border, days after the two countries flexed their military might near Poland in joint paratrooper drills. The leaders also discussed the situation in neighboring Ukraine and US-led exercises near Russia's borders and in the Black Sea, Lukashenko's office said. Russia, Belarus' largest political and economic partner, continues to defend Minsk's handling of the border crisis while also denying any involvement in it. The EU and NATO have restated their support for Poland. The EU's Foreign Affairs Chief, Josep Borrell has called on Belarus to take "urgent action" to ensure the restoration of security at the border. Jakub Kumoch, the head of the Polish President's International Policy Bureau, said in a statement on Tuesday night that any new sanctions on Belarus should be "lasting" and "touch as many people as possible responsible for leading to this tragedy." This story was first published on CNN.com, "Violence erupts on Poland-Belarus border as Polish guards fire water cannon on migrants throwing rocks." Editor's note: Dr. Neha Chaudhary, child and adolescent psychiatrist, is chief medical officer of BeMe Health and faculty at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. (CNN) The holiday season is right around the corner, and for many that means more time spent with family across generations. Before you demand that your children drop their smartphone to talk meaningfully about gratitude at the Thanksgiving dinner table, take a moment to consider what you're asking. When it comes to generational divides, it's hard to find one bigger than technology use, especially social media. How to talk to teens about technology use (and reduce it) is one of the most common questions I get from parents in my child and adolescent psychiatry clinic. Adults worry that technology overuse is taking a toll on their children's mental health. For teens, it's more complicated. Whether it's social media, gaming or online chat forums, the digital landscape has become fundamentally integrated into their everyday life. Faced with that conflict, I typically ask parents and caregivers not only how much their kids are using technology, but how they are using it and how that use is impacting their headspace. Once we know the answers to those questions, we collaborate to find solutions. Rather than try to fight the use and engage in a tug-of-war, families can focus ahead of the holiday season on how they use social media. Knowing that some social media use negatively impacts mental health, families can together can shift to a social media strategy that supports teens' social and emotional health. It's important that parents and caregivers spend some time in careful reflection in partnership with teens. (Parents, don't try to do this alone.) Here's my four-step framework to help navigate this new space together and make productive, healthy changes: Step 1: Help teens evaluate how they are using social media Talk about the quality of the content your children are consuming online. Is it generally positive, like inspirational quotes or pictures of cute babies? Or is it negative, like politically charged news or memes that make fun of certain groups? All content is not created equal, and without intentionally and critically evaluating which bucket the content falls in, it's harder to figure out what to consume more of versus less. Your teens' pattern of use is just as important. Do they typically find themselves on social media when they are feeling happy, down, bored or angry? Do they scroll through social media to distract themselves from uncomfortable feelings or to avoid doing homework that's been piling up into a mountain? What happens when they step away from their device? By asking teens to reflect on the link between real life and when they pick up their phone to open Instagram or TikTok, you might identify an underlying problem that needs more attention, like anxiety. Or you could help them identify better ways to cope with uncomfortable feelings, like calling a friend or listening to music. Step 2: Ask how social media use is serving them This is where it's time to ask your teens to be real with you about the impact of social media on their mental health. Ask them how they feel after scrolling on social media. Do they notice a difference in how they feel when they view one type of content, like puppy videos or body-positive posts, versus another, like heavily edited and unrealistic photos of influencers or content from someone in a negative headspace? Often, teens will admit that the thought of breaking from social media makes them incredibly anxious at first. But when they do separate themselves from their device, they end up feeling better. It's not that surprising, as taking time away from social media altogether can help you stay present in the moment in a way that's helpful for your mood and overall mental health. The more links teens can make on their own between how they use social media and how that usage pattern serves them or makes them feel, the more likely they will be to want to make changes for themselves, if it's on their terms. Step 3: Encourage teens to identify the changes they want Ask your teens if they want to change the way they are using social media right now, and if so, how. Perhaps they have identified that they want to spend less time on social media. Maybe they have noticed that they feel badly about themselves after comparing their lives to those of others, and they wish the content left them feeling better about themselves instead of worse. Whatever the changes are, it's a good time to catalog them intentionally and set specific goals. It can be especially helpful to focus on what they would get out of the changes. Are they looking to gain some time back for more offline activities? Are they looking to boost their mood or self-esteem? Are they looking for more authentic connection and experiences? It's critical that your teen set their goals for themselves. It's how they will buy into the process and likely follow through with any changes. Step 4: List and commit to the steps needed to get there Now is the time to get concrete. What is it that needs to happen for your teens to achieve their stated goals? Do they need to take screen-time breaks, or place restrictions on their phone? Does the phone need to go into a basket at dinner, or be left in the common space when it's bedtime? Or maybe they are happy with how much time they are spending online but want to focus on what they are consuming. What accounts that make them feel bad do they need to unfollow or block, and what types of accounts will they look to follow? How will they approach spring-cleaning their feed? Will they replace five negative accounts with five positive ones per day, or do they have another method they'd like to try? Some teens have noted that disabling comments, making their accounts private, or keeping their social media use within certain bounds, like particular hours of the day, are helpful tricks to regaining some peace of mind. With a generation of digital natives sitting across the Thanksgiving table from generations who grew up solely playing outside with the next-door neighbors, it can feel like both parties are coming from different planets when it comes to topics like technology and social media. Rather than try to fight where teens are coming from, accepting that technology use is part of their way of life, and instead focusing on quality over quantity, will allow for more productive conversations. That's the space in which real, healthy change can happen. This story was first published on CNN.com, "For teens who are glued to social media, this 4-step plan can help." Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Fully vaccinated healthcare workers are formally given the liberty to choose the COVID-19 vaccine brand they want to receive as their booster shot as the program rolled out on Wednesday. The Department of Health issued the 15-page guidelines on the administration of booster doses for the A1 priority sector. The approved booster shots for 1.6 million health workers are a single dose of Pfizer, Sinovac, and AstraZeneca, and half the regular dose of a Moderna shot. Getting the booster shots are purely voluntary. Medical frontliners need to inform the vaccination site what brand they prefer, so it can be prepared in advance. They can opt to use the same vaccine brand (homologous) or a different one (heterologous) from the initial series they received. The approved mix-and-match combination was laid down by the DOH. If the vaccinees opt to get a different brand as their booster, they may receive the following: -Sinovac: AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna (half dose) -AstraZeneca: Pfizer, Moderna (half dose) -Sputnik V: AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna (half dose) -Janssen: AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna (half dose) -Pfizer: AstraZeneca, Moderna (half dose) -Moderna: AstraZeneca, Pfizer The Health department recommended using Pfizer or Moderna as booster if the health worker received AstraZeneca as the first series. Those who received AstraZeneca as their first two doses can receive the same brand as their booster, but it should be used with precaution based on the emergency use authorization granted by the Food and Drug Administration, the DOH said. "Vector-based vaccines (e.g. AstraZeneca) are recommended to be boosted with a different vaccine platform due to the theoretical possibility of pre-existing immunity attenuating or weakening the immune response on the second or third dose," DOH memorandum No. 0484 read. A fully vaccinated health worker can only receive one booster shot. It shall be given at least six months after if they received Pfizer, Moderna, Sinovac, Sputnik V, and AstraZeneca as their first series, then three months after if they got the single-shot Janssen vaccine. Booster shots are given to those whose immunity is going down over time after completing their first series. Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said studies are ongoing to determine how long the booster shots can provide protection vs COVID-19. "Ang booster dose ang layunin nito ay maitaas muli ang sapat na antibody protection, which over time alam natin bumababa ito," he said. [Translation: The purpose of the booster dose is to increase the antibody protection again, which we know goes down over time.] Majority of health workers in the country received Sinovacs COVID-19 vaccine when the inoculation drive started six months ago since it was the first brand to arrive in the country. Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr., one of the first personalities to get vaccinated with Sinovac in March, said he would receive the same brand as his booster shot. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Certain segments of the Filipino youth were found to be more likely to fall for misleading or false information, according to a survey led by the Ateneo School of Government. A total of 7,428 college students were covered by two survey rounds from May to September. In both instances, about two-thirds of the respondents said they were confident about their ability to distinguish facts from so-called fake news, but many failed when they were put to the test. According to Ateneo associate professor and researcher Dr. Imelda Deinla, two-thirds of the respondents only got six or fewer correct answers out of a 10-item "What the Fake" online quiz, where they were asked to discern if quotes attributed to political personalities were true or not. In the second round, respondents had an average score of 6.9, missing the passing mark of seven, illustrating a "mismatch" between a student's perceived ability to identify correct from false information and their actual capacity to do so. More than half of the respondents scored 6 to 8 points, indicating "average" skills in detecting false news items and statements. False information is also a trigger for political division, Deinla said. The study also found that young Filipinos who indicated they are likely to support President Rodrigo Duterte were more likely to fall victim in misinformation compared to those who said they were supporting Vice President Leni Robredo. Deinla pointed out that while the quiz items included more pro-administration figures, their supporters were still unable to distinguish real from manufactured materials. "This finding is not actually new this behavior was likewise observed among Republican supporters in the United States," said the Boses Pilipinas convenor, referring to supporters of former US President Donald Trump. "It is possible then that these partisan tendencies to fall for misinformation is a product of the same disinformation networks that both groups are exposed to, or because of the possible impact of constant or high exposure to fake news being the new normal thus, to regard facts in a different way." Those who said they are "politically engaged" and will definitely vote in the May 9 polls were also found less likely to be deceived by false news. The study also showed that individuals relying less on traditional media like TV, radio, and newspapers struggled more in discerning real information. "Ang mga respondents na nagtitiwala sa social media ay mas madaling maniwala sa fake news at mas nahihirapan na makakilala ng totoong balita [Respondents who put more trust on social media are more likely to believe fake news and find it more difficult to recognize legitimate news]," Deinla said. "Trust in social media decreases the odds of correctly identifying both real and fake news by 3% and 14%, respectively. Trust in social media and Facebook are shown to impair one's ability to detect misinformation," she added. Commission on Elections director Elaiza Sabile-David said the poll body is looking to release guidelines for candidates in campaigning through social media later this month, but clarified these will focus more on ad spending rather than sanctions for fake news peddlers. "I dont think we still have that capacity, especially nga na wala pang batas [when we don't have a law yet] to regulate the use of social media," Sabile-David said during the Wednesday forum. "We are partners with some social media providers gaya [like] ng Facebook. Kapag may mga na-spot na fake news, pwedeng i-report namin 'yun at aalisin naman ng Facebook [When we spot fake news, we can report that and Facebook will take it down]." The Comelec currently does not set a limit on how much or how many ads a candidate can spend for advertising and campaigns on social media, but said its looking to use online platforms in 2022 amid the threat of COVID-19. READ: Social media influence on Philippines' internet-driven elections Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana announced he has once again tested positive for COVID-19. Lorenzana told CNN Philippines he took the swab test on Tuesday after physically attending a Senate budget hearing. "Yes, confirmed, I am positive. I had my test yesterday afternoon. The result came out this morning," he wrote in a text message on Wednesday. Lorenzana, who is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, said he has no symptoms. He added that he will undergo another swab test after observing his condition in the coming days. Meanwhile, Senate budget debates will be suspended until Monday as a precautionary measure, according to Senate President Tito Sotto. "To play safe, we will suspend budget deliberations until all those who were exposed to him yesterday will have an RT-PCR test by Saturday or Sunday," he said, adding disinfection will also be done in the meantime. Because of this, the entire 2022 budget will be delayed, he noted. Sotto also announced tighter protocols for those visiting the Senate. Visitors should present results of their RT-PCR or anti-gen tests taken within 24 hours to be granted entry. A photo posted on the Senate's Facebook page showed Hungarian delegates were present during Tuesday's session, as the upper chamber presented a resolution commending the National Assembly of Hungary for strengthening its inter-parliamentary ties with the Philippines. Several lawmakers were photographed without face masks, although Lorenzana was not present in the picture. The 73-year-old Defense chief returned last Sunday from an official trip to Europe, where he met with his counterparts in Spain and Poland, Department of National Defense spokesman Arsenio Andolong said. He also tested positive for COVID-19 last April. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) If elected in 2022, labor leader and presidential aspirant Leodigario "Ka Leody" De Guzman vowed to pursue a government that does not protect the interests of big businesses but of the working class, unlike previous administrations. "'Yun ang aking gustong baguhin sa ating pulitika dahil sa mahabang panahon, ang nasa likod ng mga pulitikong tumatakbo puro mga big business - mga kartel, mga monopolyo - ng mga kilalang pangalan sa mga negosyante, na 'yun ang nananaig na mga interes pagkapanalo," De Guzman told CNN Philippines' News Night on Wednesday. [Translation: That is what I want to change because for the longest time, big businesses have backed people running for office - the cartels and monopolies of known names in business - whose interests prevail when their candidates win.] He mentioned the prevalence of contractualization and the Rice Tariffication Law as examples of policies that favor businessmen over the needs of workers. "Babaguhin ko 'yung mga batas at patakaran na naglelegalize sa pagyaman ng iilan at pagpapahirap sa mga mamamayan," De Guzman said. [Translation: I will change the laws and policies that legalize making the few richer and ordinary citizens poorer.] On contractualization, the labor leader explained that companies are carrying out this malpractice through the use of manpower agencies. Contractualization means hiring workers short-term - depriving them of the benefits that regular employees are entitled to. De Guzman also earlier said that if he wins, he would issue an executive order on a labor first policy that will put an end to contractualization. The policy, he noted, will include an aggressive job creation program and set the national minimum wage at 750. The benchmark minimum wage in Metro Manila is 537. Meanwhile, the Rice Tariffication Law removes quantitative limits on rice trading and puts a minimum 35% tariff on imports. Farmers said the rule resulted in billions of pesos worth of losses for their sector. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Some local governments are now crafting ordinances that will prohibit unvaccinated children from entering public spaces like malls, the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) said on Wednesday. Si Secretary [Eduardo] Ano po ay kinausap na ang mga mayors at sila ay inatasan na pag-aralan na ang bagay na ito Marami na pong mga LGUs ang nagbabalangkas ng kanilang mga ordinansa, said DILG Undersecretary Jonathan Malaya during the Laging Handa press briefing. [Translation: Secretary Eduardo Ano talked to the mayors and they were told to review such policy Many local government units are now crafting their ordinances.] President Rodrigo Duterte earlier urged local governments to implement measures that would limit the entry of minors, especially the unvaccinated ones, to malls and other establishments. Duterte made the statement following reports that a two-year-old child tested positive for COVID-19 after going to a mall. The Department of Health said it was an isolated case. The Inter-Agency Task Force recently allowed minors to enter malls in areas under Alert Level 2. They must be accompanied by a fully vaccinated adult. Malaya also said the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) has formed a technical working group that would review the policy on allowing minors to enter establishments. Ayon po kay chairman [Benhur] Abalos ng MMDA, meron na silang technical working group composed of the various city health officers para pag-aralan kung babaguhin ba yung polisiya on minors entering malls, shopping centers and similar establishments, he said. [Translation: According MMDA chairman Benhur Abalos, they already have a technical working group composed of the various city health officers to study if there is a need to amend the policy on minors entering malls, shopping centers and similar establishments.] Meanwhile, Marikina City Mayor Marcy Teodoro and Muntinlupa City Mayor Jaime Fresnedi are proposing that Metro Manila should have a unified guideline for the entry of minors to the malls. They also assured that they would immediately issue an ordinance. Moreover, the DILG reminded the managers of malls and similar establishments to follow minimum health standards and to always check if visitors are vaccinated upon entry. The agency warned establishments that their safety seals would be revoked and they would be ordered to close if they would not follow health protocols. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Davao City Mayor and vice presidential hopeful Sara Duterte has accepted the offer to be the new chairperson of Lakas-CMD, her camp confirmed Wednesday. "I am honored to accept the chairmanship of Lakas-CMD. Together with the party, I look forward to waging a successful campaign for BBM-Sara, with the invaluable support of our fellow Filipinos," the mayor said in a statement. Earlier in the day, Lakas-CMD chairman Senator Bong Revilla, Jr. offered his post to Duterte, saying he has "full trust and confidence" the presidential daughter will lead the party to victory in the 2022 polls. "In full support of Mayor Sara Duterte's candidacy for vice president, I am offering her my post as Chairman of Lakas-CMD," Revilla said in a statement. Last week, the Davao City mayor quit her regional Hugpong ng Pagbabago party to join Lakas-CMD and later filed her candidacy as its vice presidential bet for next year's elections. At least two parties the Partido Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP) and the People's Reform Party moved to adopt Duterte as their candidate for the second highest post. But presidential aspirant Bongbong Marcos, who is running under PFP, said Tuesday that his tandem with Duterte was already official. RELATED: 'Hurting' Bong Go wants Sara Duterte to be running mate Beginning tomorrow, healthcare workers may again roll up their sleeves, this time, for booster shots. The Food and Drug Administration approved four brands: Pfizer, Astrazeneca, Sinovac, and Sputnik. Only Sputnik can be used for people who received a different brand for their primary shot. The Health Department has yet to release the complete guidelines for the booster dose. A copy of the department's letter seen by CNN Philippines indicates, the DOH is still asking hospitals for a list of fully vaccinated personnel for the last six months. Officials are also considering additional doses for other priority groups. (CNN) Brazil is looking to partner with SpaceX to expand internet connection to rural schools and protect the Amazon, the country's Communications Minister Fabio Faria tweeted on Tuesday. Faria's tweets include a video and photo of himself with SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk, whom he met in Texas. "We're looking forward to providing connectivity to the least served people in Brazil...especially to schools and hospitals in rural areas," Musk says in the video, shaking hands with Faria. "With better connectivity we can help ensure the preservation of the Amazon and monitor the Amazon to make sure there's no illegal logging activity and deforestation," Musk also says. It is unclear what the terms of such a partnership might look like. SpaceX's Starlink project offers broadband internet through a satellite network. According to its website, the service is "ideally suited for areas where connectivity has been unreliable or completely unavailable." "We want to join the technology they have developed with the Communications Ministry's own Wi-Fi Brazil program," Faria said in a statement from his ministry. "Our aim is to take the internet to rural areas and remote places, as well as helping to control fires and illegal deforestation in the Amazon forest." Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE) already tracks deforestation in the Amazon via satellite imaging. However, Claudio Almeida, Amazon monitoring coordinator at INPE, told CNN he had not received any consultation regarding potential monitoring collaboration with SpaceX. SpaceX did not respond to CNN's request for comment. This story was first published on CNN.com Brazil touts partnership with SpaceX to connect rural areas and monitor Amazon forest Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Another 3.53 million doses of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccines arrived in the country on Wednesday. Vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said the latest shipment completes the delivery of Chinese-made Sinovac vaccines procured by the government through the Asian Development Bank. Chinese Ambassador Huang Xilian, meanwhile, pledged China will donate two million more shots of the COVID-19 vaccine. Galvez said these shots will be used as booster doses of healthcare workers and during the three-day national vaccination drive set on Nov. 29 to Dec. 1. The Philippines has received 54 million doses of Sinovac vaccines, including donations of the Chinese government. (CNN) Six arrest warrants have been issued in Thailand as a result of CNN's investigation into a scam that saw millions of fake and second-hand medical gloves sold to American companies, as demand for the product worldwide surged during the coronavirus pandemic. In a press conference on Monday, Thailand's Central Investigation Bureau said the arrest warrants were for individuals alleged to have committed public fraud by scamming $2.6 million out of an American investor, Louis Ziskin. "[A] Thai court has approved arrest warrants for 6 individuals, they are the subjects which are in the interest of CNN's report," Police Lt. General Jirabhop Bhuridej said. Among the people being sought are Luk Fei Yeung Yeung, a Hong Kong national who ran Paddy the Room Trading Company. CNN's investigation found the company brokered deals with American firms to provide millions of dollars of medical-grade nitrile gloves, but instead sent lower-quality vinyl or latex gloves hand-packed into boxes claiming they were medical grade. Some were even soiled and clearly second-hand. The Thai Central Investigation Bureau told CNN on Tuesday that Luk Fei had left the country. Paddy the Room did not respond to multiple requests for comment over several months during CNN's investigation. American businessman Louis Ziskin responded to the news of the arrest warrants, telling CNN: "It's a great first step, but without a second, third, and fourth step, it means nothing." "For this to benefit the Thai people, the corruption behind this industry of fraud must also be exposed. I am hopeful that the United States, Thai, and Taiwanese governments will take this matter seriously at the highest levels," he continued. Ziskin told CNN he has been co-operating with Thai police in their investigations. Thai police also announced that the CEO of SkyMed, a company that sells medical gloves, Kampee Kampeerayannon, has been released on bail after his arrest earlier this month. According to Thai police, he faces charges of public fraud and distributing false information by computer and has denied all charges against him. Thai Police said they have expanded their investigation into SkyMed by raiding the company's factory, where Kampee claimed to have machines capable of producing nitrile gloves on a large scale. Police allege this claim lured investors to transfer large amounts of money to him. No glove-making machines were found by Thai authorities inside the factory during the raid, only empty boxes branded as SkyMed. Responding to the police findings, Kampee told CNN the factory did not have the 1,000 glove-making machines he had previously claimed "because that enormous amount of money [from investors] didn't come... But we will continue to carry out our plan by building a super machine." Last year, the Thai FDA raided Paddy the Room's warehouse and found dirty, soiled gloves packaged into SkyMed boxes. In a recent interview with CNN, prior to his arrest, company CEO Kampee Kampeerayannon denied his company was part of any repackaging operation occurring in the warehouse when it was raided. "The owner of the warehouse, they just wanted to repack our brand and export it," he said. Kampeerayannon said if any gloves are exported from Thailand under the SkyMed brand it is, "not under our permission," he told CNN. This story was first published on CNN.com, "More arrest warrants issued in Thailand over medical gloves scam following CNN investigation." 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Merchants can introduce a range of payment capabilities such as Quick Response (QR) codes on standard POS and e-commerce channels or contactless (tap and pay) payments to deliver superior, secure transacting experiences to customers. According to the eCommerce Association of Bangladesh (e-Cab), over the last three years digital payments have recorded 100% year-on-year growth. The e-commerce industry is expected to grow to US$3 billion by 2023, driven by growing consumer preference for online and touch-free payments. Archit Mylandla, Executive Director of FSS, said: We look forward to collaborating with BRAC Bank to expand its merchant payment capabilities and advance adoption of digital payments in Bangladesh. Our globally proven technology platform gives BRAC Bank the scalability and the flexibility needed to evolve with the market through continual product innovation and delivery of superior payments experiences to merchants. Khairuddin Ahmed Bappy, Head of Merchant Acquiring at BRAC Bank, added: The partnership helps us to lead the development of Bangladeshs payments ecosystem and connect it with the wider regionand the rest of the world. Africell and Industry Five are launching a pilot project that will see mobile phones assembled in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for the first time. From January 2022, up to 30,000 of Africells proprietary featurephone handsets will be assembled at a specialised Industry Five facility in Kinshasa. If the Afriphone handsets meet strict performance standards, they will be made available to DRCs population of 90 million + people, with further monthly production runs following. Industry Fives factory in Kinshasa will be equipped with award-winning modular and mobile workstations. Highly trained local technicians will assemble Afriphone devices on site, assisted by state-of-the art collaborative robots. Performance testing and quality checks will also occur at the facility. We want to encourage a critical mass of the skills and functions necessary to the production of mobile technology to take root in DRC, says Milad Khairallah, CEO of Africell DRC, part of US-owned Africell group. This is why we are collaborating with Industry Five. By assembling consumer mobile technology here in DRC, we hope to energise the local supply chain, mitigate the supply risks inherent in a highly globalised industry, and direct more of the benefits of booming mobile usage back into DRCs economy. Africell and Industry Five expect the first DRC-made Afriphones to be ready from February 2022. After an initial shakeout phase, production will increase and up to a half a million Afriphone handsets could be assembled in the following twelve months. The production process can also be decentralised, meaning that future technical activity could happen at sites in Lubumbashi, Goma, or Bandundu in addition to Kinshasa, DRCs capital city. Industry Five Groups Chairman, JP Folsgaard-Bak, believes that assembling Afriphones locally is a big step forward in the development of the DRCs telecommunications sector. This initiative challenges a common view that the only viable way to get mobile phone into the hands of African consumers is to import them box-ready, he says. Instead, we are investing in the workforce and facilities that will bring a key section of the supply chain onto African soil. Advantages include the creation of jobs, more competitive pricing, and a mobile sector in the DRC that is better able to withstand global supply shocks. The decision to assemble Afriphones in DRC reflects a broader commitment by both Africell and Industry Five to developing the regional market. In 2021, Africell undertook a record-breaking network expansion in the country, extending infrastructure and launching telecommunications services in several new provinces. Meanwhile, Industry Fives facilities in DRC are expected to produce a growing range of technology devices, including tablets, laptops, high performance servers, and data storage solutions. The company expects to generate up to five thousand skilled technical jobs in DRC within five years. Our mobile network business is meant to be a platform for growth and innovation, says Sam Williams, Africells Group Communications Director. By assembling Afriphones in DRC, we are stimulating supply chain innovation and making a long-term bet which could transform the economics of mobile provision in our African operating markets. The initiative also gives momentum to an important DRC government strategy; namely, to promote higher-tech sectors of the economy. "Africells collaboration with Industry Five combines entrepreneurship and innovation to make mobile technology more accessible, says DRCs Minister of Telecommunications, Augustin Kibassa Maliba. The government is pleased to back the local production of mobile handsets, an activity which is essential link in the telecoms value chain and a project that brings us closer to ideal of full digital inclusion in the DRC. Statement by Ambassador Byrne Nason at the UNSC Briefing on Somalia Statement Thank you Mr. President, Thank you SRSG Swan for his briefing. Thank you also to Special Representative Madiera and I also welcome my colleague the PR of Somalia. In particular, I want to say thank you to Ms. Siyad for your powerful and frank remarks this morning. Mr President, The finalisation of elections to the upper house of Parliament in Somalia is welcome, and it gives momentum for the next and admittedly more complex phase of elections for the Lower House. The quicker this process is completed, the sooner Somalias leaders will be able to refocus on the expectations of their own people for a peaceful, prosperous and stable Somalia. The collaboration we have recently seen between the President and Prime Minister is encouraging and we call for this to continue. There is an opportunity now to aim for completion of all elections, including the Presidential election, by end January. It is clear that technically, financially and from a security perspective, Somalias leaders can achieve this. Any further delays risk cost over-runs, risk interference from Al-Shabaab and risk upsetting the delicate political balance that now exists. These are risks we do not need to face. We urge the federal government and member states leaders to reconcile their differences and give renewed impetus to the crucial state-building work, which will assure a brighter future for Somalia. As DSG Amina Mohamed said during her visit to Somalia, and again when she came to this Council, womens participation in political, social and economic life is a game changer - participation and representation are pre-conditions for lasting peace. Ireland, while recognising efforts so far, still regrets that Somalia missed the 30 per cent target for the upper house elections. However, as we know there is now an opportunity, with the elections to the House of the People, where the overall target could be met. We join the call for Somalias leaders to now identify which 85 seats will be reserved exclusively for women candidates. Mr President, Ms. Siyads remarks underlined the critical nature of acting urgently on this issue. Ms. Siyads own reference to limited and insignificant progress is very worrying. We need to do better to end womens misery and struggle by ensuring their equal participation. The threat of terrorism, armed conflict and violence continue to loom over the Somali people as well as over the countrys institutions. I deeply regret that the most vulnerable are suffering the most, as incidents of conflict related sexual violence and grave violations against the most vulnerable, children, are on the rise. I echo the UNSGs call for accountability for these violations, whoever carries them out. Somalias leaders at local and national level must do all they can to end this unacceptable scourge. It is their duty. As elections and the struggle for power continues, it is vital that the Government prevent killings, arbitrary arrests and detentions as well as other actions to repress freedom of expression and political participation. The Government must also ensure that those who commit violations are held to account. We look forward, in this regard, to the outcome of impartial investigations into the killing of Ms Ikran Tahlil. Ireland reiterates its condemnation of Al-Shabaabs heinous attacks, which are exerting a considerable human toll. Their threat extends beyond Somalias borders and throughout the region, and is only heightened by recent instability. It makes it all the more urgent that the Government of Somalia, the African Union, and the UN find a path forward together on the future configuration of AMISOM and the eventual handover to Somali security forces. The EU stands ready to assist. It has long been a strong and committed partner of Somalia. But there must be agreement reached on the way forward. It is clear that the already dire humanitarian situation is being exacerbated by climate change. In this context, the work of UNSOM on climate and security is more important than ever: we look forward to further tangible outcomes of that work. And we are following the work with interest and expectation. Meanwhile, as we have heard this morning, with the extended drought conditions causing displacement and raising the spectre of worsening food insecurity, that 7.7 million people are expected to be in need of humanitarian assistance in 2022 is simply shocking. Yet it is the grave reality we face today. It is vital therefore in this context that Somalias leaders keep the interests of the Somali people at the fore, move as rapidly as possible to end this period of political uncertainty, and create the space to fully focus on tackling the fundamental issues facing Somalias people. Thank you, Mr. President. Previous Item | Next Item Aircraft of Vietnam Airlines are seen at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi on October 4, 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy A one-way ticket from Vietnam to the U.S. will cost around $1,000 and be available on the Vietnam Airlines website in a few days, the carrier has said. There would be a reduced number of passengers to lower the aircrafts weight to ensure no fuel stops are needed, CEO Le Hong Ha told reporters Tuesday. On the Boeing 787 and Airbus 350 planes Vietnam Airlines uses, this means a maximum of 210-220 passengers instead of the full complement of 300, he said. The 2.2 million Vietnamese-Americans in the U.S. would be the main targets in future, he said. The Vietnam-U.S. direct route would not be profitable for five to 10 years, but it is better to fly to sustain cash flows, he said. Passengers allowed to enter Vietnam from the U.S. now amid Covid-19 are experts, businesspeople and high-skilled workers. The first regular direct flight to the U.S. will leave HCMC in the evening of November 28, achieving a dream conceived nearly two decades ago. It will arrive in San Francisco 13 hours and 50 minutes later. A tidal sluice on the Muong Chuoi Canal in Nha Be District, a part of HCMC's VND10-trillion ($435-million) urban flooding prevention project, April 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Quynh Tran Work has resumed on a VND10-trillion ($435-million) urban flooding prevention project in HCMC after months of delay following contractual problems. The project, which covers 100 hectares (250 acres) in districts 1, 4, 7, 8, Binh Chanh and Nha Be, is building a new drainage system with six tidal sluice gates to control flooding over a 750-square-kilometer area. It is expected to benefit around 6.5 million people in downtown HCMC and those residing by the Saigon River. The project was more than 90 percent complete and with work being resumed now, it will be completed within next year, Dang Phu Thanh, deputy director of the municipal Department of Construction, told constituents at a meeting of the city's National Assembly delegation Tuesday. The project began construction in June 2016, with city-based Trung Nam Group as the lead investor under a build-transfer (BT) contract. While the project was expected to be completed within three years, construction was briefly stopped in April 2018 due to a lack of capital, and then delayed again starting November 2020 because the city administration had yet to extend the project's completion deadline. The contract had expired in June 2020. Since the contract was not extended, the bank had refused to disburse the remaining sum of VND1.8 trillion ($77.6 million) for Trung Nam to continue the project, the company's CEO Nguyen Tam Tien had said at a meeting with city authorities last December. In April, the then Prime Minister, Nguyen Xuan Phuc, ordered HCMC to work with the central bank and BIDV to provide funds for the project. Attending the Tuesday meeting with constituents, city chairman Phan Van Mai, who took office in late August, said the city has spent a lot of time and effort recently on fighting the Covid-19 pandemic, and not paid enough attention to the project. Residents of Vietnam's biggest city are eager for a respite from the chronic flooding they have been suffering for two decades. The tardy implementation of several anti-flooding projects has meant that roads and houses in HCMC continue to get submerged during high tide and heavy downpours. Burmese security forces have torched entire villages, including churches and hundreds of homes, in the countrys embattled Chin state. The United States is gravely concerned over these human rights abuses, atrocities, and the Burmese militarys continued intensification of military operations and violence against the people of Burma. State Department spokesperson Ned Price condemn(ed) such brutal actions by the Burmese regime against people, their homes, and places of worship, which lays bare the regimes complete disregard for the lives and welfare of the people of Burma. Spokesperson Price called on the international community to hold the Burmese military accountable and take action to prevent gross violations and abuses of human rights, including by preventing the transfer of arms to the military. Burmas military overthrew the democratically elected government on February 1 and deposed its leaders, many of whom, including former State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi remain in detention today. Since then, the regime has launched a violent crackdown against the people, killing more than 1,200 people and arresting more than 9,000 others including government officials, activists, journalists, and foreign citizens. Burmas military has stepped up offensives in many parts of the country, leading to massive displacement of residents and a serious humanitarian crisis compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic. Ned Price expressed deep concern over the Burmese security forces intensification of military operations in various parts of the country, including in Chin State and the Sagaing Region. He called on the regime to immediately cease the violence, release all those unjustly detained, and restore Burmas path to inclusive democracy. The United States will continue to promote accountability for the horrific violence that has been and continues to be perpetrated by the regime against the people of Burma, said spokesperson Price. We will continue to support the people of Burma and all those working toward a restoration of Burmas democratic path and a peaceful resolution to the crisis. The United States has designated Libyan national Osama Al Kuni Ibrahim pursuant to Executive Order 13726, based on his involvement in serious human rights abuse against migrants in Libya. Al Kuni is the de facto manager of the al-Nasr Detention Center in Zawiyah, Libya, colloquially named the Osama prison due to his involvement. Al Kuni, described as a migrant-smuggling kingpin, is involved in the systematic exploitation of African migrants at the detention center. Al Kuni, and/or the individuals under his direction, have been involved in serious human rights abuse against migrants at the detention center, including through sexual violence, beatings, starvation, and other mistreatment. In view of sanctions imposed by the United Nations, (Department of the) Treasury is taking this action to promote accountability and expose the illicit activities of those abusing and exploiting migrants transiting Libya in pursuit of a better and more secure life, said Director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, Andrea Gacki. We will continue to align with the international community by using sanctions and other tools to support the victims of such inhumane treatment and isolate those involved in such abuse of human rights. As a result of this designation, all property and interests in property of Al-Kuni that are in the United States or in the possession or control of U.S. persons must be blocked and reported to OFAC. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, We will continue to work with the international community and use all the tools at our disposal to support victims and identify those involved in abuses of human rights. We call on Libyas Government of National Unity to hold accountable (Al Kuni) and others perpetrating human rights abuses. Tampa Bay is a region located on Floridas western shore of the Gulf of Mexico that consists of several large cities: Tampa, Clearwater, Bradenton, Largo, St. Petersburg, Dunedin, Pinellas Park and Tarpon Springs. In the early 19th century, it was believed that this portion of Florida coined as Tampa Bay was commonly invaded by a Spanish pirate named Jose Gaspar, or Gasparilla, which the city considered as the legendary pirate who supposedly terrorized the coastal waters of western Florida in the late 18th and 19th century. So why the Buccaneers? In 1975, when the city of Tampa was welcoming the new N.F.L. franchise, team owner Hugh F. Culverhouse held a name-the-team contest. Out of 400 original submissions, Culverhouse and local sportswriters decided to go with the name that resembled the long history of the Gasparilla invasion, the buccaneers. Today, and for the past few decades, there is an annual festival that takes place in January bringing people from all over the country and beyond, celebrating the Gasparilla Pirate featuring a huge parade, festivities and much more. So technically, both a true story and a myth resulted in the Buccaneers pirate-inspired label and mascot. The event, held in Quyet Tam hamlet of Dinh Hoa districts Trung Luong commune, took place in celebration of the 91st founding anniversary of the Vietnam Fatherland Front (November 18, 1930 - 2021). NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue (third from left) presents the financial aid for building houses for the poor at the festival on November 16 (Photo: VNA) Quyet Tam hamlet is home to 193 households with 680 residents belonging to six ethnic groups, namely Kinh, Tay, Nung, Dao, San Chi, and Hoa. About 80 percent of the population works in agriculture. Expressing his delight at local development, Chairman Hue congratulated Trung Luong commune on meeting all the 19 criteria for a new-style rural area. Meanwhile, Dinh Hoa district is also striving to become a new-style rural district in 2022. He noted despite enormous difficulties and challenges to national development amid the fourth wave of COVID-19, Vietnam has still managed to sustain positive growth in the first nine months of this year, and the economy has begun bouncing back since October. He attributed the achievement to the regimes superiority and the strength of the great national solidarity, especially efforts by frontline forces and the peoples consensus, which have helped Vietnam surmount all difficulties and challenges. The more difficult it is, the more strongly the great national solidarity is brought into play, he emphasised. Agencies of the NA and the Government are preparing for an additional parliamentary session in late December or early January 2022, which is an unprecedented move, so as to soon identify overall financial and monetary solutions for supporting socio-economic recovery and social security, according to Chairman Hue. On this occasion, the NA leader, President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee Do Van Chien, and other officials presented 2.5 billion VND (109,600 USD) sourced from the Fund for the Poor to Trung Luong commune to build houses for low-income earners. The same day, NA Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue paid a working visit to the Thai Nguyen General Hospital./. Photo for illustration (Source: danviet.vn) Agricultural product shipments reached nearly 17.4 billion USD during the period, a year-on-year increase of 12.7 percent. Exports of forestry and animal husbandry products earned 12.8 billion USD and 379 million USD, up 22.3 percent and 6.1 percent, respectively. Exports of aquatic products, meanwhile, declined 0.8 percent to 6.9 billion USD in the January-October period, reported the Vietnam News Agency. The US remained Vietnams largest importer, buying over 10.8 billion USD worth of agro-forestry-aquatic products, accounting for 27.9 percent of the total. A majority of the USs imports from Vietnam (68.4 percent) were wood and timber products. China came second, with 7.5 billion USD, representing a market share of 19.3 percent. China spent mostly on Vietnams vegetables and fruits. Japan ranked third with 2.6 billion USD worth of products imported from Vietnam, accounting for 6.8 percent of the total. Vietnamese Doctor honored by Australia Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh, a Vietnamese senior lecturer at RMIT University in Australia, has just been voted by national daily newspaper The Australian as Australia's leading researcher on composite materials in 2021, with the researching theme of manufacturing fireproof materials to protect houses and other structures from being destroyed by forest fires. Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh (Photo: VNA) Within the framework of an independent research project, funded by the L'Oreal-UNESCO Foundation for Women in Science, Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh has successfully manufactured a fireproof material that can be used to cover the walls of houses, creating a protective outer shell as well as filling the gaps on the exterior of the house. Not only having the effect of preventing fire and increasing the efficiency of insulation for houses, this coating is also sustainable for the environment, because it is made from industrial and construction waste. It is expected that this new material will be available on the Australian market within about a year. Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh said that Australia is greatly affected by climate change, with the frequency and severity of forest fires increasing, causing major threats to people's lives, environment and houses. Although they are devastating, forest fires are often fast-moving and in most cases the structures the fire impacts only have to deal with the heat and flames for a short time. This is the reason why she came up with the idea of manufacturing an additional coating on buildings that can help prolong the time of resistance until the fire has passed. Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh added that in order to ensure fireproof safety for houses, it is important to consider the safety level of each type of material used and the suscepti bility of the whole building to catch fire when different materials in different textures are combined. Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh, 38, went to Australia as a PhD student in civil construction at the University of Melbourne in 2011, after she graduated from Hanoi University of Science and Technology. Currently, Dr. Nguyen Thuy Quynh is the leader of a research group on fireproof materials and advanced construction systems at RMIT University. Vietnams trade surplus in 10 months reaches 125 million USD The General Department of Vietnam Customs said that Vietnam racked up a trade surplus of US$2.74 billion during October to bring its trade surplus during the opening 10 months of the year to US$125 million. This comes following the countrys total import and export value of goods in October expanding by 2.4% to US$55 billion from the previous month. Photo for illustration (Source: VOV) Of the figure, export value surged by 6.8% to US$28.87 billion, while imports dropped by 2.0% to US$26.13 billion. These represent positive signs for the national economy due to exports bouncing back and demand from the global market showing gradual recovery. Photo for illustration (Source: moit.gov.vn) In the reviewed period, the countrys total import and export value enjoyed a surge of 22.6% to US$539.42 billion against the same period from last year, of which exports and imports rose by 17.4% and 28.5% to reach US$269.77 billion and US$269.65 billion, respectively. Photo for illustration (Source: congthuong.vn) Furthermore, the foreign-invested sector grossed US$197.49 billion from exports throughout the reviewed period, an annual increase of 20.8%, while the sector's imports surged by 31% on-year to US$176.54 billion. Vietnamese trade exchanges with Asia soared by 23.6% on-year to US$349.12 billion, thereby accounting for the highest proportion of 64.7% in terms of the nations total import-export value. Moreover, the countrys trade turnover with the Americas, Europe, Oceania, and Africa also picked up by 23.1%, 12.9%, 44%, and 24.2%, respectively./. Ambassador Pham Viet Chien and Vietnamese businessmen (Photo: baoquocte.vn) Vietnamese enterprises operating in construction materials, farm produce, electrical appliances and transport services attended the events. At the events, the Bangladeshi side announced the Governments policy of inviting investment in 100 economic and processing zones nationwide with a number of incentives, with priority given to information technology, telecommunication, farm produce processing, aquaculture, apparel for export, and tourism infrastructure. They said the country is reforming and simplifying administrative procedures to facilitate inward investment. In addition, participants highlighted a need to hold similar events to increase exchange and soon launch direct flights between Vietnam and Bangladesh to facilitate travel and business. A majority of Bangladeshi enterprises expressed interest in cooperating with Vietnam in the fields of apparel, agro-fisheries, processed food, construction materials, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. The General Statistics Office said that two-way trade between Vietnam and Bangladesh reached 981 million USD as of September 2021, of which over 90 percent were Vietnams exports to the South Asian country, up nearly 80 percent annually. The figure is expected to reach 1 billion USD this year./. Ambassador Pham Thi Kim Hoa meets the Vietnamese community in Suriname (Photo: thoidai.com.vn) The Vietnamese community in Suriname was established in 1999, most of them are Vietnamese crew members in fishing boats of Suriname, the Republic of Korea, or India. After fishing in the waters of Suriname, they decided to stay and work there. The special thing about the Vietnamese community in Suriname is that they all come from Nghi Xuan district, Ha Tinh province. The Vietnamese community in Suriname includes the owners of 5 fishing boats. They are happy to have asserted themselves in Suriname. Captain Ngo Van Quynh shared that they can catch 10-15 tons of shrimp in each trip given favourable conditions, and each fishing boat creates jobs for about 20 Vietnamese employees and those who process seafood on shore. Mr. Ho Nhat Thu, owner of a Vietnamese restaurant in Suriname, shared that his dream is to develop his Vietnamese restaurant more spaciously so that he can introduce to Suriname people as well as foreign tourists more about Vietnams cuisine. Mr. Ho Van Mau, a successful Vietnamese in construction of large projects in the capital Paramaribo, Suriname, shared that everyone is busy with work to affirm and integrate in the country of Suriname, but on occasions of Lunar New Year Festival or major national holidays, they gather together, and support each other to develop. They contribute to constructing and developing Suriname and also support their relatives in Vietnam./. Ms Men Sam An, President of the Cambodia Vietnam Friendship Association (Photo: Fresh News) After receiving the gift of 267,500 medical masks, 100 medical protective suits and VND20 million on March 8 from the Vietnam - Cambodia Friendship Association to the Cambodian people for preventing the COVID-19 epidemic, President of Cambodia - Vietnam Friendship Association Men Sam An sent a letter of thanks to Mr. Vu Vuong Viet, Vice Chairman of Vietnam - Cambodia Friendship Association. The letter said this was a vivid expression of the precious tradition of helping each other, mutual love and affection in difficult circumstances. Thank you to all my colleagues at the Vietnam - Cambodia Friendship Association for the practical and meaningful gift," the letter said. Lao Ambassador to Vietnam Sengphet Houngnuan (Photo: VNA) After receiving more than VND600 million and 225,000 masks from VUFO and the Vietnam - Laos Friendship Association to Lao people for preventing COVID-19, Lao Ambassador to Vietnam Sengphet Houngboungnuan on May 19 stated that VUFOs interest and support and the Vietnam - Laos Friendship Association is a great source of spiritual encouragement to help the Lao people overcome difficulties; affirming the close neighborly relationship and traditional sustainable friendship in all periods between the two countries. In the current difficult situation, Vietnam's sharing and concern with the Lao people is very precious, nothing can be compared with it, he said. The Vietnam India Friendship Association provides VND231 million for Indian people. (Photo: VUFO) Meanwhile, First Secretary of the Indian Embassy in Vietnam Sushil Prasad said that the noble gesture of the Vietnam - India Friendship Association, the Vietnam Red Cross, as well as the Vietnamese people, is the timely concern and sharing, demonstrating the friendly cooperation and good tradition between India and Vietnam in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Sharing his feelings when coming to the National Lung Hospital (Hanoi) to be vaccinated against COVID-19 on July 13, Mr. Michael Brosowski, co-executive director - founder of the Blue Dragon Children's Foundation, said that he was very impressed with the policy of the Vietnamese Government in giving free vaccination against COVID-19 for foreigners in Vietnam. We came to be vaccinated and saw that VUFO's officers and employees were doing everything for us: registration procedures, health checks, ordering, keeping distance, and disinfecting, he said. Ms Heidi Quine from Animals Asia Foundation said that although Vietnam still needs a vaccine for everyone, it gives vaccines to foreigners. I feel lucky and really grateful for the support of the Government of Vietnam, the Ministry of Health and VUFO to help foreigners working in Vietnam like us get vaccinated, she added. Henry Chisom Nonso Chukwuma from Nigeria receives presents from the Hanoi Union of Friendship Organizations. (Photo: TDO) Sending a message to the Hanoi Union of Friendship Organizations, Henry Chisom - Nonso Chukwuma from Nigeria wrote emotionally that, from the bottom of his heart, he wanted to say thanks for coming to help him. During the pandemic, the gifts from Hanoi and Vietnam helped me overcome difficulties. I will never forget this wonderful gesture. Thank you, thank you to the organizations that help foreigners in Hanoi, he said./. BEIJING, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- A landmark resolution of the Communist Party of China (CPC), released on Tuesday, hailed the achievements the Party made in exercising full, rigorous self-governance. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, by taking resolute action, the Party has given full play to the role of full and strict Party self-governance in providing political guidance and guarantees and significantly strengthened its ability to improve and reform itself and maintain its integrity, said the resolution on major achievements and historical experience of the Party over the past century. The problem of lax and weak governance over Party organizations has been addressed at the fundamental level, the document said. An overwhelming victory has been achieved in the fight against corruption, and this momentum has been consolidated across the board while serious potential dangers in the Party, the country, and the military have been rooted out, it added. The resolution was adopted at the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee convened in Beijing from Nov. 8 to 11. Enditem Editor: Zhang Zhou -- Chinese President Xi Jinping has visited Xihaigu four times over the past 25 years, which proved pivotal to the transformation of the area once deemed unfit for settlement by UN experts. -- The poverty-alleviation measures promoted by Xi have changed the fate of countless people in Xihaigu. Over the past 40 years, around 1.23 million people from Xihaigu have been relocated to more hospitable areas. -- "Organizing the country's eastern regions to assist western regions in poverty alleviation on such a scale and for such a long time is a feat that could only be done by our Party and nation worldwide," Xi said. YINCHUAN, Nov. 16 (Xinhua) -- Twenty-four years ago, villager Huang Tongshuai had the opportunity of seeing the man who would change his life. "In 1997, I was only 11. I saw a group of adults talking around a well in the village, and then I saw him," recalled Huang, who lives in an area called Xihaigu in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. Huang was talking about Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission. He has visited Xihaigu four times over the past 25 years, which proved pivotal to the transformation of the area once deemed unfit for settlement by UN experts. Xi lived and worked in Liangjiahe Village in northwest China's Shaanxi Province from 1969 to 1975. Still, when he arrived in Xihaigu, he could not believe what he saw. "I have seen and lived in poor places, but in the 1990s, seeing that there were still poor places like this in China was shocking," Xi said. The poverty-alleviation measures promoted by Xi have changed the fate of countless people in Xihaigu. Over the past 40 years, around 1.23 million people from Xihaigu have been relocated to more hospitable areas, and a greener and more prosperous Xihaigu began to take shape. Aerial photo shows a view at the Minning Town in Yongning County of Yinchuan, northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Sept. 3, 2019. (Xinhua/Wang Peng) MODEL FOR PAIRING-UP SUPPORT In 1997, Xi, then deputy Party chief of east China's Fujian Province, was in charge of a "pairing-up" poverty alleviation program between Fujian and Ningxia. Water shortages, Xi said, were the major cause of poverty in Xihaigu. "Xi came to our village and helped us dig a small round well to pump water for irrigation. The destiny of so many people has changed," Huang recalled. Over the past 25 years, Fujian has helped Ningxia build around 15,000 wells and cisterns, providing drinking water for 300,000 people. Local villagers call them "life-saving wells." After becoming a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and Chinese vice president, Xi continued to keep an eye on the Fujian-Ningxia cooperation projects. He made inspection tours to Xihaigu in 2008. In 2016 and 2020, Xi made his third and fourth visits as general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission. Farmers pick mushrooms at a planting base in Minning Town of Yinchuan, northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, March 18, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Peng) The "Minning model," a portmanteau out of the abbreviations of Fujian and Ningxia, was crucial to the poverty alleviation approach nationwide, epitomizing a "Chinese program" that relies on cooperation and support between localities to realize shared prosperity. "Organizing the country's eastern regions to assist western regions in poverty alleviation on such a scale and for such a long time is a feat that could only be done by our Party and nation worldwide," Xi said. On Nov. 16, 2020, Xiji, the last poor county in Xihaigu, was removed from the poverty list, which was a historic achievement for both the region and the whole nation. RELOCATING TO A BETTER LIFE In his first visit to Xihaigu, Xi pushed for a relocation project, which would see whole communities from Xihaigu move from their barren, inhospitable ancestral lands to a new area at the foot of the Helan Mountain nourished by the Yellow River. Xi named it "Minning Village." "Minning Village is now a sandy land, but it will be a fertile land in the future," Xi said then. Xie Xingchang (2nd R) and his family enjoy a family reunion dinner in Minning Town of Yinchuan, northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Jan. 24, 2020. (Xinhua/Wang Peng) Xie Xingchang was among the first to move to the village and later became its first Party chief. "Although Minning Village was still desolate at that time, to me, it is a place of hope. It is very promising," he said. Xi has always been very concerned about environmental protection in Ningxia, an important ecological security barrier in northwest China. During his inspection in 2008, he planted trees with Wang Youde, a respected national sand control hero. Thanks to policies such as relocation of communities, grazing bans and the regreening of farmland, Ningxia's forest coverage rate increased from 1.5 percent in 1958 to 15.8 percent in 2020, with the forest area exceeding 820,000 hectares. On July 19, 2016, Xi visited Yuanlong Village in Minning, which had been transformed into a bustling township of 60,000 people over the past two decades, with local life much improved. During his fourth visit to Xihaigu in June 2020, Xi visited Hongsibu District, one of the largest settlement areas for relocated people. Xi met Liu Kerui's family, who had moved from a mountain village. Liu handed Xi an old photo, saying "We have gotten rid of poverty!" "You will live a better life in the future!" Xi told the Liu family. Editor: WXL Photo taken on Nov. 13 shows black-necked cranes spotted at the Caohai National Nature Reserve in Weining Yi, Hui and Miao Autonomous County, soutwest China's Guizhou Province. The first batch of more than 1,400 overwintering black-necked cranes has arrived at the Caohai National Nature Reserve, which is one of the main wintering habitats for black-necked cranes in China. From November of this year to April of the following year, a large number of black necks will fly to Caohai for overwintering. (Han Xianpu/Guangming Picture) Head of the State Property Fund of Ukraine Dmytro Sennychenko has submitted a letter of resignation, a source close to the State Property Fund has informed the Interfax-Ukraine agency. In turn, the publication LB.ua, citing its sources, says that one of the main reasons for Sennychenko's dismissal is "the dissatisfaction of certain representatives of the politician with privatization, which has successfully started, but may have a peculiar effect on the ratings of the authorities." In turn, ex-MP, member of the supervisory board of Ukrzaliznytsia Serhiy Leschenko also wrote on the Telegram channel that the head of the State Property Fund is being fired. "The reason is the scandalous privatization of the Bolshevik plant, which took place in favor of one participant. He did not answer my message about Sennychenko's resignation," the message says. On September 18, 2019, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine appointed Dmytro Sennychenko as the head of the State Property Fund (SPF), dismissing Vitaliy Trubarov from this position. The issues of expanding cooperation were discussed in a telephone conversation by the presidents of Ukraine and Turkey, Volodymyr Zelensky and Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Zelensky praised Turkey's continued support for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine, as well as active involvement in the work of a new international mechanism - the Crimea Platform, the press service of the Ukrainian president said on Wednesday morning. Zelensky thanked the leader of Turkey for the expressed condolences over the death of Ukrainian soldiers in the east of our state. The President of Ukraine paid special attention to the issue of dismissing Ukrainian citizens illegally detained by Russia. Zelensky and Erdogan exchanged views on the security situation in the region, as well as on relevant initiatives to strengthen security in the Black Sea region. The presidents discussed issues of cooperation in the defense sector. The parties stated that the strategic partnership is already strengthening the armed forces of the two countries. The implementation of a number of important projects in the aircraft construction and development of the Navy was noted, as well as the prospects for deepening such interaction. The head of the Ukrainian state, in particular, informed Erdogan about the start of serial production of the An-178 transport aircraft. "I invite Turkey to join the circle of its customers," Zelensky said. The leaders noted their willingness to complete the preparation of an Agreement on a free trade area in the near future. Attention was also paid to the state of implementation of the agreements reached on a number of projects on the bilateral agenda, in particular, the construction of housing for representatives of the Crimean Tatar people. The parties discussed issues of interaction in the energy sector, among other things, ways to diversify the supply of energy resources. The presidents agreed to hold the 10th anniversary meeting of the High-level Strategic Council in Kyiv in February 2022. It was noted that this important event should be preceded by thorough preparations, in particular, the holding of the second meeting of the Quadriga at the level of the foreign and defense ministers in December this year. Some 36% of Ukrainian citizens are not ready to be vaccinated against COVID-19, those who do not want to be vaccinated are more present among young respondents, according to a study by the Sociological Group Rating conducted on November 10-13. According to the survey, 46% of respondents noted that they have already been vaccinated (first or second vaccination), 16% indicated that they are ready to be vaccinated, while 36% are not ready. It is noted that the survey was conducted only among the adult population of Ukraine, while the official statistics of the number of vaccinated are displayed among the entire population. Over the past month, the number of vaccinations has increased (from 36 to 46%). Relatively more reluctance to get vaccinated is seen among young respondents. At the same time, 55% support compulsory vaccination of representatives of certain spheres (teachers, doctors, government officials), 35% are against it. The ban on visiting public institutions without a COVID certificate or test is supported by almost 40%, against - 53%. Almost 30% support the ban on using public transport, 65% do not. According to the study, 71% of the respondents consider it a violation of their rights to impose restrictions on unvaccinated people, 26% are of the opposite opinion. There are more of the latter in Kyiv present among the oldest respondents and those who have already been vaccinated. At the same time, 49% do not support politicians who have not been vaccinated against COVID-19, 35% of respondents are indifferent to this, and 14% support such figures. Also, 61% of respondents believe that Ukraine is capable of developing its own vaccine against coronavirus, 37% do not. According to the survey data, 40% of respondents believe that no one is to blame for the increase in the incidence of coronavirus. Every fifth (21%) blames people who refused to be vaccinated for the worsening epidemiological situation, 15% blame the Ministry of Health. At the same time, the president and the Cabinet of Ministers are considered guilty by 7-8%, local authorities - 2%. Those who do not want to be vaccinated are more likely to believe in the spontaneous causes of the increase in the incidence. Those vaccinated and those who intend to do so are more often blamed for the growth of the epidemic on those who do not intend to be vaccinated against the coronavirus. The opinion poll was conducted using the CATI method (Computer Assisted Telephone Interviews - telephone interviews using a computer) based on a random sample of mobile phone numbers among the population of Ukraine over 18 years old in all regions, except for the temporarily occupied territories of Crimea and Donbas. The sample is representative in terms of age, gender and type of settlement. Sample population is 2,500 respondents. The error of the representativeness of the study with a confidence level of 0.95: no more than 2%. Russia-occupation forces again shelling Nevelske village in Donbas, damage seven houses, destroy two of them The police are documenting the consequences of shelling the village of Nevelske, Pokrovsky district, for the second time in a week, damage to seven houses was recorded, no one was injured, police of Donetsk region have said. "At 06:45 in the morning, the police received a message from local residents that at 02:30 the village of Nevelske came under fire from illegal armed groups. Law enforcers are examining the village, documenting the consequences of the crime and finding out what kind of help the local residents need," the message says. The police noted that as of 11:00 damage to seven houses was recorded, two of which were destroyed. There are no casualties among the population. The examination is ongoing. The issue of opening criminal proceedings under Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (violation of the laws and customs of war) is being resolved. The sanction of the article provides for imprisonment for a term of eight to twelve years. Law enforcers stressed that this is already the second shelling attack by the fighters in the village over the past week. As reported, on Sunday, November 14, as a result of the shelling of Nevelske, nine houses were damaged. Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine (NSDC) Oleksiy Danilov has held a meeting on providing housing for military personnel, during which he stated the need to make relevant proposals to the budget for 2022 and develop a clear and transparent mechanism for providing military housing, the press service of the NSDC said on Wednesday. "In this context, the Ministry for the Development of Communities and Territories of Ukraine has been instructed to conduct an examination of proposals, capacities and workload of house-building companies," the message says. It notes that Danilov also called for an analysis of the list of existing facilities of unfinished construction under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. The European Union has allocated 700,000 euros for humanitarian assistance to migrants, who are staying in Belarus, the European Commission website said in a statement on Wednesday. "Responding immediately to an appeal, the European Commission has allocated 200,000 in humanitarian funding to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). The funding is part of the EU's overall contribution to the Disaster Relief Emergency Fund, managed by the IFRC. This immediate EU funding will support the IFRC and its national society, the Belarus Red Cross, to deliver much needed relief assistance, including food, hygiene kits, blankets, and first aid kits," the statement said. The European Union has mobilized an additional 500,000 euros in humanitarian funding and is currently in contact with its humanitarian partner organizations for the implementation of the funds. The EU is supporting its humanitarian partners to help people stranded at the border and in other parts of Belarus, Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarcic said. "I am calling for continuous access of humanitarian organizations from both sides to reach this large group of refugees and migrants to provide them with urgent assistance," he said. A plan for the detention of a group of mercenaries suspected of participating in hostilities in Donbas prepared by the Defense Intelligence Agency of Ukraine's Ministry of Defense, was approved by the political officials of Ukraine in July 2020, the Bellingcat investigators said. "According to three former security officers who spoke to Bellingcat, including the former director of GUR MOU Vasily Burba, presented to end and approved by Ukraine's political leadership in early July 2020. It included the capture and detention of 33 mercenaries by staging the emergency landing on Ukrainian soil of an aircraft carrying the targets to their fictitious deployment destination," the investigators said in the report. The city of Dnipro is interested in establishing cooperation with the Israeli city of Netanya - the Embassy The state and prospects of cooperation between Ukraine and Israel at the regional level in the economic, investment and humanitarian spheres, as well as cooperation between the cities of Dnipro and Netanya were the subject of an online meeting between Ukrainian Ambassador to the State of Israel Yevhen Korniychuk and Dnipro Mayor Borys Filatov. The Embassy of Ukraine in Israel reported this at Facebook. Given the potential of the city, as well as its dynamic development, it was agreed to expand the twinning by establishing cooperation between the Dnipro and Netanya. The priority steps for the expected future have been agreed, in particular the joint participation of the Dnipro and Netanya mayors in the Ukrainian-Israeli Innovation and Investment Summit to be held on December 15, 2021 in Kyiv under the slogan Ukraine-Israel: 30 years of friendship and cooperation. And the Dnipro-Netanya online conference in the second decade of December 2021, - the statement reads. In addition, the idea of organizing a common ecosystem - Israeli-Ukrainian Startup / Business Accelerator Program - aroused mutual interest. As well as regional business events, primarily a road show to present the economic and investment potential of the city of Dnipro in Israel, - the Embassy noted. On Thursday, November 18, at 14.30, the press center of the Interfax-Ukraine news agency will host press conference by Global 100% RE Ukraine platform entitled "Energy efficiency as national idea." Participants include Chairman of the Board of the Global 100% RE Ukraine platform Oleksandr Dombrovsky; Chairman of the Board of the Association of Energy Service Companies of Ukraine Oleksiy Korchmit (moderator); Chairman of the Association of Energy Auditors of Ukraine Vadym Lytvyn; President of the Association of Housing Managers Vasyl Liman; UNDP Industrial Development Project Coordinator Oleksiy Paschenko (under consideration) (8/5a Reitarska Street). The broadcast will be available on the YouTube channel of Interfax-Ukraine. Due to quarantine restrictions, the number of places in the press center is limited, the presence of a PCR test or a certificate of vaccination is required. Admission of journalists requires registration on the spot. BTS Reminds Everyone They Are Style Icons, Showcase Classy, Edgy Airport Looks While Leaving For LA BTS Reminds Everyone They Are Style Icons, Showcase Classy, Edgy Airport Looks While Leaving For LA (Photo : Newsen/CC BY 3.0) The Bangtan Boys made an uber-stylish public appearance at Seoul's airport on November 17, reminding everyone that they rule the fashion game, in addition to K-pop, ahead of their flight to Los Angeles. BTS members Suga, RM, J-Hope, Jungkook, Jimin, Taehyung, and Jin are all set for their "PERMISSION TO DANCE ON STAGE - LA" concert in Los Angeles, US. Advertisement The Bangtan Boys looked effortlessly fashionable as they greeted fans and the paparazzi at the airport. Suga and Jungkook were seen rocking the biker look in all-black attire and leather jackets. Jin and Jimin looked classy in their trench coats. Jin paired his grey long coat with a white T-shirt, black pants, and white sneakers, while Jimin wore his green-colored coat over a black T-shirt and pants. Fans also noticed Jimin's new, different hair, and soon the phrase "Jimin Has Highlights" trended on Twitter. Kim Taehyung, also known as V, looked classy in all beige attire. He was wearing a nude-colored outfit with an undershirt, dress pants, trench coat, and Gucci Vegas Bit Loafer. It was noted that the Gucci loafers, which he wore, sold out after his airport pictures surfaced, once again cementing his position as the "sold out fairy" of K-pop. Incidentally, the Korean media compared Kim Taehyung's walk at the airport to a scene from a movie. J-Hope was dressed in a black blazer, black pants, and accessorized it with a printed yellow scarf. RM teamed a black long coat over a white turtleneck and black pants. The Bangtan Boys also took to Weverse app and Twitter to share updates with the ARMY before heading to LA. The upcoming concert will be the boy band's first in the US after two long years due to the Covid-19 pandemic. BTS has various performances and shows appearances lined up for this US visit. The South-Korean artists will be performing their remix of "Butter" with Megan Thee Stallion at the 2021 American Music Awards on November 21. On November 24, the boys will make a studio appearance as well as put up a performance on "The Late Late Show with James Corden". The group's long-awaited and highly-anticipated in-person concert "PERMISSION TO DANCE ON STAGE - LA" will be held at the SoFi Stadium on November 27-28 and December 1-2. Egypt has codified a host of COVID-19 restrictions, including those regulating facemasks and public gatherings, assigning jail penalties and fines for violators in accordance with the newly issued epidemics and pandemics law. Former President Donald Trump lashed out with profanity at Benjamin Netanyahu for congratulating President Joe Biden on his victory in last year's election, an Israeli newspaper reported Friday. The Egyptian equipment and crews will remove debris and rubble from buildings destroyed by last month's devastating Israeli air strikes on Gaza Egypt has sent a massive engineering equipment and crews to participate in the Gaza Strip reconstruction efforts after last month's devastating Israeli bombing campaign crossed the Rafah border crossing on Friday, state-owned MENA agency reported. The crews and equipment, which includes a large number of trucks, bulldozers and cranes, will participate in removing debris and rubble from the buildings that were destroyed by the 11-day Israeli air strikes and bombings of the strip last month. The re-construction convoy comes under a pledge by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to contribute $500 million as part of an Egyptian initiative for reconstructing the Gaza Strip, with the participation of Egyptian companies, in order to mitigate the suffering of Palestinians and restore normalcy in the Gaza Strip. Last month, the Israeli bombing campaign of Gaza - deemed the most serious Israeli assault on the strip since 2014 - killed more than 250 Palestinians, injured 1,900 and destroyed 2,000 residential and commercial buildings, leaving thousands homeless. The densely populated Gaza Strip is home to two million Palestinians, most of whom are refugees from the 1948 war. Egypt, Gaza Egypt, Gaza On 21 May, Egypt mediated a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas along with other Palestinian factions. Since then, Cairo has launched intensive diplomatic efforts to cement the ceasefire and lay the ground work for the resumption of peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis. Meanwhile, Egypt has already sent a ton of medical and humanitarian aid to Gaza to help the Palestinians deal with the aftermath of Israel's deadly offensive on the strip. Egypt also continues to open its Rafah crossing with the Gaza Strip to allow stranded Palestinians and humanitarian cases to cross the border in both directions. Medical and administrative teams are stationed at the terminal to facilitate the passage of the injured and their escorts to hospitals. Egypt, Gaza Search Keywords: Short link: The aid convoy sent to the strip includes 60 tonnes of medical equipment, foodstuff, and COVID-19 preventive equipment The Egyptian Red Crescent (ERC) has dispatched on Thursday, in cooperation with the International Organisation for Migration (IOU), a medical and food aid convoy to Gaza to provide support for the strip after Mays deadly Israeli bombing campaign. The aid convoy sent to the strip includes 60 tonnes of medical equipment, foodstuff, and COVID-19 preventive equipment. The convoy comes under efforts by the ERC, in coordination with their Palestinian counterparts and regional and international partners, to deliver donated aid to affected citizens and help in mitigating the impact on Palestinian society. The dispatching of the convoy was attended by Egyptian Social Solidarity Minister Nevine El-Qabbaj, IOMs Chief of Mission to Egypt Laurent De Boeck, Executive Director of the ERC Ramy El-Nazer, and representatives and ambassadors of Italy, Germany, France, Japan, Finland, and the European Union. Last month, the Israeli bombing campaign of Gaza deemed the most serious Israeli assault on the strip since 2014 killed more than 250 Palestinians, injured 1,900, and destroyed 2,000 residential and commercial buildings, leaving thousands homeless. The densely populated Gaza Strip is home to two million Palestinians, most of whom are refugees from the 1948 war. Egypt Egypt On 21 May, Egypt mediated a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas along with other Palestinian factions. Since then, Cairo has launched intensive diplomatic efforts to cement the ceasefire and lay the groundwork for the resumption of peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis. Egypt has sent tonnes of medical and humanitarian aid to Gaza to help Palestinians deal with the aftermath of Israel's deadly offensive on the strip. Egypt also sent a massive convoy of bulldozers and cranes to Gaza in order to remove the rubble and debris from buildings destroyed by Israeli air strikes as part of the country's efforts in the reconstruction of the strip. Egypts Rafah crossing remains open to allow stranded Palestinians and humanitarian cases to cross the border in both directions. Egypt Egypt Search Keywords: Short link: During his speech at the United Nations Climate Change Summit President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi said the urgency and universality of the issue prompted Egypt to implement a sustainable development model centred on increasing green projects to 50 per cent by 2025 and 100 per cent by 2030. For example, renewable energy sources currently represent 20 per cent of the Egyptian energy mix, and we are working to increase it to 42 per cent by 2030, he said. He also noted that the Egyptian state has recently issued the first offering of green bonds with a value of $750 million, adding that Egypt has completed preparing the National Strategy for Climate Change 2050 in order to institutionalise efforts to confront the issue. Earlier this week, the city of Glasgow in the United Kingdom hosted the participants in the United Nations Climate Change Conference in a global atmosphere fraught with concern over the dangers of climate change, which reinforces the importance of the 26th round of the conference coming out with decisive results. The climate change summit is known by the acronym COP26, which stands for The 26th Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change. The summit brought together 197 countries, with the aim of discussing the issue of climate change and finding solutions to thorny problems. One of the most important challenges in this context is limiting the rise in temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius, according to the President of the United Nations Climate Change Conference Alok Sharma, who stressed the need to reduce emissions by 45 per cent by 2030. Sharma believes that the $100 billion that industrialised countries have pledged to contribute to achieve this goal is no longer enough because the world needs trillions annually. In any case, major countries only fulfilled the amount of $79 billion out of the $100 billion pledged. Moreover, in 2018, three-quarters of those pledges were disbursed in the form of loans that need to be repaid, which will put a strain on poor countries. Since President Al-Sisi launched the initiative to link the three conventions (climate change, biological diversity and desertification) at the opening of the Egyptian Presidency of the Biodiversity Conference in 2018 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt has been seeking continuous cooperation with the United Kingdom, supporting efforts to adapt to the effects of climate change through the Egyptian-British coalition. Egypt partnered with the United Kingdom to take the lead on the issue of sources of adaptation and resilience at the climate summit held in New York in 2019, on the understanding that the axis of resilience and adaptation is the most important priority axis for developing countries which are the most affected. A total of seven initiatives have been put together as part of the flexibility and adaptation plan, ready to be implemented once funding becomes available, with the African energy initiative announced by the Egyptian president being the most important. During afringe event organised at COP26, Egypt will present its success story in expanding renewable energy and green transformation; its work on the African adaptation initiative, which aims to enable African countries to access the funds necessary to implement adaptation measures; as well as its work to achieve equal proportions in financing adaptation and mitigation alike - among the issues to be highlighted by Egypt during the climate conference. Egypt aspires to host COP27 as a representative of the African continent in order to provide a platform for new and ambitious commitments that develop innovative solutions to achieve progress in the face of climate change. It also aims to host next years conference to build on the previous session of the climate change conference in Africa, which was held in Morocco in 2016. The Morocco conference marked the starting point of a roadmap for action that Africa can take to overcome the negative effects of climate change on the continent despite the fact that Africa contributes the lowest percentage of greenhouse gas emissions. Egypt also aims to host COP27 to affirm its commitment to work with all countries to consolidate efforts with all parties and stakeholders to confront climate change and strengthen climate action. The world attaches great hopes to COP26, especially in the light of the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic, and the demands of countries to raise ambition, update climate indicators and develop work on zero-emission measures. *A version of this article appears in print in the 4 November, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: Iran has invited the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency for talks after the UN official expressed concern over a lack of contact with Iranian authorities, Tehran said Monday. UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi "has been invited" to Tehran and a visit date has been put forward, foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said, without providing specifics on the possible timing of the trip. Grossi is expected to meet with Iran's foreign minister and the country's atomic energy chief, Khatibzadeh told journalists, adding, "we await his response". Grossi had been hoping to visit Iran before the next meeting of the IAEA's Board of Governors starts on November 22, but on Friday described a lack of contact with the Iranian government as "astonishing". "There's a long list of things we need to discuss," he said. Grossi last visited Tehran in September, where he clinched a deal over access to surveillance equipment at Iran's nuclear facilities. Days after that visit, the IAEA complained that it had been denied "indispensable" access to a centrifuge component manufacturing workshop where it needed to service equipment. The invitation comes as talks are expected to resume on November 29 in Vienna aiming to revive a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers. The deal, which offered Tehran relief from sanctions in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program, was torpedoed when the US unilaterally pulled out in 2018. Talks have been on hold since June following the election of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. On Monday, Khatibzadeh reiterated Iran's demands for guarantees that the US would not pull out of the deal again, adding that progress in negotiations was contingent on the lifting of sanctions. Search Keywords: Short link: Iran is "absolutely serious" about nuclear talks expected to resume late this month, its President Ebrahim Raisi told his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in a phone call Tuesday. "The Islamic Republic of Iran is absolutely serious about the negotiations and we are equally serious about our people's rights to have sanctions lifted," Raisi said, according to a statement published on the presidency's website. His remarks come one day after Tehran invited the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, to visit and meet Iran's foreign minister, after the UN official expressed concern over lack of contact with Iranian officials. Nuclear talks, which have been on hold since Raisi's election in June, are set to resume in Vienna on November 29 in a bid to revive a 2015 deal that offered Tehran relief from sanctions in return for curbs on its nuclear activity. The deal was torpedoed when the US unilaterally pulled out of it in 2018 under the administration of president Donald Trump. The other parties to the deal -- Russia, China, Germany, Britain and France -- will participate in the Vienna talks in the presence of European negotiator Enrique Mora. The US will meanwhile take part in the negotiations indirectly. According to a Kremlin statement, Putin expressed hopes "that the talks scheduled for late November will be constructive". Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian had called on the West not to make "excessive demands" on Tehran in the talks, in a call with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov earlier this month. In September, Lavrov called on the US to be "more active" in its approach to help resume the stalled nuclear talks, criticising the sanctions on Iran. Search Keywords: Short link: Hanafy El-Gebaly, the speaker of Egypt's House of Representatives, announced on Tuesday that Egypt and Hungary have decided to set a parliamentary friendship association during his visit to Budapest. "This association will be an effective channel for fostering parliamentary cooperation and coordination between the two countries on issues of mutual interest in all regional and international forums and in a way that reflects the growing political relations between Egypt and Hungary," said El-Gebaly. Meanwhile, Laszlo Kover, the speaker of the Hungarian National Assembly said that "this visit is very important to us because it reflects the growing political and economic relations between Egypt and Hungary." He added that he hopes the new association will give a big push to political and parliamentary cooperation between Egypt and Hungary. Search Keywords: Short link: Seven Azerbaijani troops have been killed in border clashes with Armenia near the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, officials in Baku said on Wednesday. On Tuesday, Armenian and Azerbaijani forces engaged in their worst clashes since going to war last year over the long-disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. The six-week conflict, which claimed the lives of more than 6,500 people, ended last November in a Russia-mediated deal that saw Armenia cede swathes of territory it had controlled for decades. The clashes on Tuesday along the Caucasus neighbours' shared border sparked fears of another flare-up in their territorial dispute. "Seven servicemen died and 10 more were wounded in the clashes provoked Tuesday by Armenia," Baku's defence ministry said, adding that the situation at the border "stabilised on Tuesday evening." Armenia's defence ministry said one Armenian soldier was killed, 13 were captured by Azerbaijani forces and 24 more servicemen were missing. It said "the situation at the border's eastern sector was relatively calm and a ceasefire agreement was being respected" on Wednesday morning. Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on Tuesday accused Azerbaijan of "targeting Armenia's statehood, sovereignty, and independence." Baku said Armenia was responsible for a "large-scale military provocation." Armenia appealed to ally Russia for military support under the Collective Security Treaty Organisation pact, which obliges Moscow to protect it in the event of a foreign invasion. A ceasefire was reached Tuesday evening following mediation by Russia's Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu. The European Union, France, the United Nations, and the United States have called on both sides to de-escalate tensions. Ethnic Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijan as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, and an ensuing conflict claimed around 30,000 lives. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypt is set to form a committee to prepare for the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27), which will be held in the Egyptian Red Sea city of Sharm El-Sheikh in 2022. The committee will be presided over by Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly and will comprise a number of ministers and other officials, a statement by the cabinet said, adding that the committees first meeting will be held soon. Madbouly said in the statement that holding the summit in Egypt presents an opportunity to highlight the countrys ability to organise such high-profile international events. Alok Sharma, the UKs president of the recently concluded Glasgow COP26, has handed over to Egypt the presidency of the summit. In preparation for the event, President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi has ordered the upgrading of Sharm El-Sheikh's roads and services as well as the conversion of public transport there to operate on natural gas instead of diesel fuel. In a speech delivered to the COP26 earlier this month, President El-Sisi called on developed countries to fulfil their pledge to provide $100 billion annually to developing countries to address the effects of climate change. The president also vowed that Egypt would seek to enhance international climate action to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement during the countrys presidency of the COP27. The Paris Climate Accords adopted at COP21 and signed by over 190 states, including Egypt came into effect in 2016 with the aim of reducing the rate of global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius in this century. El-Sisi said strengthening climate action to achieve this rate has become imperative and undeferrable. Egypt is growing more concerned about climate change, as it faces losing 12 to 15 percent of the total area of the Nile Delta in an expected rise in the Mediterranean Seas water level and the intrusion of saline water. Climate change has also led to longer heat waves that are having a negative impact on the countrys food crops and water supply. Search Keywords: Short link: The head of Libya's unity government on Wednesday accused Belgium of seeking to confiscate his country's assets, frozen by the United Nations since 2011. "We have a problem with Belgium," Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah told a cabinet meeting. "The Belgian authorities... are trying once again to seize Libyan funds in Belgium." He said Belgium had sought permission from the UN Security Council's sanctions committee to seize the funds. The UNSC placed Libya's foreign assets in receivership during the country's 2011 uprising against longtime dictator Moamer Gaddafi, to avoid possible theft. The Gaddafi regime had built a vast portfolio of assets across the world, including an estimated 14 billion euros ($15 billion) in Belgium. His fall and killing by rebels sparked years of legal wrangling between those states and Libya. The funds in Belgium are the subject of a dispute that also involves Belgian Prince Laurent, brother of King Philippe. The prince has been seeking compensation from Libya after his charity, the Global Sustainable Development Trust, invested tens of millions of euros in a reforestation project that never went ahead due to Gaddafi's fall. "I call on Belgium to respect Libya," Dbeibah said. "We want to protect and defend our money." He said a Libyan delegation would head to Brussels to try to settle the matter. Libya has Africa's largest proven oil reserves, but a decade of conflict has left many of its citizens in poverty and created an ongoing liquidity crisis. Search Keywords: Short link: An Egyptian emergency state security misdemeanour court sentenced lawyer and former MP Ziad El-Eleimy to five years in prison on Wednesday for spreading false news on social media among other charges The court also sentenced journalists Hossam Mones and Hisham Fouad to four years in prison on the same charges. El-Eleimy served as an MP representing the Egyptian Social Democrartic Party in the 2012 Parliament. The prosecution charged the 13 defendants with crimes including cooperating with a group established in violation of the law, disseminating false news and information about the political and economic conditions in the country in order to destabilise public peace and undermine trust in state institutions. In June 2019, El-Eleimy, Mones and Fouad and the rest of the defendants in the case were arrested for what the interior ministry described at the time as a hostile plot dubbed Hope Cell to disrupt the national economy. In the same case, Activists Mohamed Bahnasy and Hossam Nasser received three years. Meanwhile, Labour activist Fatma Abul-Maaty received a three-year sentence in absentia. The court also imposed a fine of EGP 500 on all defendants in the case. The ruling is final and cannot be appealed. Unlike ordinary courts, emergency state security court rulings cannot be appealed. The defendants, however, have the right to petition for clemency. In April last year, a Cairo criminal court said the terrorist-designated Muslim Brotherhood leaders had tasked members and associates of the group in Egypt, including the Hope Cell defendants, with providing logistical support and weapons to carry out the scheme against the state. According to the court, the plot sought to "provide financial support for hostile actions against the Egyptian state with the aim of harming national interests and economic security, and carrying out aggressive actions against the army and the police to topple the regime." In July of this year, the Court of Cassation upheld a ruling placing the 13 defendants in the case on the country's terrorism list for five years. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypts Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Al-Azhar condemned on Tuesday the terrorist attacks conducted in each of Liverpool and the Ugandan capital of Kampala this week, affirming its solidarity against terrorism. In a statement, Egypts leading Islamic authority, Al-Azhar, condemned a bombing outside a maternity hospital in Liverpool on Sunday which forced authorities to raise the national terror threat level. Police named the bomber as 32-year-old Emad Al-Swealmeen, an asylum-seeker from the Middle East. Al-Swealmeen, the only casualty of the attack, is believed to have blown himself up with his alleged homemade device while being the sole passenger in a taxi. The taxi driver only sustained minor injuries. Police denounced the attack as an act of terror, but investigators have not yet found an ideological motive behind the attack, a matter that is essential to confirm that the attack was an act of terrorism. Police did not immediately disclose the exact nationality of the bomber. Al-Swealmeen was baptised in 2015, the Guardian cited a cathedral spokesperson as saying. Cyril Ashton, an assistant bishop of Liverpool, said that although the church takes confirmation seriously, it seems that Al-Swealmeen chose a different path for his life. In a statement on Tuesday, Al-Azhar denounced the attack, calling for international solidarity in the face of terrorism. Al-Azhar confirms its solidarity with the United Kingdom to counter all forms of extremism, violence, and terrorism, the religious institution said. In a statement, the Egyptian foreign ministry also expressed the countrys full solidarity with the government and people of the UK. Moreover, Egypt assured its unwavering stance towards combating and eradicating all the hateful phenomena of terrorism, violence, and extremism. Egypt condemns Ugandas suicide attacks Egypt also strongly condemned a series of suicide bombings in the Ugandan capital of Kampala on Tuesday which killed and injured many people. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks. The Ugandan police said that six people were killed in the attacks, including three bombers and three police officers, Reuters reported. Authorities moved 33 injured people to the hospital, the police said, including five who are in critical condition. Egypt extends its sincere condolences to the government and people of sisterly Uganda, wishing the injured people a speedy recovery, a statement by the foreign ministry read. Egypt also affirmed its full support for Uganda in the face of all forms of terrorism and extremism. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypt has so far partially vaccinated 27.4 million citizens against the coronavirus and fully inoculated 14.4 million others, Khaled Abdel-Ghaffar, the minister of higher education and acting health minister, said in a statement on Wednesday following the weekly cabinet meeting. Egypt started its vaccination campaign in January this year and is aiming to immunise 40 percent of its 102-million population by the end of 2021. The country is currently administering seven vaccines Sputnik V, Sinopharm, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Sinovac, Pfizer, and Moderna in nearly 1,000 fixed vaccination centres nationwide. Egypts Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly reaffirmed during the meeting that all citizens will be banned from entering any government institution without being vaccinated starting December. Furthermore, since 15 November, Egypt has been barring university students and state employees from entering their campuses and workplaces without being vaccinated at least with one dose. Madboulys remarks came one day after Egypts parliament approved a new law to fight pandemics and epidemics by allowing the premier to impose emergency measures or declare a state of pandemic emergency to preserve the health and lives of citizens. Meanwhile, Abdel-Ghaffar highlighted the Together, We are Assured campaign, which offers 14 walk-in vaccination centres in metro stations, has been successful so far in inoculating 482 thousand citizens throughout the 27 governorates. There are plans to expand the campaign to cover all three lines of the Cairo underground metro, Abdel-Ghaffar said. Egypt which is currently witnessing the peak of its fourth wave of the pandemic has so far recorded 345,848 COVID-19 cases, including 19,636 deaths and 288,879 recoveries. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypts Dar al-Ifta, the official body responsible for issuing religious edicts, said on Wednesday that forging COVID-19 vaccine certificates is religiously prohibited. Dar al-Ifta issued the statement following reports of an increase in forgeries after the government announced it would prohibit unvaccinated public servants from entering their workplaces. Forging the COVID-19 vaccine certificate is prohibited religiously for what it entails in lying and causing other harm. It is a sin for both owner of the forged certificate and the person who forges it, Dar al-Ifta said in its short statement. The fatwa issued by the countrys highest religious authority comes after the ministry of healths warning earlier of faking the vaccination certificate. Health ministry spokesperson Hossam Abdel-Ghafer has said that faking the vaccination certificate constitutes forgery of an official document and carries a criminal penalty of up to 10 years in prison. Starting Sunday, the government will bar public servants from entering their workplaces unless they are vaccinated or take a weekly PCR test. The government will also bar unvaccinated citizens from entering governmental institutions nationwide unless vaccinated starting 1 December. Acting Minister of Health Khaled Abdel-Ghaffer on Wednesday that Egypt has so far partially vaccinated 27.4 million citizens against the coronavirus and fully inoculated 14.4 million others. Egypt is planning to vaccinate 40 million people by the end of 2021. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypts Alexandria governorate declared a state of emergency on Tuesday in anticipation of the seasonal El-Maknasa rainstorm. El-Maknasa (the sweeper) usually hits Egypts northern coast between 16 to 20 November, accompanied by heavy rains and cold wind. It is one of numerous seasonal storms that hit Alexandria in winter. In a statement, Alexandria governorate urged drivers to avoid going over 60 kms/hour and to maintain a long trailing distance. They should also avoid parking on storm drains or in places where trees might fall. Pedestrians should avoid walking under old or rickety balconies, the statement added. In case of lightning, people should avoid public places or proximity to metallic bodies or fences. The governorate has also designated a hotline (114) to ask for assistance for homeless citizens who need urgent help. The governorates emergency room will also be available to receive emergency and urgent complaints on the same number around the clock, the statement added. Rainfall and thunder hit parts of Alexandria and Marsa Matrouh on Tuesday night. Over the recent years, authorities have been working on upgrading Alexandria's aging rain drainage system, which has repeatedly failed to contain rainwater. Alexandria was hit with disastrous rain storms in 2015, 2019, and 2020, leaving several people dead and many more injured. The 2015 disaster resulted in the resignation of Alexandria governor Hani El-Messeiri. In a statement on Tuesday, the Egyptian Meteorological Authority (EMA) said moderate to heavy rainfall is expected in parts of the northern coast and northern Delta on Wednesday, including Matrouh, Alexandria, Damietta, Port Said, Beheira, Kafr El-Sheikh, Daqahlia, and Gharbia. On Thursday and Friday, parts of South Sinai and the northern coast are expected to see mild rainfall. The EMA also expects unstable weather accompanied by varying amounts of rains and a drop in temperature on Saturday in various parts of northern Egypt and Greater Cairo. Search Keywords: Short link: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken opened his first official visit to Africa in Kenya with an appeal Wednesday for the preservation of democracy and inclusion in politically and ethnically fractured societies. His message was delivered amid worsening crises in neighboring Ethiopia and Sudan. With insecurity wracking both of those countries, Blinken began a three-nation African tour in a country with its own turbulent history of democracy. Kenya will face another test of stability in a presidential election next year yet has emerged as a player in attempting to ease the growing Ethiopian conflict. Before meeting President Uhuru Kenyatta and other senior Kenyan officials, Blinken spoke with civic leaders about the importance of combatting what he termed ``democratic recession'' around the world, including challenges in the United States that show ``just how fragile our democracy can be.'' ``This is an important time,'' he told a small group of human rights, labor, and anti-corruption advocates at a Nairobi hotel. ``Around the world, we've seen we've seen over the last decade or so what some have called 'democratic recession'.'' ``Even vibrant democracies like Kenya are experiencing these pressures, especially around election time,`` Blinken said, alluding to the presidential election set for August 2022. Combatting misinformation, political violence, voter intimidation, and corruption is critical to halting the backsliding. Blinken is looking to boost thus-far unsuccessful US diplomatic efforts to resolve the deepening conflicts in Ethiopia and in Sudan and to counter growing insurgencies elsewhere, like Somalia. His visit to Kenya, Nigeria, and Senegal this week follows months of Biden administration attempts to ease both situations that have yet to bear fruit despite frequent lower-level interventions. The top US diplomat for Africa, Molly Phee, was in Khartoum earlier this week and will be joining Blinken in Nairobi to discuss her efforts in Sudan. In addition to trying to cool tensions in the region, Blinken's trip is also aimed at raising Washington's profile as a player in regional and international initiatives to restore peace and promote democracy as it competes with China for influence in developing countries. The Biden administration's competition with China for influence didn't get off to a great start in Africa. The coronavirus pandemic canceled A planned early summer visit by Blinken to the continent. The trip was rescheduled for August, only to be postponed again due to the turmoil in Afghanistan that preoccupied Washington. Now, three months later, Blinken hopes to deliver the administration's ``America is back'' message to Africa. Despite its importance in the US-China rivalry, Africa has often been overshadowed by more pressing issues in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and even Latin America despite massive US contributions of money and vaccines to fight the pandemic and other infectious diseases. All the while, China has pumped billions into African energy, infrastructure, and other projects that Washington sees as rip-offs designed to take advantage of developing nations. Search Keywords: Short link: Ethiopia's human rights watchdog said Wednesday it had been barred from visiting detainees rounded up in mass arrests under a wartime state of emergency. The state-affiliated Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) estimated thousands have been caught up in the latest sweeps, which lawyers and rights groups say appear largely to target Tigrayans based on their ethnicity alone. The government says the operations are a legitimate effort to stamp out the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) rebel group -- its adversary in a year-long war in the country's north. The EHRC "is highly concerned that it can't collect information relating to detainees' conditions since the announcement of a state of emergency on November 2," the body said in a statement. While EHRC staffers visited detention centres in two of 11 districts in Addis Ababa, officials in other locations said "they won't give information unless there is an order that comes from above," the statement said. "It's estimated (that) in Addis Ababa alone thousands of people have been arrested with the arrests continuing across districts in the city," it said. "Up to 300 people" have been arrested in Dire Dawa city in eastern Ethiopia, it added. "Not enough efforts are being made to ensure that the tipoff-based arrests and the origins of the tipoffs aren't based on ethnicity." On Tuesday the UN's human rights agency voiced alarm about the surging arrests which have ensnared dozens of UN staff and contracted drivers. 'Very crowded' centres Detainees also include lactating mothers, the mentally ill, people who need "regular medical care" and people who are older than 80, the EHRC said Wednesday, calling for such groups to be released. The police stations where many are being held "are very crowded, don't have enough toilets, and don't receive enough air and light," it said. Some have been transferred outside Addis Ababa, and in other cases detainees' relatives do not know where they are, it said. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed sent troops into Tigray last November to topple the TPLF, a move he said came in response to rebel attacks on army camps. Though he promised a swift victory, by late June the TPLF had retaken most of the region including its capital Mekele, and it has since advanced into the neighbouring Amhara and Afar regions. The war has killed thousands and pushed hundreds of thousands of people in Tigray into famine-like conditions, according to the UN. Abiy's government accuses the international community of overlooking human rights abuses perpetrated by the TPLF in recent months. On Wednesday the government said "millions of people need humanitarian assistance" in Amhara and Afar. Search Keywords: Short link: Iraqi wheat farmer Khamis Ahmad Abbas lost it all when his battle with drought forced him to abandon his land, pushing him into unemployment. Experts have warned that record low rainfall, compounded by climate change, are threatening social and economic disaster in war-scarred Iraq. "Growing wheat and barley is a gamble. It all depends on the rain," said the 42-year-old father of nine. Unable to make ends meet, Abbas quit his land in the Plains of Nineveh, northeast of Mosul, part of the so-called Fertile Crescent where agriculture was born 12,000 years ago. With temperatures soaring above 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) and little rain, Abbas's fields quickly dried up. Three months ago, he packed up his family -- two wives and nine children -- and moved to Mosul. "Now I am unemployed," he told AFP, as he whiled away the time in a coffee shop in Iraq's second city. Once the seat of the Islamic State group's self-styled "caliphate", Mosul is still rebuilding after the devastating 2017 battle which ousted the jihadists. "Sometimes I get small jobs, just enough to feed my family," said Abbas bitterly, who longs for the old days when he harvested wheat and barley like his father and grandfather before him. His plight is shared by many farmers in the Nineveh Plains. According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), 447 families who were forced from their land in Nineveh by IS and then returned to it after the jihadists' defeat were forced to leave again between June and July this year because of the drought. "Nearly all, if not all, the families were displaced due to inability to feed their cattle," the IOM said. 'Most affected' For centuries, the Nineveh Plains were the breadbasket of Iraq, with 6,000 square kilometres (2,300 square miles) of arable land, said agriculture ministry spokesman Hamid al-Nayef. But this year, Nineveh province has been Iraq's "most affected" by drought and exceptionally high temperatures. In 2020, 927,000 tonnes of wheat were harvested in Nineveh, making it a "self-sufficient" province, said Abdelwahab al-Jarjiri, who heads the local cereal authority. This year production plunged to 89,000 tonnes because of the drought. The effects of low rainfall have been exacerbated by falling water levels on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers as a result of dam-building in neighbouring Turkey and Iran, said Samah Hadid of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC). "Iraq is facing its worst drought in modern times. This is due to record low levels of rainfall, reductions in water flow from its neighbours -- which has primarily hit the Euphrates and Tigris rivers -- and there is no doubt climate change has contributed to this crisis," she said. "Far from being a problem in the distant future, climate change is already taking effect in the region and we see this clearly in parts of Iraq." This month, a dam near the northern town of Zawita dried up completely for the first time since its construction in 2009, the head of the local irrigation authority Hega Abdelwahid said. The dam, which used to contain up to 50,000 cubic meters of water, was fed by melting snow but there was very little rain this year, Abdelwahid said, and all that is left is cracked earth. 'Displacement and instability' The severity of the drought has forced many farming families to leave their land and seek a living in urban areas. Akram Yassin, 28, is one of those considering such a move. He has already sold some of his 500 sheep and some land just "to survive", he said. "I might have to change careers, my financial losses are more than my gains," he added. In October, UN agencies, including the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), called for "urgent action" to avert a disaster in Iraq. Before that in August, 13 aid organisations, including the NRC, warned that seven million people in Iraq risk losing access to water, forcing more from their homes. But the exodus to urban centres like Mosul, Kirkuk and Basra could spark "instability" because they are ill-prepared for such an influx, said Roger Guiu, director of the Iraq-based Social Inquiry research centre. Guiu said Mosul had been left in ruins by the months-long battle to oust IS and "reconstruction has been slow". The city's roads and sewers have been rebuilt but in the health sector only 30 to 40 percent of services have been rehabilitated, district prefect Zuhair al-Araji told AFP. Search Keywords: Short link: The United States and China have agreed to ease restrictions on journalist visas shortly after a long-awaited virtual summit between its two leaders, with Beijing on Wednesday calling the move a "hard-won" achievement. Washington regularly denounces the deterioration in China's treatment of US media members and has taken measures against Chinese media on US soil that have been accused of being Beijing's propaganda organs. In 2020, Beijing expelled Americans working for several major newspapers such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal as tensions soared between the two countries. But in the wake of a virtual summit between US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, officials from both countries said they had agreed to allow new journalist visas to be issued. A State Department spokesman said Tuesday that discussions in recent months had led to "some initial progress" in "a few areas" of the media environment. The official said China had "committed to issue visas for a group of US reporters, provided they are eligible under all applicable laws and regulations." Beijing also promised to "permit US journalists already in the PRC (People's Republic of China) to freely depart and return, which they had previously been unable to do," the US official said. Chinese state media said both sides had reached an agreement, including to "reciprocally approve" the visas of new journalists. Both sides agreed to extend the validity of journalist visas to one year after both countries had largely capped permits to three months. Asked about the agreement Wednesday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters that "this hard-won achievement is in line with the interests of media on both sides, and is worth treasuring." He added that Beijing hopes "both sides will put in place the relevant policies and measures as soon as possible." The US official added that Washington would continue to push for "expanding access and improving conditions for the US and other foreign media," and for broader freedom of the press in general. The State Department believes these measures will allow US media correspondents to return to China "to continue their important work." Search Keywords: Short link: The opening of the fifth edition of the Awladna International Forum of Arts for the Gifted was held on Tuesday at the Cairo Opera House, with the Egyptian ministers of culture, tourism and antiquities, planning, and emigration attending the event. The opening was presented by known TV host Sherif Madkour and featured many of the forums participants showcasing their various talents alongside professional artists, including Moroccan star Samira Said, who collaborated with the budding artists in her new song Gehaz Tasgeil. A number of ambassadors, artists, journalists, and cultural personas attended the opening that was directed by renowned Walid Awny to show their support for special needs talents and put their cause in the limelight. With 32 countries participating in the event, various art forms will be presented in workshops, masterclasses, and performances. Running until 23 November under the slogan of Rejoice Together, the forum this year is also allowing budding artists to meet artists from the Afro-Chinese Arts and Folklore Festival, which is also taking place during the forum Many renowned artists from different disciplines will be participating in workshops, juries, and various activities, including directors Omar Abdel-Aziz, Attiya Adel Khairy, and Hisham Atwa; actors Hala Sedky and Latifa Fahmy; composer Sherif Gad; and artists Morad Darwisch, Carelle Homsy, Amina Salem, Neamat El-Diwany, and Mohamed Khedr. Under the helm of forum president Sohir Abdel-Qader, the mission of Awladna is to develop and enrich the talents of gifted individuals through cultural interactionand by emphasising their cultural and artistic achievements. Backed by the countrys President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, the event, sponsored by both the state and the private sector as well as international entities, is mainly taking place in Cairo, with some activities set to be held in other cities, including Al-Fayoum and Al-Alamein. Search Keywords: Short link: On 8 November, Egypt and Israel formally announced an amendment to the peace treaty they signed on 26 March 1979. It is the first time the treaty has been amended. In a coordinating meeting, a joint [Egyptian and Israeli] military committee succeeded in amending the security agreement to increase the number and capacities of the border guards in the border area in Rafah, said Egyptian Armed Forces Spokesman Colonel Gharib Abdel-Hafez. He explained that the development was part of Egypts efforts to safeguard national security which necessitated tightening security along the northeastern border. The Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty comprises eight articles. Paragraph 4 of the Article 4 states the security arrangements provided for in paragraphs 1 and 2 of this article may at the request of either Party be reviewed and amended by mutual agreement of the Parties, a provision that reflects the acceptance at the time that the agreement needed to allow a degree of flexibility in the face of changing circumstances. Egypt has succeeded in undermining the terrorist environment in Sinai and controlling the borders by destroying cross-border tunnels. This required exceptional troop deployments, measures that Israel questioned under former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The agreement sanctioning a larger Egyptian troop presence in Rafah signals greater Israeli understanding of Egypts security requirements under Netanyahus successor, Naftali Bennett. This understanding is reflected not just in the provision allowing for higher troop levels in the area, but in the provision pertaining to the equipment permitted. Previously, the Israeli government had opposed qualitative improvements to the capacities of the forces deployed there, which could only carry personal weapons. The changes underline the importance of the agreement as a mechanism for maintaining the Egyptian-Israeli peace. As the agreement states, amending it requires agreement by both sides. The amendment highlights Egypts ability to interact effectively with Israel within a framework that serves the interests of both sides. The treaty was signed in 1979, when Menachem Begin, a staunch hardliner, was prime minister of Israel. President Anwar Al-Sadat, nonetheless, succeeded in securing Egypts interests through the accord which provided for Israeli withdrawal from the rest of Sinai and the dismantling of Israeli settlements in the peninsula, strategically changing the situation in favour of Egypt. The same applies today. The Bennet government could well be the most right-wing government Israel has ever had. Yet Egypt has once again negotiated from a position of strength and won a strategic victory. Egypt has mounted a successful counter-terrorist operation in Sinai and is simultaneously pursuing major development projects in the peninsula. Further strengthening Cairos hand is Egypts ability to communicate effectively with Israel and the Palestinian factions, giving it a unique mediating capacity that allowed Cairo to negotiate an end to the fourth Gaza war earlier this year. The amendment has set a precedent for an approach that could be developed further if necessary. Although Egyptian forces in the border strip have been increased before (by 750 troops: 250 active, 250 on leave rotations, 250 in the camps), this occurred under the Salaheddin Passage, or Philadelphi Corridor, agreement. Israel had long refused to amend the original peace treaty itself. The signing of the amendment to the Camp David accord coincides with two critical events. The first is the lifting of the state of emergency in Egypt. The spread of terrorism in Sinai was one of the main reasons for imposing the state of emergency. Lifting it is a gauge of the success in restoring security in Sinai in general, and in Rafah and the border area in particular. The new arrangements will help safeguard this progress. For years the area had seen the infiltration of terrorist elements from Gaza into Sinai through the border tunnels which at one point numbered close to 3,000 as cross-border infiltration and smuggling operations increased sharply under Islamist rule in Egypt. The second event was the Egyptian-US Strategic Dialogue that took place in Washington last week, with Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukri and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken heading their countries delegations. One achievement of the dialogue is that it reaffirmed Washingtons crucial role in the peace treaty. The stability of the treaty not only reflects the relationship between its parties, it encompasses much of the Palestinian question. The Egyptian mediated ceasefire to the fourth Gaza war opened the doors to the reconstruction drive in Gaza which could, in turn, provide greater leverage to press for a long-term truce between Israel and Palestine. Egypt has also been closely involved in successful prisoner exchange negotiations, and mediated the prisoner exchange deal that secured the release of the Israeli POW Gilad Shalit. The added value of all these developments is that they combine to bolster Egypts role in propelling with Washingtons help the Palestinians and the Israelis to resume the peace process. *A version of this article appears in print in the 18 November, 2021 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly Search Keywords: Short link: Headlines were made from Argentina to all over the world as a native woman was announced to be miraculously cured from HIV. The woman is one of the very few patients in history to ever contract the autoimmune disease and somehow fully recover from it. Why is HIV so problematic and complicated? A simplified answer would be that HIV evades the normal immunity system mechanisms for getting rid of cells infected by viruses. HIV is notoriously difficult to purge from the body because it infects certain long-lived immune cells known as viral reservoirs that can spend lengthy periods of time in a resting state. This keeps the viral DNA that is encoded into those cells under the radar of standard antiretroviral treatment, which can only attack the virus in infected cells when they are actively churning out new copies of HIV. Nevertheless, HIV, which was once an ambiguous nightmare when it initially appeared in the eighties, has now become a manageable chronic condition once it is controlled by antiretroviral therapy; failed treatments are usually attributed to poor drug adherence, wherein medication doses are frequently missed, or treatment is interrupted. But completely recovering from the disease is more or less impossible, which is why the Argentinian ladys story has made headlines across the globe. The woman is known in the media now as the Esperanza Patient, after the town in Argentina where she lives. In English, Esperanza means hope. The now cured patient was first diagnosed in 2013, and after eight years of follow-ups, 10 tests found no detectable levels of the virus in her blood or tissue, and no one knows exactly how this miracle happened. For decades, scientist have been pursuing the dream of either curing HIV or producing a vaccine to no avail. According to data from the WHO, 38 million people are living with HIV worldwide, and only two of them have ever been cured of it; and both cases required complex and dangerous stem cell transplants. The study announcing the cure of the Argentinian lady was published on Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine, and the case serves as proof that curing the virus is apparently possible through natural immunity. Another success story that has driven scientists to intensify their research efforts is the case of the two men who researchers succeeded in prompting a sterilising cure the American Timothy Ray Brown and London resident Adam Castillejo. The men received stem cell transplants to treat acute myeloid leukemia and Hodgkin lymphoma, respectively, from donors with a rare genetic abnormality that made their cells resistant to HIV. After more than four years passed since Castillejos stem cell treatment and with no sign of the virus resurging, the physician was ready to assert for the first time that the British man was cured of HIV. In 2019, Bjorn Jensen of Dusseldorf University Hospital presented the case of a third man, known as the Dusseldorf Patient, whom the German physician and his colleagues said had likely also been cured through this method. This man has still not experienced a viral rebound three years after being taken off his antiretroviral treatment. While these three cases have stirred considerable excitement, the treatment the men received is too toxic to attempt as a cure for HIV in anyone who is not also facing cancer treatable with a stem cell transplant. Since Browns case was first published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2009, scientists have failed a number of other times to cure HIV in individuals through similar means. The Esperanza Patient reminds us of Loreen Willenberg, a now-67-year-old Californian who was diagnosed with HIV in 1992 and has an immunity system that apparently vanquished the virus entirely. Willenbergs case of an apparent natural cure of HIV is quite similar to the Esperanza Patients. The experts first theories posit that each of these women may have produced a particularly strong T-cell response to the virus naturally, dubbed the extraordinary elite control of HIV. 37.7 million people worldwide currently live with HIV, which can lead to AIDS if left untreated. HIV spreads through bodily fluids, usually after unprotected sex or needle-sharing. The Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population reported in 2020 that over 13,000 Egyptians are living with HIV/AIDS. Search Keywords: Short link: The jury at Kyle Rittenhouse's murder trial deliberated a full day on Tuesday without reaching a verdict over whether he was the instigator in a night of bloodshed in Kenosha or a concerned citizen who came under attack while trying to protect property. Kyle Rittenhouse pulls numbers of jurors out of a tumbler during his trial at the Kenosha County Courthouse in Kenosha, Wis., on Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. [Photo: Sean Krajacic/The Kenosha News via AP, Pool] The case went to the anonymous jury after the judge, in an unusual move, allowed Rittenhouse himself to play a minor role in the selection of the final panel of 12 people whose job was to decide his fate. Rittenhouse reached into a raffle drum and drew numbered slips that determined which of the 18 jurors who sat through the case would deliberate and which ones would be dismissed as alternates. That task is usually performed by a court clerk, not the defendant. Judge Bruce Schroeder said later in the day that he has been having defendants do it for Im going to say 20 years, at least. The jury will return Wednesday morning to continue its work. Rittenhouse, 18, faces life in prison if convicted as charged for using an AR-style semi-automatic rifle to kill two men and wound a third during a night of protests against racial injustice in Kenosha in the summer of 2020. The former police youth cadet is white, as were those he shot. Rittenhouse testified he acted in self-defense, while prosecutors argued he provoked the violence. The case has become a flashpoint in the U.S. debate over guns, racial-justice protests, vigilantism and law and order. The jury appeared to be overwhelmingly white. Prospective jurors were not asked to identify their race during the selection process, and the court did not provide a racial breakdown. As the jury deliberated, dozens of protesters some for Rittenhouse, some against stood outside the courthouse. Some talked quietly with those on the other side, while others shouted insults. One woman could be heard repeatedly calling some Rittenhouse supporters white supremacists. Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, who faced criticism over his response to the Kenosha protests in 2020, urged calm as the jury deliberated. He announced last week that 500 members of the National Guard would stand ready for duty in Kenosha if needed. Regardless of the outcome in this case, I urge peace in Kenosha and across our state, Evers tweeted. He added: "I ask all those who choose to assemble and exercise their First Amendment rights in every community to do so safely and peacefully. The large protests that some had anticipated did not materialize during the trial's testimony phase. On most days, only a few demonstrators gathered on the courthouse steps, and the high fence that protected the building during last year's unrest is gone. Rittenhouse was 17 when he went Kenosha from his home in Antioch, Illinois, in what he said was an effort to protect property from rioters in the days after a Black man, Jacob Blake, was shot by a white Kenosha police officer. In a fast-moving series of clashes in the streets, Rittenhouse shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, now 28. During closing arguments Monday, prosecutor Thomas Binger said that Rittenhouse was a wannabe soldier who set the deadly chain of events in motion by bringing a rifle to a protest and pointing it at protesters just before he was chased. But Rittenhouse lawyer Mark Richards countered that Rittenhouse was ambushed by a crazy person Rosenbaum. Rittenhouse testified that Rosenbaum chased him down and made a grab for his rifle, causing him to fear the weapon was going to be used against him. His account of Rosenbaum's behavior was largely corroborated by video and some of the prosecution's own witnesses. Huber was shot after he hit Rittenhouse with a skateboard. And Grosskreutz admitted he had his own gun pointed at Rittenhouse when he was shot. In his instructions to the jury, Schroeder said that to accept Rittenhouses claim of self-defense, the jurors must find that he believed there was an unlawful threat to him and that the amount of force he used was reasonable and necessary. KYODO NEWS - Nov 18, 2021 - 00:01 | All, Japan The leaders of Japan and the Philippines agreed Wednesday to consider the launch of security talks involving the two countries' foreign and defense ministers in an apparent bid to bolster cooperation in dealing with China's growing maritime assertiveness in the region. The idea of holding the so-called two-plus-two talks was discussed when Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida spoke by phone with Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, during which they also agreed to step up efforts to realize a free and open Indo-Pacific, according to the Foreign Ministry. If realized, the Philippines would be the ninth country Japan holds the periodic ministerial security talks. Japan has already formed the two-plus-two framework with the United States, Australia, Britain, France, Germany, India, Indonesia and Russia. During the phone talks, which lasted about 25 minutes, Kishida expressed his "strong opposition to any unilateral attempts to change the status quo by force in the East and South China seas," according to the ministry. Duterte is quoted as saying Japan is "a friend closer than a brother." The ministry said that the two also agreed to promote concrete cooperation on the "ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific," an initiative aimed at maintaining peace, freedom, and prosperity in the region, and work closely on issues related to North Korea, including Pyongyang's abductions of Japanese nationals in the 1970s and 1980s. By Miya Tanaka, KYODO NEWS - Nov 18, 2021 - 18:32 | All, World A flare-up in territorial tensions between Japan and South Korea led to the cancellation of a three-way news conference with the United States on Wednesday, dealing a blow to Washington's hopes of presenting a unified front to the challenge of a nuclear-armed North Korea. In Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said Japan decided to pull out of the press event, that was to be held after trilateral talks in Washington, due to a recent visit by South Korea's top police official to a pair of Seoul-held, Tokyo-claimed islets in the Sea of Japan. The event was instead held alone by U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman. Sherman explained at the press conference held at the U.S. State Department that one of multiple bilateral "differences" between Tokyo and Seoul, which was "unrelated" to the trilateral meeting, led to the change. But she added that the vice-ministerial meeting was "very constructive," which "demonstrates exactly why the trilateral format with the United States, Japan and the Republic of Korea is so important and powerful." The Republic of Korea is South Korea's formal name. The incident, however, would likely please North Korea and China. The South Korean police chief's visit Tuesday to the islets, known as Takeshima in Japan and Dokdo in South Korea, was reportedly the first from someone in the position in more than a decade and drew strong protest from Japan. The State Department had been planning a joint press conference involving Sherman, Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Takeo Mori and South Korea's First Vice Foreign Minister Choi Jong Kun after their meeting, which lasted for more than three hours. U.S. President Joe Biden's administration has been striving to promote cooperation between Japan and South Korea, viewing trilateral relations -- despite the wartime history and territorial disputes between two of its allies in Asia -- as vital in the face of North Korean nuclear threats and China's assertiveness in the region. The gathering on Wednesday was the first trilateral vice-foreign ministerial-level meeting since Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida took office in October. The joint press conference was apparently a chance to showcase enhanced ties. Japanese Foreign Ministry sources said the Takeshima issue was not discussed during the trilateral meeting. But the government decided that it was "not appropriate" to hold a joint press conference when Tokyo is protesting to South Korea over the matter. According to a press release issued by the U.S. State Department, the three officials reaffirmed that trilateral cooperation "is essential to tackling the most pressing challenges" in the region and across the globe, while sharing a commitment to maintaining a rules-based international order. They also discussed the importance of the peace and stability of the Taiwan Strait, while sharing concerns over North Korea's nuclear and missile programs and an intention to closely cooperate toward the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The deputy secretary of state said the United States will continue discussions to explore the best way forward to ensure Pyongyang's denuclearization, with South Korea proposing the declaration of a formal end to the Korean War as part of confidence-building measures with North Korea. "On (the issue of the) end of war...we are having good consultations amongst us and with other allies and partners and we will continue to do so," Sherman said. The United States and North Korea remain technically in a state of war as the 1950-1953 Korean War -- in which U.S.-led U.N. forces fought alongside the South against the North, backed by China and the Soviet Union -- ended in a cease-fire, not a peace treaty. North Korea has called for the United States to abandon its "hostile policies." A security guarantee is seen as a prerequisite for North Korea to give up its nuclear arms. But diplomatic sources have previously said that Tokyo is reluctant to support the idea, believing it would only create a conciliatory mood without clear prospects that Pyongyang would abandon its nuclear weapons and resolve the issue of its past abductions of Japanese nationals. One of the two Japanese Foreign Ministry sources who briefed on Wednesday's trilateral meeting acknowledged discussions regarding the declaration are under way based on "respective positions" on the issue, but did not elaborate. After the trilateral talks, Mori and Choi had a bilateral meeting, during which they sparred over the Takeshima issue. Mori said the South Korean police chief's visit to Takeshima was "unacceptable," given that the islands are "an inherent part of the territory of Japan, in light of historical facts and based on international law," according to the other Foreign Ministry source. Mori also expressed his awareness that the bilateral ties remain in a "very difficult" state due to disputes stemming from Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula between 1910 and 1945, such as compensation over forced labor and the "comfort women" issue. But the two agreed to continue communication through their diplomats to put relations back on a sound footing, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry's press release. Speaking at a press briefing in Seoul on Thursday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Choi Young Sam repeated South Korea's position on the disputed islets. "Dokdo is clearly our inherent territory," Choi said. "We will firmly respond to Japan's unreasonable claims over the islets." Related coverage: No. 2 U.S. diplomat Sherman to visit China from July 25 amid tension Japan, U.S., S. Korea agree to boost cooperation over N. Korea nukes Japan, S. Korea fail to narrow gap over wartime history issues KYODO NEWS - Nov 17, 2021 - 21:50 | All, Japan Japan is preparing to meet a request by the United States to shoulder more costs for hosting American troops from fiscal 2022, with the two sides possibly reaching an agreement next month, government sources said Wednesday. Japan has asked the United States to consider using the increase in Tokyo's contribution to fund expenses such as the maintenance of facilities used jointly by the Self-Defense Forces and the U.S. military, rather than covering utilities at U.S. bases as before. The Japanese government believes that such financial contribution from Tokyo will help strengthen the long-standing security alliance and make it easier to win public support. For the current fiscal year through March, Japan will shoulder 201.7 billion yen ($1.76 billion) in so-called host nation support, which includes utilities, wages for Japanese staff, and training relocation costs. The increased contribution requested by the United States has not been disclosed. But the amount now under consideration will likely not be as much as what was being asked for by the administration of former U.S. President Donald Trump, according to a Japanese diplomatic source. "Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will make a final decision," the source said. To stipulate that Japan's increased contribution be appropriated for joint training and other activities, the government will consider adding a clause in the agreement, which will remain in effect for five years through fiscal 2026, according to the sources. In negotiations, the United States is believed to have cited the importance of its military presence in the region, in the face of China's military expansion and North Korea's nuclear and missile development, as reasons for Japan to increase its burden. Japan has said it wants the United States to understand that Tokyo cannot massively increase its spending due to its strained finances. The two allies had working-level talks in early August in Washington before officially beginning full-fledged negotiations. Japan is aiming to strike a deal on the issue before the Cabinet approves the budget for fiscal 2022 in late December. An idea has been floated to have Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi sign the agreement during a meeting involving the two allies' defense and foreign ministers, according to the sources. The next round of the so-called two-plus-two talks was expected to be held within the year but could be delayed until early 2022. Bilateral cost-sharing agreements are usually signed to cover a five-year term. But for fiscal 2021, Japan and the United States settled for a one-year extension of a five-year pact that expired in March 2021, as their negotiations were affected by the transition of power in Washington from Trump to current President Joe Biden. Related coverage: Japan Kishida, U.S. Biden agree to beef up alliance in 1st in-person talks FOCUS: Biden's Indo-Pacific shift under scrutiny as AUKUS alliance is formed U.S. urges Japan to shoulder more for hosting American troops KYODO NEWS - Nov 18, 2021 - 01:02 | All, Japan A 23-year-old man was arrested Wednesday for allegedly punching his 1-month-old daughter in a fatal assault in the southwestern Japan prefecture of Kagoshima last year, police said. Natsuki Nakashima admitted to the charge, with the police quoting him as saying, "I hit her because she would not stop crying. I was suffering from stress." According to the police, Nakashima is suspected of punching his daughter Kokona in the head in his apartment in the town of Kimotsuki during the night of Feb. 26, 2020, resulting in cerebral bleeding. The girl was taken to a hospital but pronounced dead the following day. The police said they will investigate whether the man had been committing child abuse on a regular basis. After the incident, Nakashima called for an ambulance and reported that his daughter was not breathing. Hospital staff handling the case notified police of the possibility of child abuse. The man lived with his wife and four children including Kokona. At the time of the incident, his wife and two of the children were out, the police said. KYODO NEWS - Nov 17, 2021 - 22:17 | World, All U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Wednesday the United States will start negotiations with allies early next year on a new Indo-Pacific economic framework. Raimondo, who arrived in Singapore the previous day after a visit to Japan, said during a forum that the framework would be aimed at securing supply chains. "I'm here in the region beginning the discussions, laying the groundwork" for the negotiations, Raimondo said. "We are likely to launch a more formal process in the beginning of next year, which will culminate in a proper economic framework in the region." Raimondo's tour of Japan, Singapore and later Malaysia comes on the heels of U.S. President Joe Biden's announcement last month about developing an Indo-Pacific economic framework to define "shared objectives" with partners on trade facilitation, standards for the digital economy and technology. The framework could be seen an alternative to the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade deal, to which the United States has not returned since withdrawing in 2017 under Biden's predecessor Donald Trump. Regarding the possibility of Washington rejoining the deal, formally known as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, Raimondo said, "For various reasons, that is not going to happen now." But she stressed, "We are very serious in re-engaging economically with the Indo-Pacific," adding the framework would strengthen supply chains for such essential goods as semiconductors. What the United States is launching is "broader in some ways and a little bit less restrained or constrained" than traditional free trade agreements, Raimondo said. In responding to a question about China and Taiwan having applied in September to join the TPP, she said their accession would depend on the member countries. Before leaving for Malaysia on Thursday, Raimondo will meet with her counterparts from Australia and New Zealand. Related coverage: Japan, U.S. to resolve dispute over Trump-era extra steel tariffs Biden, Xi agree to communicate amid tension, but no breakthrough China, U.S. hold 3rd economic talks in 2 weeks over phone Srinagar: The celebrations of Eid-ul-Fitr were marred by violence in Kashmir as clashes broke out between security forces and protestors in Srinagar and some other parts of the valley. According to reports, stone-pelters also waved flags of Pakistan and held banners in support of banned Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar and slain militant commander Zakir Musa. Clashes between protestors and security forces were reported after Eid prayers in Srinagar's near Jama Masjid. There were no reports of anyone getting hurt in these clashes, they said. Similar clashes were reported in Sopore in north Kashmir and Anantnag in south Kashmir, the officials said. The protestors, mostly youngsters, had their faces covered and pelted stones on security personnel, who were trying to disperse them. Jammu and Kashmir: Stones pelted at security forces near Jamia Masjid in Srinagar; and posters supporting terrorist Zakir Musa and UN designated terrorist Masood Azhar seen in the area. pic.twitter.com/qu7uea90YO a ANI (@ANI) June 5, 2019 Stone-pelters held posters with their photos and placards saying "Kashmir Banega Pakistan" and "Musa Army", reported ANI. Hafiz, chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba, was the key mastermind behind 2008 Mumbai attacks which claimed around 164 lives. Masood Azhar is the head of Jaish-e-Mohammed, terror outfit that carried out Pulwama attack killing over 40 security personnel. Security forces exercised maximum restraint while dealing with the law and order situation and the situation elsewhere in the valley remained peaceful, officials said. Meanwhile, a woman was shot dead and a man was injured after the terrorists targeted civilians in Jammu and Kashmiras Pulwama on Wednesday. aTerrorists fired upon a man and a woman at Singoo-Narbal in Pulwama district today. While the lady succumbed to injuries, the injured man has been rushed to a hospital," a police official was quoted as saying by PTI. The victim has been identified as one Nigeena Bano. A report by Times Now said that the woman was allegedly targeted for being an informer of the Indian forces. The report said that Nigeena was shot outside her home in cold blood. In the scuffle, one of her family members was also injured. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. United Nations: A United Nations emergency relief coordinator says more than 2 million men, women and children could die of starvation in Somalia by summer's end if international aid is not sent quickly to the drought-stricken African country. UN Undersecretary-General Mark Lowcock says about USD 700 million is needed after a rainless season that has killed both livestock and crops. He said Tuesday that the UN's Central Emergency Response Fund has allocated USD 45 million to cover food shortages, water and daily necessities in Somalia as well as parts of Kenya and Ethiopia affected by droughts. Of a Somali population of 15 million people, more than 3 million are struggling just to meet minimum food requirements, he said, and the shortages are about 40 per cent worse now than this past winter. "What was forecast to be an average rainy season in Somalia is now one of the driest on record in over 35 years," he said. "Communities that were already vulnerable due to past droughts are again facing severe hunger and water scarcity and are at risk from deadly communicable diseases." The UN aid complements efforts by governments of the three countries to assist their people, especially those with disabilities or who are internally displaced. Somalia's humanitarian fund is currently depleted. If financial aid is delayed, the cost of saving lives on the margin of death are much higher, Lowcock said, adding that the option then is to turn to expensive, therapeutic feeding programmes. "We could have a quick response now, which would be cheaper, reduce human suffering and more effective, or we can wait for a few months until we get all those horrible pictures on our TV screens and social media of starving kids," Lowcock said. Lowcock, who heads the U.N. Office for Humanitarian Affairs, said that in past decades droughts came about every half dozen years but recently they have hit every two or three years. "There's not really any question in my mind that these more frequent droughts are related to global warming and climate change," the UN official said. "So the only middle- and longer-term response is to look at alternative livelihoods a different way to make a living." For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The two Canadian citizens, who were attending Kumasi Technical University, were kidnapped on Thursday on an exchange program in the West African nation of Ghana. Guillaume Berube, spokesman for Global Affairs Canada, told The Associated Press that the Canadians have been kidnapped in Ghana and theyre providing assistance to the individuals families. However, the department didnt specify how many Canadians were abducted. Berube further said that no other information is being released so as not to compromise ongoing efforts or endanger the safety of Canadians. He said, The Government of Canadas first priority is always the safety and security of its citizens. For this reason, we will not comment on or release any information which may compromise ongoing efforts or endanger the safety of Canadians. Importantly, this is the second time in less than a month that foreigners have been targeted in the south-central city of Kumasi. Back in April this year, an Indian national was also abducted. However, he was rescued later in Kumasi. Following the abduction of an Indian national, Ghana's president Nana Akufo-Addo vowed to crack down on those committing kidnappings. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Avdhesh Dubey, a hawker from Gujarat, who was arrested for mimicking politicians while selling toys in trains, has been finally released on bail late Monday evening. The Railway Protection Force (RPF) arrested Dubey from the Surat Railway station on May 31, after a video purportedly showing him mimicking and mocking a host of politicians went viral on social networking sites. The six-minute-long video shows the railway hawker doing a parody of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Rahul Gandhi, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Following his arrest, Dubey was sentenced to 10 days jail term by a Judicial Magistrate First Class court in Surat, but walked a free man on Monday after Surat Police Commissioner Satish Sharma personally intervened into the matter. The move comes amid a huge uproar with support pouring in for Dubey from different quarters of the society. Sharma, the Surat city police chief, too was saddened to hear the news of Avdhesh's arrest and decided to help the man. Speaking to the Times of India, Sharma said, "It is a very petty offence and Dubey being very poor was unable to pay Rs 3,500 fine slapped by the court". According to RPF officials Dubeys family did not have money to hire a lawyer for bail and, therefore, was provided financial aid to get an early release on humanitarian grounds. Avdhesh was found guilty of offences under several sections of Railway Act, including section 44 (prohibition on hawking and begging), 145 B (spreading nuisance or using abusive language in railway carriage), 147 (unlawful entry into train), among others. READ | Watch Video: Train hawker seen mimicking politicians like PM Modi, Rahul Gandhi; arrested Dubey, who found it hard to believe the news about his bail, told The Indian Express, "I had an impression that I will not see my family members and children for 10 days, till June 8. I was worried for my family. Suddenly on Monday night, the jail authorities came to my barrack and told me that I have been granted bail. I was shocked". "How could this happen? Who would have done this? Immediately, I got dressed and came out from the barrack. The jail guard took me to the office where I met Surat police officials who had helped me get the bail. They took me to the office of Police Commissioner, and for the first time I saw a Police Commissioner (Satish Sharma) in front of me. I thanked him. He too was happy," he went on to describe further. Being asked about his future plans, the hawker said, "Comedy is in built in me, and I want to explore it through television shows, so that many people could watch me perform. I have spoken to some of the people who have assured to help me in this new venture. Now, everybody knows me by my name, and I feel like a celebrity. I am thankful to Surat police". Dubey, who hails from Uttar Pradeh's Varanasi, had migrated to Gujarat's Valsad two years ago. Since then, he has been selling toys to train passengers travelling between Vapi and Surat. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The demand for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya reached its peak as soon as the Bharatiya Janata Party registered a thumping victory in the Lok Sabha Elections 2019. The Shiv Sena is also now stepping up the pressure on ally BJP for construction of Ram temple. According to the sources, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray will be visiting yodhya with all the 18 Lok Sabha MPs of the party before the beginning of the monsoon session of Parliament. As per the information from the sources, Uddhav Thackeray is likely to be in Ayodhya from June 15 till June 17. "There will be an announcement about the visit soon. Uddhav-ji will elaborate on the visit and the party's stand," the sources added. "It is true that Thackeray has decided to visit Ayodhya. The plan is to visit before the parliament session starts on June 17," India Today quoted Harshal Pradhan. "There will be an announcement about the visit soon. Uddhav-ji will elaborate on the visit and the party's stand," he added. Harshal Pradhan is a close aide of Uddhav Thackeray and media in-charge of the Shiv Sena. Interestingly, the arrival of Shiv Sena chief and 18 MPs of Maharashtra will be on the same day when the seers are expected to pass a resolution asking for the construction of Ram Mandir from Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It is to be noted that the Shiv Sena chief had visited Ayodhya in November last year and demanded that Ram temple be constructed at the disputed site before the Lok Sabha elections. Thackeray had also performed Sarayu Aarati (offer prayers to River Sarayu). For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The National Testing Agency (NTA) has officially released the final answer key for NEET 2019 Medical Entrance Exam earlier today. The candidates who have appeared for the NEET 2019 examination can check the Answer Key by visiting the official website i.e. ntaneet.nic.in. NTA NEET 2019 result will also be available on mcc.nic.in. Given that the NEET final answer key has been released, the NEET result will be released shortly. As per media reports, NTA Chairperson has told that the results will be declared on 6th June 2019 after 12 PM. However, there is no official confirmation of these reports. For the convenience of the students, we have mentioned the steps through which the candidates can download the NEET Final Answer Key: Step 1: Go to official NEET website: www.ntaneet.nic.in. Step 2: Click on the Final Answer Key link on the homepage. Step 3: The final answer key is in pdf format. Step 4: Download the pdf and check the answer key. The NEET 2019 examination was conducted on May 5, 2019, except in Odisha where the examination was conducted on May 20, 2019, due to the unfortunate occurrence of 'Cyclone Fani'. To qualify in NEET exam, a general category student must be in the 50th percentile. For OBC, SC, and ST category students, minimum qualifying criteria is 40th percentile. For general category candidates with benchmark disabilities, minimum qualifying criteria is 45th percentile and for those in OBC/SC/ST category, it is 40th percentile. Islamabad: In an unprecedented voluntary move, Pakistans military has decided to cut the defence budget for the next fiscal year amid an austerity drive launched by the government to solve the cash-strapped nations economic woes. Major General Asif Ghafoor, Director General (DG) Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) -- the media wing of the military, in his twitter message on Tuesday said that voluntary cuts in the defence budget for next fiscal year would not be at the cost of defence and security. Voluntary cut in defence budget for a year will not be at the cost of defence & security. We shall maintain effective response potential to all threats. Three services will manage impact of the cut through appropriate internal measures. It was important to participate in development of tribal areas & Balochistan, Ghafoor said. Prime Minister Imran Khan said Tuesday that he was very appreciative of the Pakistan militarys unprecedented voluntary initiative of stringent cuts in their defence expenditures especially in light of the countrys financial situation. Khan said he was grateful for the move that came despite multiple security challenges that Pakistan faces. Khan said that the funds saved will be used for the development of the newly-merged tribal areas as well as in Balochistan. Science and Technology Minister Fawad Chaudhry said this was not a small step at all. Only a strong civilian-military coordination can rescue Pakistan from the deep problems of Governance and economy, Chaudhry said. Prime Minister han, after assuming office last year, launched several austerity measures. He moved into a modest three-bed room house of his military secretary along with two servants. On May 28, the Prime Ministers Special Assistant on Information, Firdous Ashiq Awan, had announced that the federal budget will be presented on June 11. Last month, the government announced that all civil and military institutions would contribute to the austerity-oriented federal budget for 2019-20. There will be austerity in the coming budget. We will try to keep government expenditures to the minimum possible level, Prime Ministers Adviser on Finance and Economic Affairs Hafeez Shaikh had said. Pakistan in 2018 was the 20th biggest military spender in the world with an expenditure of USD 11.4 billion, a report published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri) said in April. The military spending of 2018 made up for four per cent of Pakistans gross domestic product (GDP) which is the highest level since 2004, according to the report by the Sweden-based institute. The top military spender in the world is the United States, which spent USD 649 billion on its forces last year. The US military spending, however, has decreased by 17 per cent over the past decade, the report said. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Pune: A 19-year-old sailor allegedly committed suicide at INS Shivaji, the Indian Navy's base near Lonavala in Pune district, Wednesday, police said. Akash Sainath Kannala was found to have hanged himself from ceiling fan by using a bedsheet at a recreation center on the base around 4.30 am, a police official said. No suicide note was found on the spot, and the Navy has ordered an inquiry, he said. Kannala, who was undergoing Direct Entry Engineering Mechanics course, hailed from Pardi village in Nirmal district of Telangana, the police official said. Lonavala police are conducting further probe, he added. Earlier, A 28-year-old merchant navy officer Shravan Mahendra had committed suicide by hanging himself from the ceiling fan of a hotel room in Dehradun on March 30, 2019. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan on Wednesday urged the chief ministers of Delhi, Odisha, Telangana and West Bengal to join the Centre's flagship health insurance scheme, Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY). According to a statement from the health ministry, the minister had also spoken to Arvind Kejriwal, Naveen Patnaik and Mamata Banerjee, the respective chief ministers of Delhi, Odisha and West Bengal, and was trying to connect with Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao. Taking stock of the situation that the three states and one Union Territory (UT) were yet to join the AB-PMJAY, Dr Harsh Vardhan, in his letter to the chief ministers, said, "It is important that the benefits of a visionary scheme like Ayushman Bharat should reach all the deprived and vulnerable people in the country. "I will make all efforts to convince the remaining states and the UT to bring the benefits of the scheme to their people and ensure that no eligible person is deprived of these benefits," he added. He further said that it was due to the transparent processes, ease of access and benefits to a large section of the poor population that 32 states and UTs had accepted the scheme, which was running successfully and providing financial protection to crores of people. Urging the states to join the scheme, the minister also noted that they would gain in terms of resources, national portability, state-of-the-art technological platforms, implementation systems and world-class analytics systems at no additional cost. They would also benefit from a well-proven fraud monitoring-and-control system and the exchange of key learnings and best practices of other states towards equitable healthcare, he added. Minister Harsh Vardhan also made it clear that financial resources would be made available to the states with adequate flexibility in the spirit of cooperative federalism. He further pointed out that implementing the scheme would not only prove highly beneficial for the states, but also for the people and all the stakeholders. "The ultimate beneficiary of this collaboration will be poor and vulnerable people. Due to the portability of services, the states will gain from the nationwide network of hospitals and will also help provide services in their own states to those from outside their states," the minister said. In the letter, he assured full support and cooperation to the states in aligning their own schemes with Ayushman Bharat. The AB-PMJAY scheme aims to provide a coverage of Rs five lakh per family annually, benefitting more than 10.74 crore poor families for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation through a network of empanelled healthcare providers. Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan on Wednesday urged the chief ministers of Delhi, Odisha, Telangana and West Bengal to join the Centre's flagship health insurance scheme, Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY). According to a statement from the health ministry, the minister had also spoken to Arvind Kejriwal, Naveen Patnaik and Mamata Banerjee, the respective chief ministers of Delhi, Odisha and West Bengal, and was trying to connect with Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao. Taking stock of the situation that the three states and one Union Territory (UT) were yet to join the AB-PMJAY, Dr Harsh Vardhan, in his letter to the chief ministers, said, "It is important that the benefits of a visionary scheme like Ayushman Bharat should reach all the deprived and vulnerable people in the country. "I will make all efforts to convince the remaining states and the UT to bring the benefits of the scheme to their people and ensure that no eligible person is deprived of these benefits," he added. He further said that it was due to the transparent processes, ease of access and benefits to a large section of the poor population that 32 states and UTs had accepted the scheme, which was running successfully and providing financial protection to crores of people. Urging the states to join the scheme, the minister also noted that they would gain in terms of resources, national portability, state-of-the-art technological platforms, implementation systems and world-class analytics systems at no additional cost. They would also benefit from a well-proven fraud monitoring-and-control system and the exchange of key learnings and best practices of other states towards equitable healthcare, he added. Minister Harsh Vardhan also made it clear that financial resources would be made available to the states with adequate flexibility in the spirit of cooperative federalism. He further pointed out that implementing the scheme would not only prove highly beneficial for the states, but also for the people and all the stakeholders. "The ultimate beneficiary of this collaboration will be poor and vulnerable people. Due to the portability of services, the states will gain from the nationwide network of hospitals and will also help provide services in their own states to those from outside their states," the minister said. In the letter, he assured full support and cooperation to the states in aligning their own schemes with Ayushman Bharat. The AB-PMJAY scheme aims to provide a coverage of Rs five lakh per family annually, benefitting more than 10.74 crore poor families for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation through a network of empanelled healthcare providers. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The Council of Higher Secondary Education (CHSE), Odisha has announced the results of class 12 Science examination on June 3 (Monday), 2019. Pass percentage for Science students this year is 72.33%. 20,806 candidates have scored 1st Division. The candidates can check the results on the official website of the board i.e. chseodisha.nic.in and orissaresults.nic.in. The declaration of the results have sealed the fate of thousands of students who have appeared for the examination. The results of class 12 Science will be declared at 12 noon through a press conference from the Soochana Bhawan. The HSC results will be available at the websites soon after the declaration of results, Lopa Mudra Mohanty, Secretary, CHSE Odisha told the indianexpress.com. Alternatively, the candidates can also check the results by clicking on the link given below. Every year, CHSE Odisha announces the result for the Science stream first, followed by that of Arts and Commerce streams. The results of class 12 Arts and Commerce are likely to be declared by Friday, June 7. Click Here For Odisha Board Class 12 Results 2019 LIVE UPDATES: 12.26 pm: 12.17 pm: CHSE Odisha Plus 2 Result 2019 for Science Stream have been announced. 75.02% girls have passed. Passing percent for boys is at 70.40%. 29.42% students have scored 1st division, 33.81% have scored 2nd division and 35.87% have scored 3rd division. Best result was recorded from Bhaleshwar with 86.56% pass percentage 9 colleges have Zero result while 29 colleges have 100% result (all students have passed). 60 students have scored above 90%. 12.13 pm: CHSE Odisha 12th Result 2019 has been declared. Pass percentage for Science students this year is 72.33%. 20,806 candidates have scored 1st Division. 12.10 pm: Pass Percentage 72.33 12.09 pm: The Odisha board class 12 results have been announced. 12.06 pm: Press conference is going on. Result to be out aytime soon. 11.59 am: Odisha Plus 2 Result 2019 would be released in a short while. CHSE Odisha would be releasing only the Plus 2 Science Result 2019 today. The Arts and Commerce Result would be released at a later date 11.55 am: CHSE Class 12 Science Results to be declared in few minutes. Press conference begins. 11.43 am: For the convenience of the students, we have mentioned the steps through which the candidates can check the results: Step 1: Visit the official website of the board i.e. english.newsnationtv.com/board-results and click on Odisha Result page Step 2: Input all the important information like name, birth date, and roll number Step 3: Click on the submit button Step 4: Check your Result 2019 Step 5: Download soft copy PDF / take a printout for future reference 11.40 am: The result will be available on chseodisha.nic.in and orissaresults.nic.in at 12 noon. 11.35 am: Keep checking the official links- chseodisha.nic.in and orissaresults.nic.in for results. The result can be checked through the roll number or registration number. This year the overall pass percentage is expected to increase. Last year the pass percentage for Science stream was 76.98 percent and thoverall pass percentage was 77.98 percent. 11.29 am: The Board will begin the press conference soon and announce the result. 11.01 am: One hour from now, the Odisha Board class 12 results will be available on the official website of the board. 11.01 am: In 2018, the pass percentage for Science stream Plus Two examination was 76.98%. 10.49 am: According to the reports, the results will be out at 12 pm. 9.36 am: The Council of Higher Secondary Education, Odisha, had last year announced the class 12 science result on May 19. Of the 95,096 students who had written the HSC examination, 73, 211 students (77.98 per cent) passed it. 9.35 am: A total of 3.69 lakh students, including 2.35 lakh students in Arts, 99,000 students in Science and around 27,200 students in Commerce appeared for the CHSE Plus Two examinations, which were conducted from March 7, 2019 to March 30, 2019. About the Odisha Board There are two separate boards for regulating High School Education and Higher Secondary Education. The Council of Higher Secondary Education, Odisha is in existence since the year 1982 and was established in accordance with the Odisha Higher Secondary Education Act 1982. The duties of CHSE, Odisha include regulating and monitoring the policies to develop Higher Secondary Education in the state of Odisha. The Board of Secondary Education, Odisha is a Body Corporate constituted under the Odisha Secondary Education Act, 1953. The BSE is located at Bajrakabati Road, Cuttack and is functioning as an education body since 1955. It conducts the High School Certificate Examinations (HSCE) and other related examinations. Its duties and jurisdiction involve the development of curriculum, supervision in the implementation of state academic policies and conducting examinations for the purpose of evaluating the students at the higher secondary level. New Delhi: As expected, newly appointed Home Minister Amit Shah reportedly hit the ground with the Kashmir issue. According to news agency IANS, Shah has many crucial things on his agenda including redrawing the long pending delimitation of constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir. A report by Times Now suggests on Tuesday, the Home Ministry deliberated upon the proposal to lift the freeze on delimitation in the state. Shah held a meeting with J&K Governor Satya Pal Malik to discuss the issue. The Jammu and Kashmir Assembly was created in 1939. The Sheikh Abdullah government in the state brought 43 seats in Kashmir, 30 for Jammu and two for Ladakh region. At present, the state of Jammu and Kashmir has 87 seats of which Jammu has 37, Kashmir has 46 and Ladakh has four. Zee News reported that the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) is mulling the appointment of a delimitation commission to study the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly constituencies and come up with its recommendations. The panel will take into account the population and area of different regions of the state and come up with relevant recommendations. In 2010, the Supreme Court upheld the freeze imposed by Jammu and Kashmir government on delimitation of assembly constituencies in the state till 2026 and dismissed the plea that it violated the basic structure of the Constitution. Rejecting J&K Panthers Party chief Bhim Singhs argument that it deprived Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes the right to represent the Valley, the apex court in a judgment said courts cannot interfere in matters of delimitation as there was an express Constitutional bar on such interference. By an amendment to Jammu and Kashmir Representation of the People Act 1957 and Section 47(3) of the Constitution of J&K made in 2002, the state decided to freeze the delimitation exercise till 2026. The last census operation in the state was completed in 2001 but the delimitation was done in 1995. According to the 2011 census, the total population of Jammu Division was 5,378,538 of which Dogras were the dominant group comprising 62.55 per cent of the population. Jammu has 25.93 per cent of the area and 42.89 per cent of the population. Against this, Kashmir Division or the intermountain valley population in 2011 was 6,888,475 with 96.40 per cent Muslims. Though it has 15.73 per cent of the state's area, it holds 54.93 per cent of the population. Ladakh has 58.33 per cent of the area accounting for 2.18 per cent of the population, a mere 274,289 people reside there of which 46.40 per cent are Muslims, 12.11 per cent Hindus and 39.67 per cent Buddhists. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Khartoum: Sudanese protest leaders on Wednesday turned down an offer by the ruling military council for talks and demanded justice for a crackdown that doctors said has left 101 people dead. Security forces believed to include former members of the Janjaweed, a government-backed militia which shocked the world over atrocities in Darfur, moved in to brutally disperse a protest sit-in on Monday. The Central Committee for Sudanese Doctors close to the protest movement said on Wednesday that at least 101 people had been killed in the crackdown, including 40 bodies that were recovered from the Nile river. Sudan has been controlled by a military council since it ousted veteran president Omar al-Bashir in April after protesters demanded an end to his authoritarian rule before agreeing a three-year transition period to a civilian administration. But army ruler General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan said following the crackdown that the agreement had been ditched and an election would take place within nine months -- a plan rejected by demonstrators. On Wednesday, however, Burhan said those in "the military council open our arms to negotiate with no restriction", an offer that the protest leaders were quick to reject. "The Sudanese people are not open for talks," said Amjad Farid, a spokesman for the Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA) which spearheaded protests that led to the ouster of Bashir. "The Sudanese people are not open to this TMC (Transitional Military Council) that kills people and we need justice and accountability before talks about any political process," he told AFP. Farid said both the SPA and umbrella protest group the Alliance for Freedom and Change would "continue using all non-violent tools and civil disobedience in resisting the TMC". The rejection came after the commander for the Sudanese paramilitary forces accused of carrying out the deadly crackdown insisted the country would not be allowed to slip into "chaos". "We will not allow chaos... we must impose the authority of the state through law," Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, deputy chief of the military council, told troops in a televised address. Dalgalo, known as Himediti, leads the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that protesters say is responsible for the "bloody massacre". The general singled out makeshift barricades erected across streets by demonstrators that are aimed at blocking the security forces. Hospitals in Khartoum said they were struggling to cope with the number of wounded after security forces on Monday raided a weeks-long sit-in outside army headquarters. "The situation is very difficult. Most of the hospitals have taken in more casualties than they have capacity for," a doctor who works at two hospitals in the city told AFP. "There's a shortage of medical staff, a shortage of blood, and it's difficult to do surgery because some operations can only be done in certain hospitals," said the doctor, who asked not to be named. "Among the wounded there are still people in a serious condition and I expect the number of deaths to rise." There was a heavy security presence as worshippers in some neighbourhoods came out to mark the Eid al-Fitr festival. In Omdurman, just across the Nile from Khartoum, security forces were seen patrolling in trucks mounted with what appeared to be anti-aircraft and machine guns and other weapons including rocket-propelled grenades. Protest leaders have called on their supporters to take part in "total civil disobedience" to topple the military council. On Wednesday, hundreds of residents of north Khartoum blocked off streets with rocks, and waited by them in silence, a witness told AFP. In the distance gunfire was heard. The Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors said it held "the militias of the (military) council... responsible for this massacre." The Sudanese Doctors Union accused security forces of attacks on hospitals and staff across the country, and alleged some women had been raped in an area of the capital without giving details of how the group had learned of the assaults. A push for the UN Security Council to condemn the killing of civilians and call on the military and protesters to work together was blocked by China, which was backed by Russia, during a closed-door meeting on Tuesday. Eight European countries instead issued their own joint statement criticising "the violent attacks in Sudan by Sudanese security services against civilians". The British ambassador to Khartoum, Irfan Siddiq, called for an end to the internet outages that have plagued the country since the crackdown. "In these critical times it is essential that everyone can communicate, particularly to urge messages of keeping things calm and peaceful," he tweeted. Top US envoy David Hale, under secretary of state for political affairs, underlined the importance of a transition to a civilian-led government in a phone call with the Saudi deputy defence minister, Khalid bin Salman, the State Department said. Saudi Arabia, a key backer of the military rulers, called for a resumption of "dialogue between the various parties of Sudan". (AFP via PTI) For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Damascus: Syria on Sunday accused Israel of targeting an airbase in Homs province, in the second such attack in 24 hours. Our air defences thwarted an Israeli aggression and destroyed two of the rockets that targeted the T-4 airbase, a military source told state news agency SANA. The remaining rockets killed one soldier, wounded two others, and damaged an arms warehouse, the source added. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported five killed, including one Syrian soldier. It said the attack also destroyed a rocket warehouse. In addition to the Syrian army, Iranian fighters and Hezbollah paramilitary forces are also stationed at the airbase, according to the monitor. The attack comes hours after Israel announced that it had carried out strikes in Syria in response to rare rocket fire from the neighbouring country. The Observatory said 10 were killed, including Syrian soldiers and foreign fighters in the attack south of the capital. Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes in Syria, most of them against what it says are Iranian and Hezbollah targets. Israel says it is determined to prevent its arch foe Iran from entrenching itself militarily in Syria, where Tehran backs President Bashar al-Assad in the countrys eight-year war which has killed more than 370,000 people. The Jewish state insists that it has the right to continue to target positions in Syria held by Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah out of self-defence. The latest reported strike comes amid soaring tensions between Iran and the United States. The stand-off had been simmering since the US last year withdrew from the 2015 nuclear treaty which Iran reached with major world powers. In recent weeks Washington has accused Iran of alleged threats and deployed an aircraft carrier group and B-52 bombers to the Gulf. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Cairo: Egyptian security forces have killed 14 suspected militants during a raid carried out in the restive Sinai Peninsula in response to a deadly checkpoint attack, the authorities said. Wednesday's attack, claimed by the Islamic State group, left dead eight policemen southwest of El-Arish, capital of North Sinai, and five militants were killed in exchanges of fire that ensued. Some other suspected militants fled the scene before security forces tracked down and killed 14 of them in the raid, the interior ministry said in a statement. "Following the route of escaped elements responsible for the attack led to a group of terrorist elements in an abandoned hideout in an empty lot," the ministry said. The security forces surrounded the suspected militants before engaging "in a heavy shootout" which killed 14 of them, it added. They also found 14 guns, three explosive devices and two explosive belts in their possession. Pictures of the slain militants lying in pools of blood were also circulated along with the statement. A medical source sent AFP a list naming the eight police personnel killed, which a security source confirmed. AFP also received a recording from a police officer, who asked to remain anonymous, of security forces communications that appeared to confirm that a military plane destroyed a tank hijacked by a militant during the attack. In a statement released by its propaganda wing, Amaq, the Islamic State group said its fighters had launched "two simultaneous attacks on two police checkpoints" in El-Arish. The attack took place on the day Egyptian Muslims marked the holiday of Eid al-Fitr. In February 2018, the army launched a nationwide offensive against the Islamist militants, focused mainly on North Sinai. The troubled hotspot has long been a centre of insurgents affiliated with IS that Egypt has battled against. According to official figures, around 665 insurgents have been killed since the start of the operation, while the army has lost some 50 soldiers. No independent statistics are available and the region is largely cut off to journalists, making verification of casualty figures extremely difficult. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Dubai: Unfazed by the recent Indo-Pak tensions, a Dubai-based Indian businessman has installed over 60 hand pumps in a poverty-stricken district of Pakistans southeastern Sindh province, according to a media report. Joginder Singh Salaria set up nearly 62 water pumps in Tharparkar district with the help of local social workers after knowing the plight of the area through social media. He also sent bags of grains to the community. Salaria, who has been a UAE-resident since 1993 and runs a transport business said he reached out to social workers in Pakistan via social networking sites such as Facebook and YouTube, established contacts with them and funded the entire operation. While India-Pakistan tensions were high following the Pulwama incident, we were installing hand pumps in these poor villages, Joginder Singh Salaria, who launched the Pehal Charitable Trust, was quoted as saying by the Khaleej Times. Tension between India and Pakistan were at an all-time high after 40 CRPF personnel were killed and five injured on February 14 when a suicide bomber of Pakistan-based terror group Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) attacked their bus in Pulwama district. India responded by launching air strikes across the LoC and destroyed terror camps in Balakot in Pakistans Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The philanthropist said he spent weeks and months researching the plight of people in Tharparkar and a lot of it was done through social media. Bheal Khangar, a social worker, coordinated with Salaria for the entire project. There are very few roads in the villages. The nearest hospital is 50km away, and people need to walk 25km to reach the main road. Schools are also very bad in those areas. Most children cant go to school due to lack of opportunities, lack of easy access to school and lack of schools, he said. The Khaleej Times quoted a United National Development Programme report as saying that the Tharparkar district has some of the lowest social and development indicators in Sindh province and across Pakistan with poverty head count of 87 per cent. Over the past decade, high levels of deprivation have resulted in a steady increase in the multi-dimensional poverty head count in the district, the report said. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The police on Wednesday in Nimta area of West Bengals 24 Parganas arrested two suspects in connection with the murder of Nirmal Kundu, Trinamool Congress president of Ward 6 of North Dum Dum Municipality, who was shot dead by two bike-borne persons on Tuesday evening. Uttam Mondal and Rabindranath Sil are allegedly linked to the shooting and have been produced before the Barrackpore sub divisional court on Wednesday. According to the police, two more suspects have been arrested and they would be produced the court soon. Kundu, 44, was talking to some people near by his house at Patna area in Nimta on Tuesday evening when he was shot at. He was rushed to a private hospital where doctors declared him dead. He was received bullet injuries in his head. After the incident, tension grips the area. On Wednesday morning, a CCTV footage which shows the incident went viral. In the footage, Kundu was seen talking to locals at a tea stall when two people on a motorcycle drove past and the pillion-rider shot twice at him. In the footage, the body is seen slumping to the ground as the motorcycle speeds away by cutting through the crowd that had begun to gather there. All seven phases of the just concluded Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal were marred by violence, with both the BJP and the TMC trading blame over the issue. The BJP has made deep inroads into the Trinamool citadel by winning 18 Lok Sabha seats and cutting the TMC down to size by limiting its win in only 22 seats against 34 it bagged in 2014. In the Lok Sabha polls, BJP secured a clear majority with 303 seats, while Congress was at a distant 52. Tuesday's incident took place a couple of days after a BJP worker, who had gone missing since Saturday was found dead in West Bengals Basirhat. The victim was identified as Ajay Mondal. The 36-year-old was reportedly hacked to death. His bruised body with multiple injuries was found in a roadside canal at Bajitpur on Sunday morning. The police said that the body has been sent for autopsy to know. On Monday, an infant was killed while a person sustained a bullet injury and several others were injured as there seemed to be no respite from continuous political violence between the ruling Trinamool Congress and the BJP in West Bengal. Activists of both sides were beaten up while incidents of ransacking houses and damage to vehicles were reported across districts. Trinamool activists alleged a woman at Sildanga area in North 24 Parganas' Ashoknagar was physically abused allegedly by one of her relatives and a local BJP leader for "not agreeing to support the saffron party" and her child sustained an injury while she was heckled. Earlier, another BJP worker was stabbed to death in West Bengal's West Burdwan district on Thursday. Sushil Mondal, 49, was killed allegedly by a Trinamool Congress activist following an altercation over putting up BJP flags at Panduk village under Ketugram police station limits. Local TMC leaders, however, claimed Mondal was a victim of the party's internal feud. The police said Mondal's wife has lodged a complaint against three persons who are on the run. On May 25, a 23-year-old BJP worker was shot dead in Nadia district of the state. Santu Ghosh (23), a resident of Tapaban area in Chakdaha town was shot at from a close range after he went out of his house following a phone call. He was taken to Chakdaha State General Hospital where doctors declared him brought dead. As a result, BJP leaders and workers staged a road blockade on National Highway 34, the police said. West Bengal has witnessed widespread tension since the Lok Sabha Elections were announced in March earlier this year. Sporadic violence was reported during the 7-phase-long polls across state. Both the BJP and Trinamool have blamed each other for the bloodbath. It should be noted that family members of over 40 BJP workers, who were killed in political violence in West Bengal, were also invited for the swearing-in ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on May 30 last month. It was the very reason for which Mamata Banerjee had turned down the invite and said that the BJP was trying to politicise the oath-taking ceremony. The rift has only deepened since the May 23 verdict which saw the BJP creating history in Bengal. The saffron party won 18 seats in the state with ruling Trinamool Congress getting 22 seats. The double-digit growth has given the BJP every reason to cheer. How important is the Bengal win was reflected in BJP chief and Union Home Minister Amit Shahs victory speech at party headquarters in New Delhi on May 23. The highly polarised elections in Bengal saw many firsts also. In an unprecedented move, the Election Commission of India had barred campaigning a day early, before the seventh and final phase, after a bout of clashes led to the damage of property, including a bust of reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. (With PTI inputs) For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: The onset of monsoon could be delayed further by a day to June 7, the India Meteorological Department said Tuesday. On Saturday, private weather forecaster Skymet too revised its forecast from June 4 to June 7. Last month, announcing the expected day of monsoon arrival over Kerala, IMD said it could happen on June 6, with an error margin of plus or minus four days. Cross equatorial flow over southern parts of South Arabian Sea and over the Bay of Bengal is likely to increase gradually favouring further advance of southwest monsoon over some more parts of South Arabian sea, Maldives?, Comorin area, southwest, southeast and central Bay of Bengal during next 24 hours. An east?west shear zone at 3.1 kilometres above mean sea level is very likely to develop across extreme south peninsula from tomorrow onwards leading to favourable conditions for onset of southwest monsoon over Kerala during the subsequent 72 hours, it said. Earth Sciences Minister Harsh Vardhan had also indicated that monsoon could hit the Kerala coast on June 6-7. Several parts of the country are reeling under severe heat waves with temperatures touching 50 degree Celsius in some parts. Vardhan said monsoon is likely to be 96 per cent of the Long Period Average (LPA), which falls on the border line of normal and below normal category. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Kathmandu: Under pressure after a deadly season on traffic-clogged Mount Everest, Nepal is considering tightening access to the world's highest peak, but mountaineering experts fear the proposed changes could amount to little more than lip service. Eleven people died during the climbing season that ended this week, as record numbers lined the route to the summit. Although overcrowding was blamed for at least four deaths, many say inexperience is a bigger killer. "People who know nothing of climbing, never been on a mountain, came and tried to climb Everest," Chilean mountaineer Juan Pablo Mohr told AFP after returning to Kathmandu. "A lot of people didn't know how to put (on) crampons or (use) the fixed ropes," he said, adding they relied on an army of sherpas or Nepali guides to help them accomplish such basic tasks. For years, Kathmandu has issued permits to anyone willing to pay $11,000, regardless of whether they are rookie climbers or skilled mountaineers. But after a devastating spring season, officials told AFP they are considering imposing more restrictions. "We are looking into having a minimum requirement for climbers, fixing more ropes or taking more oxygen and sherpas," said Mohan Krishna Sapkota, secretary at Nepal's tourism ministry. For veteran mountaineers, the announcement of new rules amounts to little more than a futile annual exercise -- with the government each year promising tougher measures that fail to materialise by the following spring. Russell Brice, whose company Himalayan Experience (Himex) has been organising Everest expeditions for decades, told AFP his meetings with government officials over the years had left him in no doubt about their indifference towards the industry. "The ministry is in denial of overcrowding, of issuing too many permits, not checking what people are doing and so on," Brice said. "It is just stupid words," he said, adding, "they are not interested." In 2014, Kathmandu said it would double the number of fixed ropes near the summit to prevent traffic jams. It never happened. The government also said it would station soldiers and police at Everest base camp for assistance. An AFP visit to the area in 2015 revealed no such deployment. Unlike Tibet, which caps the number of Everest climbers at 300, there are no limits on the Nepali side, making for an exceedingly profitable -- and dangerous -- business. As cheaper operators have entered the fray, the number of climbers has shot up, creating deadly bottlenecks en-route to the top of the 8,848-metre (29,029-feet) peak -- especially when bad weather cuts the number of summit days, as it did this year. Phurba Tenjing Sherpa, who has guided clients on Everest for over a decade, told AFP one of the climbers who died should never have been allowed to go up, given her excessively slow pace. But the woman, who was in her fifties, "would not listen" because she had paid the fee and wanted to see the summit, he said. "Such climbers are increasing on Everest. They force us, they want to climb no matter what. Their stubbornness is killing people on the mountain," he said. The situation has deteriorated to such a degree that Nepal's Mountaineering Association, which represents operators, is lobbying the government for stricter rules. The association's president, Santa Bir Lama, told AFP the high number of deaths this year was due to the increased presence of inexperienced climbers. "Climbers should be self-reliant. It would be best if there is a criteria set for issuing permits," he said. For years after Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first ascent of Everest in 1953, access to the world's most famous peak was a rare prize, offered only to solo mountaineers charting new routes or to climbers belonging to national teams or boasting major sponsorship deals. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. MANILA (Philippines): Sara Duterte-Carpio, the daughter of Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte and a vice-presidential candidate in the 2022 elections, has declared her support for presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who is now topping the poll. Duterte-Carpio, 43, spoke for the first time since launching her candidacy on Saturday, pleading for Filipinos to vote for her. Duterte-Carpio expressed her confidence in Filipinos' ability to help and support them until the elections are won, despite the hurdles, in a video posted on Facebook. Duterte-Carpio stated that her choice to join forces with Ferdinand Marcos Jr. was not made with the intention of derailing the campaigns of other candidates. "Our goal is not just to carry out President Duterte's proposals, but also to improve the administration's programmes," she said, urging unity. In a second statement, Marcos, 64, the only son of former President Ferdinand Marcos, acknowledged their collaboration. Duterte-Carpio was approved by Marcos' party shortly after the Davao City mayor filed her candidacy on Saturday. The president and vice president of the Philippines are chosen separately under Philippine law. Duterte's long-time aide-turned-senator Christopher Go went to the Commission on Elections office in Manila with the president shortly after the presidential daughter's filing last Saturday to change his application, submitting his certificate of candidacy for president and withdrawing his certificate of candidacy for vice president. Sara Duterte-Carpio to run for Vice President in 2022 polls Taliban Govts Aviation Personnel to be given professional training by Pak Govt China, Congo to work to strengthen local govt cooperation: Congo's PM Home Business Nepal receives no foreign grants in the first quarter of the fiscal year Kathmandu, November 17 The government has set a target of receiving Rs 59.92 billion in foreign grants in the current fiscal year. However, it did not receive a penny in the first quarter of the year. Ritesh Shakya, a joint secretary at the Ministry of Finance, says the government, nonetheless, received commitments for Rs 5.81 billion in this period. Green Climate Fund, Asian Development Bank and the Swiss government have expressed their commitments for grants in this period. Shakya says the amount of foreign grants the government receives in a certain period depends on the progress made in the projects run with such assistance in the past. Meanwhile, economist Govinda Raj Pokharel says the Covid-19 crisis might be the reason for the decrease in the grant amount. Nonetheless, the amount of foreign grants that Nepal receives is on the decline for the past five years. Mountains have always fascinated Vinayak Jaya Malla. Growing up in Mallaj in Parbat district of western Nepal, he would often stare at Dhaulagiri, the seventh highest mountain in the world, and wonder what it would be like to stand on top of it. The mountain appealed to him like nothing in the world, but coming from a family that was not into mountaineering, he knew that climbing Dhaulagiri was a farfetched dream. Fast-forward 30 years, things have changed for Malla. While he is yet to reach the summit of Dhaulagiri, through hard work and determination, he has climbed numerous mountains including Everest, Manaslu and Ama Dablam, and is one of few Nepalis certified as a mountain guide by the IFMGA. Initially, an outsider in Nepals mountaineering scene where 99 per cent of Nepal mountain guides are from the Sherpa community, Malla has defied all odds and done something only a few do. Now, he wants to continue climbing and create a space for the younger generation of climbers as he wants to share what he has learnt in the past decade to aspiring and next generation of mountaineers along with creating a space for alpinism in Nepal. Bringing the dream closer Malla on the top of the true summit of Manaslu. I knew nothing and had to spend a lot of time learning. I want to give back what Ive learnt, he says. Vinayak Jaya Malla grew up in the village near Parbat and spent most of his free time helping his parents look after the farm and animals. The rest of the day he would spend with his friends, playing around the village, climbing trees and hiking looking for firewood and fodder for the cattle. Life was tough but simple, he recalls. He was as far away from the mountains as one could imagine. But things slowly changed when he moved to Kathmandu for his higher education. It was during the civil war. The Maoists had started to recruit young boys from our village to join them fight the war. My parents were afraid theyd take me and, hence, sent me to Kathmandu. In Kathmandu, he finished his intermediates and started pursuing a degree in business. It was then that he learned more about mountaineering as he had to prepare a report about tourism and mountaineering. During his research, he heard about trekking and mountaineering guides and learnt about their lives. That fascinated him. I was interning at an investment firm. I had to put on a neat shirt and go to work on a packed public bus, Vinayak Jaya Malla remembers, But, by this time, Id already started climbing walls and hence didnt last more than six months there. When he first climbed a wall, he started to get a feeling he belonged there. He was a natural. Climbing trees and hills in his village had prepared him for this. But, he had no idea about ropes and the ins and outs of climbing. I could easily climb the normal routes. Some, I had to practise a lot. From passion to profession Malla has spent nearly a decade learning the art of mountaineering. By 2011, he started taking courses too. He knew he did not belong to an office. He wanted to be out and about. He started off as a trekking guide. On the other side, he kept practising rock climbing as he was hooked on it. An adventurer at heart, Malla kept on pushing and started winning climbing competitions held at Pasang Lhamu Climbing Centre and Astrek Wall Climbing. He had also started to attend mountaineering training at the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA). He knew that he wanted to climb mountains and being a trekking guide, and walking to the base of mountains made him sure that it was what he wanted to do. Malla climbed his first peak around the same time. An avid traveller, he asked his employers if he could join a Japanese group that was climbing Scout Peak in Langtang. They agreed, and after that, there was no turning back for Malla. I had no gear or boots. I asked people to lend me their gear and rented some and reached the top of that peak. Other mountains soon followed him as he reached the top of Mera, Island and Lobuche as he continued taking advance training from the NMA. As he was doing that, he also heard about the IFMGA, an international umbrella for mountain guide associations from more than 20 countries. He enrolled in that organisation and started attending its mountaineering courses. This was different from the training provided by the NMA. It was more detailed and provided a lot more technical know-how. It took me a little over six years to complete that. By 2016, he was hooked on mountaineering. It was what made him feel alive. Going to places where the air was thin got him excited. Summiting mountains made him happy. Looking at other peaks from the summit of a mountain is something every outdoor lover should experience. It mustnt be a big mountain; even small mountains have their charm. Standing out Malla stood first in his class of mountain guides at the IFMGA and that, he says, has helped a lot to get jobs because getting to climb mountains in Nepal if you are not from the Sherpa community is tough going. People do not believe you can climb and that doubt can get into you. After training, I wanted to climb 8,000-ers, but no one really believed that I could climb. Everyone felt what I could do on a mountain like Everest or Manaslu. They felt I didnt belong there. But, that did not deter him. He carried on training and hoped he would get a chance. In 2017 spring, he got the chance to be an assistant guide on the worlds highest mountain. That was a great opportunity for him, a person not from the Sherpa community, to show expedition agencies that he belong there. Climbing Everest was a big moment for him too. Everest is considered a benchmark. Whenever an aspiring mountain guide looks for a job, the first question people ask is if that person has climbed Everest. When Malla stood on the summit of Everest, he felt he made it. It was a feeling I cant express. But, Everest also gave him a reality check. Walking past dead bodies, he soon realised that the consequences of climbing and that one mistake can lead to death. But, like these lifeless bodies, Malla had chosen to be there and he was as alive as he could be. It taught me to be extra careful. Aspiring for alpinism Malla attempting Manaslu in alpine-style in January 2021. In the autumn of 2017, Malla reached the summit of his second 8000-metre peak, Manaslu, and since then, he has not looked back. He has continued climbing peaks and guiding people to the summit mountain. He also completed his IFMGA training and topped it. When asked what his parents felt about him being a mountaineer, he says they were disappointed at first, but are gradually understanding his choices. Nepali parents typically want their children to work for the government or become a banker or a doctor, but I didnt want to do anything like that. That disappointed them a bit, but they understood that this is what I was passionate about. Now, Malla also wants to try to do new things. Last winter, he and Tenji Sherpa tried climbing Manaslu in full alpine style. But, they had to cut their summit bid short because of poor weather. This project was dear to both of us but due to a lot of snow, we had to cut short our summit bid. Although he wants to do projects like these, the lack of sponsorships and support care causes problems for him. He says while it is easy for foreigners to get sponsorship deals, for Nepalis, that still seems very farfetched. Look how much Nimsdai had to do to get sponsorships. However, he is not disheartened. He says he will be concentrating on training aspiring and next generation of mountaineers as he wants them to learn about mountaineering. He is helping a lot of them too by providing gear and equipment as he does not want them to go through the same struggle he did. He further wants to pave way for alpinism in Nepal as he believes there are so many mountains in Nepal that can attract people. For that, we need to do a lot of work and everyone needs to be on the same page. It wont happen overnight and we need to change a lot of things. Workforce Vaccine mandate, holiday travel season loom for TSA workforce The holiday travel season is cranking into gear as the deadline for federal employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 approaches next week. That requirement includes workers at the Transportation Security Administration. Everett Kelley, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents about 45,000 frontline screening officers at TSA, told lawmakers at a subcommittee hearing of the House Homeland Security Committee on Tuesday that the union is concerned with staffing shortages at the agency. TSA has long struggled with low morale, high turnover and pay dissatisfaction among frontline screening employees. "There's such a high turnover, and the fact that we've not done an exceptional job making sure that the workforce is replenished this is what's going to make the challenge," Kelley said. "It's certainly my belief that the lack of staffing is not really related to the mandate" he said. "The lack of staffing and the issues that we may have come this holiday season will be because of the fact that we just did not replenish the workforce." He said that the frontline screener workforce has shrunk by "several thousand" during the course of the pandemic, and that although the agency is hiring, many new hires remain in training. The agency set a goal of hiring 6,000 TSOs in early 2021, which it met by Sept. 30. The agency is continuing to hire as part of its normal recruitment activities, a TSA spokesperson told FCW. Republicans at the hearing and elsewhere on the Hill have expressed concern that the vaccine mandate could deplete the TSA workforce. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has also publicly urged the agency to create a contingency plan for the holidays regarding potential disruptions due to the vaccine requirement. "The administration's mandate that all federal employees be fully vaccinated from COVID-19 by next week, Nov. 22, could contribute to a lack of staffing at airports," said ranking member of the subcommittee, Carlos Gimenez (R-Fla.). TSA itself says it isn't expecting that. "We do not anticipate any disruptions because of the vaccination requirements," the TSA spokesperson told FCW. TSA has "made good progress," said the TSA spokesperson. "The compliance rate is very high, and we still do not have full data yet." On Oct. 13, TSA Administrator David Pekoske told CNNthat about 60% of the TSA workforce was vaccinated. The upcoming deadline is not a "cliff, but a step to further counsel any unvaccinated employees," the TSA spokesperson said. White House officials have said that unvaccinated feds will face education and counseling once the deadline passes before any discipline or termination occurs. Kelley and other witnesses representing federal employees said during the hearing that their organizations want the administration to extend the deadline for feds to be fully vaccinated to Jan. 4, as it did for federal contractors. The National Federation of Federal Employees also joined the call for the administration to delay the deadline last week. AFGE's push for this is in the name of "consistency" and "fairness" for feds working alongside contractors with the January deadline, Kelley said during the hearing. Kelley told the committee that "that's the reason why we're asking the administration to at least give some sense of parity [between feds and contractors] when it comes to the vaccine mandate deadlines." However, Kelley said he did not believe that the vaccination mandate was the sole reason for high turnover among TSOs. "If I say that it's not going to affect it, I would be incorrect, I know that," he said. "I'm just saying that there are a lot more reasons why [TSOs] are leaving the jobsite [other] than the vaccination." NEW YORK, Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- "Baked Goods Market - Forecast and Analysis Report 2021-2025", the market witnessed a YOY growth rate of 5.43% at an accelerating CAGR of 6.12% between 2020 and 2025. Attractive Opportunities in Baked Goods Market by Product and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 Revenue Generating Segment The baked goods market share growth by the bread and rolls segment will be significant during the forecast period. The bread and rolls segment of the global baked goods market primarily includes products such as whole wheat bread, sourdough, rye bread, pita bread, focaccia bread, multigrain bread, white rolls, hot dog rolls, and sub rolls. The increasing demand for gluten-free bread and rolls is a major factor driving the growth of the segment. The increase in demand for free-from products such as bread, pies, and cakes is expected to encourage other major vendors to offer such products during the forecast period. Revenue generating segments highlights and insights on market analysis of coming years - View FREE Sample The report is segmented by product (bread and rolls, cakes and pastries, cookies, and others) and geography (APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and MEA). Vendor Insights The global baked goods market is fragmented and the vendors are deploying various organic and inorganic growth strategies to compete in the market. The growing competition in the market is compelling vendors to adopt various growth strategies such as promotional activities and spending on advertisements to improve the visibility of their products. Some vendors are also adopting inorganic growth strategies such as M&As to remain competitive in the market. For Instance,- In April 2020, Campbell Soup Co., the snack brand, Goldfish, partnered with America's hot sauce brand, Franks RedHot, in order to create a spicier version of the crackers called Goldfish Franks RedHot crackers. Similarly, In April 2021, Mondelez International Inc partnered with Olam Food Ingredients (OFI), a supplier of cocoa beans and cocoa ingredients. Story continues The report analyzes the market's competitive landscape and offers information on several market vendors, including: Associated British Foods Plc Britannia Industries Ltd. Campbell Soup Co. Flowers Foods Inc. Grupo Bimbo SAB de CV JAB Holding Co. Sarl Kellogg Co. Mondelez International Inc. Warburtons Ltd. Yamazaki Baking Co. Ltd. Find additional highlights on the growth strategies adopted by vendors & their product offerings. Read Free Sample Report . Geographical Market Analysis APAC will provide maximum growth opportunities in the Baked Goods market during the forecast period. According to our research report, the region will contribute 34% of the global market growth and is expected to dominate the market through 2025. China and Japan are the key markets for the baked goods market in APAC. Market growth in this region will be faster than the growth of the market in other regions. The expansion of global players in the region through organic and inorganic organizational developments will facilitate the bakery market growth in APAC over the forecast period. Know more about this market's geographical distribution along with the detailed analysis of the top regions. https://www.technavio.com/report/bakery-market-industry-analysis Key Market Trends & Challenges: The growing demand for organic and gluten-free products is one of the significant baked goods market trends expected to stimulate market growth in the coming years. Health-conscious consumers prefer organic baking products and ingredients such as aluminum-free baking powder, gluten-free flour, and organic baking flour. Several market vendors are launching new products in organic variants to capitalize on this opportunity. Organic coconut flour, whole-wheat, and multigrain-based products are gaining popularity. Fluctuations in raw material prices may hamper the market. The prices of all the ingredients are rising due to the increasing costs of production. As a result, manufacturers of bread and rolls incur more costs on raw materials. Furthermore, the supply of raw materials may be affected due to adverse weather conditions, national emergencies, strikes, governmental controls, natural disasters, supply shortages, or other unexpected events. This increasing cost, in turn, increases product prices. This becomes a challenge for marketers to introduce new product varieties with specific ingredients that enrich the taste and attract more consumers. View free sample for highlights on market Trends & Challenges affecting the baked goods market. Customize Your Report Don't miss out on the opportunity to speak to our analyst and know more insights about this market report. Our analysts can also help you customize this report according to your needs. Our analysts and industry experts will work directly with you to understand your requirements and provide you with customized data in a short amount of time. We offer USD 1,000 worth of FREE customization at the time of purchase. Speak to our Analyst now! Baked Goods Market Value Chain Analysis It includes the following core components: Inputs Inbound logistics Operations Outbound logistics End-customers Marketing and sales Services Innovations Related Reports: Bakery Premixes Market -The bakery premixes market share should rise by USD 83.01 million from 2021 to 2025 at a CAGR of 5.54%. Download a free sample now! Artisan Bakery Market -The artisan bakery market share is expected to increase by USD 1.06 billion from 2021 to 2026, and the market's growth momentum will accelerate at a CAGR of 4.32%. Download a free sample now! Baked Goods Market Scope Report Coverage Details Page number 120 Base year 2020 Forecast period 2021-2025 Growth momentum & CAGR Accelerate at a CAGR of over 6.12% Market growth 2021-2025 USD 165.49 billion Market structure Fragmented YoY growth (%) 5.43 Regional analysis APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and MEA Performing market contribution APAC at 34% Key consumer countries US, China, Japan, Brazil, and Germany Competitive landscape Leading companies, competitive strategies, consumer engagement scope Companies profiled Associated British Foods Plc, Britannia Industries Ltd., Campbell Soup Co., Flowers Foods Inc., Grupo Bimbo SAB de CV, JAB Holding Co. Sarl, Kellogg Co., Mondelez International Inc., Warburtons Ltd., and Yamazaki Baking Co. Ltd. Market Dynamics Parent market analysis, Market growth inducers and obstacles, Fast-growing and slow-growing segment analysis, COVID-19 impact and future consumer dynamics, market condition analysis for the forecast period. Customization preview If our report has not included the data that you are looking for, you can reach out to our analysts and get segments customized. About Us: Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provide actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. Contact Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Technavio (PRNewsfoto/Technavio) Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/baked-goods-market-size-to-grow-by-usd-165-49-billion--rising-prominence-of-in-store-bakeries-in-supermarkets--as-key-driver--17000-technavio-reports-301425608.html SOURCE Technavio While aging infrastructure remains a concern, focus on cybersecurity and grid modernization reflects rising challenges for service providers OVERLAND PARK, Kan., November 16, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Facing mounting demand to integrate increasing amounts of renewable energy onto the grid and elevate their resilience to power-disrupting weather events and wildfires, U.S. electric utilities continue to wage a transformation keying on their need to modernize in a decarbonizing world. Black & Veatchs new survey-driven Electric Report puts into focus the blend of challenges and opportunities for a sector tasked with bolstering their reliability in a rapidly evolving energy ecosystem. Applying its expert analyses to survey data from nearly 500 electric industry stakeholders and released on the heels of the influential COP26 global summit about climate change Black & Veatchs 15th annual report details a path forward for the sector as "new energy" from solar and wind and the ascension of hydrogen continue to reshape the domestic power landscape. Highlighted during the recent U.N. Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, unrelenting demands from governments, corporations, activists and shareholders for lower carbon footprints also are prompting utilities to balance their energy portfolios with cleaner, more environmentally friendly options. Cyber threats and the pressing need to invest in charging infrastructure for a proliferating electric vehicle (EV) market add to such headwinds as the industry prepares for a surge in demand after more than a decade of slow growth. Detailing the push for utilities and power developers to become more sustainable, reliable and resilient, the report offers key insights, including: While aging infrastructure has been a relative constant as the industrys most-cited top challenge for more than a decade, roughly one-third of survey respondents now rate the integration of renewables as their No. 1 challenge, moving up one spot from last year. Cybersecurity jumped four spots to second place, with aging infrastructure now third. Over the next decade, the energy sector expects to see solar and wind power as critical to meeting clean energy goals and/or cutting their emissions and carbon output. Those numbers drop considerably beyond 10 years, giving way to more deployments of hydrogen the most-cited option beyond the next decade and battery energy storage. Industry concerns regarding the future of renewables at scale center on three major barriers, with cost leading the way. With no universal approach in preparing grids for extreme climate events, each energy asset owner and provider will need a customized strategy that accounts for system constraints, geographic location, asset vulnerabilities, budgetary considerations and workforce availability. Government incentives and policies, along with increased governmental pressure and influence, are the top two factors driving the respondents renewable energy investments in their regions. "As the surge of clean energy fuels, advancements in energy storage and extreme weather events and wildfires continue to have a profound impact on the U.S. power grids resilience, electric utilities must embrace the opportunity to innovate and repower themselves," said Mario Azar, president of Black & Veatch's energy and process industries business. "Its a pivotal time for forward-looking, proactive energy approaches that deliver the reliability and lower carbon impacts that consumers and enterprises, big and small, demand from critical infrastructure services." Story continues Other notable findings in the report include: Nine out of 10 respondents expect energy storage investments to increase in the next five years in their region, up from 80 percent last year. More than half 56 percent expect their generation capacity investment in hydrogen to rise over the same half-decade time frame, double the 26 percent of respondents who anticipated as much in 2020. Nearly 80 percent of respondents are committed to reducing carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and other greenhouse gas emissions while furthering their own clean energy goals. More than half (57 percent) are doing this independently from any regulatory mandate. Seventy-five percent of respondents say they are directing their capital toward clean renewable energy investment, yet less than 10 percent believe a 100-percent clean energy generation model has been validated. Four out of five respondents consider asset hardening to be more important today than in previous years. This may be due to the immediacy of this years weather issues or reflect the business communitys awareness of the significant financial and reputational risk they face from extreme weather events. Nearly three-quarters of survey respondents acknowledge there is local pressure on their utilities to commit to decarbonization. Roughly one-third of respondents say theyre feeling increased demand for clean energy solutions from commercial and industrial clients, up nearly three-fold from last year. Editors Notes: Black & Veatchs report is based on a survey of nearly 500 electricity industry stakeholders. To download a free copy of the report, click here. About Black & Veatchs Industry Reports Black & Veatchs high-impact reports, in a series previously known as Strategic Directions publications, provide industry insights and analysis based on market-leading research. Encompassing several annual reports examining the electric, water and other sectors, the series serves to inform and educate industry players on key issues, challenges and opportunities. Visit https://www.bv.com/reports to learn more. About Black & Veatch Black & Veatch is an employee-owned global engineering, procurement, consulting and construction company with a more than 100-year track record of innovation in sustainable infrastructure. Since 1915, we have helped our clients improve the lives of people around the world by addressing the resilience and reliability of our most important infrastructure assets. Our revenues in 2020 exceeded US$3.0 billion. Follow us on www.bv.com and on social media. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211116005963/en/ Contacts Media Contact Information: JIM SUHR | +1 913-458-6995 P | +1 314-422-6927 M | SuhrJ@BV.com 24-HOUR MEDIA HOTLINE | +1 855-999-5991 TORONTO, Nov. 17, 2021 /CNW/ - Takeda Canada is pleased to announce that Canadian Blood Services (CBS) has awarded a three-year tender for ADYNOVATEi [Antihemophilic Factor (Recombinant) PEGgylated] as part of its request for proposal for recombinant Factor VIII Standard Half-Life (SHL) process as part of its formulary product mix. The three-year term is the second consecutive time Takeda has won the CBS tender for ADYNOVATE, which includes two 1-year option years. Takeda Canada Inc. Logo (CNW Group/Takeda Canada Inc.) "Being able to continue to provide Canadian hemophilia patients with this important treatment option is a tremendous source of pride for Takeda," said Rute Fernandes, General Manger, Takeda Canada. "Adopting a holistic approach that incorporates real world evidence, delivers personalized care, and support services that address the needs of patients beyond their treatment, underscores Takeda's commitment to patients and providing value to the healthcare system. We look forward to continuing our relationship with Canadian Blood Services, and through it, being able to extend the benefits of ADYNOVATE as well as the support services we are committed to making available for patients." As part of the tendering process in response to the Canadian Blood Services' value-based criteria, Takeda presented a model that transitioned from one that was strictly price-based to one that included value-based criteria. This transition represents a significant milestone towards a more sustainable procurement model, and ultimately a better, more holistic approach to supporting the hemophilia A community. ADYNOVATEii is a pegylated recombinant Antihemophilic factor (ADVATEiii) and is indicated in patients with hemophilia A (congenital factor VII deficiency) for: control and prevention of bleeding episodes; prophylaxis to prevent or reduce the frequency of bleeding episodes; perioperative management. About Takeda Canada Inc. Takeda Canada Inc. is the Canadian marketing and sales organization of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited, headquartered in Japan. Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited (TSE:4502)(NYSE:TAK) is a global, values-based, R&D-driven biopharmaceutical leader committed to bringing Better Health and a Brighter Future to patients by translating science into highly-innovative medicines. Takeda focuses its R&D efforts on four therapeutic areas: Oncology, Gastroenterology (GI), Rare Diseases and Neuroscience. We also make targeted R&D investments in Plasma-Derived Therapies and Vaccines. We are focusing on developing highly innovative medicines that contribute to making a difference in people's lives by advancing the frontier of new treatment options and leveraging our enhanced collaborative R&D engine and capabilities to create a robust, modality-diverse pipeline. Our employees are committed to improving quality of life for patients and to working with our partners in health care in approximately 80 countries and regions. Story continues Additional information about Takeda Canada is available at www.takeda.com/en-ca. SOURCE Takeda Canada Inc. Cision View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/November2021/17/c1772.html MSNBC Chris Christies whole political persona is as a straight-shooting tough guy who tells it like it is. Yet despite being pressed repeatedly by MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace on Tuesday, the former New Jersey governor declined to aim his fire at Fox News for peddling lies and conspiracy theories. Christie, who is laying the groundwork for a 2024 Republican presidential run, has been a ubiquitous presence on the talk-show circuit in recent days. Promoting his new book, Republican Rescue: Saving the Party From Truth Deniers, Conspiracy Theorists, and the Dangerous Policies of Joe Biden, Christie has openly criticized ex-President Donald Trump while urging Republicans to let go of their false belief that President Joe Biden stole the 2020 presidential election. But while he has blamed Trumps rhetoric and embrace of election conspiracies for the violence of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection, Christie hasnt ruled out voting for Trump if hes the GOP nominee in 2024. That stance has prompted some to remind the ex-governor that he was the first mainstream politician to glowingly endorse Trump during the 2016 election and accuse him of trying to have it both ways. With Christies political rehabilitation tour bringing him to MSNBCs Deadline: White House on Tuesday, Wallace wondered aloud why the tough-talking ex-governor didnt address Fox News inflammatory content in his latest book. The book is about conspiracies and lies, and yet you really dont take on Fox News, the former George W. Bush spokesperson said. Why not? Have you seen the Tucker Carlson program? Christie claimed that he doesnt watch Carlsons show, adding that hes not really aware of what the primetime Fox News star does or says on his show. Wallace noted that Republican Rescue is a book with truth deniers, conspiracy theorists on the cover, and you attack CNN, The New York Times, and MSNBC, yet steer clear of Fox. The former governor insisted the section of his book about the media was mostly about bias, leading Wallace to fire back: Is bias more dangerous to the country than conspiracy theorists? Story continues Christie, for his part, asserted that it was another section of his book that centers on conspiracy theories and truth denying, noting that it focused on QAnon, Pizzagate, and the election situation. He also groused that Wallace was conflating them, only for Wallace to keep the pressure on Christie. I dont think its an intellectually honest case to make about conspiracy theories without taking on Fox News, she said. Listen, you can write that in your book, Christie snidely retorted. Well, Im not trying to rescue the Republican Party, the MSNBC host shot right back. Wallace then asked Christie what his relationship with Fox News is going to be like if hes president. After first claiming he hasnt actually said hes definitely running in 2024, Christie then deflected by saying he wont make that decision for another year. Furthermore, when pressed on whether he thinks Fox News in primetime is good for the country or bad, Christie demurred and merely said there are shows he likes and others he doesnt like. Are you afraid to question the purveyors of conspiracy theories? Wallace questioned the ex-governor. While still claiming that he doesnt watch Carlsons show and is unaware of what Tucker does from night to night, Christie said he enjoys the programs of other Fox primetime hosts Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham because theyre not purveyors of conspiracies. So you may or may not support Donald Trump in 2024. You may or may not run for president, and you wrote a book about liars and conspiracy theorists but dont have anything to say about Fox News? Wallace finally asked Christie, essentially summing up his current stance. Hannity, who peddled the false Seth Rich story that resulted in a lawsuit settlement, devoted much of his airtime before Jan. 6 to pushing baseless election fraud claims. Ingraham, meanwhile, was one of the first major media figures to peddle the falsehood that antifa was responsible for the Capitol riot. Carlson, of course, not only has repeatedly said the 2020 election was rigged but has advanced many baseless claims about the Capitol riot, including that it was orchestrated by the FBI. And Fox News and several of its stars have been hit with billion-dollar defamation lawsuits from voting software firms Dominion and Smartmatic for pushing false claims that the companies were involved in widespread election fraud. The network has filed motions to dismiss both suits, citing First Amendment protections. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. FILE PHOTO: Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Robert Kaplan speaks during an interview in his office at the bank's headquarters in Dallas By Ann Saphir (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas has kicked off a search for a new president to replace Robert Kaplan, the bank's previous top executive who left last month after a scandal over his personal financial transactions. The bank's search is being led by its non-bank directors, it said in a statement on Wednesday. The bank hired the executive search firm Egon Zehnder to assist in recruiting candidates. Kaplan and former Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren drew criticism in September after revelations that they had made extensive personal trades in 2020 during the height of the pandemic crisis and the Fed's efforts to stabilize markets and rescue the economy. Both said their trades were in line with the Fed's ethics guidelines at the time and agreed to divest their stock holdings. But the furor did not subside and ultimately both left their posts. Kaplan retired Oct. 8. The scandal has been a headache for Fed Chair Jerome Powell, who is under consideration for a second four-year term. To deal with the fallout, Powell launched a review of the Fed's trading rules. That resulted in a rewrite of guidelines that now bar the kind of individual-stock trading that Kaplan undertook. The new rules limit the types of holdings and transactions permitted for policymakers. The Dallas Fed's job description includes a requirement for "unwavering ethics, character, and integrity." The bank did not provide a timeline for its search, but similar efforts at other banks and at the Dallas Fed itself have typically taken six to 12 months. The Dallas Fed chief rotates into a voting spot on the Fed's policymaking panel in 2023. (Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Dan Burns, Chizu Nomiyama and Cynthia Osterman) NEW YORK, Nov. 16, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- According to the research report " Digital English Language Learning Market - Forecast and Analysis Report 2021-2025 ", the market will witness a YOY growth rate of 13.30% in 2021 and is expected to accelerate at a CAGR of almost 17% between 2020 and 2025. The report is segmented by end-user (non-academic learners and academic learners), deployment (on-premise and cloud-based), and geography (APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and MEA). Attractive Opportunities in Digital English Language Learning Market by End-user, Deployment, and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 APAC is the largest market for digital English language learning. The increasing incorporation of English language education in the school curriculum and the rising demand for digital English language learning solutions among non-native speakers of English are providing significant growth opportunities for market players in APAC. View FREE Sample: to know additional highlights and key points on various market segments and their impact in coming years. Vendor Insights The global digital English language learning market is fragmented and the vendors are deploying various organic and inorganic growth strategies such as forming strategic alliances and product delivery through multiple distribution channels to compete in the market. Pearson Plc - In November 2019, the company acquired Lumerit Education LLC, an ed-tech company that helps address the issues of college degree completion and affordability in the consumer and corporate markets. The report analyzes the market's competitive landscape and offers information on several market vendors, including: Apollo Global Management Inc. Cambridge University Press Cengage Learning Holdings II Inc. EF Education First Ltd. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Co. eSplice Ltd. New Oriental Education and Technology Group Inc. Pearson Plc Rosetta Stone Ltd. Sanako Oy Find additional highlights on the growth strategies adopted by vendors and their product offerings. Read Free Sample Report . Geographical Market Analysis Story continues APAC will provide maximum growth opportunities in the digital English language learning market during the forecast period. According to our research report, the region will contribute 45% of the global market growth and is expected to dominate the market through 2025. In addition, countries such as China, the US, India, the UK, and Germany are expected to emerge as prominent markets for digital English language learning during the forecast period. Know more about this market's geographical distribution along with the detailed analysis of the top regions. www.technavio.com/report/digital-english-language-learning-market-industry-analysis Key Market Trends & Challenges: The use of artificial intelligence and chatbots is one of the prominent trends that is likely to drive the market growth. Vendors in the market are focusing on incorporating AI and chatbots in their offerings to provide customized learning solutions for students. It also helps educators track student progress, which is revolutionizing digital teaching methods and digital language learning solutions. Also, the use of chatbots that aid in personalized dialogue exchange is enhancing the learning experience. Such developments are expected to foster market growth over the forecast period. However, the introduction of hearables and potential innovations in the global wearable devices market is expected to hamper the market growth. The excessive adoption of smart wearables such as smartwatches, wristbands, smart footwear, jewelry, and wearable cameras have led to the development of language translation and interpretation devices, also known as hearables. They are used as in-ear devices and facilitate the instant translation of languages. The introduction of these devices is expected to reduce growth opportunities for market players during the forecast period. View free sample for highlights on market Trends & Challenges affecting the Digital English language learning market. Customize Your Report Don't miss out on the opportunity to speak to our analyst and know more insights about this market report. Our analysts can also help you customize this report according to your needs. Our analysts and industry experts will work directly with you to understand your requirements and provide you with customized data in a short amount of time. We offer USD 1,000 worth of FREE customization at the time of purchase. Speak to our Analyst now! Digital English language learning Market Value Chain Analysis It includes the following core components: Inputs Inbound logistics Operations Outbound logistics Marketing and sales Service Support activities Innovations Related Reports: Business English Language Training Market by End-user, Learning Method, and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 Digital English Language Learning Market in APAC by End-user, Deployment, and Geography - Forecast and Analysis 2021-2025 Digital English Language Learning Market Scope Report Coverage Details Page number 120 Base year 2020 Forecast period 2021-2025 Growth momentum & CAGR Accelerate at a CAGR of almost 17% Market growth 2021-2025 USD 12.38 billion Market structure Fragmented YoY growth (%) 13.30 Regional analysis APAC, Europe, North America, South America, and MEA Performing market contribution APAC at 45% Key consumer countries China, US, India, UK, and Germany Competitive landscape Leading companies, competitive strategies, consumer engagement scope Companies profiled Apollo Global Management Inc., Cambridge University Press, Cengage Learning Holdings II Inc., EF Education First Ltd., Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Co., eSplice Ltd., New Oriental Education and Technology Group Inc., Pearson Plc, Rosetta Stone Ltd., and Sanako Oy Market Dynamics Parent market analysis, Market growth inducers and obstacles, Fast-growing and slow-growing segment analysis, COVID-19 impact and future consumer dynamics, market condition analysis for the forecast period. Customization purview If our report has not included the data that you are looking for, you can reach out to our analysts and get segments customized. About Us: Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focus on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. Contact Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: media@technavio.com Website: www.technavio.com/ Technavio (PRNewsfoto/Technavio) Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/digital-english-language-learning-market-size-to-grow-by-usd-12-38-billion--market-research-insights-highlight-the-use-of-artificial-intelligence-and-chatbots-as-key-trend--technavio-301424280.html SOURCE Technavio Delivering fast and reliable machine learning business solutions. JERSEY CITY, N.J., Nov. 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- ElectrifAi, one of the world's leading companies in practical artificial intelligence (AI) and pre-built machine learning (ML) models, is showcasing pre-structured ML models today with SquareOne at Smart Data Summit in Dubai. ElectrifAi ElectrifAi has one of the largest libraries of pre-structured ML models that has been built and battle-tested since 2004. We have also developed advanced Computer Vision models that drive workplace safety as well as reduce costs. Combined with our Machine Learning as a Service (MLaaS) offering, we are helping companies quickly realize the benefits of AI and ML. Most companies understand that their data is a powerful, untapped asset. However, companies struggle simply to access and clean their data. Many of these same companies conclude machine learning is a distant possibility reserved only for the largest, most sophisticated Tier One players. Not anymore. With ElectrifAi's MLaaS, large and small companies alike can extract value from their data and turn it into a strategic weapon to drive revenue, reduce costs, and/or risk. MLaaS makes it easy for companies struggling with their data or who lack robust data science and data engineering teams. MLaaS enhances the efficiencies and convenience of ML. It is developed, maintained, and operated by ElectrifAi. Delivered as a full business function powered by AI and ML, it seamlessly connects to our client's cloud or on-premises workloads and no ML experience is needed. We ensure the MLaaS offering provides our clients with a faster, better, cheaper, and substantially less risky way to achieve ML. With ElectrifAi's MLaaS, clients can get ML solutions fast without the time-consuming hassle and expense of building ML from scratch. Part of our MLaaS offering are the following pre-structured ML models: Computer Vision, Demand Forecasting, Inventory Optimization, Dynamic Pricing, Scheduling Optimization, Predictive Maintenance, Customer Engagement, A/R Collections and Invoice, as well as SpendAi and ContractAi. The Computer Vision models include solutions for Upstream, Midstream, and Downstream oil and gas companies. Story continues ElectrifAi's pre-structured ML models are business-ready and proven in the real-world. With a fast time-to-deployment and lower project risk, we do all the heavy lifting for our clients. Clients describe their business use case and we tell them what data is needed to run the best ML solution to solve their business problems. We train, operate and deploy the models and quickly deliver results. "We are excited to showcase our pre-structured machine learning models and MLaaS at the Smart Data Summit. It's all about time-to-value and turning data into a strategic weapon with high ROI use cases. With our pre-structured models, companies who struggle with data or who lack deep data engineering and data science expertise can quickly enjoy the benefits and power of machine learning and computer vision. Similarly, larger companies who have invested in platforms or who have capable internal technical teams can further accelerate with ElectrifAi's MLaaS and pre-structured models. Why wait for machine learning? With our MLaaS offering, you can achieve machine learning in 8-12 weeks versus 8-12 months to build new models." Edward Scott, CEO, ElectrifAi About ElectrifAi ElectrifAi is a global leader in business-ready machine learning models. ElectrifAi's mission is to help organizations change the way they work through machine learning: driving revenue uplift, cost reduction as well as profit and performance improvement. Founded in 2004, ElectrifAi boasts seasoned industry leadership, a global team of domain experts, and a proven record of transforming structured and unstructured data at scale. A large library of Ai-based products reaches across business functions, data systems, and teams to drive superior results in record time. ElectrifAi has approximately 200 data scientists, software engineers and employees with a proven record of dealing with over 2,000 customer implementations, mostly for Fortune 500 companies. At the heart of ElectrifAi's mission is a commitment to making Ai and machine learning more understandable, practical and profitable for businesses and industries across the globe. ElectrifAi is a global company with offices in Miami, Jersey City, Shanghai and New Delhi. About Square One SquareOne helps organizations exponentiate their potential by partnering up with industry leaders in solutions, providing our clients a complete digital vision leveraged by the latest in tech and complete implementation with our team of experts. Square One helps organizations in their digital transformation journey with visionary, world-class software applications, powered by an experienced and committed professional team with vast experience and focus on customer delight. Square One spot early global technology trends in the digital initiatives space, partner with the best and furiously learn and bring these platforms and solutions to the region. SquareOne is the region's leading provider of business transformation technologies, powered by best-in-class software solutions and profound knowledge of local enterprise needs from over a decade of experience, enabled by a passionate team of professionals whose expertise spans across multiple industry verticals. SOURCE ElectrifAi John Keppler, Chairman and CEO of Enviva, is recognized as a bold and innovative entrepreneur who is helping transform our world for the better BETHESDA, Md., November 17, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Enviva Partners, LP (NYSE: EVA) ("Enviva"), the worlds largest producer of industrial wood pellets, announced today that John Keppler was named an Entrepreneur Of The Year 2021 National Award winner by Ernst & Young LLP (EY US). Recognized as one of the most prestigious business award programs in the world, winners of the EY National Award are chosen after being evaluated on their entrepreneurial leadership, talent management, financial performance, societal impact, degree of difficulty in navigating and overcoming obstacles to make their companies successful, and originality, among other core contributions and attributes. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211117006194/en/ John Keppler, Chairman and CEO of Enviva, accepts EY's Entrepreneur of The Year 2021 National Award. (Photo: Business Wire) "I am deeply honored to be recognized by EY as a National Entrepreneur of the Year award recipient," said John Keppler, Co-Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Enviva. "The core of Envivas value proposition is our commitment to fighting climate change and decarbonizing economies around the globe. I am proud of the hard work and dedication my colleagues bring to our company every day, and this award underscores that their efforts are being noticed on a national scale. However, combating climate change remains the biggest global challenge of our time, and there is still a lot of work to be done. I look forward to working alongside many fellow entrepreneurs in this program to collectively make a significant impact in the fight against climate change." The vision behind Envivas founding and its tremendous growth have propelled John to this moment. Looking to fundamentally change the complex equation of energy and the environment, John co-founded Enviva in 2004 to produce a renewable energy source from low-value woody biomass that could help decarbonize the global energy and power supply. John and his team saw the tremendous value of sustainably sourced woody biomass as a low-carbon, cost-effective, dispatchable energy source for use in power and heat systems. Today Enviva is a $4 billion company that is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: EVA) and owns and operates more than a dozen plants and terminals across the southeastern United States that sustainably produce approximately 6.2 million metric tons of wood pellets per year. Starting with a handful of employees, John is proud that Enviva now employs almost 1,400 people and supports many other jobs and businesses in the rural South, strengthening communities where jobs and economic opportunities are sometimes scarce. Enviva drives more than $2 billion in annual economic activity, and Enviva strives to both hire locally and procure from local businesses so that the communities in which it operates and their residents directly benefit from the financial impact of its operations. Story continues Envivas demand creates a market for low-value and residual wood that generates income for rural landowners and incentivizes landowners to keep the forest as forest. As a result, Enviva plays a critical role in promoting sustainable forest management and forest growth in the southeastern United States while fighting global climate change in the process. "In an unprecedented era for business, all of our national winners showed an exceptional level of resilience, agility and innovation," said Andrew (AJ) Jordan, EY Americas Entrepreneur of The Year Director. "These national winners demonstrate the true spirit of entrepreneurial leadership, pivoting as necessary to keep their commitment to society at the forefront, while also continuing to build companies rooted in uplifting their employees and community stakeholders." This year marks the 35th anniversary of the EY Entrepreneur of the Year awards program. Since 1986, EY US has honored entrepreneurs whose ingenuity, spirit of innovation, and tenacity have driven their companies success, transformed their industries, and made a positive impact on their communities. On Saturday, November 13, 2021, the national winners were announced during a celebration held at the Strategic Growth Forum in Palm Springs, California. The national winners will go on to become lifetime members of the esteemed multi-industry community of award winners, with exclusive, ongoing access to the experience, insight, and wisdom of fellow alumni and other ecosystem members in over 60 countries all supported by a wide variety of EY resources. The 2021 national award follows John Kepplers regional win as the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year 2021 for the Mid-Atlantic. To reference the full list of 2021 national winners and/or to view photos and videos from Strategic Growth Forum Awards Gala, click here. About Entrepreneur of The Year Entrepreneur of The Year is the worlds most prestigious business awards program for unstoppable entrepreneurs. These visionary leaders deliver innovation, growth and prosperity that transform our world. The program engages entrepreneurs with insights and experiences that foster growth. It connects them with their peers to strengthen entrepreneurship around the world. Entrepreneur of The Year is the first and only truly global awards program of its kind. It celebrates entrepreneurs through regional and national awards programs in more than 145 cities in over 60 countries. National overall winners go on to compete for the title. Visit ey.com/us/eoy. About Enviva Enviva (NYSE: EVA) is the worlds largest producer of industrial wood pellets, a renewable and sustainable energy source that is produced by aggregating a natural resource, wood fiber, and processing it into a transportable form, wood pellets. Enviva sells a significant majority of its wood pellets through long-term, take-or-pay off-take contracts with creditworthy customers in the United Kingdom, the European Union, and Japan. Enviva owns and operates 10 plants with a combined production capacity of approximately 6.2 million metric tons per year in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Mississippi. In addition, Enviva exports wood pellets through its deep-water marine terminals at the Port of Chesapeake, Virginia, the Port of Wilmington, North Carolina, and the Port of Pascagoula, Mississippi, and from third-party deep-water marine terminals in Savannah, Georgia, Mobile, Alabama, and Panama City, Florida. To learn more about Enviva please visit our website at www.envivabiomass.com. Follow Enviva on social media @Enviva. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211117006194/en/ Contacts MEDIA CONTACT: Jacob Westfall media@envivabiomass.com +1-301-657-5560 ORLANDO, Fla., Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Executives from F3 Intelligence Corp, the nation's leading business intelligence firm, were in attendance as VIP guests for the first annual Texas Blockchain Summit. The summit's purpose was to bring leaders in the industry together, discuss how blockchain technology is changing industries, and address Texas' role as the growing center for this activity within the United States. Notable speakers at the event included Senators Ted Cruz and Cynthia Lummis, and SEC Commissioner Hester Pierce. F3 Analyst Wilberto Robles, Analyst Zachary Hunter, CEO Richard Ring, and COO Daniel Ruiz One of F3 Intelligence Corp's key tenants is constantly staying on the cutting-edge regarding technology and industry disrupters. Specializing in due diligence and corporate intelligence, F3 Intelligence Corp's clientele span the gambit of fortune 500 companies, hedge firms, venture capitalists, as well as the healthcare, environmental, and banking sectors. F3 clientele represents industries that live or die by accurate industry intelligence, which is why F3 analysts make it a point to stay educated in emerging technologies. This knowledge and foresight are vital to providing their clients the intelligence and solutions they've come to trust and expect. "Blockchain was just not something we could ignore, and rather than being scared of it, we decided to lean into it headfirst," F3's COO Daniel Ruiz stated. Currently, F3 is working with leaders in the industry to integrate blockchain technology within their operations and the company's non-profit, F3 Mission Children's Intelligence Agency. "To be able to share and document intelligence in a way that is secure, quick, and with immutable trust layers is vital for what we're trying to do in the industry," Mr. Ruiz further elaborated. Crypto and blockchain technology first came to the attention of the analysts at F3 in 2019 when they started noting executives and companies using the technology to move and hide assets. F3 CEO Richard Ring was quick to point out, "Sure, some companies are moving money into crypto as a hedge against inflation or as a way to diversify their organization's portfolio. However, we'd be pretending if we didn't say that we've been seeing people do it to evade and hide assets for various reasons. Anyone that understands this technology knows that everything can be tracked on the ledgers, but that's IF someone even knows that they should be looking." Story continues F3 prioritizes staying educated on industry disrupters and then educating clients on how those disrupters specifically affect their organization. Mr. Ring stated, "We've had a lot of fun educating our clients on this technology. Many of our clients have gone from viewing blockchain technology as "how do we mitigate our risk?" to "how do we harness and integrate this technology to dominate?" According to F3 Analyst Zachary Hunter, "Clients across all industries are starting to wake up to what this technology is. If you're viewing this as a currency, you're missing the point." According to F3, blockchain technology represents secure cross-border transactions, network security, preventing entertainment piracy, secure contracts, supply chain management, and a whole lot more. F3 Intelligence Corp continues to be the industry leader in business intelligence. Through their deep bench of talent, multi-intel discipline approach, and cutting-edge methodologies, they support top 100 law firms and clients across multiple industries. F3 Intelligence Corp has redefined what is possible in the world of corporate litigation support, capital market research, mergers and acquisitions due diligence, corporate governance, and board advisory. Media Contact: Richard Ring 407-676-1442 323709@email4pr.com F3 CEO Richard Ring speaks with Hedera CEO President Mance Harmon regarding new use cases for Hedera's hashgraph HCS. Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/f3-intelligence-corp-attends-first-annual-texas-blockchain-conference-301426105.html SOURCE F3 Intelligence Corp LAS VEGAS, November 29, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--First paragraph of release dated Nov. 16, 2021, should read: Flower One Holdings Inc. ("Flower One" or the "Company") (CSE: FONE) (OTCQX: FLOOF) (FSE: F11), the leading cannabis cultivator and producer in Nevada, today announced that it is filing its third quarter 2021 financial results and accompanying managements discussion and analysis (the "Q3-21 filings") on Monday, November 29, 2021 after markets close and will hold its conference call on Tuesday, November 30, at 10:00 a.m. ET (instead of ... before markets close ...). The updated release reads: FLOWER ONE RESCHEDULES RELEASE OF THIRD QUARTER 2021 FINANCIAL RESULTS AND EARNINGS CALL Flower One Holdings Inc. ("Flower One" or the "Company") (CSE: FONE) (OTCQX: FLOOF) (FSE: F11), the leading cannabis cultivator and producer in Nevada, today announced that it is filing its third quarter 2021 financial results and accompanying managements discussion and analysis (the "Q3-21 filings") on Monday, November 29, 2021 after markets close and will hold its conference call on Tuesday, November 30, at 10:00 a.m. ET. As previously announced on October 11, 2021, Flower One hired its new CFO, Araxie Grant. Since her appointment, Ms. Grant has completely rebuilt the Companys financial department and implemented financial processes to ensure the Company is operating at an enhanced level of best practices. With the implementation of these processes, the Company has elected to reschedule its Q3-21 filings to a later date within the allotted filing deadline. Conference Call Details: Date: Tuesday, November 30, 2021 Time: 10:00 a.m. ET Call: 1-877-407-0789 (Canada and US) 1-201-689-8562 (International) Conference ID: 13724959 Webcast: A live webcast will be available on Flower Ones website or at ViaVid All interested parties are invited to participate. Please connect at least 15 minutes prior to the conference call to ensure adequate time for any software download that may be required to join the webcast. Story continues For those unable to join the live webcast, a replay will be available until 11:59 p.m. ET on Thursday, November 29, 2022. To access the archived webcast, please visit Flower Ones website. About Flower One Holdings Inc. Flower One is the largest cannabis cultivator, producer, and full-service brand fulfillment partner in the state of Nevada. By combining more than 20 years of greenhouse operational excellence with best-in-class cannabis operators, Flower One offers consistent, reliable, and scalable fulfillment to a growing number of industry-leading cannabis brands (Cookies, Kiva, Old Pal, Heavy Hitters, Lift Tickets, The Clear, HUXTON, and Flower Ones leading in-house brand, NLVO, and more). Flower One currently produces a wide range of products from flower, full-spectrum oils, and distillates to finished consumer packaged goods, including a variety of: pre-rolls, concentrates, edibles, topicals, and more for top-performing brands in cannabis. Flower Ones Nevada footprint includes the Companys flagship facility, a 400,000 square-foot high-tech greenhouse and 55,000 square-foot production facility, as well as a second site with a 25,000 square-foot indoor cultivation facility and commercial kitchen. Flower One has built an industry-leading team focused on becoming the first high-quality, low-cost brand fulfillment partner. The Companys common shares are traded on the Canadian Securities Exchange under the Companys symbol "FONE", in the United States on the OTCQX Best Market under the symbol "FLOOF" and on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange under the symbol "F11". For more information, visit: https://flowerone.com. Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Information Statements in this press release that are not statements of historical or current fact constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of Canadian securities laws and "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of United States securities laws (collectively, "forward-looking statements"). Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other unknown factors that could cause the actual results of the Company to be materially different from historical results or from any future actual results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. In addition to statements which explicitly describe such risks and uncertainties, readers are urged to consider statements labeled with the terms "believes," "belief," "expects," "intends," "anticipates," "potential," "should," "may," "will," "plans," "continue" or other similar expressions to be uncertain and forward-looking. Forward-looking statements may include, without limitation, timing of the release of the Q3-21 filings, timing of the conference call to discuss such financial results, the Companys ability to operate at an enhanced level of best practices, statements relating to the Companys position as a leader in the Nevada cannabis market, the Companys leadership as a cannabis cultivator, producer, innovator and full-service brand fulfillment partner, and the production of a wide range of products for the nations industry leading brands. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are expressly qualified in their entirety by this cautionary statement, the "Cautionary Statement regarding Forward-Looking Information" section contained the Companys managements discussion and analysis for the three and six months ended June 30, 2021 (the "MD&A"). All forward-looking statements in this press release are made as of the date of this press release. The forward-looking statements contained herein are also subject generally to assumptions and risks and uncertainties that are described from time to time in the Companys public securities filings with the Canadian securities commissions, including the Companys MD&A. Although Flower One has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results, performance or achievements to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements, there can be other factors that cause results, performance or achievements not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. Although the Company believes that any forward-looking information and statements herein are reasonable, in light of the use of assumptions and the significant risks and uncertainties inherent in such information and statements, there can be no assurance that any such forward-looking information and statements will prove to be accurate, and accordingly readers are advised to rely on their own evaluation of such risks and uncertainties and should not place undue reliance upon such forward-looking information and statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements in this press release are made as of the date of this release. Flower One disclaims and does not undertake any intention or obligation to update or revise any such forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by applicable law. NEITHER THE CANADIAN SECURITIES EXCHANGE NOR THEIR REGULATIONS SERVICES PROVIDER HAVE REVIEWED OR ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211116006452/en/ Contacts Flower One Investor Relations ir@flowerone.com Kellen OKeefe, President & CEO 702.660.7775 Flower One Media media@flowerone.com SALT LAKE CITY, Nov. 16, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Fortis, a high-growth commercial bank serving small- to medium-sized privately held businesses in Colorado and Utah, announced the hiring of four new banking teams in Salt Lake City, UT. Fortis (PRNewsfoto/Fortis) Mr. Kristopher Adams will be responsible for the continued expansion and growth of the Fortis SBA Lending strategy. Mr. Michael Borys, Mr. Jon Moir and Ms. Lindsey Williams will lead teams in the Utah Commercial Banking market. "We are pleased to continue to expand our presence in Utah, furthering our commitment to serving the market and supporting the local community," stated Chris Luce, Fortis Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder. "Fortis continues to build teams of bankers who bring breadth and depth of industry experience and do not require layers of middle management to be successful. We are fortunate to have welcomed nine veteran bankers over the past year in both Colorado and Utah." "Our new teams fit perfectly into the Fortis business model that our clients have come to appreciate and expect," stated Josh Peters, Fortis' Chief Lending Officer. "We expect consistent growth within our commercial, specialty and treasury management departments and look forward to the continued expansion of our SBA products and offerings. Our focus on the development of our people and products will enhance our market position as our clients continue to grow, so they can focus on what matters most to them: running their businesses." "Bankers chose Fortis because of our lack of bureaucracy," continued Mr. Luce. "This gives them the ability to better serve their clients compared to the regional or money center banks. We reward our bankers with a simple, performance-based compensation model that continues to deliver superior results to our clients." About Fortis Fortis is insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and is a state-chartered bank with offices in the Denver and Salt Lake City metropolitan areas. The bank provides business and personal clients with a full suite of loan, treasury management and deposit products, with an emphasis on Commercial and Specialty clients. To learn more about Fortis, visit www.fortisprivatebank.com. Story continues Contact Laura Hildreth, Senior Vice President, Head of Human Resources lhildreth@fortispb.com Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/fortis-announces-key-talent-acquisition-to-support-the-growth-of-its-utah-commercial-lending-team-301426369.html SOURCE Fortis Coquitlam, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - November 16, 2021) - Greenbriar Capital Corp. (TSXV: GRB) (OTC Pink: GEBRF) ("Greenbriar") is pleased to announce that it has executed an agreement for long-term solar energy supply with West Lake Energy Corp ("West Lake"), a leading privately owned independent Canadian oil and gas producer based in Calgary, Alberta. Under the agreement's terms Greenbriar will build, own and operate 90MWac of solar energy production with the first solar site having a capacity for 30MWac. West Lake agrees to purchase all solar power generated from the project and has the option to purchase from the second site which will provide the remaining 60MWac. West Lake intends to become a leader within the Canadian oil and gas industry by being one of the first pure upstream oil and gas producers taking the significant step towards carbon neutrality. As part of this goal, West Lake is working towards having a significant portion of its electricity needs met through clean energy. "This relationship represents a very exciting step for West Lake," says Bruce McDonald, CEO of West Lake. "In addition to providing a secure, low-cost power supply for our operations and carbon credits from the project, our agreement creates a strong partnership with Greenbriar, leveraging their experience in the renewable sector in North America and providing a model for future renewable projects. We intend to bolster participation in renewable energy sources as part of our journey towards carbon neutrality, becoming a leader in the renewable energy transition." Greenbriar and West Lake have agreed to a framework to work together in future solar production facilities. With the goal of increasing capacity to 400MW over the next several years, the two companies intend on being the premier solar energy provider to other independent upstream oil and gas producers who do not have the capacity and expertise to build and own their own renewable energy facilities Story continues Greenbriar's award-winning and experienced management, board and advisory team, has built, financed, owned or operated over 50,000 MW of renewable energy facilities totaling over US $180 Billion of capital expenditures. The projections for 90MWac of solar energy generation facilities should have an approximate 10-year annual levelized EBITDA of CDN $19,500,000 and a CAPEX of approximately CDN $105 to $120 Million. CAPEX will vary subject to changes in equipment, interconnection and construction costs. Greenbriar has engaged Nu-E Corp. for the construction of the solar energy facilities. Nu-E is a proven leader in the renewable energy construction industry. Jeff Ciachurski, the CEO of Greenbriar states: "We are excited about the leadership and vision from West Lake Energy Corp. To be part of a first-class upstream oil and gas producer's primary energy needs and assist them in their transition to carbon neutrality, speaks volumes to their exemplary leadership for the environment, social practises and governance. This is a major milestone in the upstream oil and gas business." About West Lake Energy Corp: West Lake Energy Corp. is an intermediate privately held Calgary-based oil and natural gas producer focused on development and exploration in western Canada with annual revenues greater than $200 million per year. West Lake's operations are focused in the Provost medium oil region, the Lloydminster heavy oil region, and the Brazeau area of West Central Alberta. These three core areas contain over 90% of West Lake's production. Committed to sustainability, West Lake is implementing a growth strategy of selective acquisitions and exploration and development of its core areas through a combination of primary, secondary and enhanced oil recovery techniques to increase reserves, production and cash flows at attractive returns on capital. At the same time, West Lake is dedicated to strong environmental, social and governance practices, including potential future energy transition opportunities. Additional information about West Lake can be found on the company's website at www.westlakeenergy.ca. About Greenbriar Capital Corp: Greenbriar is a leading developer of renewable energy and sustainable real estate. With long-term, high impact, contracted sales agreements in key project locations and led by a successful, industry-recognized operating and development team, Greenbriar targets deep valued assets directed at accretive shareholder value. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS "Jeff Ciachurski" Jeffrey J. Ciachurski Chief Executive Officer and Director Greenbriar Capital Corp For information please contact: E: info@greenbriarcapitalcorp.ca P: 949.903.5906 www.greenbriarcapitalcorp.ca The TSX Venture Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the accuracy or adequacy of this release. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Service Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This press release may contain forward-looking statements. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, constitute "forward-looking statements" and include any information that addresses activities, events or developments that the Company believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future including the Company's strategy, plans or future financial or operating performance and other statements that express management's expectations or estimates of future performance. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/103922 Project with Mellower Coffee uses technology to help SMEs and growers to increase their working capital SINGAPORE, Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Singapore's GUUD (Finance) Pte. Ltd. ("GUUD Finance"), the financing pillar of the GUUD group, a leading trade technology company, has inked an agreement with Mellower Coffee ("Mellower"), one of China's leading speciality coffee chains to provide working capital loans across its coffee supply chain. The agreement marks the GUUD group's first foray into the coffee market and is also significant as it allows GUUD to provide credit access all the way upstream to the farmers or growers of coffee beans. The GUUD group's vision has always been to simplify trade processes so that anyone and everyone can access global trade. As a key player enabling financing for all businesses in the global trade cycle, this project is important to GUUD, as it allows everyone in the supply chain, whether coffee growers, roasters, or retailers to be able to access trade financing via traditional and alternative sources, and to free up their funds to be re-deployed into the day-to-day working capital needs of their respective businesses. As part of this agreement, GUUD Finance will provide working capital support of up to USD12 million for Mellower by financing the purchase of coffee beans of Chinese origin from Yunnan during the harvest season, providing farmers and growers with access to the working capital they need. GUUD Finance will also finance the purchase of coffee powder and other coffee related products of Chinese origin earmarked for export, helping smaller businesses in China gain access to working capital so they can further grow their export volumes. Mellower Coffee is a plantation-to-cup coffee chain from Shanghai that believes quality specialty coffee is synonymous with a high quality of life. As the leading specialty coffee brand in China, Mellower currently operates a chain of 72 retail stores in Mainland China, Singapore, South Korea and Vietnam. Story continues Ms Cathy Lei, Founder of Mellower shared, "We are pleased to be partnering GUUD Finance as we continue to grow our business and start to expand to more markets internationally. By providing working capital financing for all the businesses upstream and downstream in the coffee supply chain, GUUD Finance has been helping all our partners and producers access funding, giving them the opportunity to take in more stocks for sale. Their overall expertise in navigating global trade, use of sophisticated technology to track shipments and monitor goods as well as ability to facilitate financing, especially for businesses like ours, is invaluable as we expand to even more countries." GUUD Finance has been working closely with Mellower Coffee to implement asset-backed financing across its supply chain, using internet-of-things (IOT) for goods tracking and optimising trade flows and processes since mid this year. They completed their first successful financing deal earlier this month. Mr Desmond Loh, Chief Executive Officer of GUUD Finance shared, "Helping smaller producers and SMEs access working capital finance has always been a priority for GUUD Finance. We are extremely happy to have this opportunity to partner Mellower Coffee as they continue their expansion plans globally, supplying great coffee to businesses and retail chains around the world. In particular, we hope to assist companies that have been impacted by the various supply chain disruptions and are required to aggregate their products for sale earlier. Similarly, we want to help companies that have been looking to store more buffer stock compared to the Just-In-time solutions that they have been traditionally working with. We look forward to supporting more of such businesses in the agriculture commodity business and to help them gain access to financing solutions that help meet their working capital needs." GUUD Finance, which forms the "Pay" pillar of the GUUD group, helps businesses gain access to finance so they can trade greater volumes of goods with ease. GUUD's digital trade ecosystem, the only one in the world that connects all stakeholders in the trade facilitation process, helps businesses bypass long-standing barriers to global trade, enabling them to import or export goods seamlessly to any part of the world. GUUD Finance recently launched RYTE in July 2021, an intelligent trade financing technology platform designed to simplify complex and traditionally manual trade finance processes, connecting business users to both banks and alternative financiers, allowing them greater opportunities to access funding options to meet their working capital requirements. GUUD is one of the fastest-growing technology companies in Singapore, with offices strategically located in Indonesia, China and Kenya, and projects spanning more than 17 countries. Notes to editors: About GUUD GUUD, a new digital way to trade globally, is a technology platform and group of businesses under the vCargo Cloud umbrella. The GUUD group references the UN/CEFACT Buy-Ship-Pay model to cover all aspects of trade facilitation, bypassing long-standing barriers to trade, and digitally transforming trade processes so they become simpler, more efficient and more inclusive. Led by a strong team of industry and IT professionals, GUUD aspires to help anyone and everyone, especially micro, small and medium enterprises, to become a player in global trade and to export and import from any part of the world. Our mission is to Trade for Good, and guided by UN's sustainable development goals, we pursue what is good for people, businesses and economies, helping improve livelihoods, generating prosperity and creating technological efficiencies and improvements everywhere we go. For more information, please visit www.guud.company About Mellower Coffee Established in 2011, Mellower coffee is a leading specialty coffee brand in China, operating a chain of 72 stores in Mainland China, Singapore, South Korea and Vietnam. The company prides itself as the key player, introducing excellent coffee products and advanced specialty coffee culture into China coffee market. With its unique and integrated industrial chain, Mellower aims to be the top player in the Chinese coffee industry, and it not only has its own plantation of 3,000 mu in Yunnan but has also established strategic agreements with leading specialty coffee farmers in Ethiopia, Panama and Colombia, ensuring premium quality and stable supply. Mellower also owns its own roasting factory in Shanghai. The only OEM partner of NESTLE in China, and the supplier of well-known beverage brands, such as Never Coffee, Nongfu Spring, LaiYiFen, Take-Away Cafe, Mellower has established itself as a top beverage company and it also cooperates with top beverage companies worldwide in continuously developing new products. SOURCE GUUD Pte Ltd TOKYO, Nov 17 (Reuters) - Yields on Japan's 10-year government bonds ended flat on Wednesday as investors showed scant response to a moderately weak outcome of Bank of Japan's bond-buying operations. The market also shrugged off a rise in U.S. Treasuries yields overnight after strong retail sales data. The 10-year JGB yield was flat at 0.070%. U.S. Treasuries and benchmark 10-year note yields reached as high as 1.646% in early Asia, a three-week high. Yields on longer-end notes rose, with the 20-year JGB yield gaining 0.5 basis point to 0.470% ahead of an auction for the debt with the same maturity on Thursday. The 30-year JGB yield also rose 0.5 basis point to 0.680% and the 40-year JGB yield rose one basis point to 0.730%. The two-year JGB yield was flat at minus 0.125% and the five-year yield fell 0.5 basis point to minus 0.085%. Benchmark 10-year JGB futures fell 0.04 point to 151.62, with a trading volume of 17,078 lots. (Reporting by Tokyo markets team) Customer data and marketing automation leader experienced 679% revenue growth from 2017 to 2020 BOSTON, Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Klaviyo , a leading customer and marketing automation platform, today announced it ranked 201 on the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 and 15th in the New England region. Now in its 27th year, the list is a ranking of the 500 fastest-growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences, fintech, and energy tech companies in North America. Award winners are selected based on percentage fiscal revenue growth from 2017 to 2020; Klaviyo grew 679% during this period. Klaviyo (PRNewsfoto/Klaviyo) "Our team has worked incredibly hard to build the infrastructure for our customers to take ownership of their growth and success, and we're honored to be recognized by Deloitte as one of the fastest growing companies in North America," said Andrew Bialecki, co-founder and CEO of Klaviyo. "But more importantly, we're excited to be creating real value and revenue for our customers, particularly as we enter the busiest shopping season of the year." Overall, 2021 Technology Fast 500 companies achieved revenue growth ranging from 212% to 87,037% from 2017 to 2020, with median growth of 521%. To learn more about Klaviyo, visit www.klaviyo.com About the 2021 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Now in its 27th year, the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 provides a ranking of the fastest-growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences, fintech, and energy tech companies both public and private in North America. Technology Fast 500 award winners are selected based on percentage fiscal year revenue growth from 2017 to 2020. In order to be eligible for Technology Fast 500 recognition, companies must own proprietary intellectual property or technology that is sold to customers in products that contribute to a majority of the company's operating revenues. Companies must have base-year operating revenues of at least US$50,000, and current-year operating revenues of at least US$5 million. Additionally, companies must be in business for a minimum of four years and be headquartered within North America. Story continues About Klaviyo Klaviyo is a leading customer data and marketing automation platform dedicated to accelerating revenue and customer connection for online businesses. Klaviyo makes it easy to store, access, analyze and use transactional and behavioral data to power highly-targeted customer and prospect communications. The company's hybrid customer-data and marketing-platform model allows companies to grow by fostering direct relationships with customers, without giving up their valuable data to popular big-tech ad platforms. Over 275,000 innovative companies like Unilever, Custom Ink, Living Proof and Huckberry sell more with Klaviyo. Learn more at www.klaviyo.com . About Deloitte Deloitte refers to one or more of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, a UK private company limited by guarantee ("DTTL"), its network of member firms, and their related entities. DTTL and each of its member firms are legally separate and independent entities. DTTL (also referred to as "Deloitte Global") does not provide services to clients. In the United States, Deloitte refers to one or more of the US member firms of DTTL, their related entities that operate using the "Deloitte" name in the United States and their respective affiliates. Certain services may not be available to attest clients under the rules and regulations of public accounting. Please see www.deloitte.com/about to learn more about our global network of member firms. Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/klaviyo-named-to-2021-deloitte-technology-fast-500-list-301426946.html SOURCE Klaviyo Hong Kong, China--(Newsfile Corp. - November 17, 2021) - META FANTASY, a metaverse technology company, announces that it has partnered with Grayscale Asia-Pacific to develop metaverse and decentralized network in the Asia-Pacific region. META FANTASY aims to take the metaverse concept to the next level with its decentralized metaverse project, FantaVerse that utilizes the BIGANT technology. BIGANT (Blockchain, Interactivity, Game, AI, Network, Token Economy) is a proprietary design & technological ecosystem by META FANTASY that works comprehensively for the development of the metaverse and realizes the elements of the metaverse, including decentralization, creator economy, anywhere, variety, economy & civility, virtual social, immersive and low friction. META FANTASY has completed its economic and ecological modules and has accelerated its technological development since the beginning of the year, making breakthroughs and revolutionary advancements to date. Grayscale is currently expanding into the Asia-Pacific markets with plans to invest and acquire companies in Indonesia, Japan, Australia, Hong Kong, South Korea and Malaysia. The Asia-Pacific region will be the centre of its decentralized data processing infrastructure and data centres with the aim to empower decentralized technological developments in the region. Grayscale-Asia Pacific will also increase the deployment of low-energy, green and eco-friendly mining technologies within the next two years, and deploy blockchain technology, artificial intelligence, big data and 5G to create and enhance digital economies, distributed data storage, decentralized cloud computing infrastructure in the region. As a strategic partner, Grayscale's expansion and development roadmap empowers META FANTASY's vision of creating a decentralized metaverse that brings the virtual world to life and unlocking the infinite possibilities of the metaverse. "We are confident that the cooperation with Grayscale will accelerate the creation and development of FantaVerse, and become an industry leader in metaverse technology and decentralized network. We will take lead in the pilot construction of decentralized network in South Korea," said Albert, COO of META FANTASY. In the first quarter of 2022, users will be able to experience metaverse products that utilizes META FANTASY's BIGANT technology. Story continues Contact: META FANTASY 3109209996 To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/103966 Retail giants are offering to pay for employees' college education in a bid to attract more talent amid a historic race to fill open positions. Tech giant Microsoft (MSFT) is one of those companies but it's also charting a unique course. Unlike Amazon (AMZN), Target (TGT), Walmart (WMT), and other companies offering free tuition for employees who wish to upgrade their skills in almost any field at in a variety of colleges, Microsoft is honing in on community colleges to fill a specific but urgent need: More cybersecurity professionals. Looking at the demand for educational programs they launched after the COVID-19 pandemic, Microsoft found that "the appetite is there," Naria Santa Lucia, general manager of digital inclusion and U.S. community engagement at Microsoft Philanthropies, told Yahoo Finance. The company also realized that "people weren't completing the course pathways as much as we would have liked," Lucia added, "and what we realized is we need to get really targeted and look very carefully at the roles that we know are going to expand." Microsoft Corporation Chief Executive Officer, Satya Nadella, gestures as he addresses the Future Decoded Tech Summit in Bangalore on February 25, 2020. (Photo by Manjunath Kiran / AFP) 'There is more the private sector can do' Microsoft identified cybersecurity as a field with a massive shortage of workers, and is hoping to fill 250,000 cybersecurity jobs in the U.S. by the middle of the decade. (With an increase in the number of data breaches and hacks, the need is urgent.) The company is hoping to help train and recruit about 250,000 people into cybersecurity by 2025. Some may end up working with Microsoft, its clients, or other employers across the country. "Then we thought about, 'Hey, what's the best way we can really reach scale in this?' And we really believe that the community college system in the United States is just a great resource," Lucia explained. "There are community colleges everywhere. The tuition is generally affordable. If you are lower income, you can apply for aid and sometimes get that fully covered. It's diverse. People go part-time [or] full-time. I think the average age is often about 26 years old in a given space. ... It just offers a broad range and opportunity." Story continues Microsoft's approach is markedly different from what other retail giants have offered to workers in a bid to attract more talent. A student at The Los Angeles Community College campus on Monday August 30th of Los Angeles City College (LACC) in the LACCD, the nation's largest community college district. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images). Partnering with community colleges, for instance, is different from Amazon's and Walmart's efforts, given that the company is investing in "not necessarily on the current employees at Microsoft, but on society as a whole," Lucia added. For instance, if a worker was currently employed in a retail job or a different industry and wanted to try out something new, Microsoft is hoping to create a runway for that person to pursue a role in cybersecurity at a low cost. Microsoft, according to its press release, is providing funding and training for faculty at 150 community colleges, and scholarships and resources to 25,000 students. The tech giant's interest is likely a boon to some two-year colleges, given that enrollment has taken a beating at these institutions. According to early data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, undergraduate enrollment continued to decline in fall 2021 by 3.2% after dropping last year amid the coronavirus pandemic. Enrollment at community colleges dropped by 5.6%, more than at public four-year colleges, which dropped by 2.3%. Already, colleges have started benefitting from the program. El Paso Community College was recently reported to have received a $50,000 grant from Microsoft for the its cybersecurity program. Store employees wait for customers during the grand opening of a flagship Microsoft Corp. retail store in New York, October 26, 2015. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson According to Lucia, working with community colleges made sense because of the outcomes. When Microsoft partnered with nonprofits to deliver its content, completion rates "went through the roof," she explained. "And that was the way when we realized, yes, there is a breadth offering that's important, but let's really double down and partner with those that are already in the space so already trusted by the learners, like community colleges to really do something different and take a different approach." Lucia also hinted at more commitments coming down the pike in the near future. "If it is a PR push for companies, I say we should all push more," she said. "There is more the private sector can do to partner with the public sector, with nonprofits, with the higher education system. This is a moment where we all have to have hands on deck with the changes in the labor market." Aarthi is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. She can be reached at aarthi@yahoofinance.com. Follow her on Twitter @aarthiswami. Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Flipboard, and LinkedIn Lead Plaintiff Deadline Is January 11, 2022 NEW YORK, Nov. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Wolf Haldenstein Adler Freeman & Herz LLP announces that a federal securities class action lawsuit has been filed against Novavax, Inc. (Novavax or the Company) (NASDAQ: NVAX) in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland on behalf of those who purchased Novavax common stock between March 2, 2021 and October 19, 2021, inclusive (the Class Period). All investors who purchased shares of Novavax, Inc. and incurred losses are urged to contact the firm immediately at classmember@whafh.com or (800) 575-0735 or (212) 545-4774. You may obtain additional information concerning the action or join the case on our website, www.whafh.com. If you have incurred losses in the shares of Novavax, Inc., you may, no later than January 11, 2022, request that the Court appoint you lead plaintiff of the proposed class. Please contact Wolf Haldenstein to learn more about your rights as an investor in Novavax, Inc. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE CASE The filed Complaint alleges that Defendants misrepresented the Companys progress toward successfully developing its COVID-19 vaccine (NVX-CoV2373), including: overstating the Companys manufacturing capabilities and downplaying manufacturing issues that would impact the approval timeline for NVX-CoV2373; concealing that the Company was unlikely to meet its anticipated EUA regulatory timelines; exaggerating the regulatory and commercial prospects for NVX-CoV2373. On August 5, 2021, the Company reported that it expected to file for NVX-CoV2373s EUA in the fourth quarter of 2021, rather than the third quarter of 2021. On this news, the Companys stock price fell by more than 19%. Then, on October 19, 2021, Politico published an article entitled They rushed the process: Vaccine makers woes hamper global inoculation campaign. The Politico article reported that the Company faces significant hurdles in proving it can manufacture a shot that meets regulators quality standards with respect to NVX-CoV2373. The Politico article cited anonymous sources as stating that the Companys issues are more concerning than previously understood and that the Company could take until the end of 2022 to resolve its manufacturing issues and win regulatory authorizations and approvals. Story continues On this news, the Companys stock price fell another 14.7%. Wolf Haldenstein has extensive experience in the prosecution of securities class actions and derivative litigation in state and federal trial and appellate courts across the country. The firm has attorneys in various practice areas; and offices in New York, Chicago and San Diego. The reputation and expertise of this firm in shareholder and other class litigation has been repeatedly recognized by the courts, which have appointed it to major positions in complex securities multi-district and consolidated litigation. If you wish to discuss this action or have any questions regarding your rights and interests in this case, please immediately contact Wolf Haldenstein by telephone at (800) 575-0735, via e-mail at classmember@whafh.com, or visit our website at www.whafh.com. Contact: Wolf Haldenstein Adler Freeman & Herz LLP Patrick Donovan, Esq. Gregory Stone, Director of Case and Financial Analysis Email: gstone@whafh.com, donovan@whafh.com or classmember@whafh.com Tel: (800) 575-0735 or (212) 545-4774 This press release may be considered Attorney Advertising in some jurisdictions under the applicable law and ethical rules. AUSTIN, Texas, Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- On November 8, 2021, Mr. Jermaine Irby filed suit against the U.S. Army alleging retaliation for filing a sex discrimination complaint in 2015. Wiley Walsh, P.C. (PRNewsfoto/Wiley Walsh, P.C.) "I hope my lawsuit proves that the Army is subject to the same laws that everyone else is and that no employer can retaliate against an employee who complains of discrimination," Mr. Irby said. According to the complaint, in 2013, Mr. Irby started working for the Army's Sexual Harassment Assault Response Program, which is also known as SHARP. He was promoted shortly after that to an instructor/trainer position. In 2015, Mr. Irby filed a sex discrimination complaint against his supervisor Jeffrey Gorres. That complaint resulted in a settlement where Mr. Gorres was required to attend training on communication issues. Since then, according to the complaint, Mr. Gorres has retaliated against Mr. Irby in several ways. For example, in 2018, despite not having been Mr. Irby's supervisor for approximately two years, Mr. Gorres inserted himself into a complaint against Mr. Irby and expressly brought up Mr. Irby's prior EEO complaint in explaining how Mr. Irby created a hostile environment. In 2019, according to the complaint, Mr. Gorres ensured that Mr. Irby was denied necessary credentials he needed to do his job as a SHARP trainer. These denied credentials forced Mr. Irby to have to find other employment outside of SHARP. In September 2019, Mr. Irby requested an EEO hearing with the Army. To date, no Administrative Law Judge has been assigned to the case. Therefore, Mr. Irby has exercised his right to file a lawsuit in federal court. Mr. Irby is represented by Colin Walsh and Jairo Castellanos of Wiley Walsh, P.C. Colin Walsh is a board certified specialist in labor and employment law. Related Links https://www.scribd.com/document/540416188/Complaint-Irby-v-Wormuth https://www.wileywalsh.com Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/plaintiff-represented-by-wiley-walsh-pc-files-suit-against-the-united-states-army-alleging-retaliation-for-complaining-of-sex-discrimination-301427238.html SOURCE Wiley Walsh, P.C. The Essential Housing Campaign's Kickoff Trailer The Essential Housing Campaign's Kickoff Trailer The Essential Housing Campaign's Kickoff Trailer LOS ANGELES, Nov. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- As the price of housing continues to surge in cities across the country, the middle class is being left behind, with the supply of affordable homes falling far short of current demand. In Los Angeles County, the median price of a home increased 12% annually to a record $795,000 in September - far above what an average household can afford, estimated to be approximately $300,000 based on the County's latest estimated $73,000 median household income. To tackle this dilemma, a new coalition of leading public and private organizations in the community and housing development industry has recently formed to launch 'The Essential Housing Campaign', organized by The Housing Innovation Collaborative (HICo), the Los Angeles-based nonprofit housing R&D organization, in partnership with the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) and the Urban Land Institute (ULI). The goal of the new Campaign, running now through 2030, is to build 130,000 new homes throughout Los Angeles County, priced to be affordable to residents earning up to 120% of the area's median income, using limited public subsidy. "While there are many obstacles ahead, this essential middle-income housing can be built in the Los Angeles region using existing private market funds, existing construction methods, and existing available land - we just need the policies and incentives in place to encourage more equitable housing development," said Charly Ligety, Director of HICo. "The Los Angeles region is not building housing for middle-income workers anymore - many nurses, teachers, firefighters, public safety and transportation personnel, among other essential workers, cannot afford to live in the communities they serve," said Ligety. "If left unchecked, the problem of housing affordability for middle-income workers is projected to get worse," he continued. Story continues This phenomenon, known as 'the missing middle', is present in many high-growth cities around the world where the supply of new homes has not kept up with demand and most new development is priced only for the highest end of the market. Based on the latest projections by Los Angeles City Planning, only 1,000 new homes for middle-income workers are expected to be built by 2030, less than 0.5% of the more than 310,000 housing units expected to be built in the City. The projected number is consistent with recent development trends in Los Angeles - since 2014, only 827 units of more than 117,000 new homes built in the City were affordable to the middle-income segment. The goal of 130,000 new homes by 2030 is based on a timeline set by California's latest state-mandated housing production goals, which went into effect in October and runs through the end of 2029. The call to action to build an unprecedented 130,000 new middle-income homes is joined by local and regional political leaders. "Our essential workers are the foundation that keeps our city running, and this new pledge to create affordable housing in the communities they serve will help ensure they can access prosperity," said Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti. The Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) - the nation's largest metropolitan planning organization - is also helping lead the effort. "Providing tools and developing new approaches to affordability and public-private collaboration will be vital in our efforts to build middle-income housing projects throughout the region," said Clint Lorimore, President of SCAG. The coalition has been working on a comprehensive action plan, and has already hosted more than 30 public presentations of solutions in the housing development space that can be deployed, ranging from proven approaches in policy, land use, finance, design, construction, along with various operational and process reforms to help accelerate and drive down the cost of housing development. For more information about The Essential Housing Campaign, visit housinginnovation.co/essential. The Housing Innovation Collaborative ("HICo") is a solution-oriented, non-profit housing R&D organization based in Los Angeles, CA, focused on accelerating the next generation of design, finance and policy to address the housing crisis, more at housinginnovation.co. Press Contact: Charly Ligety, charly@housinginnovation.co. Related Images Image 1: The Essential Housing Campaign's Kickoff Trailer On a mission to build more than 130,000 new middle-income homes in Los Angeles. Image courtesy of The Housing Innovation Collaborative. This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com. Attachment BERLIN and ERFURT, Germany, Nov. 17, 2021 /CNW/ - Greenrise Global Brands Inc.'s (formerly AMP Alternative Medical Products Inc.) (Frankfurt: C4T) (ISIN: CA39540L1085) (CSE: XCX), wholly-owned subsidiary, AMP Alternative Medical Products GmbH ("AMP"), a pharmaceutical supplier of medical cannabis products to German pharmacies, announces the launch of a new dronabinol medical cannabis product available in pharmacies beginning in January 2022. Greenrise Global Logo (CNW Group/Greenrise Global Brands Inc.) Dronabinol is pure Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and is registered as an active pharmaceutical ingredient (API). AMP's dronabinol product is "Made in Germany." It will be offered at a competitive price and completes AMP's product portfolio supporting any therapy requiring medicinal cannabis products for the growing range of therapies approaches being prescribed by a growing number of doctors. Dronabinol has been a prominent medical cannabis product in Germany for many years, and it is frequently prescribed by doctors for pain management. In comparison to the procedure of preparing vaporized forms of medicinal cannabis, many patients find dronabinol prescriptions easier to ingest. Doctors believe that the THC concentration of dronabinol is more accurate than that of flowers or extracts, making dosage monitoring easier. Pharmacists use Dronabinol to fill doctor-prescribed medicine prescriptions for patients, usually in the form of drops or solutions. Dronabinol is Germany's most often prescribed medical cannabis product, accounting for 35% of all medical cannabis prescriptions and 46.5 million in sales in 2020. In Germany, total medical cannabis sales of reimbursed prescriptions totaled 165 million, accounting for almost 90% of the medical cannabis market in 2020. AMP's national sales team is presently receiving training with medical professionals to learn about the benefits of dronabinol for doctors' patients and prescription preparation methods for pharmacists. Story continues AMP selected a German partner as its dronabinol supplier. Doctors and pharmacists can find more information about the product or order on the AMP website: https://amp-eu.com/doccheck-login "We are expecting strong sales from this new product as dronabinol is well known to doctors and insurance companies who often reimburse dronabinol prescriptions," said Dr. Stefan Feuerstein, Managing Director of AMP, and President and Director of Greenrise Global. AMP's dronabinol product offers the best quality for patients and the best value for pharmacists and insurance companies compared to the limited number of other products in the market currently." About Greenrise Global Brands Inc. Greenrise Global helps people realize the beneficial properties of cannabis. Greenrise Global is a Canadian publicly traded corporation with two German operating subsidiaries: Greenrise GmbH ("Greenrise Wellbeing") and AMP Alternative Medical Products GmbH ("AMP"). Greenrise Wellbeing is a CBD wellness firm based in Hamburg, with brands including Herbify and CANAVEX in its portfolio. AMP is based in Erfurt and supplies medical cannabis products to pharmacies across Germany, including medical cannabis brands from Aphria, Bedrocan, Little Green Pharma and AMP's branded line of products and sold through its nationwide sale team. AMP complies with the German Narcotic Drug Act (BtMG) and the Free State of Thuringia's regulatory requirements, ensuring that products imported from around the world and sold in Germany meet the European Union's Good Manufacturing Practice (EU-GMP) standard. For more information about Greenrise Global, please visit www.greenriseglobal.com Neither the CSE nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the CSE) accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This news release contains forward-looking statements that are based on the Company's expectations, estimates and projections regarding its business and the economic environment in which it operates, including with respect to its business plans and milestones and the timing thereof. Although the Company believes the expectations expressed in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, such statements do not guarantee future performance and involve risks and uncertainties that are difficult to control or predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may differ materially from those expressed in these forward-looking statements and readers should not place undue reliance on such statements. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date on which they are made, and the Company undertakes no obligation to update them publicly to reflect new information or the occurrence of future events or circumstances unless otherwise required to do so by law. SOURCE Greenrise Global Brands Inc. Cision View original content to download multimedia: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/November2021/17/c5692.html The UK's largest grocer Tesco enhances product buying through partnership with global product sourcing platform RangeMe, creating visibility to over 200,000 suppliers. Having expanded to the UK this summer, RangeMe is now working with buyers at a range of retailers. SAN FRANCISCO and LONDON, Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The UK's largest grocer Tesco has partnered with the world's largest product sourcing platform RangeMe to support their product buying teams with access to the most relevant products their customers demand. The UK's largest grocer Tesco enhances product buying through partnership with global product sourcing platform RangeMe, creating visibility to over 200,000 suppliers. Tesco will leverage RangeMe to help their buyers scale product sourcing efforts with streamlined submissions and simplified discovery tools. Buyers can filter searches to find brands and products meeting exact sourcing needs, seamless connectivity and collaboration with suppliers, and access curated collections. Tesco will leverage RangeMe to help their buyers scale product sourcing efforts with streamlined submissions and simplified discovery tools. Buyers can filter searches to find brands and products meeting exact sourcing needs, seamless connectivity and collaboration with suppliers, and access curated collections to help identify and understand category trends and emerging brands. RangeMe first launched in 2014 and is used today by over 12,000 retail buyers in the UK, Benelux region, North America, and Asia Pacific. It has quickly established itself as the industry leader for retail product discovery and sourcing by becoming the world's largest source of brands and products purchased by retail buyers. RangeMe is the global online platform where retailers and suppliers can discover, connect, and grow their business. Suppliers can showcase their range, bring new products to market, increase brand visibility, and grow sales, while retail buyers use RangeMe to discover new products, search trends, and communicate directly with brands. "We launched in the UK a few months ago and today Tesco, the largest grocer and supermarket chain in the country, has joined forces with us. We welcome them to our community of top retailers from around the world to transform their product sourcing experience. This is also an extraordinary opportunity for British suppliers to showcase their products directly to Tesco buyers and put their best foot forward" said Nicky Jackson, CEO of RangeMe. Story continues This news presents suppliers around the world and especially in the UK a front-row audience with one of the biggest names in retail. RangeMe helps suppliers grow their retail relationships with a platform that gives them the tools and insights to manage their products, market their brand, and build awareness. About RangeMe RangeMe , an ECRM company, is the leading online platform that streamlines new product discovery between suppliers and retailers. The platform empowers retail buyers to efficiently discover innovative and emerging products, while streamlining the inbound product submission process. For product suppliers, RangeMe enables them to grow their retail relationships with a platform that gives them the tools to manage their products, market their brand, and build awareness. Now integrated into the ECRM product offering, RangeMe adds increased breadth and depth to the industry's most complete sourcing solution for top retailers and product suppliers. Press Contacts: U.S. Dan Dyer E-mail: 324015@email4pr.com Phone: 513-478-7818 Europe Bilal Mahmood E-mail: 324015@email4pr.com Phone: +44 (0) 20 3640 7759 and +44 (0) 771 400 7257 "We launched in the UK a few months ago and today Tesco, the largest grocer and supermarket chain in the country, has joined forces with us. We welcome them to our community of top retailers from around the world to transform their product sourcing experience. This is also an extraordinary opportunity for British suppliers to showcase their products directly to Tesco buyers and put their best foot forward." - Nicky Jackson, CEO of RangeMe Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rangeme-to-help-more-suppliers-reach-tesco-shelves-301426625.html SOURCE RangeMe During the event, Santander Chile announced that the entity will be the first local bank to build solar plants for its own energy source SANTIAGO, Chile, Nov. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- For the second year in a row, Santander Chile held a virtual event with investors, where the advances of the Bank were explained by Claudio Melandri, President of the Bank, and its CEO, Miguel Mata. In this opportunity, the focus was ESG themes (Environmental, Social, and Governance), highlighting the efforts Santander has done to help its clients transition towards a greener economy and how it has reduced its own impact on the planet. The road forward The Bank is currently preparing its first ESG Framework which should be launched soon. Under this mechanism, the bond issues will have an official seal as ESG bonds. This framework will include a Second Party Opinion to ensure that funds will be allocated to projects, complying with the principles of the International Capital Markets Association. Initially, US$1.5 billion in initiatives have been identified that will be financed through this program. The ESG bonds will be linked to energy efficiency, renewable energy, pollution reduction, financial inclusion, and social projects. Miguel Mata announced the ten responsible banking commitments that we have established to meet in the coming years: To be the best company to work for in Chile: we are currently the number 1 company in the Great Place To Work ranking in 2020 in companies with more than 1,000 workers and we have the Top Employer certification. We seek to maintain this leadership position. Increase the percentage of women in managerial positions: currently 25% of managers are women and our goal is to reach 30% by 2025. Eliminate the gender pay gap: we currently have a 3.1% gender pay gap and our goal is to eliminate it by 2025. The Equal Conciliation Seal, delivered by the Ministry of Women and Gender Equity, gives us a path and an official commitment to advance on this issue. Work to financially empower people: between 2019 and 2020 we contributed to financially empower 921,779 people. Through our financial products such as Life we want to financially empower more than 2 million people by 2025. Grant green financing to our clients: We have defined a goal for 2025 to finance our own projects and those of our clients for at least US$ 1.5 billion through our ESG framework. Increase energy from renewable sources: 28% of our energy comes from these types of sources. In addition, we are committed to ensuring that 100% of the electrical energy we use comes from renewable sources. Mitigate 100% of our carbon footprint and gradually reduce it: since 2019 we mitigate 100% of our carbon footprint. We will also continue to make progress in measuring the carbon footprint of our loan portfolio and we join the Group's goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050. Regarding our own operations, the goal is to be carbon neutral by 2025, without the need to offset the footprint with the purchase of carbon credits. Eliminate single-use plastics in our operation: This year we will eliminate 100% of single-use plastics. Deliver scholarships, internships and entrepreneurship programs: in 2020 we awarded 2,951 scholarships for education and entrepreneurship at the local level. Our goal is to award 13,541 scholarships between 2019 and 2024. Support people through our community contribution programs: during 2020 we supported 103,792 people through our education programs and other support measures for the benefit of people in vulnerable situations. In social matters between 2019 and 2024 we hope to help 493,852 people through our community programs. We also want to continue generating ROE at 17% -19% with core capital levels above 10% in BIS III. Story continues During the event, there was also a deep dive into each theme of Environmental, Social, and Governance and how the Bank has integrated these into its strategy: Environmental The financial solutions linked to ESG criteria has been one of the value added offers the Bank has put forth to companies that seek to advance in these themes. Through different financing alternatives, Santander Chile has driven the local market to move towards a greener economy. We have been part of important projects such as Desaladora Spence, Cerro Dominador, and other projects with ESG criteria that are linked to the achievement of ESG KPIs. All structured projects above US$10 million pass through the evaluation of the Equator Principles, a strict risk policy for restricted activities. Santander Verde is a comprehensive value proposition for our clients that promotes various eco-friendly products such as: A Green Mortgage, where homes or real estate projects with sustainable construction certificates are financed at a preferential rate and offset their carbon footprint. Consumer credit, focused on reconditioning and energy efficiency projects. This credit provides a preferential rate to the client and also the bank compensates 1 ton in Carbon Bonds to mitigate the impact of the product. Carbon footprint offset program, where clients can choose to offset their footprint through the purchase of carbon bonds or choose to make a direct contribution to environmental projects in Chile. Electric car loans, with the launch of a credit line for electric cars sold by SKBerge and a discount for electric cars sold by VoltEra. PYME Verde is an initiative in conjunction with Sistema B that is supporting some 300 small companies to measure their ESG footprint and thus be able to start a certification process. Santander Asset Management Green Mutual Fund, which allows investment in companies committed to the environment, society and good corporate governance practices. During the ESG Talk, Claudio Melandri announced that the entity will be one of the first large companies in Chile and the first local bank in producing its own renewable energy. An agreement was signed with Gasco Luz and Fourtrees Capital where six solar plants of 300kW each will be built in the Coquimbo, Valparaiso and Metropolitan Region and will be fully operational by 2022. The contract consists of a 10-year lease of these solar plants that are already under construction for an annual payment of US$240,000. 100% of the energy produced in these plants will be used for energy consumption within the Bank, thus reducing its carbon footprint by 1,380 tons each year. In this manner, the energy generated in these plants will be incorporated to the national grid, permitting Santander to compensate its consumption through this contribution. These energy plants are in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. In effect, in 2019 the Santander Group set as an objective to have 100% of its energy come from renewable resources in 2025 in countries where it was possible to certify the energy resource. In addition, the loan book will also be carbon neutral by 2050, in line with the Net Zero Banking Alliance, which Santander adheres to. Social In the Social dimension, we are focused on the contribution towards a more sustainable development for communities. The employees of the Bank are important stakeholders, and the Bank has made many efforts to promote the development of its employees, so they can fully deploy their potential and contribute to the sustainability of the organization. In 2020, we achieved first place in Great Place to Work for companies with over 1,000 employees. In 2021, we became the first bank to receive the seal Iguala Conciliacion by the Ministry of Women and Gender Equity, ratifying our commitment to continue to increase diversity throughout the workforce and consolidate its first place as the best place to work. We also focus on three main areas to contribute to the progress and the inclusive development of communities: Social Inclusion, Financial Education and Entrepreneurship. In total, all of our social aid and financial inclusion programs have helped more than 1.5 million people throughout the country since 2019. We are one of the companies with the most clients in the country. In total, as of September 2021, the total customer base was 4.0 million, an increase of 14% year-over-year. Customers with current or debit accounts totaled 1.8 million as of September 2021 with a 44% growth and our digital clients were growing 30% at the same date, totaling 1.9 million. The success with our clients is especially due to progress in digital banking and the constant improvement in service quality. This has allowed us to resume our vocation for financial inclusion in a responsible way and without over-indebting clients. We are the bank with the highest levels of satisfaction and NPS in the industry, reaching a historically high level of 59 points and opening the gap even more with our competitors. Governance Santander Chile has three layers of ring-fencing to protect the interests of all investors equally. The first layer is regulatory. The Bank complies with the regulations of the CMF and the Central Bank of Chile and also the SEC regulations for foreign issuers, the Sarbanes Oxley Law of the United States, the corporate governance standards of the NYSE and, as it is part of Grupo Santander , we are monitored by the European Central Bank. It is one of the most regulated companies in the region. The relationship with the Group is also key and is the second layer of protection. The Santander Group has adopted a multiple points of entry structure. While Santander Chile enjoys sharing best practices, corporate frameworks, policies, and know-how with the Group, it is completely independent in terms of capital, liquidity, and financing, protecting the interests of all investors equally. The third layer is the Board of Directors, the highest governing body in Santander-Chile. The Board of Directors is made up of nine regular members and two alternates. A key aspect of the Board of Directors is its independence and diversity. Of the 11 directors, seven are independent from the main shareholder. All eleven directors have vast experience in many fields to ensure a widespread view of global issues. CONTACT INFORMATION Robert Moreno Investor Relations Banco Santander Chile Bandera 140, Floor 20 Santiago, Chile Tel: (562) 2320-8284 Email: irelations@santander.cl Website: www.santander.cl In fact, a third equate holiday shopping to getting a root canal! CHERRY HILL, N.J., Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank, announced today that while the holidays are often thought of as "the most wonderful time of the year," not everyone is excited to break out their holiday decorations just yet. According to TD Bank's 2021 Merry Money Survey, more than half of Americans (52%) describe the holiday shopping experience as painful. Of this group, 33% actually equate the pain of holiday shopping to a root canal. America's Most Convenient Bank. (PRNewsFoto/TD Bank) TD Bank polled 1,004 U.S. consumers to gauge their shopping, spending, money management habits and overall sentiment during the holiday season. The survey found that while Americans are increasingly responsible with their holiday spending, with 73% creating a budget up from 66% in 2018 two-thirds (66%) of consumers say the financial aspect of the holiday season makes them anxious. There's no place like home for the holidays Perry Como was onto something: there really is no place like home for the holidays. In addition to making Americans more budget-conscious, the pandemic also changed how people feel about the holidays. The survey finds that 84% of Americans felt like celebrating the holidays during the pandemic was more about the time spent with loved ones versus spending money on gifts. While many are excited to resume in-person events this year, 56% of Americans admit they liked having the excuse the pandemic provided of not having to attend holiday gatherings in recent years. This year, most Americans are looking forward to more intimate celebrations, with 83% preferring small family gatherings. In fact, more than half (52%) wish they didn't have to travel as much during the holidays and another 52% wish they didn't have as many obligations. On Dasher, on Dancer, on Fido and Mittens Americans are also thinking of their four-legged family members this holiday season. Sixty-three percent of Americans plan to buy gifts for their pets this year, especially millennials (76%). In fact, 14% of millennials plan to spend more than $100 on each of their pets, making sure to include their furry friends in their holiday celebrations. Story continues The most stressful time of the year Feelings of anxiety when budgeting for the holidays are especially prominent among younger shoppers, with 79% of millennials saying that holiday shopping makes them anxious, more so than their Gen X (68%) and Baby Boomer (51%) counterparts. Previous spending mishaps may be responsible for the stress experienced during the holidays. According to the survey, 69% of Americans say they have previously overspent during the holidays and 41% say they experienced a negative financial situation because of holiday spending. An additional 31% have tapped into emergency savings to pay for holiday expenses. "As people prepare to celebrate the holidays with their loved ones, perhaps for the first time in-person since the pandemic began, there are still many things weighing on their minds," says Matt Boss, Head of Consumer Products at TD Bank. "Holiday shopping, travel, hosting and celebrations all have costs associated and due to supply chain issues, we're seeing cost increases that will make joining in even more of a challenge for some. Doing what's best for you could mean staying home from travel or scaling back on gift-giving, but it will help make the holiday season more enjoyable. Set your limits whether financial or personal and stick to them." Ho-Ho-Hold up While the holidays can bring pressure to spend, consumers need to stop and evaluate what makes financial sense for them. There are several steps shoppers can take to ensure they are prepared to shop smartly and avoid overspending: Don't just make a budget stick to it : Of Americans who create a holiday budget, more than a quarter (27%) don't stick to it. What's more, only 31% of consumers strongly agree that they feel confident in their ability to create an effective budget for holiday spending. When creating a budget, shoppers should use the tools and resources they find most helpful. A physical planner or notebook was the most common tool cited for budgeting (41%), while others may find digital tools and applications linked to bank accounts useful for staying on track. If you're using plastic maximize those rewards : Forty-two percent of Americans cite using a debit card for most of their holiday spending. While shoppers should use the payment method that works best for their financial situation, using rewards-based credit cards can help shoppers earn cash back or points as they spend. Start early: Amid supply chain challenges impacting delivery times and store inventory, 63% of Americans say they'll start their shopping earlier to avoid delays. In fact, 60% say they will shop two months in advance of the holidays. Many consumers start saving early, too with 63% setting aside money throughout the year for holiday spending by stashing cash in jars, saving gift cards or reward points, or using a separate account. "Consumers who are spending this year are looking for a deal 90% of millennials surveyed are planning to shop on Black Friday," Boss adds. "However, more than a quarter of consumers say these sales are the primary reason they overspend, which signifies the importance of not only creating a holiday budget, but also using tools that track spending and help eliminate impulse purchases, no matter how irresistible the deal." Methodology Engine surveyed 1,004 Americans 18 years of age and older who celebrate the holidays. The online survey was conducted Oct. 26-28, 2021. About Engine ENGINE is a global, full-service media and marketing services company that empowers clients to outperform in the present and win in the future with its vast range of marketing solutions including insights, creative, media, data and technology. Founded in 2005, ENGINE has global headquarters in New York and 16 offices across North America, the UK, Europe and Asia-Pacific. Find out more at enginegroup.com and follow @engineworldwide. About TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank, is one of the 10 largest banks in the U.S., providing more than 9.6 million customers with a full range of retail, small business and commercial banking products and services at more than 1,100 convenient locations throughout the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Metro D.C., the Carolinas and Florida. In addition, TD Bank and its subsidiaries offer customized private banking and wealth management services through TD Wealth, and vehicle financing and dealer commercial services through TD Auto Finance. TD Bank is headquartered in Cherry Hill, N.J. To learn more, visit www.td.com/us. Find TD Bank on Facebook at www.facebook.com/TDBank and on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TDBank_US and www.twitter.com/TDNews_US. TD Bank, America's Most Convenient Bank, is a member of TD Bank Group and a subsidiary of The Toronto-Dominion Bank of Toronto, Canada, a top 10 financial services company in North America. The Toronto-Dominion Bank trades on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges under the ticker symbol "TD". To learn more, visit www.td.com/us. Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/shoppers-are-more-budget-conscious--and-anxious--this-holiday-season-td-survey-finds-301427069.html SOURCE TD Bank With a bit of perspective, we can see what ought to have been clear all along. Tiger King was a tawdry little episode in TV history, a moment of collective hysteria when millions of viewers 64 million in four weeks, if we believe Netflixs reports tuned in to rubberneck a gruesome car crash of working-class Americana. The tale of Joe Exotic, real name Joseph Allen Maldonado-Passage, an eccentric country musician-turned-tiger park owner, and his war with the animal rights activist Carole Baskin, was a three-way hybrid of true-crime documentary, circus freak show and Attenborough. With the world locking down, it was the right series at the right time. If the pandemic created the viewing conditions, Netflix provided the opportunity. Eighteen months later, everyone should know better, but here we are again, with Tiger King 2. Joe Exotic might be behind bars, serving 22 years for tiger-related crimes and (mostly) for attempting to get Baskin murdered, but that hasnt stopped the Tiger Kingdom. His quasi-martyrdom has only increased his notoriety. The soap opera has only grown less edifying since last March. The first episode is a hotchpotch that revisits the fallout from the first series, before attempting to provide some more context to Exotics life. Theres the tough childhood in Texas, then the first career as a policeman, where he was persecuted for being a gay cowboy. But then the story hops forward again to last year. With Trump in charge, Exotics supporters sensed the opportunity to appeal for a presidential pardon. It was just the kind of wacky thing he might do. They hired a battle bus, limos, a tiger-liveried private plane. As Trump egged on his supporters to reject the 2020 election result, Exotics supporters were right there. The series seems keen to imply that Exotic and co were more than a sideshow, somehow involved in subverting democracy. Whatever else you might say about the first Tiger King, it was an extraordinary yarn, and the directors and producers spent many years polishing a peerless piece of sensationalism. For all its new interviews and revelations and scratchy audio from Joe in prison, the second outing has none of that depth. At times, it feels like a self-congratulatory cuttings show, a didnt-we-do-well lap of honour for Netflix and its battalions of attention span engineers. Somehow, they stretch it to five episodes, going over the death of Caroles second husband, Don Lewis, whom Joe and his crew suspect was murdered by Baskin, and looking at what Jeff Lowe, who took over the park after Joes imprisonment, has done with the business. Its all icky. Story continues In a saner entertainment market, that would be an end to it all. I wouldnt bet on it. If the real victims of Tiger King are the blameless animals, the hero is money. People are driven to wild acts by lust for it, and lack of it. There are the people paying money for a tiger experience, the people making money selling the experience, the damaged people forced into working for this eccentric ringleader. Everyones on the grift: Joe, his husband Dillon Passage, Joes former employees and enemies, Netflix, sundry lawyers and hangers on. Baskin and her husband, Howard, predictably refused to cooperate with the new programmes. She is reportedly suing Netflix. When the pots this big, everyone has an angle. Sitting at home, watching, were not much better. Read More Succession, episode 5 recap: The Roys have hit their rich-jerk peak suing Greenpeace Dopesick review: Ambitious drama masterfully shows the human beings caught up in Americas opioid crisis The Tower review: Gemma Whelan stands out in ITV thriller that fails to reach great heights Attributes 526% Revenue Growth to Massive Enterprise Demand for its Conversational Automation Platform that uses AI to Modernize and Democratize Customer Experiences PALO ALTO, Calif., November 17, 2021--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Uniphore, the leader in Conversational Automation, today announced it ranked 248th on the Deloitte Technology Fast 500, a ranking of the 500 fastest-growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences, fintech, and energy tech companies in North America, now in its 27th year. Uniphore grew 526% during the evaluated period of 2017 to 2020 based on fiscal year revenue growth. This latest recognition comes on the heels of a record-breaking year for Uniphore. In 2021, Uniphore announced several key milestones, including its $150M Series D funding, as well as the strategic acquisition of two innovative companies Emotion Research Labs and Jacada. These acquisitions, combined with the existing hiring plans for the year, have doubled Uniphores workforce over the course of this calendar year and established new global offices in Spain, Israel and Atlanta. As part of this hypergrowth phase, Uniphore has also expanded its customer base to more than 100 large enterprise organizations, including some of the worlds largest BPOs, telecom providers, insurance companies and financial service organizations. As a result, Uniphore now supports over 175,000 customer service agents who can handle more than 120 million engagements every month. Uniphores in-house innovation, combined with the acquisitions of Emotion Research Labs and Jacada technologies, have allowed the team to expand its existing Conversational Automation Platform and create a comprehensive solution that combines Conversational AI, workflow automation, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), low-code/no-code capabilities and a business friendly UX to transform and democratize customer experiences, and help deliver highly effective, personalized and empathetic interactions. Story continues "As we continue to work through the pandemic and into a post-pandemic era, customer experience has never been more important. At Uniphore, we are bringing the best in AI and automation to that experience while maintaining the critical component of human empathy in the mix. These important technical innovations, combined with an easy-to-use interface and an incredible team at Uniphore dedicated to our mission of making sure every conversation is understood and actioned have put Uniphore at the forefront of a new era of customer experience with tremendous growth," said Umesh Sachdev, CEO and founder at Uniphore. "We are excited to be recognized in the Deloitte Fast 500 and look forward to continued momentum in the next year and beyond." "Each year the Technology Fast 500 shines a light on leading innovators in technology and this year is no exception," said Paul Silverglate, vice chair, Deloitte LLP and U.S. technology sector leader. "In the face of innumerable challenges resulting from the pandemic, the best and brightest were able to pivot, reinvent and transform and grow. We celebrate the winning organizations and especially the talented employees driving their success." "The pandemic has underscored the urgent need for tech solutions in a variety of areas across health care, fintech, energy tech, entertainment, to name a few, so reliance on innovators like the winners of the Technology Fast 500 is more important than ever," said Christie Simons, partner, Deloitte & Touche LLP and industry leader for technology, media and telecommunications within Deloittes audit & assurance practice. "These companies are not only at the cutting edge, transforming the way we do business, but most importantly, recognize the strategic importance of ongoing innovation, especially in the ever-changing world of technology." About the 2021 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Now in its 27th year, the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 provides a ranking of the fastest-growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences, fintech, and energy tech companies both public and private in North America. Technology Fast 500 award winners are selected based on percentage fiscal year revenue growth from 2017 to 2020. In order to be eligible for Technology Fast 500 recognition, companies must own proprietary intellectual property or technology that is sold to customers in products that contribute to a majority of the companys operating revenues. Companies must have base-year operating revenues of at least US$50,000, and current-year operating revenues of at least US$5 million. Additionally, companies must be in business for a minimum of four years and be headquartered within North America. About Uniphore Uniphore is the global leader in Conversational Automation. Every day, billions of conversations take place across industries customer service, sales, HR, education and more. Whether they are human to human, human to machine or machine to machine, conversations are at the heart of everything we do, and the new currency of the enterprise. At Uniphore, we believe companies that best understand and take action on those conversations will win. We have built the most comprehensive and powerful conversational automation platform that combines conversational AI, workflow automation and RPA (Robotic Process Automation) with a business user friendly UX in a single integrated platform to transform and democratize customer experiences across industries. Follow our blog and connect with us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. About Deloitte Deloitte refers to one or more of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, a UK private company limited by guarantee ("DTTL"), its network of member firms, and their related entities. DTTL and each of its member firms are legally separate and independent entities. DTTL (also referred to as "Deloitte Global") does not provide services to clients. In the United States, Deloitte refers to one or more of the US member firms of DTTL, their related entities that operate using the "Deloitte" name in the United States and their respective affiliates. Certain services may not be available to attest clients under the rules and regulations of public accounting. Please see www.deloitte.com/about to learn more about our global network of member firms. View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211117005675/en/ Contacts North America Marjaneh Ravai, Uniphore marjaneh.ravai@uniphore.com India/Asia Pacific/Middle East Cynanda Noronha, Uniphore Cynanda@uniphore.com TORONTO, Nov. 17, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- ARHT Media Inc. ("ARHT Media") [TSXV:ART], the global leader in the development, production and distribution of high-quality, low latency hologram and digital content, is proud to announce that world-renowned scientists will be beamed into the Council of the Hong Kong Laureate Forum's flagship program: Masterminds, Masterclasses from around the world. Using ARHT's patented HoloPresenceTM technology, these scientists will present live from Europe, appearing as life-sized and lifelike holograms. From the 16th to the 18th of November 2021, "Masterminds, Masterclasses" will showcase world-renowned scientists sharing their thought-provoking and inspirational research experiences and discoveries. The scientists include Shaw Laureates, recipients of the Breakthrough Prize, CNRS Gold Medal recipients, Fields Medal recipients and Royal Medal recipients for three disciplines, namely Life Science and Medicine, Astronomy, and Mathematical Sciences. Given that the presentations will cover not only research topics and their applications, but also the presenters' research journeys and the experience that they gained during the process, we envision that these presentations will be thought-provoking, inspirational and will appeal to a vast and diverse audience, in particular fellow scientists, young scientists and the younger generation who are interested in science, says Professor Timothy W. Tong, Chairman of the Council of the Hong Kong Laureate Forum. Keynote speakers beaming into Hong Kong from Paris and Berlin include female Astrophysicist Professor Francoise Combes, as well as Shaw Laureates recipient Astronomy Professor Simon DM White and Mathematical Sciences Professor Jean-Michel Bismut. "As the pace of learning accelerates, we are seeing increased demand to bring the very best minds in a variety of disciplines to a much broader audience using our HoloPresence technology. Client research has shown that experts presenting using HoloPresence score higher for engagement and content retention than when those same presenters appear in person, so why not have greater impact and reduce carbon emissions while inspiring, colleagues, clients and other stakeholders," stated ARHT CEO Larry O'Reilly, "We are honoured that the Council of the Hong Kong Laureate Forum has embraced our technology to bring these impressive scientists to Hong Kong without having to leave their home cities." Story continues About ARHT Media ARHT Media's patented HoloPresence technology is a complete end-to-end solution that creates a sense of presence for audiences as though the holographic presenter was actually live in the room. With no noticeable latency, ARHT Media makes two-way live communication with a 3D holographic presenter anywhere in the world possible. We can also playback pre-recorded content and 3D animations on our HoloPresence displays to deliver rich holographic experiences. Add to this our capability to stream the same content online on our premium Virtual Global StageTM. Connect with ARHT Media Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ARHTmedia Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ARHTmediainc LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/company/arht-media-inc- For more information, please visit www.arhtmedia.com or contact the investor relations group at info@arhtmedia.com. ARHT Media trades under the symbol "ART" on the TSX Venture Exchange. ARHT Salman Amin ARHT Media samin@arhtmedia.com This press release may contain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking information includes, but is not limited to, the intention to exercise convertible securities of the Company; disclosure related to the Company's sales funnel; the Company's technology; the potential uses for the Company's technology; the future planned events using the Company's technology; the future success of the Company; the ability of the Company to monetize the ARHT Media technology; the development of the Company's technology; and interest from parties in ARHT's products. Generally, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", "expects" or "does not expect", "is expected", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "intends", "anticipates" or "does not anticipate", or "believes", or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be taken", "occur" or "be achieved". Forward-looking information is subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information, including but not limited to: general business, economic and competitive uncertainties; regulatory risks; risks inherent in technology operations; and other risks of the technology industry. Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking information, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking information, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. NEITHER THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN THE POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE. The Taliban has renewed calls for Washington to release Afghanistans Central Bank assets frozen by the U.S. Federal Reserve, as the war-ravaged nation faces one of the worlds worst humanitarian crises. In a letter to the U.S. Congress, Amir Khan Muttaqi, the acting foreign minister of the Taliban-led government, said that the situation in Afghanistan is getting increasingly dire as winter approaches. The U.S. decision to freeze the assets of a nation already plagued by poverty, war, drought, and the coronavirus pandemic has been hurting ordinary Afghans, Muttaqi said in the letter, released on November 17. He warned that if the crisis continues in Afghanistan, it could fuel a refugee crisis impacting the whole world. After the Taliban takeover in August, the United States froze nearly $9.5 billion in assets belonging to Afghanistans Central Bank and stopped shipments of cash. The move was part of a pressure campaign aimed at getting Afghanistan's new rulers to create an inclusive government and respect the rights of women and minorities. Also, the International Monetary Fund said earlier this year that Afghanistan will no longer be able to access its resources. The World Bank has also halted funding for projects in Afghanistan, which has also been hit by an exodus of foreign aid. Afghanistan is suffering from a severe drought, as well. The UN's World Food Program (WFP) warned in October that millions of Afghans could face starvation due to a combination of the drought, conflict, and COVID-19 this winter unless urgent action is taken. More than half of the Afghan population -- about 22.8 million people -- faces acute food insecurity, while 3.2 million children under the age of 5 could suffer acute malnutrition, the WFP said. WFP chief David Beasley said that Afghanistan is now among the world's worst humanitarian crises, if not the worst. Facebook says it took action earlier this year to block hackers from Pakistan who targeted people tied to Afghanistan's former government and security forces in the months leading up to the Talibans seizure of power in August. Facebook said on November 16 that the Pakistani group was one of four malicious groups it disrupted by disabling their accounts, blocking their domains from appearing on Facebook, alerting people it believed were targeted, and sharing information with other social-media platforms. The other three were from Syria and targeted opposition or government critics and humanitarian organizations in that war-torn country. The Pakistan-based group, known as SideCopy, targeted people who were connected to the previous Afghan government, military, and law enforcement in Kabul, according to cybersecurity officials at Meta, Facebooks parent company. This malicious activity had the hallmarks of a well-resourced and persistent operation while obfuscating whos behind it, the official said in a news release on November 16. Meta did not describe what the ultimate motive appeared to be but said the campaign ramped up between April and August by primarily sharing links to websites hosting malware. The groups tactics also included "romantic lures" used to build trust with potential targets and get them to click on phishing links or download malicious chat applications. They operated fake app stores and also compromised legitimate websites to host malicious phishing pages to manipulate people into giving up their Facebook credentials, Meta said in describing some of SideCopys tactics. Similar to the campaign from Pakistan, the Syrian campaign primarily targeted people using social-engineering tactics to trick them into clicking on links or downloading malicious software. The company did not provide figures on the number of accounts potentially affected or the nature of the information hacked. With reporting by AFP You have permission to edit this article. Edit Close A family celebrates Kwanzaa. The Kinara (candle holder) and the Mishumaa Samba (the seven candles) are symbolic of Kwanzaa. The candles and holder represent the Seven Principles, or the minimum set of values by which African people are urged to live. 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. More Information Empty Stocking Fund benefits 20 health and human service agencies in the Pikes Peak region who serve over 350,000 neighbors in need from birth to end of life. One donation. 20 agencies. A whole community served. Give now at EmptyStockingFundCO.org, or call 719-476-1673 to make a credit card or stock donation. Make checks payable to Empty Stocking Fund and mail to P.O. Box 910942, Denver, CO 80291-0942. An 11-year-old Westminster girl who was reported missing for nearly 24 hours was found safe Wednesday afternoon, the Westminster Police Department announced. Police said the girl was found in unincorporated Jefferson County thanks to a tip from a citizen. More information about the nature of her disappearance will be released Wednesday evening, police said. The girl went missing after leaving her Westminster home around 3:30 p.m. Tuesday to walk to a park. Her mom called the police at around 5:30 p.m. when she didnt return home. Police said they searched for the girl nonstop since she was reported missing, including door-to-door searches and combing the neighborhood and surrounding parks and lakes using foot patrols, a bloodhound, thermal cameras and drones. The Colorado Bureau of Investigation issued an Amber Alert and an Endangered Missing Alert for the girl Wednesday, hours before she was found. In a statement, Westminster police said they were concerned about the girl's safety because of the length of time she was missing and the cold weather in the area overnight. The agencies involved in the search included the Lakewood, Thornton, Arvada, Broomfield, Wheat Ridge and Golden police departments, Jefferson County Sheriff's Department, CBI, FBI, Ralston House, Westminster Fire Department and more. The Cheyenne Mountain Zoo received a rare clean report of inspection from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, joining just three organizati Aurora police officers stand outside the main entrance of Aurora Central High School after a shooting occurred at nearby Nome Park on Monday, Nov. 15, 2021, in Aurora, Colo. (Timothy Hurst/The Gazette) In the week following Halloween, Colorado College detected 88 COVID-19 cases among mostly vaccinated students, however the school says the outbreak is already under control thanks to its quarantine policies. Colorado College, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak Community College all say they are controlling the spread of the virus well in classroom settings and most of the spread connected with their campuses is happening in social settings. All have instituted mask mandates and they all have also seen a similar number of cases since the beginning of the semester. Colorado College and the UCCS both have vaccination mandates along with many other colleges in the state that adopted them to slow the spread of the virus. It's a measure that Colorado College considers a success because none of the students with the virus have needed hospital care, said Leslie Weddell, a spokeswoman for the school. Pikes Peak Community College will start enforcing a vaccine mandate next semester that will require students and staff to either get shots or get tested weekly, school spokesman Warren Epstein said. The school currently asks its students to stay off campus if they have experienced symptoms, he said. Most community college students are spending most of their time off campus and that's contributing to the spread, he said. The virus is widespread in El Paso County with about 2,600 cases detected in the last week and a positivity rate of 12%. The percentage indicates how many people on average are testing positive and such a high rate means that cases are likely getting missed in the community. However all the institutions have taken slowing the spread of disease seriously. Colorado College first detected its post-Halloween spike on Nov. 4 and then tested all students so that those with the virus could be isolated and have already brought their average number of tests down to pre-spike levels, Weddell said. "It is important to do our part, isolating students who receive positive test results, in order to mitigate risk to others and to not contribute to the already high number of people needing hospitalization in the community," she said. The college has seen a total of 177 cases since the beginning of the school year and they have achieved a vaccination rate of 90% or higher among students, staff and faculty, according to the school's website. The school's student body is about 2,200. In response to a question about whether Halloween was responsible for the surge Weddell said that spikes tend to follow holidays when people are gathered in private homes with poor ventilation. Pikes Peak Community College, a school without a vaccination mandate, has had 152 cases among students and 22 among staff members and faculty, Epstein said. Although some cases may have been missed. The schools student body is about 18,000. Epstein said he estimates the school's vaccination rate is about 70% and they have been encouraging students and employees to get vaccinated by offering $100 gift cards. The school has seen some pushback to its new vaccination or testing mandate, but expects its enrollment next semester will be on par with current enrollment and its intended to help ensure the spread of COVID-19 doesn't start on campus, he said. He was not aware of any resignations as a result of the new vaccine rules. At UCCS, 202 people have tested positive since the beginning of the semester, the schools' website said. The school has a student body of about 12,000 and about 80% of them are vaccinated, according to the school. Contact tracing at the UCCS has shown the virus is spread by family members, at work and at social gatherings, said Chris Valentine, UCCS spokesman. Colorado College has found a similar trend with cases getting transmitted during indoor unmasked social gatherings where multiple households mix, restaurants, Weddell said. " " Pope Francis waves to his flock as he arrives in St. Peter's Square for his weekly mass in September 2017 in Vatican City. The pope suffered a black eye after hitting his head on the Popemobile when his vehicle stopped suddenly. Franco Origlia/Getty Images They can be embarrassing reminders of less-than-graceful moments or a marks of profound pride: However you choose to view bruises, they're pretty fascinating. The variety of colorful patterns they create on the skin is reason enough to want to learn more about these weird, sometimes painful, spots that everyone has coped with at one point or another. Otherwise known as a contusion, a bruise is a mark that appears when blood is trapped under the surface of the skin. Bruises occur when some type of trauma or injury crushes tiny blood vessels (known as capillaries), but doesn't break the skin. As a result of the injury, the broken capillaries leak out red blood cells, which get trapped under the skin, collecting in a pool that forms the blue/purple/red/black blemish. "A bruise is an area of discolored skin on the body caused by a rupture of underlying blood vessels secondary to a blow or impact," explains Dr. Navya Mysore, a New York City-based primary care provider. Bruises can feel tender when they first form, and can be accompanied by some swelling. They usually take about two weeks to heal, but some bruises can last months. During the healing period, the body breaks down and reabsorbs the pooled blood that produced the mark. As this happens, the color of the bruise can fade from dark to light and take on all kinds of interesting hues along the way. Advertisement End of the Rainbow "Right after the injury, bruises are usually red or purple as it's the color of the blood that has pooled underneath the skin," Mysore says. "As the bruise heals, the body breaks down the blood that has accumulated under the skin from the broken vessels. As this happens, the bruise turns different colors varying from black, blue, green to yellow." To break that down a bit: When a bruise first forms, it's usually some shade of red, thanks to the fresh blood just below the skin's surface. It takes about a day or two for hemoglobin (the protein that transports oxygen) to start imbuing the bruise with blue, purple or even black tones. Oxygen is what gives blood that red color in the first place, so when an injury causes hemoglobin to rapidly lose its oxygen, the red tone darkens and changes. After a few more days, the mark usually fades to green or yellow before being hit with a hint of brown and fading away completely. This color change occurs as the body reuses the iron in the hemoglobin to form new red blood cells the unused, decomposed hemoglobin transforms into a green pigment called biliverdin, which then converts into a yellow or light brown-tinged compound called bilirubin. As all these products are either reabsorbed or purged from the body, the mark fades and disappears. Advertisement Who's a Bruiser? Just about everyone gets bruises, but some people are more prone to them than others. Elderly people, for example, may be more likely to bruise due to thinner skin and softer tissue. Other factors, like certain diseases, medical conditions and medications, can also increase a person's risk for bruising. So what do you do when you get a hickey, a shiner or any other form of contusion? Usually, time really does heal all wounds (eventually). "Typically, mild bruises will resolve in a week," Mysore says. "More moderate to severe bruises can take two weeks to even a month to completely resolve. If the injury is forceful you can develop a hematoma, which is a solid swelling of clotted blood within the tissues and this can take many months to resolve but they do on their own." And while there are plenty of urban myths and tales about how to magically banish bruises in a snap, the only legit healing method is to chill literally and figuratively. "Rest the injured area as much as possible and apply ice to the bruise right after the injury happens," Mysore says. And if that isn't helping things move along, try applying some heat to increase blood flow and speed the healing process up a bit. Now That's Interesting If you find yourself constantly battling bruises, you might want to talk to a doctor to investigate whether you have a nutrient deficiency. Because your blood requires vitamin K to clot properly, if you don't have enough, you might bruise more easily. Vitamin C is also important to protect your blood vessels. November 16, 2021 Media contacts: Deidre McCabe, Director, Office of Communications, 410-767-3536 Andy Owen, Deputy Director, Media Relations, 410-767-6491 Travel-Associated Monkeypox virus infection confirmed in Maryland resident Individual presented with mild symptoms; public health authorities currently following up with potentially exposed people, no special precautions recommended for the general public Baltimore, MD The Maryland Department of Health, in collaboration with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), today confirmed a single case of monkeypox virus infection in a Maryland resident who recently returned from Nigeria. The individual presented with mild symptoms, is currently recovering in isolation and is not hospitalized. No special precautions are recommended at this time for the general public. Public health authorities have identified and continue to follow up with those who may have been in contact with the diagnosed individual, said MDH Deputy Secretary for Public Health Dr. Jinlene Chan. Our response in close coordination with CDC officials demonstrates the importance of maintaining a strong public health infrastructure. Monkeypox is in the same family of viruses as smallpox but generally causes a milder infection. It can be spread between people through direct contact with skin lesions or body fluids, or contaminated materials such as clothing or linens. It can also be spread through large respiratory droplets which generally cannot travel more than a few feet, and prolonged face-to-face contact is required. Illness typically begins with flu-like symptoms and swelling of the lymph nodes, progressing to a widespread rash on the face and body. Most infections last 2-4 weeks. The individuals identified as having been potentially exposed to this case will be monitored for symptoms of monkeypox for 21 days after exposure. Human monkeypox infections primarily occur in central and western African countries and have only rarely been documented outside of Africa. Although all strains can cause infection, those circulating in western Africa, where Nigeria is located, generally cause less severe disease. Travelers returning from central or western Africa are advised to notify their health care provider if they develop symptoms of monkeypox, particularly flu-like illness, swollen lymph nodes or rash. Clinicians are urged to maintain a high index of suspicion for clinically compatible illness. Additional details about human monkeypox cases are available on the CDCs website. -###- The Maryland Department of Health is dedicated to protecting and improving the health and safety of all Marylanders through disease prevention, access to care, quality management and community engagement. Follow us on Twitter @MDHealthDept and at Facebook.com/MDHealthDept . For All U of U Health Patients & Visitors New Braunfels, TX (78130) Today Partly cloudy. High 82F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Partly to mostly cloudy. Low near 55F. NW winds at less than 5 mph, increasing to 15 to 25 mph. " " Jim Crow laws mandated segregating mainly blacks from whites, right down to water fountains. The New York Public Library For the better part of a century, African Americans lived under the burden of what now are known as Jim Crow laws. This racist system of segregating people, mainly blacks from whites, infected virtually every sector of American life, and reached far beyond the South where it was best known and most cruelly practiced. Worse yet, Jim Crow and the deep wounds it inflicted on American society are not relegated to the past tense. Its legacy is still felt, in many ways, today. "Jim Crow was about so much more than laws," says Stephen Berrey, a professor of American Culture at the University of Michigan and the author of "The Jim Crow Routine: Everyday Performances of Race, Civil Rights, and Segregation in Mississippi." "It really was an all-encompassing system that involved political practices, economic practices, social practices, cultural practices. Some of that was about legal things, but some of it wasn't. "One of the challenges why Jim Crow often seems like it's in the past, people tend to think that, 'Oh, it was a few laws, and we got rid of segregation laws, and we got the Voting Rights Act, so that must have taken care of it.' "It didn't." Advertisement Who Was Jim Crow? The real-life person, Jim Crow, never was. Crow was a fictional character in a minstrel show, a representation of a black man an exaggerated, stereotypical, racist representation carried out by a white man onstage, in blackface, in the early part of the 19th century. The New York actor's singing, babbling, raggedy version of "Jim Crow" was a hit with many audiences, and by 1838, the term "Jim Crow" had become a racial epithet. As states began passing laws to restrict the rights of slaves freed at the end of the Civil War, the laws came to be known as Jim Crow laws. These laws were said to be enacted for many reasons, but the simplest explanation for them is this: They aimed to maintain white people's claim to first-class status in American society, and to forever keep black people as second class. From the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia at Ferris State University in Big Rapids, Michigan: The Jim Crow system was undergirded by the following beliefs or rationalizations: whites were superior to blacks in all important ways, including but not limited to intelligence, morality, and civilized behavior; sexual relations between blacks and whites would produce a mongrel race which would destroy America; treating blacks as equals would encourage interracial sexual unions; any activity which suggested social equality encouraged interracial sexual relations; if necessary, violence must be used to keep blacks at the bottom of the racial hierarchy. " " Jim Crow laws intended to provide "separate but equal" accommodations for the white and colored races at places like the Rex Theater in Leland, Mississippi. The New York Public Library Advertisement The Birth of Jim Crow Laws The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 freed all slaves from states that had seceded from the Union, and in the following years, three amendments to the U.S. Constitution the 13th (in 1865, abolishing slavery), 14th (1868) and 15th (1870) guaranteed "equal protection" to all citizens (14th) and the right to vote regardless of "race, color, or previous condition of servitude" (15th). The South, humiliated by its loss in the Civil War and what it felt was punishment meted out by the U.S. government, responded by enacting a series of laws over several years to severely restrict the rights that had been granted to blacks. A few early examples: 1866: The Tennessee legislature passed a bill requiring separate schools for blacks and whites. Between 1866 and 1955, Tennessee passed 20 Jim Crow laws, including ones that outlawed miscegenation and required segregation in public accommodations. 1877: The new constitution of the state of Georgia included requirements that primary schools be segregated and established a separate university for blacks. It also instituted a poll tax, which disproportionately affected poor, black people, effectively stripping them of the right to vote. 1890: The Louisiana Railways Accommodation Act (also known as the Separate Car Act) required railways "to provide equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races." That law would be the basis of a chilling Supreme Court decision later that decade. Laws like these kept blacks from voting, and thereby having a say in governance; barred them from holding public office, slanting the justice system against them; restricted them socially (requiring blacks to use different phone booths, drinking fountains, restrooms, etc.); stymied them economically; and, in all, prohibited them from gaining equal footing with white citizens. By themselves, the Jim Crow laws were devastating. But, as Berrey points out, the legal aspect of Jim Crow was only part of the problem. Blacks also were subjected to widespread violence and murder implicitly condoned by much of white society and rarely prosecuted that continued well into the 20th century. The Ku Klux Klan, originally a club for Confederate veterans, was born in the aftermath of the Civil War and has terrorized black people for decades. The Equal Justice Initiative in 2015 released a report, "Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror" that documented, in the period between 1877 and 1950, almost 4,000 lynchings. From the report: Racial terror lynching was a tool used to enforce Jim Crow laws and racial segregation a tactic for maintaining racial control by victimizing the entire African-American community, not merely punishment of an alleged perpetrator for a crime. All this the suffocating laws, the extreme violence had its desired effect. Black people lived in everyday fear. They felt powerless. They were, in every way, made to feel inferior to whites and forced to live that way. "There's this tendency to think of both Jim Crow, specifically, and racism more broadly as being this overt form that looks like the KKK that looks like a cross burning that looks like dramatic acts of violence. Sometimes it is that," Berrey says. "But often it's much more subtle. It's in the air that we breathe and the water that we drink." " " White demonstrators hold signs and American flags protesting the admission of the Little Rock Nine to Central High School in 1957. Buyenlarge/Getty Images Advertisement The Growth of Jim Crow Laws Up until 1896, Jim Crow laws were limited to state and local regulations. But in a landmark case that year, the U.S. Supreme Court codified the laws nationally. In Plessy v. Ferguson, the Court upheld the Louisiana Separate Car Act of 1890. The law's "equal but separate" doctrine, though never stated as such in the Plessy v. Ferguson decision, opened the door for even more restrictive Jim Crow laws in the coming years, including: 1903: In Arkansas, it was unlawful for "any white prisoner to be handcuffed or otherwise chained or tied to a negro prisoner." 1911: In Nebraska, "Marriages are void when one party is a white person and the other is possessed of one-eighth or more negro, Japanese, or Chinese blood." 1926: Atlanta passed a law that stated, "No colored barber shall serve as a barber to white women or girls." Thanks to the green light provided by Plessy v. Ferguson, these laws proliferated throughout the country. In California in 1894, the state's constitution was amended to strip voting rights from anyone "who shall not be able to read the constitution in the English language and write his name." Rights of blacks and other minorities continued to be slashed. Worse, blacks continued to be beaten and lynched, even as African Americans fought and died for their country in World War I and World War II. Pockets of resistance to Jim Crow formed from time to time, Berrey says, especially after black soldiers returned home and pressed for equal treatment for their sacrifices. But the system of oppression remained strong. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, a white mob in Blakely, Georgia, lynched William Little in 1919 for refusing to take off his uniform after returning home from World War I. "African-Americans always challenged the system. They always pushed back. Sometimes it came just in terms of teaching your children how you survive this system," Berrey says. "Not only, 'We want you to know these rules so that you're safe,' but 'We also want you to know that you're just pretending.' "The poet Paul Laurence Dunbar referred to this as, 'We Wear the Mask.' The idea was you're wearing this mask and pretending to go through the rules, but you're learning that that's not who you really are. That you're not really inferior even though you're following those rules that are meant to tell you that." " " (L-r) Julia Aaron and David Dennis are escorted by Mississippi National Guardsmen on a Freedom Riders bus in the segregated southern United States in 1961 between Montgomery, Alabama, and Jackson, Mississippi. Paul Schutzer/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images Advertisement The Death and Legacy of Jim Crow Laws Three years after the end of World War II, July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman desegregated the military, perhaps one of the first real steps toward the downfall of Jim Crow laws. It wasn't until 1954's Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, though, which ruled that separating school children on the basis of race was unconstitutional (overturning the idea of "separate but equal" expressed in the Plessy decision almost 60 years earlier) that Jim Crow laws were truly dealt a fatal blow. "World War II was a huge turning point," Berrey says. "People are always pushing back and fighting. There's this constant struggle. But it became more visible [then], and you do get this mobilization in the mid-1950s." The struggle to free black Americans from Jim Crow had more setbacks to come. The Cold War was a hard time for anyone to question American values, for fear of being branded a communist. But the turbulent 1960s, with the full-throated protests of the Freedom Rides of 1961 and the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1968, helped to solidify the idea that Jim Crow laws were a thing of the past and that segregation had no place in American society. Author Jerrold M. Packard, in "American Nightmare: The History of Jim Crow," wrote that "Jim Crow was a disease that once permeated every fissure and fold of American society." Yet photos of politicians in blackface are still surfacing. In the past few years, voter suppression measures have been introduced by the hundreds. Blacks in America today are incarcerated at a rate more than five times that of whites. Jim Crow laws may be dead. Jim Crow, though, is not. NOW THAT'S INTERESTING The effect of Jim Crow laws on voting, and the disenfranchisement that came along with that, can't be understated. According to the Constitutional Rights Foundation, in 1896, Louisiana had 130,334 black voters. Eight years later, as Southern states limited the right to vote with poll taxes, literacy tests and other laws, only 1,342 blacks in Louisiana could pass the new rules and vote. " " Malcolm X served as Nation of Islam leader from 1953 to 1964, expanding the organization's membership astronomically. Bettmann/Bettmann Archive/Getty Images In the summer of 1963, a young Sudanese student at Dartmouth College named Ahmed Osman was walking through Harlem with a friend when he decided to pop into Muhammad's Temple No. 7. There he encountered a charismatic, 38-year-old minister named Malcolm X, who was delivering a passionate talk on the theology of the Nation of Islam. At the time, Malcolm X was expounding the philosophy of his spiritual leader, Elijah Muhammad, who, among other things, asserted that the white man was the devil. After the talk, there was a Q&A session and Osman challenged Malcolm X, noting that the Islamic faith was a religion that welcomed people of all backgrounds and ethnicities. It was the beginning of a long friendship, which would see Malcolm X through his pivotal rejection of Elijah Muhammad and his conversion to Sunni Islam. And it was Osman who arranged for his friend to perform hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca. The hajj was a watershed moment in Malcolm X's life a multi-ethnic gathering of peoples united not by culture or skin color, but by faith. This was a revelatory experience for someone who had grown up in a society permeated by racism. Advertisement Malcolm's Early Life Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1925. It's a lesser-known fact that he could just as easily have been born in Montreal, Quebec. That's where his parents met in 1917. His mother, Louisa Langdon Norton, was a recent immigrant from Grenada, who had moved to the Little Burgundy neighborhood of Montreal to live with her uncle. Malcolm's father, Earl Little, had left his first wife and three children in small-town Georgia and joined the Great Northward Migration, eventually landing in the City of a Hundred Steeples. Earl and Louisa met after joining the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), founded by the Jamaican visionary, Marcus Garvey. Garvey's Pan-African perspective would have a life-long influence on Malcolm's thought. As activists in the movement, his parents moved first to Philadelphia, and then to Omaha to man an outpost of the organization there. It was dangerous work. Earl Little received numerous death threats and one night, when he was out of town, hooded Klansmen bearing torches came looking for him. When a pregnant Louise informed them that he was away, they shattered every window in the house before leaving. After Malcolm's birth, the family moved several times, eventually taking up residence in Lansing, Michigan. There, despite being burned out of the family's new house mostly likely by white neighbors Earl continued his activism on behalf of the UNIA, taking his favorite child, 5-year-old Malcolm to meetings. In September 1931, Earl died after being cut nearly in two by a street car. Although his death was ruled as accidental, many suspected that he'd been murdered by a local white supremacist organization. Earl's death was a pivotal event in Malcolm's childhood. His mother never fully recovered from the shock of it and the sudden burden of becoming an impoverished single parent. She suffered a breakdown and her children ended up in foster care and orphanages. By 1946, Malcolm was in Boston, where he was arrested for burglary and sentenced to 10 years in prison. " " Malcolm X was considered the radical voice of the civil rights movement, offering a different solution for those who wanted an alternative to Martin Luther King Jr.'s non-violent approach. Truman Moore/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images Advertisement Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam He spent seven years behind bars before being paroled. During that time, he read widely and joined the Nation of Islam, the sect of Black Muslims his brother Reginald had joined. They preached and embraced an ideology of Black nationalism that pushed for Black Americans to establish a state separate from white Americans. He changed his name to Malcolm X before he was released from prison in 1952. Once out of prison, Malcolm X quickly established himself as the Nation of Islam's most articulate and successful spokesman. He worked with Elijah Muhammad to further expound the Nation of Islam's message from Temple No. 7 in Harlem and Temple No. 11 in Boston where he was a minister. His teachings and speeches were militant in style he preached that whites were not to be trusted. He suggested Black people use "any means necessary," including violence, to gain their freedom. His electrifying speeches rang true with Black crowds, and by the 1960s, he became the radical voice of the civil rights movement. Malcolm X offered a different solution for those looking for an alternative to Martin Luther King Jr.'s non-violent approach. Under Malcolm X's leadership, national membership in the Nation of Islam increased from 1,200 in 1953 to as many as 75,000 by 1961. But that influence also earned him the unwanted attention of the FBI, which infiltrated the Nation of Islam with agents who bugged and wiretapped members. It later emerged that one of Malcolm's bodyguards was, in fact, an FBI agent. Advertisement His Journey to Mecca All this time, Malcolm X strictly adhered to the teachings of the Nation of Islam, including his commitment to celibacy until his marriage to Betty Shabazz in 1958. This made it even more painful when he learned in 1963 that his spiritual leader, Elijah Muhammad, was secretly carrying on illicit relationships with six different women, some of whom had borne his children, violating his own teachings. It was at this point that Malcolm broke with Muhammad and the Nation of Islam, founded his own organization, Muslim Mosque, Inc. and went on hajj. It was in Saudi Arabia that he also converted to Sunni Islam and changed his name again to El-hajj Malik El-Shabazz. He returned to the United States with a renewed faith in the civil rights movement and race relations. But because of his enormous influence on the Nation of Islam, such a cataclysmic shift was bound to create dangerous waves. The FBI agents in his circle learned that he was marked for death by elements of the Nation of Islam. His house was firebombed, though none of the family was injured. " " After his split from the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X had a renewed faith in working with civil rights leaders. Here he's seen in 1964 with (from left) Lawrence Landry (Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, Chicago), Gloria Richardson (Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee), comedian Dick Gregory and Stanley Branche (Committee for Freedom Now). Bettmann/Bettmann Archive/Getty Images Advertisement His Assassination But the net was closing in. On Feb. 21, 1965, as he was preparing to give a talk in the packed Grand Ballroom of the Audubon in Washington Heights, Manhattan, a disturbance broke out in the crowd. As two men tussled in the audience, Malcolm's security guards moved to intervene, leaving him alone on stage. A man in the front row stood, walked quickly to within 15 feet (4.5 meters) of Malcolm X, pulled a sawed-off shotgun from under his winter coat and opened fire. Two other gunmen followed him. In all, they shot Malcolm X 15 times. He was dead by the time he got to the hospital. He was just 39. Tens of thousands of people viewed Malcolm X's body and at his funeral, his friend, the actor Ossie Davis delivered the eulogy. Three men were arrested for the assassination and eventually sentenced to life in prison. One of them, Tommy Hayer, was caught at the scene and confessed to the crime, but he insisted that the other two men convicted were actually innocent. Years later, after the death of Elijah Muhammad, Hayer revealed the names of his four other co-conspirators, all members of the NOI. None of them had been paid, he insisted. They believed at the time that they were doing right thing. In the wake of his assassination, Malcolm X only gained more fame. His autobiography, co-written by Alex Haley, became an international bestseller and an enormously influential work. Years later, Spike Lee's feature film treatment of Malcolm's story reignited interest in the life and teachings of one of the 20th century's most important cultural figures. " " After his assassination, thousands of mourners lined up outside of Unity Funeral in Harlem to pay their respects to Malcolm X. Library of Congress Now That's Interesting On Nov. 17, 2021, the Manhattan district attorney said two men, Muhammad A. Aziz and Khalil Islam, who were found guilty for the assassination of Malcolm X, will likely have their convictions overturned. After a 22-month found that prosecutors, the FBI and New York Police Department withheld key evidence during their trial that likely would have led to their acquittal. Advertisement Originally Published: Mar 11, 2021 1. Yes. The Schlueter Group has extensive experience and contacts. Its a good investment. 2. Yes. The firms namesake has a background as a legislator and knows Killeen well. 3. No. The expenditure is a waste of money. Our lawmakers should be doing that work. 4. No. The contract should be shorter, incentivized and based on performance benchmarks. 5. Unsure. Its not always easy to quantify the outcomes of lobbying efforts. Vote View Results Actress Sues Over Contingent Compensation from `Hustle & Flow A Hustle & Flow actress is suing a production company formed by the late director John Singleton, saying she is owed contingent compensation from the 2005 film he co-produced. Taryn Mannings Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit against Crunk Pictures LLC alleges breach of contract and seeks an accounting. She maintains that under a May 2004 agreement with Crunk Pictures she is entitled to 1% of 100% of the net profits derived from exploitation of the picture. Manning alleges she is owed at least $812,245 in the suit brought Friday. A Crunk Pictures representative could not be immediately reached. Mannings accountant and attorney contacted various people about the money she is allegedly owed and a Crunk representative said on Sept. 21 that the company does not owe plaintiff anything in connection with the picture, the suit states. The 43-year-old Manning is best known for portraying Tiffany Pennsatucky Doggett in the Netflix original series, Orange Is the New Black. ADVERTISEMENT Hustle & Flow starred Terrence Howard as a Memphis hustler and pimp who aspired to become a rapper. The movie was an Academy Award for best original song for, Its Hard out Here for a Pimp. The film was produced by Singleton and Stephanie Allain. Singleton, who founded Crunk Pictures in 2004, died in April 2019 of a stroke at age 51. Costco Alerts Customers to Recall of Kool-Aid Mix Due to Possible Metal, Glass Costco is warning its customers about a recall of Kool-Aid Tropical Punch drink mix that was sold in some of its business centers and warehouses in the Los Angles area. According to a notice from the Kraft Heinz Co. and circulated to Costco members, the recall is due to the potential presence of foreign material, specifically small pieces of metal or glass. Costco indicated that the drink mix was sold in business centers and stores in the Los Angeles area and in the Northwest. The affected drink mix is Costco item #95740, and has a Best When Used By date of 8-31-2023 or 9-1-2023. People who purchased the mix are being urged to return it to a Costco store for a full refund. ADVERTISEMENT LA County To Probe Alleged Beating of Fostered Boy, DCFS Policies The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted today to have the Office of Child Protection investigate the circumstances of a 4-year-old boy who was allegedly tortured and beaten by his foster mother, leaving the boy in a coma. Supervisor Janice Hahn, who represents Norwalk, where the boy was living, called for the probe shortly after the boys extended family went public with his story. If these allegations are true, we put him in the care of an abusive foster mother who hurt him so severely he had to be hospitalized, Hahn told her colleagues during a virtual meeting Tuesday. We not only need to know how this was possible but we also need to question why he was removed from his mother in the first place. ADVERTISEMENT Both Hahn and Supervisor Hilda Solis suggested that language or cultural barriers may have played a role in social workers decision to remove the boy from his family. Its really tragic what happened to this little boy and probably could have been avoided had we done a better job of assessing the young child and really understanding his cultural and linguistic abilities, Solis said. The motion also directs the Department of Children and Family Services to assess the experience and tenure of the social workers involved, as well as to review the departments policies and training on forensic evaluation and referrals to medical care. Several residents and activists told the board the child welfare system needs to be changed. Chris Martin, a co-leader of the Reimagine Child Safety Coalition and a lawyer who has represented parents seeking to maintain custody of their children, said DCFS policies target and harm Black, brown and Indigenous families. The coalition estimates that 40% of foster children are Black, far out of proportion to the 9% of county residents who are Black. Ive personally seen DCFS unnecessarily ruin the lives of countless families, Martin said. Some of these parents have gotten their kids taken away because they smoke marijuana. Others because they are victims of domestic violence (who reached out to the police). Martin also said children should not be separated from their parents simply because the parents use or have used drugs. A drug test is not a parenting test, Martin said. The sad thing here is that a number of these kids are going to go into homes where they are even more traumatized by foster parents. Martin urged the board to review the coalitions demands, which include a call to end the partnership between the DCFS and law enforcement. ADVERTISEMENT The group says about 25% of DCFS calls originate with law enforcement, and social workers work together with police or sheriffs deputies to enter homes and remove children, a practice they say further traumatizes kids. Both Hahn and Solis expressed interest in the coalitions ideas. We do have to reimagine what the services look like because it is dysfunctional, Solis said. The L.A. County Sheriffs Department confirmed last week that the boys foster mother, Gabriela Casarez, was arrested Oct. 29 on suspicion of child abuse, one day after the Special Victims Bureau was called to a location in the 14700 block of Pioneer Boulevard in Norwalk. The boy identified as Andres F. in a criminal complaint filed against his foster mother sustained grave injuries and was admitted to an intensive care unit. An update on his status was not available Tuesday, although Hahn said she was continuing to pray for his recovery. Casarez pleaded not guilty to three felony counts two counts of child abuse likely to cause great bodily injury or death and one count of assault on a child becoming comatose, according to court records. Last Monday, the boys aunt came forward to say his extended family is struggling to get more information on what happened, and has been barred from visiting the boy. The aunt, Maria Jacinto, spoke out during a news conference that morning, standing alongside lawyer Michael Adler. They dont deserve this at all. No kid deserves this, in any care, under anybodys care, Jacinto said. Were just asking for justice and information. Jacinto appeared to be referencing both Andres F. and his 2-year-old brother, Emiliano, who is also reportedly in foster care. Adler said Andres was in the care of his foster family when he was severely beaten. We have no evidence that he was with anyone other than this foster family, and theres clear evidence that he was tortured and beaten into a coma, Adler said. The criminal complaint against Casarez names Emiliano F. as a second victim of abuse likely to cause great bodily injury or death. In the case of both Andres and Emiliano, the complaint cites the date of abuse as occurring on or between June 4 and Oct. 28. Casarez is being held in lieu of $1.2 million bail and is due back in court Dec. 6, according to court records and the LASD. The DCFS issued a statement last week saying that confidentiality protects children and families and prohibits the release of specific information. But the department defended the process of choosing foster families. Licensure of resource families involves rigorously examining the suitability of potential families to identify safe, nurturing and supportive homes for children in foster care, the statement read in part. The DCFS oversees the care of approximately 32,000 children countywide. A report on the investigation is expected back in 45 days. The drug maker Pfizer has signed a deal with a United Nations-supported group to permit other producers to make its experimental COVID-19 pill. The agreement could make the medicine available to more than half of the worlds population. In a statement released Tuesday, Pfizer said it would permit the Switzerland-based organization Medicines Patent Pool to produce the antiviral drug. That would let generic drug companies produce the pill for use in 95 countries. About 53 percent of the worlds population live in those 95 countries. The agreement does not include some countries that have struggled with large numbers of coronavirus deaths. For example, a Brazilian drug company could be permitted to make the pill for export to other countries, but the medicine could not be made for use in Brazil. But health officials note that because the deal was reached even before Pfizers drug has been approved anywhere, the agreement could help to end the pandemic sooner. Esteban Burrone is head of policy at Medicines Patent Pool. He said, Its quite significant that we will be able to provide access to a drug that appears to be effective and has just been developed, to more than 4 billion people. He estimated that other drug makers would be able to start producing the pill within months. But he said he understands that the agreement may not make everyone happy. We try to strike a very delicate balance between the interests of the (company), the sustainability required by generic producers and most importantly, the public health needs in lower and middle-income countries, Burrone said. As part of the agreement, Pfizer will not receive royalties on sales in poor countries. Royalties means money that is paid to the creator of a product based on how much of the product is sold. Pfizer will also not get royalties on sales in any countries included in the agreement while COVID-19 remains a public health emergency. Earlier this month, Pfizer said its pill cuts the risk of hospitalization and death by nearly 90 percent in people with mild to moderate coronavirus infections. Health experts said the company should stop its trials based on such good results. Pfizer said it would ask the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and other agencies to approve the pill as soon as possible. Since the pandemic started spreading last year, researchers around the world have worked to create a drug to treat COVID-19 at home and keep people out of the hospital. Currently, most COVID-19 treatments must be taken through the bloodstream. Britain approved Mercks COVID-19 pill earlier this month. In a similar deal with the Medicines Patent Pool announced in October, Merck agreed to let other drug makers produce its COVID-19 pill. It is available in 105 poorer countries. Doctors Without Borders said it was disheartened that the Pfizer deal does not make the drug available to the whole world. The group noted that the agreement announced Tuesday does not include countries like China, Argentina or Thailand. Yuanqiong Hu is Doctors Without Borders. She said, The world knows by now that access to COVID-19 medical tools needs to be guaranteed for everyone, everywhere, if we really want to control this pandemic. Although Pfizer has agreed to share its COVID-19 drug, the company and others have not released their vaccine instructions for use in other countries. The World Health Organization in South Africa invited pharmaceutical companies to share online their messenger RNA vaccine instructions and technologies. But no companies have taken part. Less than 1 percent of Pfizers COVID-19 shots has gone to poorer countries. Im Dan Novak. The Associated Press reported this story. Dan Novak adapted it for VOA Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor. _______________________________________ Words in This Story experimental adj. made or done in order to see how well something works generic adj. not sold or made under a particular brand name significant adj. large enough to be noticed or have an effect delicate adj. easily broken or damaged sustainable adj. able to be used without being completely used up or destroyed income n. money that is earned from work, investments, business, etc. access n. a way of getting near, at, or to something or someone A new report finds that more international students are coming to the United States after a sharp drop because of the coronavirus health crisis last year. About 15 percent fewer international students studied in the U.S. or took classes from U.S. universities online during the school year that ended last spring compared to the year before. Those findings were released recently by the Institute of International Education, IIE, based in New York City in partnership with the U.S. State Department. The IIE published the yearly Open Doors Report on International Educational Exchange. In 2021, the group found that students are coming back to the U.S. About four percent more students came to America for the 2021-2022 school year compared to last year. During a presentation Monday, the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Department of Education said the coronavirus pandemic changed educational exchange a lot. Matthew Lussenhop is the Acting Assistant Secretary for the State Departments Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. He said he is hopeful about the strength and resilience of the worlds educational community during the last 20 months. He said the U.S. government knows how important international exchange is to building a more understanding world. We will continue to work together to expand access to global learning and engagement opportunities for international and American students, scholars and researchers. Fewer new students IIE research showed that about 55,000 fewer Chinese students studied at U.S. universities last school year. That was the biggest drop. China sends the most students to the U.S. About 30 percent of the international student population in America comes from China. India is second with 18 percent. The most popular fields of study for international students are engineering, math and computer science. Over 40 percent of international students study those subjects each year. The pandemic cut by 45 percent the number of new international students studying in the U.S. The report included students taking classes in person and those attending classes by video from home. About 45,000 fewer international students worked on graduate degrees during the 2020-2021 school year compared to the year before. The IIE report showed that the number of students already studying in the U.S. did not change very much, dropping just three percent. The recent report was not as worrying as some people expected based on the increase in coronavirus infections over the summer. The Associated Press reported that a slowdown in visa processing, vaccinations and international travel for young people were the reasons for the lower numbers. For example, Vinh Le is a student from Vietnam studying at the University of San Francisco. He only made it to California on November 1 because of travel restrictions at home. He was not able to get vaccinated and to Ho Chi Minh City for a flight to the U.S. Instead, he took classes by computer from home for two months. He said his professors were very supportive and helped him by recording classes so he could watch them in Vietnam. Some Chinese students who are supposed to be taking classes at New York University, NYU, but cannot get to the U.S., are using the universitys center in Shanghai for study. In normal times, that center is used by NYUs American students studying in China. NYU is doing better than in 2019. The school said 14 percent more international students are taking classes this year compared to before the pandemic. At the University of Illinois, the school lost 28 percent of its international students last school year. But this year, student numbers have returned to the level of 2019-2020. "A return to normal" Andy Borst is the University of Illinois director of undergraduate admissions. Undergraduates are students who have not yet earned a college degree. He said those students increased the most. India sent 70 percent more students than before the pandemic. He called the numbers a return to normal for our international populations. He said the demand for higher education was pent-up. Lussenhop, from the State Department, said the U.S. expects the increase in student interest to continue because students continue to value a U.S. education. Some people give credit to the administration of President Joe Biden for speaking in support of international students. In July, U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Education Secretary Miguel Cardona recorded video messages that welcomed international students to the U.S. Rachel Banks is director of public policy and legislative planning for NAFSA, an organization that supports international education based in Washington. She said the new administration is telling the world international students are important for the U.S. Experts are worried, however, that the increase in students will only help schools that are already popular. They think smaller schools and community colleges may not recover. Across the U.S., the two-year schools suffered a 24 percent loss of international students. In addition, researchers are still trying to find out if the jump in students will continue past this school year. Universities in Canada, Australia and Great Britain were competing for students with the U.S. even before the pandemic. Im Dan Friedell. Dan Friedell wrote this story for Learning English based on a report by the Associated Press and information from IIE. Mario Ritter, Jr. was the editor. Do you think the number of international students in the U.S. will continue to grow after this year? Tell us in the Comments Section and visit our Facebook page. Quiz - International Students Returning to US Start the Quiz to find out Start Quiz _____________________________________________________________________ Words in This Story resilience n. the ability to be strong enough to recover quickly after a crisis engagement n. the act or state of being involved with something scholars n. someone who has been given a scholarship graduate degree n. a degree given by a college or university to someone who has already received an undergraduate degree pent-up adj. held or kept inside; not released yet Russia has denied that a missile test that destroyed an orbiting satellite endangered the crew on the International Space Station (ISS). U.S. officials said Monday the missile hit an old Russian satellite, which burst into more than a thousand pieces. They said this debris thrown into orbit at about 28,000 kilometers per hour could cause major damage to the ISS. The American space agency NASA said all seven members of the ISS crew were directed to seek safety in their spaceship capsules for two hours. The crew includes four American astronauts, a German astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the satellite strike reckless and irresponsible behavior. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told The Associated Press the action had put ISS astronauts at four times greater risk than usual. Russia's Defense Ministry confirmed Tuesday it carried out a missile test and destroyed a non-operational satellite that had been in orbit since 1982. But the ministry added that the strike was planned and carried out carefully. It said any resulting debris did not and will not pose a threat to orbital stations, spacecraft and space activities. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg agreed with U.S. officials that the Russian strike had put the space station at risk. He told reporters in Brussels the action was also concerning because it demonstrates that Russia is now developing new weapons systems that can shoot down the satellites. Experts say such tests create clouds of small debris pieces that can crash into other objects, sometimes leading to a chain reaction of dangerous flying objects through Earths orbit. NASA said the increased threat could delay some science research and other planned ISS activities. Four of the seven crew members just arrived at the station Thursday night. A similar weapons test by China in 2007 also resulted in a large amount of debris. One of those pieces threatened to come dangerously close to the ISS last week, but was later ruled out as a risk. The U.S. carried out missile tests on similar satellites in 2008, as did India in 2019. But those tests took place well below the ISS, which orbits around 420 kilometers above Earth. Im Bryan Lynn. Reuters and The Associated Press reported on this story. Bryan Lynn adapted the reports for VOA Learning English. Caty Weaver was the editor. We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments section, and visit our Facebook page. _________________________________________________ Words in This Story debris n. broken or torn pieces that come from something larger capsule n. the part of a spacecraft that people live in reckless adj. showing a lack of care about risks or danger pose v. to cause a problem chain reaction n. a series of events in which each one causes the next one to happen Gue Gue used to be a travel guide in Mandalay, Myanmar, an ancient royal city that has moved quickly into the 21st century. Today, it has shiny new shopping centers, well-dressed students and popular eateries. Gue had never thought of herself as politically active. But that changed earlier this year. Myanmars military seized power in a coup on February 1, overthrowing the civilian government. In the months that followed, hundreds of protesters were killed by troops on the streets. Now, Gue is in a hidden rebel training camp. The members of the resistance say they will fight the final battle against military rule. Todays generation of young people have grown up in a world of smartphones and greater political freedom, unlike their parents. They say they are ready to pay any price in order to overthrow a government that threatens to take them back to a dark past. On an April evening, Gue Gue secretly left her family home. A few weeks later, she was in a rebel training camp in the jungle. There, she had a medical emergency her appendix was infected and had to be removed. The operation was carried out in a poorly equipped medical center without any medicine to take away the pain. She had to stay awake during the operation. Since the coup, Gue Gue had seen many of her generation killed by troops on the streets of her hometown as they called for democracy. There was hope that the international community would take action against the militarys increasing violence. When no action was taken, thousands like Gue Gue decided the only choice was force. Two faces of the resistance The army has been the most powerful institution in the country since it became an independent nation in 1948. The military has stood against popular uprisings and civil war for many years. That includes the 1988 uprising that led to the appearance of Aung San Suu Kyi as a human rights leader. The men and women rebelling against Myanmars military say they will be the last generation to live under the control of the countrys military. In the months since the February coup, university teachers, day laborers, technology workers, students, artists and others have become guerrilla fighters. The International Crisis Group reported in October that hundreds of armed groups have begun operating across the country. Many groups call themselves Peoples Defense Forces, or PDFs. Famous people and actors, wanted by the officials for supporting the protests, have appeared on social media holding guns. Tayzar San is a 32-year-old librarian. He and others like him have been hiding in cities, organizing secret demonstrations, sending money to striking workers and planning. He lives out of a backpack, moving from place to place. The government has offered a $5,600 reward for his capture. He has not seen his wife and daughter in many months. The junta has promised to hold elections within two years. Speaking in October, army chief and coup leader Min Aung Hlaing said the junta was working on a plan to reach a true union based on democracy and federalism. He said the leadership was working to change the country peacefully. The country of 55 million people once seemed to be on its way to becoming Asias newest semi-democratic nation. In the 70 years since it won independence from colonial Britain, it has had less than 25 years of civilian governance. House arrest for Suu Kyi Aung San Suu Kyi was imprisoned in her home for 15 years. She was freed to take part in elections and, in 2015, won. In the following years, Suu Kyi drew criticism for standing by the military as they carried out what the United Nations called a genocidal campaign against the Rohingya Muslim minority. But Suu Kyis government made some steps toward weakening military power and gaining foreign investment. The Myanmar kyat became Asias best-performing money. The World Bank was predicting economic growth in the country even with the COVID-19 health crisis. That all came to an end in the early hours of February 1. Suu Kyi and her leadership were arrested. The junta declared a direct return to military rule. The rights group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, or AAPP. says more than 1,200 people have since been killed in attacks by junta troops. Hundreds have also been killed by the resistance, according to the junta and local media reports. They say newly formed guerrilla groups have killed suspected informers and troops. The fighting spread across the country. Longtime activist Bo Kyi is a co-founder of the AAPP. He believes the junta can now be defeated. He said the young rebels have creative ideas and good political understanding. They are trying to unite the countrys many ethnic groups. Smartphones and the internet have made it harder for the military to hide its actions. On social media, reports of acts of violence spread widely in minutes. The librarian Three days after the coup, Tayzar San and some friends gathered outside the medical university in Mandalay. They held signs that read Protect democracy, Peoples protest against military rule and Respect the peoples votes. They left quickly, but minutes later police arrested four of the young men. Their actions helped set off a wave of protests around the country. Tayzar San left his family to keep them safe. He began to organize daily protests. On Facebook, he called on people to take to the streets: Dont look for a leader, dont wait All the people in the community, please come out. At home, his daughter has turned two years old and only sees him on television. The jungle In April, after the long bus ride from Mandalay, Gue Gue and her friends were led by their contacts to an old school in a village close to the jungle. One of them said Gue Gue was the first woman to go for the training there. They told me that they dont accept women, because they havent prepared anything, Gue Gue said. It will be so tiring, they said. I told them: I dont care whether it is tiring. I must join. From there, they traveled to the training camp, and several more women arrived. Together, they built up the camp. Over the phone, Gue Gue said she now understands she had never done anything truly difficult in her life before. She said she never dreamed she would be living in the conditions she was in. After weeks of silence, Gue Gue sent a short message to Reuters reporters in early September. Her group had to move its camp because the military was coming their way. I dont want the people to forget about the young people who are sacrificing their lives on the ground, Gue Gue said by phone. Were still here. Im Jill Robbins. Poppy McPherson and Shoon Naing reported on this story for Reuters news service. Jill Robbins adapted it for Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor. ___________________________________________________________ Words in This Story jungle n. a tropical forest where plants and trees grow very thickly institution n. an established organization uprising n. a usually violent effort by many people to change the government or leader of a country reward n. money or another kind of payment that is given or received for something that has been done or that is offered for something that might be done librarian n. a person who works in a library (a place where many books are kept and may be borrowed) backpack n. a bag for carrying things that has two shoulder straps and is carried on the back junta n. a military group controlling a government after taking control of it by force according to prep. as stated, reported, or recorded by (someone or something) infrastructure n. the basic equipment and structures (such as roads and bridges) that are needed for a country, region, or organization to function properly What do you think of the young Burmese who are fighting the military government? We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section. Welcome to the Center of Taiwan Studies (CTS) In partnership with Taiwan's Ministry of Education, the Department of Asian Studies has expanded the Taiwan Studies program into the Center for Taiwan Studies, a multidisciplinary facility dedicated to promoting Taiwans society, history and culture on the UT campus. Asian Studies Professor Sung-sheng Yvonne Chang spearheaded the development of the center, receiving a grant from the Taiwanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs for her proposal to broaden Taiwan Studies to include the wide array of UT activity related to Taiwan. UT has long been recognized as an institution committed to research on Taiwan literature and its socio-historical contexts, launching one of the first Taiwan studies programs in the country in 2009. The creation of the Center for Taiwan Studies was announced at a signing ceremony on campus on March 22, attended by Texas state representatives, leaders from the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office (TECO) in Houston and faculty from the College of Liberal Arts. The agreement was signed by Dr. Sonia Feigenbaum, senior vice provost for global engagement and chief international officer, and TECO Director-General Robert Fu-Wen Lo. Attendees included congressman Michael McCaul, associate dean of Liberal Arts Robert Crosnoe, chair of Asian Studies Donald Davis, professor Sung-sheng Yvonne Chang, associate professor Tse-Min Lin, executive assistant to senior vice provost for global engagement Cheryl Lane, TECO Division Director Patrick Ho, TECO Education Division Director Andrea Yang, Texas state representative Angie Chen Button and Carl B. Mica, state director of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz. Among all of the things weve accomplished in the last 12 years, I take the greatest pride in the fact that the Taiwan Studies Program offered 42 Taiwan-focused courses on 24 different topics spread over seven departments in three different colleges, Chang said. There are now over 1,000 UT students who have taken at least one semester-long course on some Taiwan-related subject. I believe the knowledge theyve acquiredand the very experience of taking the coursewould make a meaningful difference to their personal lives, and to the State of Texas, once these students graduated and entered society. The signing builds upon a long history of engagement between UT and Taiwan. Taiwanese international students represent one of the largest populations studying at UT, and many Taiwanese alumni are now serving in faculty and leadership positions at higher education institutions in Taiwan. Hundreds of UT students have studied, interned and conducted research in Taiwan. Texas Global recently awarded a Global Virtual Exchange grant to education associate professor James Patton to teach a virtual exchange course in collaboration with the National Taiwan Normal University. Among the many activities at the center, Taiwan Studies brings distinguished visitors from Taiwan to campus, supports student and faculty research on Taiwan, hosts a variety of international symposia and offers courses in language, culture, history and society of Taiwan. Story Orginally from Texas Global Fig. 1: BH3-mimetics and BH3-only proteins upregulate BCL-2 and MCL-1 causing apoptotic resistance. a Schematic model of the mitoprimed system. b HeLa tBID2A cells were treated with venetoclax (ven) and imaged over time. Percentage of dead cells was determined by staining all cells with Syto 21 and dead cells with propidium iodide. n = 3 independent experiments; mean values s.e.m.; unpaired, two-sided t-test at 24 h. c HeLa tBID2A cells were treated with 500 nM venetoclax, harvested at the indicated time points and protein expression was analyzed by western blot (representative blot of three independent repeats). d HeLa tBID2A cells were treated for 48 h with 500 nM venetoclax followed by replacement with regular growth medium (washout). At the indicated times post medium change cells were harvested and protein expression was analyzed by western blot (representative blot of three independent repeats). e HeLa tBID2A cells were treated with or without venetoclax as indicated for 48 h followed by treatment with venetoclax and the MCL-1 inhibitor S63845. Cell death was then monitored by Sytox Green staining and Incucyte imaging. n = 3 independent experiments; mean values s.e.m. f Control or BAX BAKCRISPR HeLa tBID2A cells were treated with 500 nM venetoclax in combination with 10 M qVD-OPh as indicated for 48 h, harvested and protein expression was analyzed by western blot (representative blot of three independent repeats). g Control or BAX BAKCRISPR HeLa cells were transfected with tBID-GFP plasmid, harvested after the indicated times and protein expression was analyzed by western blot. Fold change normalized to loading control is stated below (representative blot of three independent repeats). Credit: DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26613-0 Glasgow scientists have uncovered important information about how cancer cells become resistant to certain treatments, according to research published in Nature Communications. Scientists at the University of Glasgow and Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute have found that dying cancer cells release a protein called FGF2, which helps neighboring cancer cells temporarily cheat death and gives them the opportunity to regrow into new drug-resistant tumors. The scientists believe that this crucial information could help make chemotherapy more effective, reducing the chances of relapse in cancer patients. In the lab, the scientists tested cancer cells with a drug called venetoclax, which stops cancer from growing by activating the cell's self-destruct mechanism, known as programmed cell death. Venetoclax is commonly used to treat chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML). The scientists found that adding dead cancer cells, which had been given venetoclax, to live cancer cells resulted in those live cancer cells becoming resistant to the drug. They identified that FGF2 was responsible for protecting the live cancer cells from death caused by venetoclax. Further experiments showed that removing FGF2 made the cells susceptible to the drug again. Professor Stephen Tait from the Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute, who led the research, said: "Drug resistance is a major complication in many different types of cancer. Our study has shown for the first time how cancer cells can become resistant to treatment and how we can overcome that resistance. "Cancer will take every opportunity it can find to cheat death, but we believe we can stop it from escaping by using existing treatments more effectively." Interestingly, when the scientists looked at tissue samples from cancer patients and examined the levels of FGF activation in those samples, they found that those patients with higher levels of FGF activation were given a poorer prognosis by their doctor. This finding suggests a potential link between the cancer's ability to cheat death and the patient's chances of long-term survival. Professor Tait said: "Understanding how drug resistance builds in cancer will allow us to use existing treatments more effectively, as well as helping us to develop new treatments that minimize the chance of cancer coming back. "Further research is needed to confirm the clinical significance of our findings, but we believe our research could help us target treatments more effectively to the characteristics from each patient's tumor." Leukemia is the 12th most common cancer in the UK. There are around 9,907 new cases in the UK each year. Graeme Sneddon, Cancer Research UK spokesperson for Scotland, said: "This research increases our understanding of how drug resistance develops in cancer at a cellular level. "It shows for the first time how cancer cells can temporarily cheat death and regroup, with significant implications for how we use chemotherapy. With this vital information, we can stop cancer from fighting back by smarter use of existing treatments. "Further studies are now needed in patients to see which drug combinations and doses work best to overcome potential resistance and help more people survive cancer." Explore further Two drugs are better than one in fight against leukaemia More information: Florian J. Bock et al, Apoptotic stress-induced FGF signalling promotes non-cell autonomous resistance to cell death, Nature Communications (2021). Journal information: Nature Communications Florian J. Bock et al, Apoptotic stress-induced FGF signalling promotes non-cell autonomous resistance to cell death,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26613-0 Credit: CC0 Public Domain Hospitals in Michigan and Minnesota on Tuesday reported a wave of COVID-19 patients not seen in months as beds were filled with unvaccinated people and health care leaders warned that staff were being worn down by yet another surge. Michigan had slightly more than 3,000 COVID-19 patients in hospitals this week, the first time it had crossed that threshold since spring, while nearly all hospital beds were occupied in Minnesota. Both held the unflattering rank of national virus hotspots. It "should be alarming to all of us," Bob Riney, chief operating officer at Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, said of the hospital crush. The overall outlook has improved significantly in recent weeks in the U.S., with coronavirus hospitalizations standing at about 40,000, compared with more than 90,000 at the peak of the delta surge. Virus spread has slowed in the South to the point that more locations are doing away with mask restrictions. But pockets of the country are seeing surges, including the Northeast, Rockies and Upper Midwest. Henry Ford Health and Spectrum Health across the state in Grand Rapids, Michigan, together reported 700 COVID-19 patients in their hospitals, the majority of whom were not vaccinated. Positive test rates were running above 20%. Michigan had the country's highest seven-day COVID-19 case rate at 503 per 100,000 people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Minnesota was No. 2 at 490. "All of us had hoped that we'd be in a very different place as we approach this Thanksgiving season. But we really are not," Riney said. When he listens to front-line staff, Riney said they are disheartened to see more COVID-19 cases, especially when vaccines are available. "These are the women and men that the community celebrated last year," he said. "Parades were held in their honor. They were touted as the heroes they are. ... They haven't gotten a break." In Minnesota, Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm said she's ready to expand access to the booster vaccine by the end of the week if the federal government doesn't act first. An influential U.S. advisory panel will discuss expanding eligibility booster shots to all adults Friday, a move that could make the shots available nationwide as early as this weekend. Pfizer asked U.S. regulators last week to allow boosters of its COVID-19 vaccine for anyone 18 or older. The Food and Drug Administration is expected to sign off on Pfizer's application before the advisory panel meets Friday. The final stepthe CDC's official recommendationcould come soon after the meeting. "As we now head indoors for the winter and gather for the holidays, this booster protection is particularly important and timely," Malcolm said. Meanwhile, a growing number of Americans are getting boosters. Arkansas this week joined California, Colorado, West Virginia and New Mexico in offering them to anyone 18 or older instead of only giving them to people at a greater risk for COVID-19 or age 65 and up. Elsewhere, some communities in the South were easing virus restrictions as a result of high vaccination rates and low numbers of positive tests. Louisiana State University dropped an indoor mask order on campus. More than eight out of every 10 students and 79% of staff are vaccinated against COVID-19. "We are moving forward with confidence but with caution," President William Tate said. Masks and social distancing now are optional in Florida courthouses. Chief Justice Charles Canady noted that nearly 70% of eligible Florida residents were fully vaccinated and the rate of new COVID-19 cases had dropped. In Orange County, Florida, which includes Orlando, county employees are no longer required to wear masks indoors, although masks still are recommended. Local virus transmission risk was downgraded to moderate. Explore further Colorado governor says all adults can get COVID booster shot 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. A case of monkeypox in a traveler who returned to the United States from Nigeria is being investigated by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and the Maryland Department of Health. The infected person is currently in isolation in Maryland. Monkeypox is a rare but potentially serious viral illness that typically begins with flu-like symptoms and swelling of the lymph nodes, and then progresses to a widespread rash on the face and body. The strain in the infected person matches the strain that reemerged in Nigeria in 2017, after more than 40 years of no reported cases in that country. The CDC said it's working with other officials to seek out airline passengers and those who may have had contact with the patient, and to assess their potential risks. Travelers on the flight were required to wear masks, so it's believed that there's a low risk that the monkeypox virus spread through respiratory droplets to other passengers, according to the CDC. Since 2017, 218 monkeypox cases have been confirmed in Nigeria and eight cases have been reported in international travelers from Nigeria, including a case in Texas in July 2021 and the latest case, the agency said. The symptoms of monkeypox are similar to but milder than the symptoms of smallpox. The main difference in symptoms is that monkeypox causes lymph nodes to swell while smallpox does not, the CDC says. The incubation period for monkeypox is usually 7 to14 days, but it can range from 5 to 21 days. The agency asked that health care providers be on the lookout for poxvirus-like lesions, particularly among travelers returning from Nigeria. Because of the health risks associated with even a single case of monkeypox, clinicians should report suspected cases immediately to state or local public health authorities. More information: Visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for more on Visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for more on monkeypox Provided by U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain The Covax scheme aimed at equitable global access to COVID-19 vaccines has now delivered more than 500 million doses around the world, figures showed Wednesday. Covax was established to ensure poorer countries get COVID jabs but the facility has been hit by setbacks as wealthy nations hog doses straight off the production lines. Covax, co-led by the World Health Organization (WHO), Gavi the Vaccine Alliance, and CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, had said at the beginning of the year it hoped to deliver two billion doses in 2021. "Thanks to incredible hard work and dedication from partners and health workers, Covax has delivered 500 million COVID-19 vaccines to 144 countries and territories," Gavi chief executive Seth Berkley said on Twitter. The 92 poorest participating territories can access jabs for free via Covax, with donors covering the costs. "Covax has faced challenges in 2021 in the form of export bans, supply shortages and vaccine nationalism. Arrivals in countries are now rapidly ramping up as we strive to ensure countries have as many doses as they are able to administer," said Berkley. "When donors and manufacturers give us visibility on when doses arrive, countries can plan large-scale national roll outs. This is the only way we will bridge our dangerous global vaccine divide." More than 7.5 billion vaccine doses have been administered around the world, according to an AFP count. Some 143 doses per 100 people have been injected in high-income countries, compared to fewer than seven per 100 people in low-income nations. Gavi said Tuesday that five of the world's poorest countriesChad, the DR Congo, Congo, Haiti, South Sudan and Yemendid not even have enough doses to reach two percent of their populations. The Covax collective development and procurement scheme was set up to counter the likelihood that much of the world would be shut out from access to any eventual vaccines. According to its forecasts, it should truly come into force throughout 2022. Meanwhile the WHO said that more than 3.3 million new coronavirus cases were reported last weekup six percent on the previous week. Just under 50,000 new deaths were registered, with all regions reporting stable or declining trends, apart from Europe which recorded a five-percent increase. Explore further Covax eyes vaccines for just 20% of people in poor nations in 2021 2021 AFP Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain About 9% of cancer patients experience complications while hospitalized that lead to a deterioration in their condition, a transfer to the intensive care unit or even death. A multidisciplinary team of researchers at Washington University in St. Louis is developing a machine learning-based early warning system model to predict this deterioration and improve patient outcomes. Chenyang Lu, the Fullgraf Professor at the McKelvey School of Engineering, with collaborators including Marin Kollef, MD, the Golman Professor of Medicine at the School of Medicine and director of the medical intensive care unit and respiratory care services at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, and Patrick Lyons, MD, instructor in medicine at the School of Medicine, recently developed a new predictive model for hospitalized cancer patients that integrates heterogeneous data available in electronic health records (EHR). Using historical, de-identified data from more than 20,000 hospitalizations of patients with cancer at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, Lu and Dingwen Li, a doctoral student in his lab and first author of the paper, found a way to integrate two types of valuable data in deep learning models that might offer clues about a patient's condition: static data, or data collected at the time of admission, such as demographics, other medical diagnoses or information from previous hospitalizations; and time-series data, which is collected repeatedly during a hospital stay and includes body temperature, blood pressure, medication and test results. Li presented results of their work Nov. 3 at the Association for Computing Machinery Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. As static and time-series data contain complementary information related to clinical deterioration, it is important for a predictive model to exploit both types of variables to maximize its accuracy, Lu said. "There are early signs hidden in the data that suggest that a person will develop clinical deterioration in a few hours or a few days," said Lu, an expert in the Internet of Things, cyber-physical systems and clinical artificial intelligence. "Humans cannot see these hidden patterns or trends in the data, so this is where machine learning is very good at picking up these patterns." Lu and his team used a recurrent neural network (RNN) model that originally was designed for the time-series data and enhanced it to incorporate the static data using a multimodal fusion approach. Their end-to-end model, called CrossNet, learns how to predict deterioration events while accurately imputing any missing static or time-series data. This novel approach to incorporate both static and time-series data combines the power of deep recurrent models and the benefits of heterogeneous data in EHR. Ideally, an early warning system would learn from a patient's data the signs that the patient is deteriorating, which would activate an alarm calling health-care providers to the bedside. However, one of the risks with such a system is that an alarm would sound so frequently, possibly triggered by false alarms, that the health-care providers would develop alarm fatigue and eventually stop responding. In a case study under realistic in-patient care settings, Lu and the team set a threshold of 48 notifications in a 24-hour period, or one every 30 minutes. The team then implemented a more proactive early warning system where the alarm rate can be high, but the number of false alarms is limited to avoid alarm fatigue. With the same false alarm rate, the team's CrossNet model captured 39.5% of clinical deterioration events, while an existing model used by many hospitals called the Modified Early Warning Scores (MEWS) captured only 3.9% of the same events. While the model has potential, Lu is working with the physicians on the team to determine the best way to implement it in a hospital setting. Kollef said Barnes-Jewish Hospital has been using a simpler early warning system for about 15 years. After some evaluation, alarms from that system are sent to an early response team that can assess and triage patients. "An alert is meaningless unless it's tied to intervention," Kollef said. "It's easy for someone to pull data from a machine and analyze it, but what do you do with it? That's the challenge." Kollef, who has worked in the intensive care unit for 35 years, said an early warning system is a step in the right direction, and collaborators such as Lyons are key to implementing such a system. "Patients with cancer are often very sick and fragile and are already monitored intensely," said Lyons, an informatics-based clinician. "With chemotherapy and other treatments, they generate a lot of data that is hard to sort through in a meaningful way. We would like to use this model to distill what data is going to point health-care providers toward a clear direction." Lyons said the team is seeking funding to build an infrastructure around their model and test it to see if it improves the processes of care. In the meantime, he is doing focus groups with patients and nurses to determine their priorities. Explore further Early warning system model predicts deterioration of hospitalized cancer patients More information: Dingwen Li et al, Integrating Static and Time-Series Data in Deep Recurrent Models for Oncology Early Warning Systems, Proceedings of the 30th ACM International Conference on Information & Knowledge Management (2021). Dingwen Li et al, Integrating Static and Time-Series Data in Deep Recurrent Models for Oncology Early Warning Systems,(2021). DOI: 10.1145/3459637.3482441 (HealthDay)The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is poised to approve Pfizer's COVID booster shots for all American adults as early as Thursday. That would make tens of millions more Americans eligible for the booster doses, sources familiar with the plan told The New York Times. The FDA is expected to make its decision without the input of its own expert panel, while the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's independent panel of vaccine experts plans to meet Friday to discuss the safety and efficacy of the booster dose. If both agencies give Pfizer the green light, it will come just a bit more than a week after the company first applied for emergency authorization. Approval would mean that any adult who received a second dose of the vaccine at least six months earlier would be able to get a booster as soon as this weekend. "This comes as welcome news, especially with the holidays fast approaching as families gather together, triggering a spike in domestic and international travel," said Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency room physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. 'The reality, however, is that many people have already received boosters in the past several months, even if they didn't qualify based on the FDA's initial ruling in September," Glatter added. "Because multigenerational families living in close quarters may be at higher risk for spread of the virus, seeking boosters before official FDA approval became commonplace, to mitigate risk sooner than later." More than 30 million Americans have already gotten booster shots, with the number often outpacing the number of first shots given each day across the country, according to the CDC. "The bottom line is that with surging cases and hospitalizations in many European citiesincluding Austria, the Netherlands, Germany and the UKthe concern is that the next surge to follow may be in the U.S.," Glatter noted. "Lockdowns in Austria further serve as a reminder that the virus is not finished with us." In addition to Pfizer's booster request, it's expected that Moderna will soon also ask the FDA to expand eligibility for its COVID-19 vaccine booster shot, the Times reported. Some state and local officials have already taken matters into their own hands: New York City health officials on Monday encouraged all adults who want boosters to seek them out. Meanwhile, Arkansas, California, Colorado and New Mexico have already moved to expand access. In September, the FDA authorized Pfizer booster shots for adults 65 and older, those with underlying medical conditions, and those with jobs that put them at risk. In October, the FDA approved booster shots for everyone who received the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, and for vulnerable people who received Moderna's two-dose vaccine. President Joe Biden wanted to start offering boosters to all adults in September, but faced pushback from public health experts. However, there's growing evidence of reductions in vaccine efficacy and in protective antibodies in fully vaccinated people. "Antibodies decay with time. That's not just a coronavirus vaccine story," FDA advisory committee member Dr. Ofer Levy, director of the Precision Vaccines Program at Harvard's Boston Children's Hospital, told the Times. "Vaccines vary in the durability of the protective response. We are starting to see waning in other age groups as well." Explore further Boosters for all adults in US closer with panel meeting set More information: Visit the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for more on Visit the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for more on COVID vaccines Copyright 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved. Credit: CC0 Public Domain Two years ago Laetitia Defoi suffered serious health complications from a blood transfusion gone wrong. The 31-year-old Frenchwoman has sickle cell anaemia and her blood, though B+, contains genetic material that makes it rare complicating the regular transfusions she requires to be able to walk. "My body rejected B+ blood because it didn't exactly match my type," Defoi told AFP after nearly two years of difficulties posed by incompatible transfusions. A programme of events in France this week seeks to encourage blood donations from members of certain ethnic groups who possess rare blood groups and themselves may be more at risk of sickle cell. The rare types number as many as 250 but are found in just one in 250 people. The drive is particularly seeking to increase donations from donors with blood types highly sought for transfusions, including those from African, Caribbean and Indian Ocean backgrounds, according to the French Blood Establishment (EFS) website. Members of those groups can also be at greater risk of sickle cell, which in turn increases demand for therapeutic transfusions. Sickle cell disease is a group of inherited red blood cell disorders characterised by the presence of an abnormal protein in the red blood cells, causing swellings, fatigue, jaundice, and episodic or chronic pain. "(Rare groups) are defined by two factors: a prevalence of less than 0.4 percent in the general population, and the fact that they have no alternative for transfusions," said Jacques Chiaroni, a professor at the EFS which organised the awareness campaign. Some groups are especially rare with those dubbed "Bombay" found in one in a million people, and Rhesus null found in some 50 people globally who can in turn donate to anyone. When transfusions are required, patients need a blood type as close as possible to their own with "incompatible" blood "at the very least risking an ineffective transfusion, or at worst risking (the patient's) death", according to Chiaroni. Detected by chance The prevalence of a blood group in any given region is down to humans adapting to their environments, with genetic characteristics forged over centuries. "Genetic diversity is greatest in Africa where the human presence goes back furthest since that's where man first appeared," said Chiaroni. The global distribution of blood groups is linked to historic migrations meaning that a group that is rare in one area is not necessarily uncommon in another as a result of population movements. Chiaroni highlights the presence of a group in Eurasia "the distribution of which aligns with the Mongol expansion in the 13th century". "I am Rhesus negative, and in China I am untransfusible" because the trait is rare therebut 15 percent of Europeans have it, he said. As a result of shortages it can be necessary to import rare blood as happened recently for a child undergoing a bone marrow transplant in France for whom supplies were flown in from the United States. Rare blood carriers can be detected by chance during pre-transfusion checks or screening campaigns, with their siblings subsequently approached because of the likelihood they have the same type. Defoi said that her sickle cell condition had caused bone complications with the need for additional operations and transfusions. "If I walk, it's partly thanks to the transfusions," added Defoi whose organisation Drepacare supports those with the illness. Explore further Understanding sickle cell disease 2021 AFP Credit: Institute of Cancer Research The last decade has brought major advances in the way we diagnose and treat prostate cancer and men with advanced disease are living longer than ever. We spoke to our scientists about the most exciting research areas that have the potential to revolutionize prostate cancer treatment in years to come. About 1 in 8 men will get prostate cancer at some point in their life. This makes prostate cancer the most common cancer in men, and the second most common cancer overall in the UK. Over 50,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer in the UK every yearthat's more than 100 each day. Ongoing prostate cancer research is looking at new treatment and early detection approaches, such as genetic screening, PSMA-targeting drugs and new targeted therapies, including precision medicines like PARP inhibitors and immunotherapies. The ICR's scientists, including Professor Ros Eeles, Professor Johann de Bono and Professor Nick James, are advancing our understanding of prostate cancer and how to treat itso that many more men can live longer, better lives in the next decade. Targeted screening based on individuals' genetic profiles As our understanding of the genetics behind prostate cancer expands, it's possible that simple tests could reveal someone's risk of prostate cancer, meaning those at highest risk could benefit from more frequent screening. Professor Ros Eeles has been studying prostate cancer genetics at the ICR for more than 25 years. She has led research identifying more than two thirds of the currently known genetic variants that increase prostate cancer riskand could identify many more in the next decade. "One of the main research areas undergoing a revolution in cancer research is the use of genetic discoveries to group and separate populations into different levels of risk, so that we can target early detection to those men that need it the most," she said. At the ICR, Professor Eeles is leading studies like GENPROS, an international study following men with changes in genes such as BRCA1, BRCA2, MMR or HOXB13, and following their prostate cancer diagnosis and treatment. The aim is to better understand how well treatments work in these men at higher risk. Prostate cancers can often grow too slowly to threaten a man's life. For this reason, many men who have early disease and do not carry a mutation linked to cancer would normally just be watched closely by clinicians, as the disease is unlikely to progress further. What Professor Eeles and her team are trying to figure out as part of GENPROS is: should we use the same 'active surveillance approach' with men who carry certain mutations, such as BRCA2, for example? Along with GENPROS, Professor Eeles is also leading PROFILE and IMPACT, two other studies investigating the most appropriate screening and management of prostate cancer in different groups of men at higher risk. Improving diagnosis through liquid biopsies "Once we know who is more likely to benefit from screening, we can work to achieve early diagnosis. This is where a second revolutionary area of research becomes important: developing and using new types of diagnostic techniques. For example, liquid biopsiessimple blood tests aiming to identify changes specific to the tumor which can direct the clinician as to where they should try new targeted treatments," says Professor Eeles. Liquid biopsies could transform clinical practice in the future, as they enable a new, more personalized approach to cancer treatment. Instead of using conventional tissue biopsies, which involve surgically removing a piece of the tumor and are invasive and painful, to analyze tumor DNA, researchers can use blood tests that pick up tumor DNA circulating in the bloodstream. Last year, Professor Johann de Bono and his team used liquid biopsies to predict how well men with advanced prostate cancer responded to treatment with abiraterone with or without ipatasertib. Their research suggested these simple blood tests could replace some of the existing methods used to characterize and track the disease in the clinic. When they analyzed cancer DNA from the blood tests, researchers found specific genetic changes associated with drug resistancewhich indicate that men are at risk of early relapse. "These simple blood tests could help us track how cancer changes and stops responding to treatment. We are already using them as part of clinical trials and they are likely to eventually become part of routine care. Liquid biopsies are minimally invasive, cost-effective and can be performed often and with ease. Tracking prostate cancer with a blood test instead of a painful surgical biopsy could significantly improve patients' quality of life," said Professor Johann de Bono. Delivering a radioactive payload directly to cancer cells Professor Johann De Bono has also been working on research involving a new 'search-and-destroy' medicine known as PSMA therapy. The treatment acts like a guided missile, consisting of a radioactive particle that can be delivered directly to cancer cells. The treatment, sometimes known as Lutetium-177 PSMA, uses a 'homing device' to seek out cancers by detecting the presence of a target molecule called prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) on the surface of cancer cells. Once in contact, it delivers a radioactive payload to kill them. Professor De Bono's team found that the treatment's PSMA target is present at higher levels on the surface of cancer cells in some patients than others, making it possible that a genetic test could pick out men who are most likely to benefit from the therapy. This year a phase III trial called VISION, involving Professor Johann De Bono, showed for the first time that the therapy is effective and can keep patients with advanced prostate cancer alive and healthy for longer. Around a third to a half of the 10,000 men a year diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer have tumors with high levels of PSMA and could therefore benefit from the treatment. For this reason, PSMA therapy, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) earlier this year, could be a game-changer in years to come. Targeted drugs that are kinder to patients Increasingly, we are moving away from a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to cancer care and we are getting better at tailoring treatment to individuals. The benefit of targeted treatments is that they involve fewer side effects and can help prostate cancer patients live longer but also with a better quality of life. In the next decade, we are hoping to increase access to targeted treatments that already exist, bringing them to more patients, and we are also hoping to discover and develop new ones. Abiraterone, a targeted hormone therapy discovered at the ICR and developed in partnership with our partner hospital The Royal Marsden has already given hundreds of thousands of men around the world extra years of life without the side effects of other treatments. Another precision drug, olaparib, is known for its use in breast and ovarian cancer, but Professor Johann de Bono has led trials showing that olaparib can be effective in men with prostate cancer who have tumors with mutations in specific genes involved in DNA damage repair, such as BRCA1 and BRCA2. It is now available in Scotland as a treatment for some men with prostate cancer. Better clinical trials with adaptive, smarter designs It is thanks to well-conducted clinical trials that new cutting edge drugs eventually become available to patients. STAMPEDE, led by Professor Nick James, is an innovative multi-arm multi-stage (MAMS) trial which also helped change the standard of care for men with advanced prostate cancer. Three of the treatments tested have shown substantially improved survival: abiraterone, docetaxel chemotherapy and prostate radiotherapy in men with disease that has spread at diagnosis. "When we started the STAMPEDE trial back in 2005, the survival of advanced prostate cancer that had spread to other parts of the body was around three and a half years, on average. Now, it's around seven to ten yearsand abiraterone and the other advances from the STAMPEDE trial can claim a lot of the credit for that," said Professor James STAMPEDE is an adaptive clinical trialmeaning researchers can add in new treatments to the trial and drop ineffective treatments early. In other words, MAMS trials help us answer multiple research questions simultaneously and compare more than one treatment under a single trial protocolsaving money, time and resources, while also generating evidence more quickly and accelerating the delivery of the next game-changing treatments for patients. The MAMS approach has famously been used to trial potential COVID-19 treatments in the RECOVERY trial, the world's largest clinical trial into treatments for COVID-19, involving more than 40,000 participants across 185 trial sites in the UK. "Rather than waiting to set up a new trial to test a new treatment, you can just add a new treatment arm to a trial that is already ongoing. Additionally, recruitment to a trial takes a long time to build up, but by adding a new arm to an existing trial, recruitment becomes less of an issue as the set up process has already happened," said Professor James. "As STAMPEDE progresses, we've been adding new comparisons to the trial, which should help us answer even more questions, allowing us to figure out what the best way of treating men with newly diagnosed advanced prostate cancer is, faster. So far, STAMPEDE has tested ten different treatment combinations, with three more new ones in set up." Training the immune system to fight cancer The immune system is able to kills cells that are harming the body, including cancer cells. However, cancer can often turn off the body's natural 'anti-cancer immune responses." One way in which our scientists are trying to defeat cancer is by reawakening the immune system, encouraging immune cells to attack cancer cells. Immunotherapy is a type of treatment that has been very effective in other cancers, including skin cancer, but we are just beginning to make it work for men with prostate cancer. However, investigating the immune response in prostate cancer is already starting to show promise. Professor Johann de Bono has been working to understand and target a protein known as CD38, displayed on the surface of immune cells. He will soon be leading a clinical trial in this area, which is a first in prostate cancerlooking at drugs which target CD38, which could hold promise against prostate cancer by reawakening the anti-cancer immune response and fighting cancer's 'cloaking' strategy, which allows it to hide from the immune system. Another trial looking at an immunotherapy showed that some men with advanced prostate cancer with mutations in genes involved in DNA repair, like the BRCA genes, and who had exhausted all other treatment options could live for two years or more on the immunotherapy pembrolizumab. Manipulating 'gut bugs' More and more evidence is showing that the microbiomethe community of microorganisms living in and on us, which are essential to our development and immunityplays a role in many diseases, including prostate cancer. Recently, Professor de Bono and his team found that common gut bacteria can become 'hormone factories' and sustain prostate cancer's growth, progression and resistance to hormone therapyopening up a whole new research avenue. In future we might see bacterial 'fingerprints' used in the clinic to pick out patients at high risk of developing resistance to treatment. These patients could then benefit from strategies to manipulate their microbiomefor example, men could undergo fecal transplants to alter their intestinal microbiota, reducing the number of certain potentially harmful bacterial strains. Ultimately, researchers hope to come up with a yogurt drink enriched with bacteria that could also switch the microbiome to a more favorable profile and avoid or delay resistance to hormone treatments. Cutting edge radiotherapy There have also been many advances in the field of radiotherapy, including new courses of radiotherapy, known as 'hypofractionated radiotherapy," delivering higher doses of radiotherapy in fewer sessions. This supports a shorter treatment plan that allows men to finish treatment soonerreducing the number of trips to hospital without negatively affecting men's quality of life in the long term. Another recent advance is the MR Linac, which combines two technologiesan MRI scanner and a linear accelerator. This technology, which is currently being trialed by researchers at the ICR and The Royal Marsden, allows radiographers and clinicians to precisely locate tumors, tailor the shape of X-ray beams in real time, and accurately deliver doses of radiation even to moving tumors. This is particularly important for cancers that can move during radiotherapy, or between scanning and treatment, including prostate cancer. Innovation still to come Professor de Bono shared his thoughts on the future: "The last decade has been historic for prostate cancer research, many advances have been madewe have started to use genetic information to personalize treatment, reduced side effects thanks to targeted therapies and we are just beginning to train the immune system to combat prostate cancer. "But we're already looking ahead, and there is no doubt that the most innovative years in prostate cancer research history are yet to come." Explore further New BRCA-targeting drug could offer hope in treating advanced prostate cancer Credit: CC0 Public Domain Many people lucky enough to have grown up with doting grandmothers know that they can burnish a child's development in unique and valuable ways. Now, for the first time, scientists have scanned grandmothers' brains while they're viewing photos of their young grandchildrenproviding a neural snapshot of this special, inter-generational bond. Proceedings of the Royal Society B is publishing the first study to examine grandmaternal brain function, conducted by researchers at Emory University. "What really jumps out in the data is the activation in areas of the brain associated with emotional empathy," says James Rilling, Emory professor of anthropology and lead author of the study. "That suggests that grandmothers are geared toward feeling what their grandchildren are feeling when they interact with them. If their grandchild is smiling, they're feeling the child's joy. And if their grandchild is crying, they're feeling the child's pain and distress." In contrast, the study found that when grandmothers view images of their adult child, they show stronger activation in an area of the brain associated with cognitive empathy. That indicates they may be trying to cognitively understand what their adult child is thinking or feeling and why, but not as much from the emotional side. "Young children have likely evolved traits to be able to manipulate not just the maternal brain, but the grand maternal brain," Rilling says. "An adult child doesn't have the same cute 'factor,' so they may not illicit the same emotional response." Co-authors of the study are Minwoo Lee, a Ph.D. candidate in Emory's Department of Anthropology, and Amber Gonzalez, a former Emory research specialist. "I can relate to this research personally because I spent a lot of time interacting with both of my grandmothers," Lee says. "I still remember warmly the moments I had with them. They were always so welcoming and happy to see me. As a child, I didn't really understand why." It's relatively rare, Lee adds, for scientists to study the older human brain outside of the problems of dementia or other aging disorders. "Here, we're highlighting the brain functions of grandmothers that may play an important role in our social lives and development," Lee says. "It's an important aspect of the human experience that has been largely left out of the field of neuroscience." Rilling's lab focuses on the neural basis of human social cognition and behavior. Motherhood has been extensively studied by other neuroscientists. Rilling is a leader in researching the lesser-explored neuroscience of fatherhood. Grandmothers interacting with grandchildren offered new neural territory. "Evidence is emerging in neuroscience for a global, parental caregiving system in the brain," Rilling says. "We wanted to see how grandmothers might fit into that pattern." Humans are cooperative breeders, meaning that mothers get help caring for their offspring, although the sources of that help vary both across and within societies. "We often assume that fathers are the most important caregivers next to mothers, but that's not always true," Rilling says. "In some cases, grandmothers are the primary helper." In fact, the "grandmother hypothesis" posits that the reason human females tend to live long past their reproductive years is because they provide evolutionary benefits to their offspring and grandchildren. Evidence supporting this hypothesis includes a study of the traditional Hadza people of Tanzania, where foraging by grandmothers improves the nutritional status of their grandchildren. Another study of traditional communities showed that the presence of grandmothers decreases their daughters' interbirth intervals and increases the number of grandchildren. And in more modern societies, evidence is accumulating that positively engaged grandmothers are associated with children having better outcomes on a range of measures, including academic, social, behavior and physical health. For the current study, the researchers wanted to understand the brains of healthy grandmothers and how that may relate to the benefits they provide to their families. The 50 participants in the study completed questionnaires about their experiences as grandmothers, providing details such as how much time they spend with their grandchildren, the activities they do together and how much affection they feel for them. They also underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure their brain function as they viewed pictures of their grandchild, an unknown child, the same-sex parent of the grandchild, and an unknown adult. The results showed that, while viewing pictures of their grandchildren, most participants showed more activity in brain areas involved with emotional empathy and movement, compared to when they were viewing the other images. Grandmothers who more strongly activated areas involved with cognitive empathy when viewing pictures of their grandchild reported in the questionnaire that they desired greater involvement in caring for the grandchild. Finally, compared with results from earlier study by the Rilling lab of fathers viewing photos of their children, grandmothers more strongly activated regions involved with emotional empathy and motivation, on average, when viewing images of their grandchildren. "Our results add to the evidence that there does seem to be a global parenting caregiving system in the brain, and that grandmothers' responses to their grandchildren maps onto it," Rilling says. One limitation to the study, the researchers note, is that the participants skewed towards mentally and physically healthy women who are high-functioning grandmothers. The study opens the door to many more questions to be explored. "It would be interesting to also look at the neuroscience of grandfathers and how the brain functions of grandparents may differ across cultures," Lee says. An especially gratifying aspect of the project for Rilling was personally interviewing all the participants himself. "It was fun," he says. "I wanted to get a sense of the rewards and challenges of being a grandmother." The main challenge many of them reported was trying not to interfere when they disagreed with the parents over how their grandchildren should be raised and what values should be instilled in them. "Many of them also said how nice it is to not be under as much time and financial pressure as they were when raising their children," Rilling says. "They get to enjoy the experience of being a grandmother much more than they did being parents." Explore further The impact of relatedness on grandmothers' desire to care for their grandchildren Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Even with nearly 63% of Californians fully vaccinated, some public health officials worry that big gatherings this holiday season could lead to big outbreaks of COVID-19. But families looking to reunite have at least one infection-averting tool that they didn't have last year: rapid at-home testing kits. The kits aren't foolproof, and most aren't as reliable as the lab-based alternative when it comes to detecting infections in their earliest stages. Also, the cost can be high if you have to check a houseful of people. If used in the right circumstances, however, an at-home test can warn you in a matter of minutes if Cousin Antoine's cough or Aunt Maggie's muscle aches are signs of a potentially grave threat to the rest of the family. Even better, the tests can make it easy for your invited guests to check for an active infection before they trundle off to your home. One other crucial caveat: If you haven't been fully vaccinated, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cautions against traveling to that holiday get-together. And if you're determined to travel sans vaccination, the CDC recommends doing so only if you get a negative COVID test one to three days days before departure, then quarantining for seven days after arrival (or fewer, if you test negative again). Here's a rundown of how the tests work, how reliable the results are, who makes them, where to find them and how much they cost. What are at-home rapid COVID tests? The key word here is "rapid," as in delivering results in about 15 minutes. Unlike the self-testing kits that you have to send to a lab for processing, the rapid kits let you process your samples at homein fact, most of them let you watch the results slowly emerge on a test strip, the way you might watch an image form on a Polaroid (but with higher stakes). The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has given emergency-use authorization to two kinds of rapid tests: molecular and antigen. The molecular tests, which boast higher sensitivity but carry a higher cost, examine the genetic material in your sample for the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The antigen tests look for the presence of a protein that binds to the coronavirus' RNA. Only one of the three approved home molecular teststhe Lucira CHECK-IT kitis easily found online, and it's pricy: Amazon sells it for $89 per test. A quick search for antigen tests, on the other hand, found six of the nine approved tests available to U.S. consumers in stores or online, one from two different manufacturers: iHealth$14 for a two-pack at the company's website. QuickVue$20 to $24 for a two-pack at local pharmacies. BinaxNowabout $24 for a two-pack at local pharmacies. CareStart$24 for a two-pack at RiteAid. BD Veritor$26.50 for a two-pack at Amazon. Inteliswab$29 to $40 for a two-pack from medical supply stores online. On/Go$35 for a two-pack at Amazon, Walmart and the company's website. One other antigen test, by Celltrion, is available in bulk quantities from medical supply stores online for about $10 per test. Different antigen test kits come with different featuresfor example, some have smartphone apps that can display your test result, which would be useful if you're asked to show proof of a negative test. And the performance of the tests may vary, although all did well enough to win the FDA's emergency authorization. Dr. Ashish K. Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, said the BinaxNow test has been the most widely used, so it has more of a track record than the other tests. But he said people shouldn't pay too much attention to brand names, given that the tests have been in relatively short supply. "Any of the tests that you can find are way better than not having tests," he said. How reliable are the results? The coronavirus that causes the COVID-19 disease can take several days to build up steam (or "viral load"), which means you aren't likely to show symptoms or be infectious to others immediately after you've caught it. That's why public health officials advise you not to get tested immediately after you've been exposed to people who might be infectious. Molecular tests, however, use chemical techniques to amplify the amount of genetic material in a sample, enabling them to detect the presence of the coronavirus at a very early stagein some cases, even before a person can pass along the infection to others. On the other hand, they may also find leftover traces of the virus after a person is no longer contagious. And like any test, they are subject to contamination and other glitches that can cause erroneous results, including the occasional false positive. It's not common, but it's more likely to happen in communities that have few cases of the disease. Antigen tests have proven to be as good as molecular tests at avoiding false positive results. And according to the CDC, these tests are also just as good when it comes to detecting COVID in someone who is showing symptoms of the disease, such as a cough, a fever and a sore throat. Where the tests fall short, the CDC warns, is with people who have the virus but show no symptoms, especially if they're in the early stages of infection and may not yet have enough of a viral load to infect others. The agency recommends that people perform a second antigen test a few days after the first one, which is why the kits are sold as two-packs. If you haven't been vaccinated and you've come into close contact sometime in the previous two weeks with someone who had COVID, the CDC recommends that you get a molecular test just to be sure you're not infected. What's the best use of rapid tests? Testing can reduce the risk in a variety of holiday scenarios, but Jha and Dr. Robert Wachter, chair of the department of medicine at UC San Francisco School of Medicine, said it makes the most sense in two situations: if unvaccinated people will be joining you for the holidays, or if people in your group would be at high risk of deadly complications if they contracted a breakthrough case of COVID-19. "Other than that, while it could render a gathering a smidgen safer, it doesn't feel worth it to me to spend a few hundred bucks testing 10 or so people," Wachter said in an email. Another factor weighing in favor of testing is when there is a high rate of COVID infections in the community, Jha said. But which community determines the amount of risk? That may be hard to figure out if you have guests coming from several parts of the country. When and how often you should take a test depends on the nature of the gathering. "Rapid tests are a measure of contagiousness," Jha said, "and so you want to test as close as you can of getting together with people." If it's just a Thanksgiving day meal, Jha said, "The ideal situation would be to test on Thursday morning." But if it's a holiday weekend visit, he and Wachter suggested testing more than oncesay, just before arriving and again in a day or twoespecially if you'll be in the presence of unvaccinated people. "Two negative tests, you're really good to go," Jha said, adding that if you're around people at high risk of COVID complications, you could even take a test daily. "In an unvaccinated population, one single test is probably not good enough," Jha said. For proof, he pointed to the ceremony President Trump held last year for new Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Attendees had to have gotten a negative test result to gain admission but it still turned into something close to a superspreader event. How do you test yourself? The typical process starts with taking a sterile swab from the kit and tracing the inside of each nostril several times. That gathers the sample. The next step depends on the type of test. With molecular tests, the swab is inserted into a small container, where the sample is mixed with a reagent, a substance that starts the process of revealing the sample's genetic makeup. The container is then placed in a base unit, where the magic (technically, the isothermal amplification) happens. The results appear on the base unit or in a smartphone app. With antigen tests, the swab is placed in a disposable reader (often made of paper) where it meets a test strip. You add a few drops of the kit's reagent, then watch to see whether the strip shows a positive, negative or inconclusive result. Be sure to read and follow the instructions carefully to collect a proper sample and avoid contamination. With the popular BinaxNow test, for example, you're supposed to swab each of your nostrils for 15 seconds and rotate the swab three times after placing it in the reagent. 2021 Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Table 3. Risk of depression in child if mother had depression, adjusting for deprivation (clustering on mother ID). Credit: Brophy et al., 2021, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Children who live with a parent who has depression are more likely to develop depression and to not achieve educational milestones, according to a new study published this week in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Sinead Brophy of Swansea University, UK, and colleagues. Maternal depression is a known risk factor for depression in children and is associated with a range of adverse child health and educational outcomes including poorer academic attainment. To date, however, risk factors associated with paternal depression have been less well examined. Understanding the effects of timing of both maternal and paternal depression of offspring outcomes has implications for prevention and early intervention. In the new study, Brophy and colleagues used data from the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage (SAIL) databank assembled as part of the Born in Wales Study funded by the Welsh Government. Information on children born in Wales from 1987 to 2018, as well as their mothers and fathersor stable, adult male figure in the same householdwas used in the study. Both parental and child diagnosis of depression was attained from general practitioner records in the SAIL databank. Overall, 34.5% of mothers and 18% of fathers/stable men had a diagnosis of depression. In offspring, 4.34% of all children, 2.85% of boys, and 5.89% of girls were diagnosed with depression. Children were more likely to develop depression if their mother had depression before their birth (HR 1.32, 95% CI 1.21-1.43), after their birth (HR 2.00, 95% CI 1.96-2.05), or both before and after their birth (HR 2.25, 95% CI 2.15-2.35). The risk of depression was also increased when their father/stable man had depression before their birth (HR 1.44, 95% CI 1.18-1.74), after their birth (HR 1.66, 95% CI 1.58-1.74), or both before and after their birth (HR 1.47, 95% CI 1.25-1.73). In addition, the odds of achieving milestones at the end of primary school were significantly decreased if either parent had depressionfor instance, the odds of passing Key Stage 3 (KS3) tests was 0.57 (95% CI 0.55-0.60) if a child's mother had depression both before and after their birth and 0.56 (0.490.63) if their father/stable man had depression both before and after their birth. Other risk factors for children's depression identified in the study included being female, their mother taking antidepressants and having no stable man in the household. The authors conclude that the impact of paternal depression requires more attention than has previously been given, and suggest that holistic approaches to whole family wellbeing and depression will help ensure positive outcomes for children. The authors add: "Children who live with a parent (mum or dad) who has depression are more likely to also develop depression and not achieve as well in school, compared to children who live with a parent with treated depression. Working with families and treating parental depression (in dads as well as mums) is likely to have long-term benefits for children's mental health and educational attainment. This has never been more important than after lockdown and COVID, as depression is contagious too." Explore further Increased risk of depression for young people if their mothers experienced depression during or after pregnancy More information: Brophy S, Todd C, Rahman MA, Kennedy N, Rice F (2021) Timing of parental depression on risk of child depression and poor educational outcomes: A population based routine data cohort study from Born in Wales, UK. PLoS ONE 16(11): e0258966. Journal information: PLoS ONE Brophy S, Todd C, Rahman MA, Kennedy N, Rice F (2021) Timing of parental depression on risk of child depression and poor educational outcomes: A population based routine data cohort study from Born in Wales, UK.16(11): e0258966. doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0258966 Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain For the past year and a half, the COVID-19 pandemic has continued to engulf the globe, fueled in part by novel variants and the uneven distribution of vaccines. Every day, hundreds of thousands of new COVID-19 cases and thousands of new deaths are still being reported worldwide, creating a need for drugs that can combat the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2. Now, new research led by investigators at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children's Hospital points to a well-known and widely available drug called disulfiram as a possible treatment for COVID-19. In the retrospective study, published Oct. 28 in PLOS ONE, patients taking disulfiram for alcoholism were less likely to become infected with SARS-CoV-2, and those who did get infected were less likely to die from COVID-19 than those not taking the drug. The researchers caution that since the study was observational, it cannot establish a cause-and-effect link between disulfiram and disease development. However, they say, the results are encouraging enough to warrant further study and clinical testing. The precise mechanism of the drug against SARS-CoV-2 is not yet known, but researchers have hypothesized that it may prevent the virus from taking hold by interfering with an enzyme it requires to replicate. Additionally, disulfiram may blunt the symptoms of severe COVID-19 by inhibiting a protein involved in hyperinflammation. If disulfiram's effect against SARS-CoV-2 is confirmed, it could become a useful tool against the virus. A Pandemic Pivot In spring 2020, SARS-CoV-2 was rapidly spreading across the world, and it was quickly becoming apparent that the most severeand deadlysymptoms of COVID-19 are caused by an intense inflammatory response to the virus. At the same time, Judy Lieberman, HMS professor of pediatrics at Boston Children's, and Hao Wu, the Asa and Patricia Springer Professor of Structural Biology in the Blavatnik Institute at HMS, were investigating whether disulfiram, an oral medication widely prescribed for alcoholism, could be repurposed to treat inflammation. In May 2020, they published a study in mice demonstrating that disulfiram reduced inflammation caused by sepsis by blocking a key protein involved in the process. Realizing that their research could be relevant to inflammation associated with COVID-19, the duo reached out to Chris Sander, professor in residence of cell biology at HMS. "They approached me and asked, can you find any evidence computationally whether this drug works against COVID-19?" Sander recalled. "I just thought, the world is going to pieces here, let's do something useful. I wanted to help them take their research one step further." Springing into action, Sander worked with Lieberman and Wu to assemble a team of epidemiologists and public health experts, including Nathanael Fillmore and Nhan Do at the Boston VA Cooperative Studies Program Center. The researchers used computational techniques to analyze a large database of clinical records from the national Veterans Affairs health care system. The analysis included 944,127 veterans who had at least one SARS-CoV-2 test between February 2020 and February 2021; of these, 2,233 had been prescribed disulfiram for alcoholism. Veterans taking disulfiram had a 34 percent lower incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection than those who weren't. Moreover, no one on disulfiram who was infected with the virus died, compared with 3 percent of those infected and not on the drug. "There's evidence that disulfiram not only reduces the incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection, but it may actually reduce the number of deaths," Sander said. He noted, however, that the study, being retrospective, can only establish an association between disulfiram and SARS-CoV-2and thus the findings must be confirmed in randomized clinical trials. A small randomized phase 2 clinical trial of disulfiram in patients with moderate COVID-19 is nearing completion, and another is underway. The authors hope that the study will motivate large international phase 3 trials of the drug. Noting that it would be unrealistic to give the drug as a preventative measure, they are especially interested in how patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19 fare on disulfiram. The researchers are also eager for further research on the mechanism underlying disulfiram's effect against SARS-CoV-2. One possibility is that the drug inhibits a key protease that SARS-CoV-2 needs in order to replicate, thus preventing the virus from proliferating inside cells. "That's a plausible mechanism, but it must be confirmed with further research. It's a work in progress," Sander said. Disulfiram may also tamp down hyperinflammationwhich can cause respiratory issues in patients with severe COVID-19by inhibiting a protein called gasdermin D that is needed for this inflammatory response. If disulfiram does indeed reduce infection with SARS-CoV-2 and death from COVID-19, it could become part of a growing arsenal in the global fight against the disease. The drug is FDA-approved and has been prescribed for over 60 years as a treatment for alcoholism. It is safe, inexpensive, familiar to physicians, and widely used in many countries. "This is a great candidate for a repurposed drug," Sander said. "It could easily be made available worldwide if we can prove it has a positive effect on patients with COVID-19." More information: Nathanael Fillmore et al, Disulfiram use is associated with lower risk of COVID-19: A retrospective cohort study, PLOS ONE (2021). Journal information: PLoS ONE Nathanael Fillmore et al, Disulfiram use is associated with lower risk of COVID-19: A retrospective cohort study,(2021). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0259061 The study identified and measured 8,938 proteins, providing a comprehensive view of the proteins expressed during the development of the lung. Credit: Stephanie King and Geremy Clair | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Researchers have compiled the most comprehensive road map of the protein composition of human lungs, providing a clearer picture of the healthy development of this essential organ that made terrestrial life possible. The study, led by scientists at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, describes how thousands of molecules are modulated in a coordinated fashion during the formation of pulmonary tissue. The findings are expected to provide a gateway for further study of human lung formation and function. The study was published in the Nov. 15 issue of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. The findings lay the groundwork for progress on a host of diseases that affect more than 35 million Americans, according to the American Lung Association. The study's authors say the molecular road map of the lung's proteins will help physicians understand lung development. This should help guide strategies to help premature infants and lead to new ways to explore tissue regeneration in adults. Common lung diseases include asthma, pneumonia, emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or COPD, pulmonary fibrosis, and COVID-19. "We examined proteins in early development stages and we looked at how they are changing during the development of the organ," said PNNL research scientist Geremy Clair, the study's lead author. "The idea was to learn things about development that we have not seen with previous biomedical studies. Those studiesmostly derived from animalspainted part of the picture, but the data we have generated provide insights on previously unknown details." Protein power The lungs are a complex organ with around 40 cell types, and proteins are the engines powering the bulk of their cellular processes. Researchers analyzed the protein composition and molecular maturation in pulmonary tissue from nearly 50 donors, from birth to 8 years. Scientists identified and measured 8,938 proteins. The team found that the immune system in the lungs continues to develop for years after birth. While scientists know that the immune system develops throughout our lives, the extent of change in the lungs in childhood surprised researchers. It's a welcome phenomenon because the lungs are one of the main gateways for pathogens to enter the body throughout our lifetime. "The take-home message is that this is a first-of-its-kind analysis of how the protein building blocks of the lung change as a child grows from birth to mid-childhood," said Dr. Gloria Pryhuber, a study coauthor and professor of pediatrics and environmental medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York. "This study provides a reference map for future investigators to work on certain subsets of the changing proteins, whether they be enzymes or structural proteins." Lung development, normal and abnormal The research provides greater clarity about lung development. For example, while it's been known that lung development continues after birth, the study showed more precisely when to expect further stages of development. "The lung is not completely developed when a baby is born," Clair said. "There is a little sac at the end of the airwaysthe major passages of the lungsthat has to divide into grape shapes called alveoli. Our study helps us better understand how this process works. Sometimes that development does not take place as expected. Our findings will help provide answers for that unfortunate circumstance, too." Medical professionals will be able to use the protein map to help diagnose a variety of lung ailments as well as assess lung malfunction and disease in adults, Clair said. The data of the study are publicly available on Lungmap.net. "This study will be a resource in understanding developmental biology," Clair said. "It has relevance for lung transplants, for cystic fibrosis in children, for pulmonary fibrosis, as well as for idiopathic fibrosis." Pryhuber concurred that the study will have practical benefits for patient care. "But that won't happen overnight," Pryhuber said. "Much work remains to be done. Now that it is known that these nearly 9,000 proteins are there and change with age, some may be studied as biomarkers of health or disease and others as potential targets for therapies." Lungs of the future Clair also said the study could play a role in COVID treatment. "That may not happen right away," he said. "But so many of the patients who survive COVID have experienced difficulties in breathing. We don't know the long-term implications for those patients in years to come. But this studyalong with otherswill provide information that likely will assist in the development of therapeutic strategies." Ultimately, Clair said the lung protein data could provide some of the pieces to create artificial lungs. "Right now, there is a shortage of donor lungs for people who need transplants," he said. "We need to find ways to regenerate lungs, or potentially make new lungs from cells of existing lungs. Technology today is much better than it was 20 years ago. We may have better technology 20 years from now. This study is part of the data that may make this possible." The research was performed through the LungMAP project, which includes investigators from around the world working together to develop a molecular atlas of the developing human lung. In addition to researchers from PNNL and the University of Rochester, scientists from the University of Cincinnati Children's Hospital, the University of Washington and the University of Texas contributed to this project. The protein analyses were done at EMSL, the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory, a DOE Office of Science user facility at PNNL. Authors from PNNL, in addition to Clair, include Lisa M. Bramer, Song Feng, Vincent G. Danna, Harsh Bhotika and Joshua N. Adkins, as well as former PNNL scientist Charles Ansong, now at NIH. Explore further Novel glimpses into early lung development Credit: CC0 Public Domain Maryland and Massachusetts, soon to be followed by other states, now allow taxpayers to begin the sign-up for health care coverage on their tax returns, aiming to draw many residents into low- or no-cost plans they may not know they qualify for. The effort is intended to gather in many of the last Americansmore than 28 million of themstill without health insurance, despite the gains achieved by the 2010 Affordable Care Act. A quarter of those people are eligible for Medicaid, the public health plan for low-income Americans, according to an analysis of the uninsured by the Kaiser Family Foundation. And more than a third could get federal tax subsidies to help them pay for at least part of the premiums for private plans. "As surprising as it may seem, there are many people out there who don't know there are insurance options for them," said Michele Eberle, executive director of the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange, a state agency that helps enroll residents. "People are just surviving out there. They don't know what's available to them." Republican Gov. Larry Hogan signed Maryland's first-of-its-kind measure into law in 2019. For the past two years, Maryland income tax forms have included a box that taxpayers can check to indicate they do not have health insurance. With the taxpayer's permission, the state comptroller submits the household's income and family size data to the state's health insurance exchange for possible enrollment in Medicaid or subsidized private insurance. The Massachusetts legislature adopted a similar measure this year, which will be implemented next year. Other states are following suit. Colorado and New Jersey have passed legislation, both with strong bipartisan support, to implement their own easy enrollment plans via tax returns. Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis signed the bill into law. In New Jersey, Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy has said he strongly supports the measure, but asked for some small technical changes, which the legislature is likely to adopt next month. The idea also is gaining steam, either legislatively or administratively, in New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Meanwhile, in Congress, U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat from Maryland, introduced a bill last month that would put a similar check-off box on federal tax returns. Van Hollen cited the success in Maryland, which has enrolled nearly 7,000 residents over the past two years, according to the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange. The state's uninsured rate was 6% in 2019, the last year for which statistics are available. Nationally, according to last year's census, the percentage of those without health insurance is 8.6%. President Joe Biden's Build Back Better bill before Congress would increase federal subsidies for health insurance and make millions more people eligible for Medicaid. Proponents say a check-off box on federal tax returns would alert many of those taxpayers of their options and usher them into health insurance plans. In 2020, the first year of Maryland's Easy Enrollment program, 60,645 Maryland taxpayers checked the box indicating they didn't have health insurance. The state determined that 53,146 were eligible for either Medicaid or a federal tax credit. Of those, 4,015 people, or 7.6%, ultimately enrolled in a health plan. This year, 29,020 individuals checked the box, 27,223 were found eligible and 2,962, or 10.8% of those deemed eligible, enrolled. "We're pleased with that 10%," said Eberle. "Although it sounds low, it's 10% more than we would have gotten otherwise." Most of the other taxpayers didn't respond to the state's outreach. Nevertheless, Eberle said the information collected from the tax returns could help her office to better target its marketing and education campaigns. Maryland now puts this check box on its tax returns to initiate a process for enrolling residents in health insurance. Image credit: Maryland Health Benefit Exchange Of those who enrolled in health care plans through their Maryland tax return, Eberle said nearly a quarter identified as Black and 20% as Latino. More than 40% were ages 18 to 34, a group notorious for low rates of insurance. Nearly three-quarters of the new enrollees joined Medicaid. The rest enrolled in commercial plans, and about 95% of them qualified for federal tax credits, Eberle said. Kentucky found another way to piggyback on a government agency's functions to help boost health insurance enrollment. Last year, as thousands of people were laid off in the first months of the pandemic, Kentucky's Medicaid agency followed up with those who applied for unemployment benefits to enroll them in health plans. Eric Friedlander, secretary of the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, said in an interview that outreach contributed to a 130,000-person bump in the state's Medicaid rolls during the pandemic. Friedlander called Maryland's Easy Enrollment "a great model" that he hopes Kentucky also will eventually adopt. And Eberle said Maryland is looking into leveraging unemployment benefit applications for health insurance enrollment as well. In Massachusetts, which has the lowest rate of residents without health insurance at 3%, officials have been frustrated at the hurdles to getting everyone into health plans, said Audrey Morse Gasteier, chief of policy and strategy at the Massachusetts Health Connector, the state's health insurance exchange. "We've devoted lots of resources and efforts into marketing and outreach and community engagement into getting people enrolled," she said. "That remaining 3% is very vexing to us, and we remain committed to reaching that population." With that goal in mind, Republican Gov. Charlie Baker's administration pushed a new law that will introduce a program next year like Maryland's. The Easy Enrollment concept in Maryland originated in the Maryland Health Insurance Coverage Protection Commission, a panel comprising lawmakers, hospitals and other providers and consumer advocates that the legislature created to recommend measures to improve access to health care in Maryland. One of the commission goals, said Vinny DeMarco, a member of the commission and president of the Maryland Citizens' Health Initiative, was to scoop up the last 6% of Marylanders without health insurance. And one way to do that, he said, was to leverage residents' interactions with government bureaucracy, such as tax-collecting agencies. "The success of the ACA is terrific, but we need to get the rest of the way for health care for all Marylanders and Americans," he said. Explore further Millions who joined medicaid during health emergency could soon lose coverage 2021 The Pew Charitable Trusts. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain Spain's panel of vaccine experts approved Wednesday the use of a COVID-19 booster shot for people between 60-69 years old and for health workers, as part of an effort to combat an uptick in infections. The final go-ahead for the shot must be given by Spain's health minister and the country's regional health chiefs. Spain has already given 2.7 million booster shots to people age 69 and over and to people of all ages with suppressed immune systems. A highly successful vaccination program has inoculated 89% of Spaniards age 12 and over. That amounts to some 37 million people. While the increase in infections in Spain is still lower than the sharp spikes seen in other European countries, some Spanish regional governments are considering the use of a vaccine pass for access to indoor public spaces. Spain's reports an official infection rate of 96 cases per 100,000 inhabitants over 14 days. Explore further Spain to give different booster to strengthen J&J vaccine 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: CC0 Public Domain Nearly 10 million children in lower-income countries like Nigeria and Pakistan have never been vaccinated, leaving them vulnerable to deadly diseases like polio, measles and pneumonia. Two-thirds of these "zero-dose" kids live below the international poverty line, their families subsisting on less than $2.35 a day in poor villages, in urban slums, in conflict zones. Over the last 20 years, international organizations spearheaded by GAVI, The Vaccine Alliancein partnership with national governments, the World Health Organization and UNICEFhave ensured that significantly more children in poor countries in Africa and elsewhere get routine vaccinations: 81 percent today versus 59 percent in 2000. And that has had a major impacta 70 percent drop in child mortality from vaccine-preventable diseases over two decades. As an anchor donor to the Gavi Alliance, Canada has played a major part in this success. But what about the root causes of non-vaccination of the young: is the problem one of poverty alone, of the failure of domestic governments and their public-health departments to reach the most vulnerable communities, or simply of an inability to overcome deep-rooted social disadvantages? A new Canada-India study of tens of thousands of zero-dose children in India suggests that the causes of low-vaccination rates in lower-income countries is all of those and more. Published today in the Lancet Global Health and led by Universite de Montreal public-health professor Mira Johri with colleagues S.V. Subramanian at Harvard University and Sunil Rajpal at FLAME University in Pune, the study analyses a quarter century of national survey data to better understand how social, economic and geographical inequalities in India shaped the chances of children remaining unvaccinated between 1992 and 2016. The researchers analyzed data over four survey rounds from close to 73,000 babies between 12 and 23 months, the standard age when immunization data are assessed. They found that India had made tremendous progress in reaching children with routine immunization: the proportion of zero dose-children in India declined threefold in a quarter-century: from 33 percent in 1992 to 10 percent in 2016. But they also found that, in 2016, children remained concentrated among disadvantaged groups, including the lowest-income households and children born to mothers who had no formal education. As well, compared with vaccinated children, zero-dose children were more likely to suffer from malnutrition. For instance, in 1992, 41 percent of zero-dose kids had severely stunted growth, versus 29 percent of vaccinated kids; by 2016, the numbers had declined but were still disproportionate, with 25 percent of zero-dose kids severely stunted versus 19 percent of vaccinated ones. All told, in 2016, there were an estimated 2.9 million zero-dose children in India, concentrated in less developed states and districts and several urban areas. "Over a 24-year period in India, child zero-dose status was shaped by large-scale social inequalities and remained a consistent marker of generalized vulnerability," the researchers concluded. "Interventions that address this cycle of intergenerational inequities should be prioritized." At UdeM, Professor Johri pointed to the uniqueness of the work of her and her colleagues. "It's the first to trace aggregate patterns in zero-dose children over time globally and in India," said Johri, who is an overseas citizen of India as well as a Canadian citizen. Added Subramanian, a professor of population health and geography at Harvard: "Over the 24 years we analyzed, the proportion of zero dose-children in India declined by just over 23 percent in absolute terms, with more rapid reductions among the worst off. This is a tremendous national achievement." However, said Rajpal, an assistant professor of economics at FLAME, "these children continue to be concentrated among socially disadvantaged groups, including rural households, poorer households, Muslims, mothers with less education, and expectant mothers who do not benefit fully from health services." More globally, the Indian experience suggests that "child zero-dose vaccination status is an important marker of vulnerability linked to systematic disadvantage over the life course," Johri said. "Identifying zero-dose children and intervening early to address the complex sources of disadvantage they face has the potential to transform life opportunities and combat intergenerational inequities. It should be a top priority for the international community." "Progress in reaching unvaccinated (zero-dose) children in India, 19922016: a multilevel, geospatial analysis of repeated cross-sectional surveys," by Mira Johri, Sunil Rajpal, and S.V. Subramanian, was published Nov. 16, 2021 in the Lancet Global Health. Explore further Disparities found in vaccination coverage by age 24 months before COVID-19 More information: Progress in reaching unvaccinated (zero-dose) children in India, 19922016: a multilevel, geospatial analysis of repeated cross-sectional surveys, Lancet Global Health, www.thelancet.com/journals/lan (21)00349-1/fulltext Journal information: The Lancet Global Health Progress in reaching unvaccinated (zero-dose) children in India, 19922016: a multilevel, geospatial analysis of repeated cross-sectional surveys, A researcher at work in the Ryu lab. Credit: Hackensack Meridian Health The secret to melanoma's metastatic spread could be a complex natural pathway it hijacksone which may be a therapeutic target in combination with other targeted therapies and immunotherapies, according to new research published by Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI) scientists. The laboratory of Byungwoo Ryu, Ph.D., and colleagues at the CDI demonstrated the pathway centered around a bone morphogenetic protein known as BMP6 might be the main way melanoma seeks to take over the body, according to the publication in the journal Molecular Cancer Research. "Metastasis is the main reason cancer patients die," said Ryu, an associate member of the CDI, and also a research member of the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, of which Hackensack University Medical Center's John Theurer Cancer Center is part. "If we can prevent cell motility, we can prevent cancer from spreadingand save lives. That is what we are aiming to do through our science." "This is good work by the Ryu laboratory, and the findings are therapeutically relevant for melanoma, in terms of preventing metastases in the future," said Benjamin Tycko, M.D., Ph.D., member of the CDI and also an author of the paper. "This is the kind of translational work that could be a veritable boon for patients in the near future." Melanoma starts as a localized lesionbut once it reaches the point of metastasis, it becomes a killer: just 27 percent of the patients who reached stage 4 of the disease survive, even with the latest immunotherapies, according to the American Cancer Society. Cancers are all known to take over natural processes of the body in order to promote their spread. Ryu and colleagues identify perhaps the main culprit in the spread of melanoma: the silencing of a protein known as BMP6 (bone morphogenetic protein 6). In a complex chain reaction, the BMP6 is silenced by an epigenetic "eraser complex" known as SIN3A-HDAC1/2 fostered by the cancer. The lack of BMP6 expression then cascades into abnormal silencing of an intracellular signaling pathway mediated by a protein called SMAD5 (Small Mothers Against Decapentaplegics 5). The ultimate effect downstream is the aberrant over-production of yet another protein, FAM83G/PAWS1. This final step is exactly what the cancer seeks to spread beyond the initial lesion: since the FAM83G/PAWS1 promotes cancer cell motility and cell migration, it allows the cancer cells to spread more quickly through the body, as Ryu and team demonstrated in an animal model of melanoma metastasis using clinical skin cancer samples. The molecular "chain reaction" connections were shown through the use of a noble small molecule compound called Corin, developed in the lab of Philip Cole, M.D., another one of the authors on the paper, from Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School. The Corin was synthesized in Cole's laboratory to inhibit HDAC1/2 and KDM1Ameaning it cuts off the cascade right at the beginning with the "eraser complex" at the start, before BMP6 is impacted. "We showed that, using the Corin, the cancer was not actively spreading and proliferating in the model," said Ryu. "We believe the compound could be a therapeutic agent that could be extremely effective in combination with other clinically approved melanoma drugs. It could make a big difference for keeping the cancer cells from spreading and recurrence." The Ryu laboratory is conducting follow-up work using cutting edge technologies such as transcriptome and proteome analysis and building a better metastasis model. Two questions they hope to answer in the laboratory: how the FAM83G at the end of the epigenetic cascade resulting in metastasis regulates the intrinsic machinery of cell motility that cancer cell hijacks for spreadingand whether this FAM83G itself is a viable target for preventing melanoma from spreading, perhaps via adjuvant drugs in combination with other molecularly targeted therapies. Additionally, the team is investigating other epigenetic "eraser complexes" such as CoREST and NuRD complexes which may be involved in metastatic cancer development and therapy resistance. "This is the kind of bench science which promises great bedside benefits in the future," said Ihor Sawczuk, M.D., FACS, the chief research officer and president of the Northern Region for Hackensack Meridian Health. "The CDI's work is an investment into the health of our years to come." More information: Dongkook Min et al, Epigenetic Silencing of BMP6 by the SIN3AHDAC1/2 Repressor Complex Drives Melanoma Metastasis via FAM83G/PAWS1, Molecular Cancer Research (2021). Journal information: Molecular Cancer Research Dongkook Min et al, Epigenetic Silencing of BMP6 by the SIN3AHDAC1/2 Repressor Complex Drives Melanoma Metastasis via FAM83G/PAWS1,(2021). DOI: 10.1158/1541-7786.MCR-21-0289 Provided by Hackensack Meridian Health A banner at the Acacia fraternity house reads, "Anything but yes means no," during a protest Aug. 31 against the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity chapter at the University of Iowa. Protests at large public universities have spread across the country. Students have packed board meetings with university leaders. They have gathered hundreds-strong outside fraternity chapters. In some cases, they've flipped cars. Though the specifics of the incidents and messages differ, a fresh wave of student protest has catalyzed around fraternities with members that have been accused of sexual assault. The protests started with the beginning of the fall semester at large public universities, such as the University of Iowa, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the University of Kansas and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The movement has since spread to campuses in states including Alabama, California, Mississippi and New York. College students often protest without incident or news coverage, but the demonstrations at Greek chapters have stood out for their frequency and fervor. Some of the protests stemmed from nameless posts on social media, especially the platform Yik Yak, an app that allows students to post anonymously within a limited radius. Several involved allegations that men at fraternities drugged their peers. In many cases, the protests have served as rallying cries against universities that students say have been unwilling to crack down on Greek organizations whose members commit sexual violence. Frats under pressure for years, with little change: Young men died in fraternities every year for two decades. Its unclear whether these short-term actions will result in long-term change, especially since impassioned undergraduates typically graduate and move on after a few years. Some advocates have pushed for universities to cancel Greek life altogether. Defenders of fraternities say that unfairly paints all fraternities and shutting down chapters drives students to gather in secret. Something has changed, said Sarah McMahon, a Rutgers University professor who studies sexual violence within higher education. Undergraduates want administrations to do more than issue statements condemning sexual violence on campus, she said. They want a cultural change, too. Story continues If institutions are willing to say theyre committed to having safe, inclusive campuses, they need to take a real look at whats prohibiting that, she said. Theres enough thats gone wrong with fraternities that there needs to be some engagement and looking at that system. Stay in the know: For more news on colleges and other cant-miss moments of the day, sign up for Daily Briefing. Are fraternities the problem on college campuses? About 1 in 4 college women report they have been assaulted as an undergraduate, according to the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network. (The advocacy group cautioned the actual numbers may be higher because some women opt not to report.) More than half of the sexual assaults committed on college campuses take place during the fall months when many students are new to higher education, the organization said. Its difficult to say whether fraternities commit more acts of sexual violence than their peers on college campuses. Other all-male groups, such as athletic teams or military groups, have come under similar criticism, McMahon said. Some research indicates men who join fraternities have attitudes that are more supportive or accepting of sexual violence, she said. But some studies have found fraternity members have about the same level of sexual aggression as other male college students. Eastern Michigan University student Taylor Malpass holds a sign that says, "Rapists belong in jail not on campus," during a protest against fraternities Alpha Sigma Phi and Delta Tau Delta in Ypsilanti on Oct. 19. Fraternity culture varies from college to college, and protests have taken place at public and private institutions small and large. The wave started with demonstrations in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska in late August and early September. Since then, a protest has followed nearly weekly. In early November, students at the University of Colorado, Boulder, held a protest after two women filed police reports saying they were assaulted at the local chapter of Pi Kappa Alpha. The Denver Post reported 500 to 600 protesters showed up. Social media helps to drive protests Though the protests take place now, the sentiments behind them have been brewing for months or years. Prisha Sujin Kumar, a senior at Boston University, and two other women started a group and Instagram account called Campus Survivors in spring 2020. That group posts anonymous stories on Instagram from people who said they experienced sexual assault, mostly at Boston University. The group doesnt verify the submissions, and it generally doesn't include information that would identify someone. Some posts do include locations, universities or groups by name. Other Instagram accounts posting anonymous assault stories have sprung up at Arizona State University, Brown and the University of Vermont. Sujin Kumar said the Boston University account serves two purposes. First, the creators wanted a space for people who have experienced sexual assault to be able to share their experiences. Many women, Sujin Kumar said, dont feel comfortable sharing their stories with law enforcement or their universities. Second, they wanted to show people sexual assault may be happening on their campuses. That heightened awareness has driven this year's protests, Sujin Kumar said. When students see that its not just their college, it brings even more anger, Sujin Kumar said. Sexual assault hotline calls set a record during the pandemic: Many reaching out are children. Are protests unfair to fraternities? Jud Horras, CEO of the North American Interfraternity Conference, is unequivocal about stamping out sexual assault within Greek life. But Horras, whose trade association unites 57 national fraternities and more than 6,000 chapters, disagrees with some of the approaches by critics. Specifically, he is frustrated with protesters who demonstrate against fraternities that report and take action when they encounter sexual assault. The NIC instructed fraternities to create a plan to address sexual misconduct and to report any incidents to their university and police. Horras called for activists to hold students accountable publicly, rather than encouraging anonymous accusations on social media. Few chapters, he said, have closed as a result of the latest movement. University of Delaware students protest a fraternity Oct. 13 after one its members allegedly attacked a female student. Fraternities bring value to campus, he said. Men in the groups are often more engaged with their campus and often have higher grades than their peers. Some fraternity members have even joined the protests. He said abolishing Greek life would be counterproductive: Students are going to gather in groups even if they're not recognized by the university, so colleges should want to continue official groups they can sanction. Secret frats are real: What else to look out for during college fraternity rush 'It's a very uphill battle' The pressing question for the activists remains: Will anything change? Theres mixed evidence. Universities have expelled students, as was the case at the University of Delaware. The University of Nebraska announced it would increase resources for survivors of sexual assault on campus. It issued a five-year suspension to the chapter at the center of the protests, citing an infraction of the university's alcohol policy. In other instances, fraternities expelled members or voted to halt social activities for the year. After starting their account, Sujin Kumar and the founders of Campus Survivors noticed many of the stories were tied to one fraternity: Kappa Sigma. That group had been suspended at Boston University in 2015 but was allowed to reopen. She and her co-founders reported what they found to the university. Kumar wrote open letters to the university detailing her concerns. When that didnt get the traction they wanted, they protested the fraternity in February and again in October. Boston University has since suspended the chapter for holding a party and meeting while the group was supposed to abstain from social activities. Kenneth Elmore, an associate provost, told the university's in-house news service the university needed to speak to members of the fraternity while it investigated. "I told them that before they did any more programming, they would need to get my approval," Elmore said of the chapter. "They did not do that, so we moved to suspend them." Sujin Kumar said she was glad to see the university take action, but it feels like administrators still haven't gotten the point. "It's just really frustrating, to say the least. They are being forced to change," she said. "But it's a very uphill battle." If you are a survivor of sexual assault, you can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 800-656-HOPE (4673) or visit hotline.rainn.org/online and receive confidential support. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fraternity protest over sexual assault: Can college Greek life change? Murray State University recognized as a Phi Kappa Phi Circle of Excellence Gold Chapter By Alex Pologruto | Nov 17, 2021 The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi the nations oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines recently recognized the Murray State University chapter of Phi Kappa Phi as a Circle of Excellence Gold Chapter, the second-highest commendation a chapter can receive from the organization. MURRAY, Ky. The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi the nations oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines recently recognized the Murray State University chapter of Phi Kappa Phi as a Circle of Excellence Gold Chapter, the second-highest commendation a chapter can receive from the organization. The award is given to chapters that exceed expectations in chapter operations and who demonstrate sustainability and vitality as a chapter of Phi Kappa Phi. The Circle of Excellence program was introduced in 2018. The program recognized 74 chapters this year, including 23 with the Gold distinction. Phi Kappa Phi currently has chapters on more than 325 select campuses in the United States, its territories and the Philippines. Our chapters are the lifeblood of Phi Kappa Phi. Were proud to recognize and celebrate their success with a Circle of Excellence Award, said acting Society Executive Director Traci Navarre. The Circle of Excellence Gold honor is given to chapters who scored a 95-99 out of 100 on a criteria scale that evaluates chapter health indicators. By receiving the Gold distinction, the Murray State chapter is recognized as a thriving organization that holds annual initiations, upholds the Society Bylaws, regularly attends chapter training opportunities and submits a chapter-endorsed nominee to the Phi Kappa Phi Fellowship Program. "I cried after reading the email from the Society headquarters that we were a Gold Chapter," said chapter president Dr. Melony Shemberger. "The chapter officers worked extremely hard last academic year during a pandemic to offer opportunities for members to participate during our university's Scholars Week (both semesters), to be included in the commencement programs, to publicize efforts to all members, and to induct new members in April. How a small crew of faculty and student officers achieved all this is still beyond me. I am blessed to work with members who hold Phi Kappa Phi near and dear to their hearts as much as I do." Chapters achieving the Circle of Excellence Gold distinction receive: a commendation letter from the Society sent to chapter officers and campus administration special recognition on the Phi Kappa Phi website specially-designed logo for use in chapter communications a $200 cash award To learn more about the Circle of Excellence program, please visit phikappaphi.org/2022Excellence. FSM President David W. Panuelo poses with T.H. Elina Akinaga, CEO Jared Morris, and representatives from the Department of Resources & Development and Vital Signage at the entrance to Capricciosa Ristorante Italiano informs customers that because of the governor's executive order they will have to show proof of vaccination, as seen on Aug. 24 in Hagatna. What Calistoga officials not too long ago described as an eyesore is now a first-class wine tasting room, promising to elevate the eastern gateway to Calistoga, on Lincoln Avenue. Owner Mario Sculatti and his business partner, Trevor Mallett, have transformed Roam Antiques into Vault Wine + Artifacts, with a mix of American and European antiques, and offering a variety of Napa Valley wines. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! The buildings industrial nature has been masked with velvet chairs and original glass-blown lighting fixtures, adding to the luxurious ambiance, along with new landscaping and a flagstone patio out front. Sculatti has also added two more glass-paned garage doors to the original one, which allows for a wide entrance space into an interior that is both opulent and inviting, with an already lived-in feel. We used reclaimed materials wherever we could. As an antique guy I love history, and I love patina, Sculatti said. This is my version of a really cool industrial, historical space. The center of the tasting room is dominated by a show-stopper of a Roman press, with a limestone basin. The limestone is from Italy, and the press itself could have come from Austria or Italy, Sculatti said. Another press bears an inscription in German, which translates as In good times and in bad times we still make red and white wine. Our idea was to offer this awesome collection of great, Napa Valley wines, surrounded by historical, winemaking artifacts, he said. Sculatti operated Roam for about five years as an antique shop, and Vault is now the sister property to Sculattis Rutherford Wine Vault, a vintner and collector storage space with a members-only lounge. There are still wine-related antiques for sale at Vault, like Sculattis corkscrew collection, highlighted in a large glass display case. Ive been a corkscrew collector for too long, he said. The biggest pieces are not for sale, he said, because I love them way too much. The Sculatti family has deep roots in Napa Valley. He grew up in St. Helena and his ancestors were straight off the boat from Italy, he said, and went to work in St. Helena vineyards. His great-grandfather was a sharecropper on a vineyard that is now Bill Harlans Napa Valley Reserve, and his grandfather planted and managed all of Beringers holdings. Sculattis father, Ron, also helped create the Chateau Montelena Chardonnay that won the historic 1973 Paris tasting, he said. The family has also owned two retail stores in St. Helena for about the last 40 years. Sculatti himself as has built his winery brand, along with Wheeler Farms in St. Helena. He and his wife and son now reside on a ranch in Pope Valley. The wines in Sculattis collection range from entry level to reserve, with a Zinfandel at $28 a bottle, a Chardonnay at $10 a glass, and coming soon a $250 bottle of wine, he said. No food service is offered at Vault, for now, but patrons have the option of a variety of experiences, from wine by the glass, or entire winery portfolio tastings. There is also a private room at Vault, for a party of eight or less, that includes a secret door disguised as a large mirror. It leads to a library, for future use as a private tasting room. The room also holds an old display case Sculatti acquired from Steves Hardwares Gary Menegon in St. Helena. The case is imprinted with the name Fisher, and as it turns out, is from a Calistoga jewelry store dating back to 1910. Sculatti said his vision for the future of the tasting room includes fun wine release events featuring antique cars, another of his passions. You can reach Cynthia Sweeney at 942-4035 or csweeney@weeklycalistogan.com. Pop the cork on Napa Valley wine! Discover the hidden stories of Napa Valley wine and the people behind it -- plus expert analysis from our columnists and more with our weekly email newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. Bookmark Napa Valley, the fundraiser benefiting the St. Helena Public Library, Friends & Foundation, returns Jan. 30 after a one-year hiatus. The sixth annual event will be from 5 to 9 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 30, at Tre Posti, 641 Main St. Tickets are $180 and include appetizers, a three-course seated dinner and wine, plus moderated interviews with three guest authors. As of last week, 90 seats were still available out of 160. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! Ted Habte-Gabr will interview authors Alka Joshi, Lisa Napoli and Sheldon Siegel. Ted Habte-Gabr Habte-Gabr is the founder and producer of Live Talks Los Angeles, which was the culmination of a lifetime love of conversation and community dating back to his days as a student in Iowa chairing the universitys lecture series. He has worked as a consultant advising colleges and nonprofits on creating live event experiences in pursuit of institutional advancement. Alka Joshi Joshi was born in India and raised in the U.S. since the age of 9. She has a bachelors degree from Stanford University and an MFA from California College of Arts. Her debut novel, The Henna Artist, became a New York Times bestseller, a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick and is being developed into an episodic TV series. The recently released sequel, The Secret Keeper of Jaipur, will be followed by a third book in the trilogy in 2023. Lisa Napoli Napoli, a past featured author and moderator at Bookmark, was born and raised in Brooklyn. She moved to Southern California in 2004 to work on the public radio show Marketplace. Her journalism career has spanned CNN, New York Times and public radio, with books including Up All Night: Ted Turner, CNN, and the Birth of 24 Hours News, and Ray & Joan: The Man Who Made McDonald's Fortune and the Woman Who Gave It All Away. Her most recent book is Susan, Linda, Nina & Cokie: The Extraordinary Story of the Founding Mothers of NPR. Sheldon Siegel Siegel is the bestselling author of the Mike Daley/Rosie Fernandez series of courtroom dramas featuring San Francisco criminal defense attorneys Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez. He is also the author of the thriller The Terrorist Next Door featuring Chicago homicide detectives David Gold and A.C. Battle. His books have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into a dozen languages. Siegel has been an attorney for more than thirty-five years, and he specializes in corporate and securities law with the San Francisco office of the international law firm of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP. Bookmark Napa Valley Proceeds from Bookmark Napa Valley go to library's nonprofit Friends & Foundation, which augments funds the library receives from the City of St. Helena. The city funds full-time staffing and things like electricity, heat and water, said Paige Pohlers Meek, executive director of the Friends & Foundation, St. Helena Public Library. We support part-time staffing, programs and services. Bookmarks corporate sponsors include Boeschen Vineyards, the Napa Valley Vintners, Tierra Roja, Frank Family Vineyards, Alpha Omega Winery, Alila Napa Valley, Napa Valley Reserve, CAMi Vineyards and 55 Degrees. For tickets and sponsoring and advertising options, go to bookmark2022.eventbrite.com. Tuesday, Nov. 9 0717 A manhole cover popped off near Tainter/Oak. 1123 A driver said hed struck a dog on Silverado Trail. 1842 Report of a possible drunk driver on Silverado Trail. 2034 A caller said the traffic light at Main/Mitchell was malfunctioning. An officer observed it, and it seemed to be working fine. Wednesday, Nov. 10 0647 Police arrested someone following a traffic stop at Main/Adams. 1409 Police contacted a pedestrian on Main Street and arrested the 42-year-old St. Helena man for three misdemeanor bench warrants. He was cited and released with a promise to appear in court. Thursday, Nov. 11 0952 Report of someone on Hunt Avenue using a leaf blower on a holiday. 1016 Water was leaking from an Oak Avenue building. 1128 Liquid was being discharged from a commercial building at Main/Hunt. 1342 A caller warned police about a phishing scam thats going around. 1540 Report of a dog barking near Fulton Lane. 1603 Medical aid for a man feeling sick on Pope Street. 2348 Report of a water leak on Railroad Avenue. Friday, Nov. 12 0121 Medical aid for an unconscious man on Main Street. 0751 A branch was hanging low over Spring Mountain Road. 1146 A man got upset about a pump not working at a Main Street gas station. He reportedly burned rubber and almost ran someone over as he drove away in his black Lincoln. 1242 A tool was reported stolen from a parking lot on Vintage Avenue. 1342 A white luxury bus was parked in the wrong direction near Oak/Adams, creating a traffic hazard. 1458 Police took a report on a non-injury accident at Main/Britton. 1632 Seven guests were being verbally combative and refusing to leave a restaurant on Charter Oak Avenue. 1823 Non-injury accident on Main Street. 1905 Report of three juveniles possibly intoxicated near Main Street. Police checked the area. 1956 The unruly restaurant patrons from a previous call were now reportedly calling the restaurant, making threats and using racial slurs. 2051 Following a traffic stop at Main/Grayson, police arrested a 32-year-old Chicago woman on suspicion of DUI. 2250 An intoxicated man was refusing to leave a Main Street property. 2307 Report of an intoxicated woman trying to get into a house on Charter Oak Avenue. Saturday, Nov. 13 0004 Report of vandalism on Charter Oak Avenue. 0201 Report of loud music, singing and talking since 8 p.m. on Oak Avenue. 0519 Report of a reckless driver on Main Street. 0740 Medical aid for a woman having a seizure on Pratt Avenue. 1339 A fallen tree branch was blocking the northbound lane of the elm tunnel. 1348 A man threw coffee all over an Oak Avenue building during what was described as a domestic altercation. 1641 Report of two reckless motorcyclists swerving in and out of traffic on Main Street. 1918 Report of a reckless driver passing illegally on Main Street. 2024 Report of a verbal dispute between a man and a woman at Britton/Main. Police took a report. 2102 St. Helena police assisted Calistoga police responding to a shooting on Washington Street. Sunday, Nov. 14 0136 Following a traffic stop at McCorkle/Allison, police arrested a 22-year-old St. Helena man on suspicion of DUI. 1224 Report of a dog wandering around Allyn Avenue. 1422 Non-injury hit-and-run on Silverado Trail. 1636 Police were asked to check on a small child in a car seat in a vehicle near Hunt Avenue, with no adults around. 1807 Non-injury hit-and-run on the Pope Street Bridge. 2148 Loud amplified music on Main Street was audible from McCorkle Avenue. An officer asked for it to be turned down. Monday, Nov. 15 1803 A broken-down pickup was blocking one lane of Starr Avenue and needed to be moved to Monte Vista. Tuesday, Nov. 16 0405 Medical aid on Redondo Court. LONDON (AP) A book about a wealthy American family whose actions helped unleash the United States opioid epidemic described by its author as a story of hubris won Britains leading nonfiction book prize Tuesday. Patrick Radden Keefes Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty was awarded the 50,000 pound ($67,000) Baillie Gifford Prize during a ceremony at Londons Science Museum. Keefes book chronicles the billionaire Sackler clan, owner of Purdue Pharma, whose members used their fortune to fund museums and art galleries around the world. A reckoning has come with the revelation that much of that fortune was based on OxyContin, a powerful prescription painkiller that the company developed in the 1990s and marketed aggressively to doctors. Empire of Pain traces the rise of the familys fortunes under three doctor brothers and their children, and its downfall in a web of lawsuits and bankruptcy proceedings. Keefe said it was a portrait of three generations of one family behaving very badly, but also on a deeper level a story about systems and about impunity. I think in some ways its a story about hubris, he said. In a lot of ways its a story about denial." Amid protests over its role in the opioid business, the Sackler name has been removed in recent years from wings and galleries at institutions including the Louvre in Paris and the Serpentine Gallery in London. Institutions including Britains National Portrait Gallery and the Tate galleries have stopped taking the familys donations due to its role in the opioid crisis, which has been linked to more than 500,000 deaths in the U.S. alone since 2000. Some opioid deaths have been attributed to OxyContin and other prescription painkillers, though most are from illicit forms of opioids such as heroin and illegally made fentanyl. Sackler family members have denied wrongdoing, although their company has pleaded guilty twice to federal crimes over their opioid practices. In September a U.S. federal judge gave conditional approval to a settlement that would remove the family from ownership of Purdue and reorganize the business into a charity-oriented company whose profits would go to government-directed efforts to prevent and treat addiction. Accepting the prize, Keefe thanked all of the many lawyers who advised me about what to do with all the incoming mail when facing threats from the Sackler family during his work on the book. It wasnt a situation where I ever thought about bailing, particularly under pressure from the family, he told The Associated Press. If anything, some of the pressure that I got persuaded me that I was probably on the right track. The Baillie Gifford Prize recognizes English-language books from any country in current affairs, history, politics, science, sport, travel, biography, autobiography and the arts. Empire of Pain beat five other finalists: Cal Flyns environmental exploration Islands of Abandonment; Harald Jahners Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich, 19451955; Kei Millers essays on discrimination, Things I Have Withheld; John Prestons media mogul biography Fall: The Mystery of Robert Maxwell; and Albanian writer Lea Ypis memoir Free: Coming of Age at the End of History. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Jazz represented freedom to me, said Larry Vuckovich, jazz pianist extraordinaire. It represented the United States. As a boy, I lived under Nazi and then Titos repression in Yugoslavia but jazz, especially improvisation, was freedom. Vuckovichs family was given refugee status and allowed to immigrate to the United States in 1951 when he was a teenager. They settled in San Francisco. He and his wife now live in Calistoga. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! San Francisco in those days had over 20 jazz clubs; it was hard to decide which to choose. Trained as a classical pianist, Vuckovich became mesmerized by all types of jazz: boogie-woogie, bebop, Big Band to Cuban Latin and beatnik poetic jazz. He listened to the greats including Miles Davis and John Coltrane as well as the Big Bands of the day. He was the only student Vince Guaraldi ever taught. Jazz music takes in all the world. It comes from African music, but its shared by all people, Vuckovich said. Its always evolving. Jazz takes Latin and South American music and gives it a rhythm of its own. Theres Middle Eastern, gypsy, and romantic jazz. Hes happy to share the origins of jazz and has many stories of the legendary jazz performers hes known and with whom hes shared the stage. Sometimes solo and other times with invited artists, he plays jazz and tells anecdotes on his weekly Saturday night streaming presentations (www.larryvuckovich.com). Past presentations are also archived on the site. Besides an opportunity to play my streaming programs, it also gives me a chance to share my experiences in jazz with listeners, and at the same time I give them some history about the great masters who created this music," he said. Larry Vuckovich performs Dec. 23 Larry Vuckovich Bay Area All-Stars will perform Dec. 23 at Yoshi's on Jack London Square in Oakland at 8 p.m. in a wide-ranging program of blues, ballads, swing/bebop, Latin salsa, Balkan ethnic and funky boogaloo sounds. Tickets at yoshis.com. Also, the wonderful composers are mentioned. What is so unique about America is that a number of great standards were written by people who came from other countries. Look at these tunes and how much more American can you get? Autumn in New York, I Cant Get Started, You Make Me Feel So Young. These were written by Russians, immigrants of Russian descent. The famous song Flamingo, which Duke Ellington recorded, featuring wonderful vocalist Herb Jeffries, was written by a Romanian. I am fortunate to have played with so many greats, learned so much from them and heard meaningful stories, said Vuckovich in a follow-up email. I think the Napa Valley audience will enjoy knowing some of experiences with (just to name a few) Tony Bennett, Jon Hendricks, Vince Guaraldi, Cab Calloway, Dexter Gordon, Bobby McFerrin and others. When Mel Tormes tours stopped in San Francisco, Vuckovich was his first-call pianist. He was the house pianist from 1974 to 1984 for KGO radio. He got to know Lenny Bruce and opened for him several times. Vuckovich has received numerous accolades including being named a Jazz Legend at the Fillmore Jazz Heritage Center in San Francisco, having his birthday proclaimed Larry Vuckovich Day in San Francisco, receiving the Buddy Montgomery Jazz Legacy Jazz Pioneer Award and getting the Lifetime Achievement Award from his former country of Yugoslavia. He said of that award, Im the only cat from the old country living in the U.S. who has played with so many greats over a period of six decades. Hes also a composer and performed his original composition on albums and CDs for his production company Tetrachord Music. One of his favorite local memories was being commissioned by the late Richard Miami to write an accompanying piece for one the classic Saturday movie showings at Copia. The haunting composition, titled View from Telegraph Hill, fit the dark film noir tones for the 1951 film House on Telegraph Hill, and was later featured on Vuckovichs album High Wall. The album placed in the Top 10 of the JazzWeek National Public Radio charts. I want to mention a historic jazz event that happened in Napa Valley in 2013, Vuckovich said. Bruce Hopewell presented a tribute to the highest-selling jazz recording of all time - 'Kind of Blue' by Miles Davis." "At the time, the last living member on the recording, former Miles Davis drummer Jimmie Cobb, was the headliner. I was honored when presenter Bruce Hopewell asked me to organize the band and play in this production at the Lincoln theater in Yountville. This is only one of my many exciting jazz experiences, but at the same time one of the highlights of jazz events that Napa Valley ever had. If he had a chance to go back in time, what would he like to do? If I could take what I know now, Id go back and play with the great (alto saxophonist) John Handy, who was my instructor at San Francisco State," he said. "Id want to play also with (bebop tenor saxophonist) Dexter Gordon. It would be good to go back with the experience, knowledge and strengths I have today. He added, I want to say when I started playing jazz, there was no racism, and we were all good with the brotherhood of the spirit and nature of the music. What we played was more than notes and music theory. The good ones talked the music. When you listen to (tenor saxophonist) Lester Young play 'Stardust,' it hits you, it talks to you. Vuckovich finds much of todays music boring and unimaginative. Jazz is always evolving but with pop music, everythings packaged, he said.I have been fortunate to have played with so many greats, learned so much from them and heard meaningful stories. I look at my performances as a way to pay back the masters of this great music, who dedicated their lives to living it and playing it." "I want to spread the word of the music they produced; pass it on to the audiences whose spirits can be uplifted in these difficult times. The audiences, I believe, feel good about learning something new and getting inspiring musical messages. Napa Valley College has accepted a $10 million gift to its wine education program and will label its future home with the benefactors name. The board of the two-year community college last week formally accepted the largest donation ever made by the Wine Spectator Scholarship Foundation, a gift first announced in September by the foundations namesake magazine. Funding will support an expansion of NVCs Viticulture, Wine and Technology program as well as construction and expansion at its facilities, which will be named the Wine Spectator Wine Education Complex at the Napa Valley College. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! Both the gift and the naming of the wine center won unanimous approval from the seven-member NVC board Thursday night. Wine Spectators donation, which also may include up to $1.2 million of contingency funds, is intended to spark more support of NVC from the wine community, according to editor-publisher Marvin Shanken, who first began traveling to the Napa Valley in the 1970s but said he only became aware of the colleges wine education program about five years ago. If there was ever an educational institution poised for significant contributions to the growth of the California wine industry, this is it, he told the Napa Valley Register in September as the gift was being announced. It is our hope that the door for learning opens wider for young adults from all walks of life, providing a platform for future leadership in the wine industry. Talks between Wine Spectator and the Napa Valley College Foundation about a donation took place over five years, according to the foundations executive director Jessica Thomason. Wine Spectator Foundation donates $10 million to Napa Valley College The Wine Spectator Scholarship Foundation is donating $10 million to Napa Valley College to support the construction and expansion of the school's Viticulture, Wine and Technology program. Plans call for building a new sensory classroom and converting an existing space into a wine laboratory for instruction and production. An existing historic building will be overhauled to contain indoor and outdoor areas for teaching hospitality, sales, and marketing, and also will include a public tasting room. The expansion of the wine education center would take place in three phases, according to plans shared by Thomason with the NVC board. The first stage, expected to cost $8.15 million, would feature the construction of a 6,080-square-foot sensory classroom with a 100-student space that could be divided into two smaller spaces, and equipped with lighting and acoustic design specially suited to wine sensory classes. A second phase budgeted at $922,395 would include the creation of the wine lab and other lab stations and air purification for tasting instruction, among other improvements. The third phase would cost $2.15 million and include a rebuilt, seismically sound wine sales training center with indoor and outdoor teaching spaces, as well as both instructional and public tasting rooms and a retail center for the college winery. In addition to imprinting the Wine Spectator name on the NVC complex, the agreement also will rechristen the facilitys branches after the magazine its classroom building, laboratory, and tasting room. A team of advisers from NVC and Wine Spectator have recommended entrusting the projects design with TLCD Architecture, a Santa Rosa firm that previously planned the colleges library, North Gym, and life sciences buildings, according to Thomason. Napa Valley College to break ground on campus housing this fall, aims for fall 2023 opening This autumn, Napa Valley College plans to start work on the first student housing development on its main campus in its 57-year history. NVCs wine program enrolls 800 to 1,000 students annually at a site that includes a 5-acre vineyard and commercial winery. Students can earn certificates or associates degrees in viticulture, enology, and wine marketing and sales, and a majority of students are current wine industry workers seeking to advance their careers. Created in 1982, Wine Spectators foundation has donated more than $20 million in grants and scholarships to help train future wine industry leaders, including support for UC Davis students and for programs at Sonoma State University, Washington State, Cornell University, and the Culinary Institute of America. Earlier this year, the foundation also donated $100,000 to the Roots Fund, a nonprofit organization that aims to open pathways in the wine businesses for students of color. Thomason of the NVC foundation also said the college is close to announcing another major donation, from the estate of a past donor, potentially as significant as the Wine Spectator gift, although no other details were released Thursday. The wine education center is one of two major additions planned for the main NVC campus on Highway 221 in south Napa. A housing development with apartments and dormitories for more than 500 students, estimated to cost more than $83 million, is scheduled to break ground next spring and open in stages in 2023 and 2024. You can reach Howard Yune at 530-763-2266 or hyune@napanews.com Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! * I understand and agree that registration on or use of this site constitutes agreement to its user agreement and privacy policy. One of the Napa Valleys early Christmas season celebrations will return this weekend, as the Yountville Town & Tree Lighting resumes Sunday after being scaled back in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Co-sponsored by the town and the Yountville Chamber of Commerce, the ceremony will begin at 6 p.m. in the plaza of the Community Center at 6516 Washington St. and will feature music, a toy collection, and a visit by Santa Claus before a countdown to the illumination of the tree. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! Last years tree lighting took place as scheduled, but with an Internet video stream instead of an in-person ceremony to promote social distancing. Performing at the celebration will be Ken Clarke and the Ding-a-Lings, a bell ensemble based at the nearby Veterans Home of California. Visitors also are encouraged to bring unwrapped toys to benefit the holiday toy drive of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Napa Valley. Those unable to attend the tree lighting in person may view a livestream Sunday on Facebook at Explore Yountville, or via Instagram at @yountvilleca. Late-year events return to Napa Valley Expo after extended COVID-19 shutdown The Napa Valley Expos calendar is filling up again and with it, a fairground that stood largely idle during the coronavirus pandemic. Sundays tree lighting opens the towns fifth annual Holidays in Yountville, an array of craft classes, cooking classes, and in-person and virtual wine tastings. For more information on the Yountville celebration, visit townofyountville.com/Home/Components/Calendar/Event/6517/ Holiday festivities will continue in the city of Napa later in the week, when the city hosts its annual tree lighting ceremony at 6 p.m. Nov. 24 at Veterans Memorial Park, followed by its Christmas Parade starting at 5 p.m. Nov. 27 on Second, Brown and Third streets downtown. The global supply chain crisis is daunting. Congestion and bottlenecks across the West Coast have left large cargo vessels stranded at anchor for weeks on end. Across the country, our supply chain has faced major disruptions, driving up costs for consumers and inevitably causing major delays in delivery of essential goods. Last week, I testified before the Senate & Assembly Select Committees on Ports and Goods Movement to offer policymakers solutions to address these challenges. Quality journalism doesn't happen without your help. Subscribe today! Support local news coverage and the people who report it by subscribing to the Napa Valley Register. Special offer: $5 for your first 5 months! Early last year during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic California ports saw significant decreases in trade with record-breaking impacts. But demand rose for medical equipment, along with home improvement items, exercise equipment, and office furniture as consumers grappled with adapting to a new world that revolved around remote work and virtual learning. The surge in cargo has created unprecedented challenges across our states coast. California ports stepped up and took action to help address supply chain disruption. Operationally, California ports have proactively taken steps to alleviate supply chain congestion. These steps include: creating policies that incentivize terminal operators to move trucks faster and more efficiently, extending operating hours at port terminals, and implementing best practices to make use of existing cargo capacity. While the steps taken by California ports are significant, addressing the global supply chain crisis demands intensive public policy initiatives and reform at every level of government. As president of the California Association of Port Authorities, Ive asked how the most consequential system of ports in the nation could receive so little resources from the federal government. Over the past decade, the federal government has invested roughly $11 billion in the eastern Gulf coast ports, but only $1 billion in the West Coast ports. I urge the Legislature, governor and federal policymakers to work with California ports to advance initiatives to mitigate supply chain disruption. This includes: Ongoing long-term funding for projects that address land capacity challenges and infrastructure; A designated supply chain czar within state government to work with the industry to create and implement a state freight and goods movement policy; and Identifying incentives for American companies making equipment like chassis and containers to allow the ability to move containers currently clogging port property. The issues facing our global supply will not disappear overnight. Our elected leadership must take action to help get goods moving. That requires a holistic policy approach that addresses the consistent underfunding of California ports and a reinvestment in infrastructure, technology, and data-driven methods that will get us back on track. Last weeks Legislative hearing on the ports and goods movement was a significant step in addressing these goals. The California Association of Port Authorities stands to work as a partner with these leaders to address and advance solutions. Home to our nations three largest container ports and responsible for handling 40% of containerized imports in the nation, California should play an important role in fixing Americas broken supply chain. But to do that, our state must take immediate and bold action by embracing the maritime industry and commit to ongoing, critical investments in the global supply chain. At the California Association of Port Authorities, we look forward to working with the governors office and the Legislature to meet this moment with long-term solutions. Danny Wan is the executive director of the Port of Oakland and the president of the California Association of Port Authorities. He wrote this for Calmatters, a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how Californias Capitol works and why it matters. Armenia MFA: '3+3' platform needs to refrain from duplicating formats with mandate to settle conflicts RT: US may build facilities in Georgia and Armenia to support its "defense activities" Armenia 2nd President: We will continue the struggle, all the phony cases will be crushed MFA: Armenia calls on Azerbaijan to refrain from provocative rhetoric Hero of 44-day Karabakh war Garik Hovakimyan's sister Mariam is born Republican Party of Armenia Executive Body holds session chaired by Serzh Sargsyan Iranian Embassy: Iran supports '3+3' platform during meeting held in Moscow Armenia ex-defense minister on Prosecutor General's Office imposing attachment on his assets Alen Simonyan: Armenia is in one of the most crucial stages in its history, and opposition is demanding my resignation PM: Armenia is committed to contributing to global mission of strengthening democracy, and we hope we're not alone Armenia MOD: Soldier who was injured from gunshot fired by fellow serviceman has regained consciousness Armenia Deputy PM: Omicron variant is not sufficiently explored First meeting within scope of '3+3' regional platform held in Moscow NEWS.am daily digest: 10.12.21 Armenia soldier killed while resisting Azerbaijanis' attack, 8 are injured, 6 of whom are in severe condition Armenia PM introduces new Head of State Supervision Service Romanos Petrosyan Armenia human rights activists: There were cases when POWs were brought to territory under Azerbaijan's control The book Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman was translated and published on the initiative of Ardshinbank Armenia regional governor, IFRC Secretary General discuss return of Armenian POWs originally from Shirak Province Armenia human rights activist: Number of Armenian POWs in Azerbaijan is 80 more than the confirmed one Pashinyan: Environmental sphere is of strategic importance for Armenia Armenia President: We must understand that we are entering completely different era for humanity Dollar goes up somewhat in Armenia Armenia State Revenue Committee chief meets with French Development Agency Regional Director Opposition 'Armenia' faction MPs Artur Sargsyan and Mkhitar Zakaryan released from penitentiary institution Head of Armenia's Norabak village: Azerbaijan has military post that is 2 km from us Armenia finance minister receives France Ambassador and French Development Agency Regional Director Armenia opposition MP Ishkhan Zakaryan leaving 'With Honor' faction Russian and Armenian Deputy FMs meet in Moscow Armenia PM highlights importance of speedy conclusion of full-format agreement between Iran and EEU Armenia opposition MPs Mkhitar Zakaryan and Artur Sargsyan to be released without court decision today Armenian opposition MP Armen Charchyan is released Armenia MOD: Armenian side has one casualty, few soldiers are injured, exchange of fire is over Armenias Pashinyan: High-tech component development also important in Eurasian integration context Armenia Deputy PM dismisses his two assistants Nazarbayev says Azerbaijan can become observer country in Eurasian Economic Union Head of Armenia village: The Azerbaijanis tried to advance in direction of Sotk, but our soldiers didn't let them Armenia MOD: Azerbaijan attacked in eastern direction of border Special court hearing underway on case of Armenia opposition lawmaker behind bars Artsakh officials visit Stepanakert memorial 2 more die of coronavirus in Karabakh Vardenis protesters dismiss Armenia MOD statement on obstructing car taking wounded soldier to Yerevan Armenia FM briefs Francophonie chief on regional security issues (PHOTOS) Armenia Police: 13 people apprehended near MFA building Armenia protesting residents reopen Martuni-Vardenis motorway due to border tension Armenia parliament passes changes to some laws Armenia MOD: Deputy commander was told in Vardenis that car taking wounded soldier to Yerevan would be obstructed 347 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Armenia opposition movement staging protest inside MFA building Armenia has new environment minister Artsakh MFA: Referendum on independence is solid legal basis for statehood Special court session to be held on case of imprisoned Armenia opposition MP Biden promises Zelenskyy to punish Russia in case of invasion of Ukraine Newspaper: Armenia parliament recent fight case to have former ones fate Newspaper: What is reason for recent long visit to Armenia by ex-commander of Russia peacekeepers in Artsakh? Petition to arrest one of accused Armenia soldiers returned from Azerbaijan captivity is granted Russian Aerospace Forces consider practice of reconnaissance and strike UAVs during Karabakh conflict Investigative Committee: Motion filed for arrest of 5 of 10 POWs returned to Armenia on Dec. 4 Armenia State Revenue Committee chief hosts Iran Customs Administration head Armenia Shirak Province ex-deputy governor Boris Aleksanov dies Constitutional Court announces decision on release of arrested MPs of opposition 'Armenia' parliamentary faction Iran, Azerbaijan discuss cooperation in petrol and natural gas sectors Lavrov: We understand the complexity of the situation in Armenia, but it's not right to speculate Russia's role Cem Ozdemir who initiated adoption of Armenian Genocide resolution is Germany's first minister with migration history Armenia FM, France Secretary of State sign 'Roadmap for Armenian-French Economic Cooperation' Armenia PM scheduled to deliver speech at Summit for Democracy on Dec. 10 Zakharova says news about recall of Russia's Ambassador to Armenia is misinformation Opposition 'Armenia' Alliance: 3 deputies of parliamentary faction will be released Attorney: MP Armen Charchyan needs to be released immediately by virtue of Armenia Constitutional Court decision Armenia ex-environment minister Romanos Petrosyan appointed Head of State Supervision Service Armenia MOD: 2 Armenian soldiers receive slight firearm injuries as a result of Azerbaijanis' provocation NEWS.am daily digest: 09.12.21 Zakharova: Moscow hopes Armenia and Azerbaijan leaders reaffirm commitment to implementing agreements Zakharova on Aliyev's statement and murders of Armenian peaceful civilians Ex-chief advisor to Armenia PM Hakob Simidyan appointed Minister of Environment Joe Biden's Summit for Democracy kicks off, Armenia PM is also participating Armenia environment minister sacked Residents of Armenia's Vardenis shut down Martuni-Vardenis road in support of opposition alliance's leader (PHOTOS) Armenia MOD: Azerbaijan opened intense fire toward Gegharkunik Province military positions Armenia President meets with Emir of Qatar Azerbaijan opened fire on Artsakh village tractor operator, says Machkalashen mayor Parliament ruling majority obstructs decriminalizing severe insult in Armenia Armenia deputy defense minister: No group has come from Moscow for demarcation Armenia parliament approves several amendments to laws in first reading Ambassador: American Studies center at YSU will play important role in deepening relations with Armenia Armenia Parliament Speaker receives IFRC Secretary General-led delegation Armenia PM receives IFRC Secretary General Dollar still gaining more value in Armenia Armenia Parliament Speaker sues opposition MP Aregnaz Manukyan for previous allegations Law will lead to positive changes in Armenia universities administration, says US ambassador Georgia formally refuses attending '3+3' regional cooperation platform meeting Armenia MFA officials pay tribute to innocent victims of genocides 2 Azerbaijanis killed in mine explosion near Karabakh's Karin Tak village MFA: Armenia will continue to work diligently to raise awareness of genocides American Studies center to open at Yerevan State University Gerasimov: Russian military in Karabakh working to restore peaceful life in region Armenia opposition MP: Authorities present at household level establishment technical furnishing on frontline Bomb threat in Yerevan building Armenia: 6,500 people in border communities to receive cash for winter needs Armenia government restricts access to open information from gov.am, govtravel.am YEREVAN. Zhoghovurd daily of Armenia writes: The Republic of Armenia yesterday appealed to the Russian Federation [(RF)] to defendunder the agreement between the two countries since 1997the territorial integrity of the country, as there was an attack on the sovereign territory of Armenia. According to Article 3 of the Treaty of Friendship and Mutual Assistance signed between the two countries in [19]97, "the parties shall jointly take all available measures for them to eliminate the threat to peace, the breach of the peace, or to counteract the aggression launched by any state against them, and provide necessary assistance to each otherincluding military." Let us note that in May, when the Azerbaijani troops entered the territory of Armenia, an application was made [from Armenia] to the CSTO, but later the assistance was considered unproductive. In turn, the [Armenian] foreign ministry, noting that Azerbaijan's offensive actions have resulted in casualties, calls on international partnersRF, the CSTO, the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairsto express a clear and targeted response to these actions of the Azerbaijani side, which undermine the regional peace and security, and undertake effective steps aimed at its prevention, as well as unconditional and complete withdrawal of the Azerbaijani armed forces from the territory of the Republic of Armenia. YEREVAN. As of 10am on Wednesday, the situation on Armenias eastern border, where the Armenian positions were attacked Tuesday by the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces, is relatively stable, and the ceasefire agreement is generally observed. As a result of Tuesdays hostilities, the adversary has up to 70 killed and wounded soldier, as well as considerable losses of military equipmentin particular, 4 armored personnel carriers, 1 armored vehicle, and 5 military vehicles, the Ministry of Defense of Armenia informed Armenian News-NEWS.am. The Armenian side has 1 fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Intensive work is underway to find these soldiers. Two Armenian military outposts are now under the control of the adversary. Negotiations are underway, with the mediation of the Russian side, to resolve the situation and to have the captured Armenian servicemen returned. David Cicilline, a senior member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the US House of Representatives, has issued a statement condemning the Azerbaijani military aggression on Armenia. Azerbaijans attack on Armenias eastern border is a clear violation of last years peace deal & cant be tolerated. 6,000 died in last years conflict, not one more should be lost to this dispute. Azerbaijan must acknowledge & respect Armenian sovereignty, the Congressman Cicilline wrote on Twitter. At around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has 1 fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Vahan Hunanyan, Spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Armenia, on Wednesday responded to the questions of the media. Regarding Armenias appeal to Russia, Hunanyan said: The Republic of Armenia is in direct and multilevel contact with its allythe Russian Federation. As you know, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia and the President of the Russian Federation held a phone conversation, during which Nikol Pashinyan briefed Vladimir Putin on the situation. In this context, the leaders of the two countries discussed possible joint steps, the implementation of which is enshrined in a bilateral legal framework and is in line with allied relations. At around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Azerbaijan has reported seven military casualties during its aggression Tuesday against the territorial integrity of Armenia. According to the Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan, these servicemen were killed in the aforesaid aggression: Lieutenant Umud Niftaliyev, Noncommissioned Officer Orhan Jabarov, Junior Sergeant Natig Aliyev, and Privates Elchin Aghayev, Elmin Alizade, Elchin Aliyev, and Murad Halilov. At around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Vahan Hunanyan, Spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Armenia, on Wednesday responded to the questions of the media. With respect to Armenias appeal to the UN Security Council, the MFA spokesperson said: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia has already informed the President of the UN Security Council on the situation. I would like to note that for the protection of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Republic of Armenia we consider the implementation of all the toolkits of international law and diplomatic practice. At around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. MOSCOW. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrey Rudenko on Wednesday had a telephone conversation with Toivo Klaar, the European Union (EU) Special Representative for the South Caucasus and the Crisis in Georgia, reported the press service of the Russian foreign ministry. They discussed the situation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. As reported earlier, at around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Moscow calls for restraint to the parties to the conflict on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, and is in favor of maintaining the trilateral agreement, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday, according to TASS. "Indeed, the resumption of hostilities on the [Armenian-Azerbaijani] border is what caused serious concern yesterday. But thanks to the mediation efforts of the Russian side, it was managed to call on the conflicting parties to show restraint," the Kremlin representative added. "The Russian side will continue to do that. Nevertheless, we hope that the only way to stabilize the situation is to fulfill the trilateral agreements." As reported earlier, at around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. The Armenian authorities expect from Russia that their strategic partner will help resolve the issues related to the recent actions of Azerbaijan. Armen Grigoryan, Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia, told this to Kommersant daily of Russiaand within the framework of the Moscow meeting of the secretaries of the security councils of the CIS countries . He responded the question as to what kind of assistance Yerevan expects by petitioning to Moscow within the framework of the 1997 agreement. Earlier, Grigoryan had called on Russia to "protect the territorial integrity of Armenia." "A written [respective] petition is being prepared," he had added. "Currently, the Azerbaijani armed forces are in the sovereign territory of Armenia; this is an act of aggression. In 1997, Armenia and Russia agreed to help each other in such cases on a reciprocal basis. That was the reason why we [i.e., Armenia] petitioned to Russia," Grigoryan responded to Kommersant. To the question as to exactly what kind of assistance this is about, Grigoryan responded: "We are in favor of resolving this issue through diplomacy. But if it is impossible to resolve it through diplomacy, then the issue must be resolved by military means." Earlier, the secretary of Armenias Security Council had made it clear that, "Yerevan can also ask for help from international partners." In his interview with Kommersant, he assured that Russia and the CSTO are the priority in this regard. "But if a decision is not made, we will consider other possibilities as well," he added. "The hostilities [on Tuesday] have stopped thanks to the active participation of the Russian side. But the problem has not been resolved because the Azerbaijani armed forces continue to remain in the sovereign territory of Armenia," Armen Grigoryan said on Wednesday. "According to all the maps that existed during the USSR, all those territories are sovereign territories of Armenia." As reported earlier, at around 1pm on Tuesday, the units of the Azerbaijani armed forces attacked the Armenian positions located in the direction of the eastern border of Armenia. Also, the adversary used artillery, armored vehicles, and firearms of various calibers in this attack. And according to the agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, the exchange of fire was stopped at 6:30pm, and the situation has relatively stabilized. The Armenian side has one fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, the contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. And the Azerbaijani defense ministry has reported seven casualties and ten wounded on their side. The purpose of our meeting is to present to you the details of the provocative and aggressive actions of Azerbaijan on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border yesterday. Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan stated this Wednesday at the beginning of an urgent meeting with the heads of diplomatic missions accredited in Armenia. Subsequently, Mirzoyan presented the aforesaid details, and added as follows, in particular: "We can not call this anything other than aggression against the Republic of Armenia. (). I would also like to inform [you] that in our deep conviction, this behavior of Azerbaijan is a consequence of the fact that our international partners and the international community in general did not respond properly and in a targeted manner to the use of force by Azerbaijan during the [military] aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh [(Artsakh)] that started back on September 27 last year, and then during these months, too. In our conviction, the response of the international community to all the provocative, aggressive statements and actions I have mentioned has not been targeted and proper. The continuing statements equating the parties were directly perceived by Azerbaijan as an incentive to continue this behavior. We expect that our partner and friendly countries will respond promptly and in a targeted manner to these actions, and will use their direct influence on the Republic of Azerbaijan to urge [it] to end the provocative actions and encroachments on the Republic of Armenia. (). And from this moment on, the entire accountability for the further escalation of the situation falls directly on the Republic of Azerbaijan. I want to talk about another political nuance, too. In our conviction, by shifting the tension on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, the territory of the Republic of Armenia, Azerbaijan is attempting to divert the attention of the international community from the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. I would like to emphasize once again that the Republic of Armenia will defend both its territorial integrity and the right of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh to self-determination. " And at the end of the meeting, Ararat Mirzoyan responded the questions of those in attendance. My stance is the following: a corridor cant be provided to Azerbaijan, and no country, including our enemy country Azerbaijan, can receive that corridor by force. This is what deputy of the Civil Contract faction of the National Assembly of Armenia Armen Khachatryan told reporters in parliament today. This will turn into a large-scale war, and Armenia and our people wont tolerate encroachment on our country. Now they are trying to achieve ceasefire and move forward peacefully. If the hostile encroachments continue, there will be zero tolerance. The enemy cant achieve any success in Syunik Province, regardless of military advantage, he said. Asked if Azerbaijans action was conditioned by the desire to receive the corridor, the deputy said he couldnt say why Azerbaijan took this action, but added that the corridor could be one of the options. When told that deputy of the Civil Contract faction Eduard Aghajanyan stated that there were 15 casualties yesterday and the Ministry of Defense reported only one casualty, Khachatryan said there is no communication with other soldiers and failed to state a figure since he hadnt verified the number 100%. The Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly) has been in touch with Congressional leaders and Biden Administration officials following Azerbaijans recent full-scale attack upon Armenias southern regions. Support for legislative and Administration application of Section 907 sanctions and other measures against Azerbaijan to re-assert United States credibility and save lives is growing, for which the Assembly is grateful. Further, the continuing role of NATO-member Turkey in military actions against Armenia is a betrayal of the principles underlying the alliance. An end of the day ceasefire announced by Russia is expected to be as ineffective against Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyevs genocidal pattern of behavior as past ceasefires, and as the relatively small presence of Russian peacekeepers attests. Since crossing Armenias borders in May 2021, the Azerbaijani military has occupied approximately 41 square kilometers of sovereign Armenian territory and continues to stage assaults in its quest to have a corridor run though southern Armenia to the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhichevan. Todays attacks occurred along the narrowest part of Armenia, and are clearly designed to cut the country in two. The recent attacks resulted in the deaths of several Armenian soldiers and the capture of 12 Armenian prisoners of war. This latest assault is in clear violation of the November 9, 2020 and January 11, 2021 ceasefire terms, which Azerbaijan has repeatedly undermined, and is in clear disregard of the U.S., French and Russian-led OSCE Minsk Groups repeated statements, as well as UN resolutions, to resolve matters peacefully and to respect ceasefire conditions. Ironically, Turkey is supposed to be a member of the mediating Minsk Group but has openly and actively coordinated and often led military and diplomatic policies with the Aliyev regime. Armenias National Security Council Secretary met with U.S. Ambassador Lynne Tracy earlier today and emphasized the current siege as a blow to democracy. Azerbaijans escalation of violence on Armenian soil is unacceptable, said Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ). This increase of deadly violence against Armenia will only continue unless the OSCE Minsk Group, the State Department, and the international community take immediate and decisive diplomatic action. Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said that this unprovoked attack is in direct violation of Azerbaijan and Armenias ceasefire agreement, and a grave reminder that the United States must be doing everything we can to deter Azerbaijans ongoing aggression. To that end, it is imperative that the Administration end the waiver to Section 907 of the FREEDOM Support Act, which prohibits direct U.S. aid to Azerbaijan, and to halt U.S. military assistance to the autocratic regime in Baku, which increased to over $100 million in Fiscal Year 2019. Now is the time for the Biden Administration and Congress to take decisive action. As President Biden stated in his address to Congress last April, We will meet the challenge...by proving that democracy is durable and strong. Autocrats will not win the future. The Assembly calls upon the Administration to end the waiver to Section 907, support Armenias democracy, and strongly condemn Azerbaijans ongoing ceasefire violations, which continue to destabilize the South Caucasus region. Armenian News - NEWS.am presents the digest on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border situation as of 17.11.21: According to an agreement reached through the mediation of the Russian side, starting from 6:30 p.m Tuesday firing stopped in the eastern direction of the border of Armenia, the situation has become relatively stable. Yesterday, at around 1 p.m., the units of the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan launched an attack on the Armenian military posts deployed in the given direction of the border. The adversary also used artillery, armored vehicles,, and firearms of various calibers. As a result of Tuesdays hostilities, the adversary has up to 70 killed and wounded soldiers, as well as considerable losses of military equipmentin particular, 4 armored personnel carriers, 1 armored vehicle, and 5 military vehicles, the Ministry of Defense of Armenia noted. The Armenian side has 1 fallen and 13 captured servicemen. Also, contact with another 24 soldiers was lost during the hostilities, and their fate is unknown at the moment. Intensive work is underway to find these soldiers. Two Armenian military outposts are now under the control of the adversary. Talks are underway, with the mediation of the Russian side, to resolve the situation and to have the captured Armenian servicemen returned. The Armenian authorities expect from Russia that their strategic partner will help resolve the issues related to the recent actions of Azerbaijan, Armen Grigoryan, Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia, told Kommersant daily of Russia within the framework of the Moscow meeting of the secretaries of the security councils of the CIS countries. He responded to the question as to what kind of assistance Yerevan expects by petitioning to Moscow within the framework of the 1997 agreement. Earlier, Grigoryan had called on Russia to "protect the territorial integrity of Armenia." "A written [respective] petition is being prepared," he had added. The judicial farce against the Armenian captives continues in Azerbaijan. According to the Azerbaijani media, the investigation into the criminal case against two Armenian citizensIshkhan Sargsyan and Vladimir Rafayelyanwho are accused of terrorism, is over. The materials of the criminal case were sent to the Ganja Grave Crimes Court. These two Armenian nationals are charged under Article 214.3 of the Criminal Code of Azerbaijan; that is, Terrorism committed with the use of firearms and objects which are used as weapons. International officials and organizations are calling Armenia and Azerbaijan to take immediate concrete steps to reduce tensions. The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said they are deeply concerned about reports of intensive fighting today between Armenia and Azerbaijan. We also call on the sides to engage directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation," he added. Meanwhile, according to Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov "thanks to the mediation efforts of the Russian side, it was managed to call on the conflicting parties to show restraint." In her turn, the Canadian FM calls Armenia, Azerbaijan for de-escalation of the situation. Our thoughts are w/ the victims families, loved ones & the community, Melanie Joly noted. The Secretary-General of the Council of Europe, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, has also made the statement concerning relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan. News of a ceasefire is welcome and I call on both sides to maintain it," she noted. Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigoryan today attended the ninth meeting of the Secretaries of Security Councils of the CIS, as reported the Security Council Bureau of Armenia. The risks emerging from the territory of Afghanistan, the cooperation of CIS countries in the migration and humanitarian sectors, as well as the key issues of security that have emerged as a result of the development of biotechnology were pinpointed and discussed during the meeting, and the CIS countries expressed their willingness to expand the scope of cooperation. In his speech, Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigoryan touched upon the invasion of Azerbaijani troops of the territory of Republic of Armenia and the current situation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. He particularly stated that Azerbaijan not only fails to maintain the ceasefire regime, but also fails to implement the agreements that have been reached. Grigoryan added that Armenia views Azerbaijans hostilities as an act targeted against Armenias territorial integrity. The Secretary of the Security Council emphasized that Armenia stays committed to the peace process and is ready to launch the process of delimitation and demarcation, but alongside this, it will resolutely retaliate after any military aggression. In regard to the unblocking of communications, Grigoryan stated that Armenia attaches great importance to the format of the Deputy Prime Ministers and is ready to put in all efforts to implement, in an unobstructed manner, the agreements reached on November 9, 2020 and January 11, 2021. The 41 square kilometers werent formed as a result of the operations that were carried out yesterday or the day before that. This is what Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan declared in parliament today. The balance hasnt changed in any way as a result of yesterdays operations. Its not like the 41 square kilometers were under the full control of the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan. I have stated several times that as a result of the process that took place after May 12, the positions of the Azerbaijani and Armenian Armed Forces in different sectors are sorted out like the figures on a chessboard. Even before May 12, nearly 40 and more square kilometers of territory of Armenia was under Azerbaijans control, as a result of the first war in Nagorno-Karabakh. As a result of the first war, there are territories of Soviet Azerbaijan that are under Armenias control. It is due to these circumstances that great importance is attached to demarcation and delimitation. The International community is telling Armenia and Azerbaijan to start the process of demarcation and delimitation and determine the methodology and legal grounds for the process so that the issue is resolved once and for all, Pashinyan said. The situation in the eastern direction of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border was extremely tense yesterday. At around 1 p.m. the units of the Armed Forces of Azerbaijan launched an attack on Armenian military posts. The adversary used artillery, armored vehicles and firearms of various calibers. Starting from 6:30 p.m. the fighting stopped and the situation became relatively stable, based on an agreement reached through Russias mediation. The Ministry of Defense reported that today at 10 a.m. the situation on the eastern border of Armenia is relatively stable, and the ceasefire agreement is mainly maintained. The Ministry of Defense has reported only one casualty, that is, the death of contractual serviceman Meruzhan Harutyunyan (born in 1991). There are 13 captured servicemen, communication with 24 servicemen is lost, and their fate remains unknown. Based on the statements by representatives of Baku and Yerevan, it becomes clear that the sides have diametrically different evaluations of the situation and blame each other for what happened, and Russia is in contact with Armenia and Azerbaijan in order to move the situation to the peaceful path, Spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Maria Zakharova said today. Zakharova recalled that yesterday the President of the Russian Federation held phone talks with Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, and Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation Sergey Shoygu held talks with his Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts, after which the clashes ended in the evening after the mediation efforts. We continue the joint efforts to weaken the tension. We call on the sides to show restraint, prevent new incidents and settle all disputes exclusively through the political and diplomatic way. We are ready to continue support to ensure peace and stability in the region. The latest events affirm the importance of the speedy launch of demarcation and the process of delimitation after that. As far as the activities of the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group are concerned, Zakharova reminded the statement of November 15. The Co-Chairs continue their active mediation efforts. The trio is currently in Vienna to discuss the current situation. Again, we state the importance of the Co-Chairs visit to the region, she said. Touching upon the possibility of using the Treaty between Armenia and the Russian Federation on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance signed on August 29, 1997, as well as the mechanisms of the Collective Security Treaty Organization, Zakahrova stated that Moscow treats the bilateral and multilateral agreements seriously. Relevant bilateral consultations are being held. As far as the CSTO is concerned, the CSTO is closely following the current situation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. Armenia calls on its international partners to strictly condemn the actions of Azerbaijan that are posing a serious risk for peace and security in the region and believes the only solution is the unconditional and complete pullout of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces from the territory of the Republic of Armenia. This is what Ambassador of Armenia to the Holy See Karen Nazaryan told local presses on Nov. 15 and 16, as reported the Embassy of Armenia to the Holy See. While Azerbaijan talks about peace, the countrys armed forces attack the eastern border of Armenia and have invaded the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia, causing human casualties and devastations. This is continuity of Azerbaijans consistent policy on occupying Armenian territories, the foundation for which was laid with the infiltration into the Syunik and Gegharkunik Provinces in May of this year, he said, adding that, according to the United Nations Charter, Armenia is entitled to repel the use of force against its territorial integrity and sovereignty by all means. In his comments, Nazaryan touched upon the issue of Armenian prisoners of war and civilians being held and stated the following: We attach importance to and appreciate the fact that our international partners, including the Holy See continue to raise the issue on bilateral and multilateral platforms and call on Azerbaijan to release all the captives and civilians held, in accordance with the countrys commitments assumed within the framework of international humanitarian law and the trilateral statement. Armenia MFA: '3+3' platform needs to refrain from duplicating formats with mandate to settle conflicts RT: US may build facilities in Georgia and Armenia to support its "defense activities" Armenia 2nd President: We will continue the struggle, all the phony cases will be crushed Ralf Rangnik has goals for transfers MFA: Armenia calls on Azerbaijan to refrain from provocative rhetoric Hero of 44-day Karabakh war Garik Hovakimyan's sister Mariam is born Borussia Dortmund reach agreement with Karim Adeyemi Republican Party of Armenia Executive Body holds session chaired by Serzh Sargsyan Iranian Embassy: Iran supports '3+3' platform during meeting held in Moscow Armenia ex-defense minister on Prosecutor General's Office imposing attachment on his assets Alen Simonyan: Armenia is in one of the most crucial stages in its history, and opposition is demanding my resignation PM: Armenia is committed to contributing to global mission of strengthening democracy, and we hope we're not alone Armenia MOD: Soldier who was injured from gunshot fired by fellow serviceman has regained consciousness Armenia Deputy PM: Omicron variant is not sufficiently explored Magnus Carlsen defends title of world champion for the fourth time (PHOTO, VIDEO) FC Barcelona plan to sell ter Stegen, Dest and de Jong First meeting within scope of '3+3' regional platform held in Moscow Kanye West asks Kim Kardashian to come back during his Runway rendition NEWS.am daily digest: 10.12.21 Armenia soldier killed while resisting Azerbaijanis' attack, 8 are injured, 6 of whom are in severe condition Armenia PM introduces new Head of State Supervision Service Romanos Petrosyan Armenia human rights activists: There were cases when POWs were brought to territory under Azerbaijan's control The book Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman was translated and published on the initiative of Ardshinbank Armenia regional governor, IFRC Secretary General discuss return of Armenian POWs originally from Shirak Province Armenia human rights activist: Number of Armenian POWs in Azerbaijan is 80 more than the confirmed one IMDb shares list of the most popular movies and TV series of the year Pashinyan: Environmental sphere is of strategic importance for Armenia Armenia President: We must understand that we are entering completely different era for humanity Dollar goes up somewhat in Armenia Armenia State Revenue Committee chief meets with French Development Agency Regional Director Opposition 'Armenia' faction MPs Artur Sargsyan and Mkhitar Zakaryan released from penitentiary institution Head of Armenia's Norabak village: Azerbaijan has military post that is 2 km from us Armenia finance minister receives France Ambassador and French Development Agency Regional Director The first edition of Harry Potter sold for a record amount Armenia opposition MP Ishkhan Zakaryan leaving 'With Honor' faction Russian and Armenian Deputy FMs meet in Moscow Armenia PM highlights importance of speedy conclusion of full-format agreement between Iran and EEU Armenia opposition MPs Mkhitar Zakaryan and Artur Sargsyan to be released without court decision today FC Van defeat FC Noravank Armenian opposition MP Armen Charchyan is released Armenia MOD: Armenian side has one casualty, few soldiers are injured, exchange of fire is over Armenias Pashinyan: High-tech component development also important in Eurasian integration context Armenia Deputy PM dismisses his two assistants Nazarbayev says Azerbaijan can become observer country in Eurasian Economic Union Head of Armenia village: The Azerbaijanis tried to advance in direction of Sotk, but our soldiers didn't let them Crazy Frog is back with 1st track in 11 years Armenia MOD: Azerbaijan attacked in eastern direction of border Barca president promises Xavi to be active in January transfer market One of Sex and the City main characters dies in 1st episode Special court hearing underway on case of Armenia opposition lawmaker behind bars Thierry Henry: You need to understand that Messi is human being also Artsakh officials visit Stepanakert memorial 2 more die of coronavirus in Karabakh Vardenis protesters dismiss Armenia MOD statement on obstructing car taking wounded soldier to Yerevan Armenia FM briefs Francophonie chief on regional security issues (PHOTOS) I went to premiere: scandals, intrigues, investigations - "House of Gucci" (NO SPOILERS) Armenia Police: 13 people apprehended near MFA building Armenia protesting residents reopen Martuni-Vardenis motorway due to border tension Russia researchers developing intranasal vaccine against Covid Armenia parliament passes changes to some laws Unvaccinated Bayern footballer to be out of action for 1 month due to coronavirus effects Travis Scott comments on death crush for the first time at his concert Armenia MOD: Deputy commander was told in Vardenis that car taking wounded soldier to Yerevan would be obstructed 347 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed in Armenia Armenia opposition movement staging protest inside MFA building Gwyneth Paltrow prepare joint gift for Kim Kardashian, Pete Davidson Armenia has new environment minister Artsakh MFA: Referendum on independence is solid legal basis for statehood Armenia ready for new pandemic? Special court session to be held on case of imprisoned Armenia opposition MP Alec Baldwin defends continuing making of Rust Biden promises Zelenskyy to punish Russia in case of invasion of Ukraine Newspaper: Armenia parliament recent fight case to have former ones fate Newspaper: What is reason for recent long visit to Armenia by ex-commander of Russia peacekeepers in Artsakh? Europa Conference League: Match results of the day Europa League: Match results of the day Petition to arrest one of accused Armenia soldiers returned from Azerbaijan captivity is granted Russian Aerospace Forces consider practice of reconnaissance and strike UAVs during Karabakh conflict Investigative Committee: Motion filed for arrest of 5 of 10 POWs returned to Armenia on Dec. 4 Armenia State Revenue Committee chief hosts Iran Customs Administration head Armenia Shirak Province ex-deputy governor Boris Aleksanov dies Constitutional Court announces decision on release of arrested MPs of opposition 'Armenia' parliamentary faction Iran, Azerbaijan discuss cooperation in petrol and natural gas sectors Lavrov: We understand the complexity of the situation in Armenia, but it's not right to speculate Russia's role Cem Ozdemir who initiated adoption of Armenian Genocide resolution is Germany's first minister with migration history Jordi Alba to not play in Barca for a month Armenia FM, France Secretary of State sign 'Roadmap for Armenian-French Economic Cooperation' Armenia PM scheduled to deliver speech at Summit for Democracy on Dec. 10 Suarez might not participate in Madrid Derby Zakharova says news about recall of Russia's Ambassador to Armenia is misinformation Opposition 'Armenia' Alliance: 3 deputies of parliamentary faction will be released Attorney: MP Armen Charchyan needs to be released immediately by virtue of Armenia Constitutional Court decision Armenia ex-environment minister Romanos Petrosyan appointed Head of State Supervision Service Boxing teams of Armenia, Iran, Ukraine and Georgia to participate in championship in Yerevan Armenia MOD: 2 Armenian soldiers receive slight firearm injuries as a result of Azerbaijanis' provocation NEWS.am daily digest: 09.12.21 Zakharova: Moscow hopes Armenia and Azerbaijan leaders reaffirm commitment to implementing agreements Zakharova on Aliyev's statement and murders of Armenian peaceful civilians Ex-chief advisor to Armenia PM Hakob Simidyan appointed Minister of Environment Joe Biden's Summit for Democracy kicks off, Armenia PM is also participating The Frost School of Music at the University of Miami congratulates Kate Reid, M.M. 96, D.M.A. 03, Director of Jazz Vocal Performance and Associate Professor of Jazz Voice, Studio Music, and Jazz Department, on receiving the prestigious 2021 Phillip Frost Award. Professor Reid was recognized by a Selection Committee of her peers as an exemplary faculty member for her outstanding contributions as an educator, scholar, and practitioner in the music industry. "I am truly humbled by the recognition my colleagues and peers have bestowed upon me with this honor. To be acknowledged for the delicate balance of education, performance, and scholarship that makes up my position means such a great deal to me. The true privilege, however, is the amazingly talented students and exceptional colleagues I get to work with every day at the Frost School of Music," Professor Reid said. More About Kate Reid Apart from overseeing all aspects of the Jazz Vocal Performance program, Professor Reid directs two of Frosts three jazz vocal ensembles -- Frost Extensions and Frost Jazz Vocal I. Dr. Reid also teach jazz improvisation, sight-singing, and music theory and she maintains a full jazz voice studio of undergraduate and graduate students. Dr. Reid enjoys a busy career as a guest artist, conductor, clinician, and adjudicator at all-state jazz and choral festivals throughout the United States and Canada. She has also participated in the Manhattan Concert Productions Jazz Series and has conducted the California, New York, and New Hampshire All-State jazz choirs. Dr. Reid enjoys a multi-faceted career as an educator, recording and performing artist and has appeared regularly with her own quartet She has performed with such renowned artists as John Clayton, Robin Eubanks, Jon Hendricks, Grady Tate, Mercer Ellington, Don Shelton, Mark Murphy, the Duke Ellington Orchestra, Liza Minelli, Mark Murphy, Rosemary Clooney, Diane Schuur, and Dr. Billy Taylor. Her voice can be heard on several network television series, to commercial spots for Ace Hardware, T-Mobile, and Suntory Whiskey, and to recordings by such artists as MUSE, X Japan, and Josh Groban. Dr. Reid is a member of the American Federation of Musicians Local 47, Screen Actors Guild/American Federation of Television and Recording Artists (SAG-AFTRA), The Recording Academy (formerly NARAS), the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), Phi Beta Kappa, and the Jazz Education Network (JEN). The Carmen and Joe Unanue Family Foundation, led by alumnus Andy Unanue, has donated $3.3 million to the University of Miami Patti and Allan Herbert Business School in honor of Unanues late parents, who led philanthropic initiatives in education and health care through the foundation that carries their names. The donation, matched by the Herbert Challenge Endowment Gift Match for a total of $5 million, will strengthen the schools capabilities to prepare graduate students to successfully enter the workforce or advance their careers upon graduation. The Unanue Family Foundations gift is part of the University of Miamis recently announced Ever Brighter: The Campaign for Our Next Century. The most ambitious in the universitys history, the campaign has already raised more than $1.6 billion toward a goal of $2.5 billion and is set to conclude in 2025, when the University will celebrate its centennial. We are honored and grateful to be the stewards of the Joseph and Carmen Unanue Graduate Career Advancement Center, said Virginia Ginger Baxter, assistant dean of graduate career advancement and engagement and director of the newly named graduate career center. The donation will purposefully advance the career and professional development of graduate students and alumni and transform the way we connect, collaborate, and co-create experiences. Funds will be used to increase networking opportunities, specialized training, and participation in more national and international case competitions and student conferences. Added resources will also enable continued innovative responses to a rapidly changing hiring climate fueled by technology and a trend toward work-life integration. For Unanue, who is president of the Carmen and Joe Unanue Foundation, the goals align with his parentsand now his owndedication to elevate job opportunities for students. My parents always wanted to help educate people and prepare them for the real world so that they could get good jobs with which to provide for their families, he said. The gift will hopefully help prepare the students to get the jobs that they want and that they will be happy in, whether entering the workforce or creating their own businesses. The New Jersey native recently established the headquarters of his firm AUA Private Equity Partners in West Palm Beach, bringing him back to South Florida after living in several cities around the country and abroad since graduating from Miami Herbert in 1991. Unanue also serves as a member of the deans advisory committee at Miami Herbert and as the Miami Herbert chair of the Universitys Ever Brighter campaign. We are grateful for this generous gift which underscores the Unanue familys commitment to help drive the University forward, said Josh Friedman, senior vice president for development and alumni relations. It also brings together two philanthropic familiesthrough the Herbert matchwho believe in the power of education, and in particular the University of Miami, to change lives, and are investing in the future of our students so they can become the business innovators and entrepreneurs of tomorrow. Unanue said that he learned from my parents that we should never forget where we came from, that there are always people who help us along the way, and that we need to help and give back in return. The University of Miami helped me with my education, along with my niece and nephew, and was one of the building blocks to make me who I am. And I am now in a position to help the students at the University through a helpful hand up, not a handout. His efforts already nurture a philanthropic spirit among students. Those of us striving to become business leaders are inspired by donors who invest in our potential and we hope to one day soon be in a position to do the same for others," said Sushant Koppikar, an MBA candidate and president of the Graduate Business Student Association. Unanues dedicated support extends to potential future Canes, as well. AUA Private Equity Partners, where he serves as the managing partner, recently joined forces with First Generation Investors, a nonprofit that teaches high school students and young adults how to invest and thrive in the financial sector. Through the partnership, AUA now sponsors half of the cohort of FGI students at the University. The sponsorship meets the needs per student for their investment account as they embark on real-life investing. Miami Herbert Dean John Quelch acknowledges Unanues growing impact on the University and Miami Herbert, especially as his donation to the Ever Brighter campaign occurs as an endowed gift, which enables the charitable objectives in perpetuity. We cherish the generosity of the Unanue family, Quelch said. Andy Unanue is continuing his parents legacy graciously, and we honor his contributions to help develop the next generation of principled leaders. 'Resignation of AmCham head a wake-up call for govt' 'Resignation of AmCham head a wake-up call for govt' An economics scholar on Wednesday said the resignation of the head of the American Chamber of Commerce should serve as a "wake-up call" for the SAR government. Tara Joseph, who is currently in the US, told Reuters News Agency that she was quitting because she didn't feel she could appeal to the administration to ease its Covid-19 travel restrictions if she was undergoing quarantine herself. Kevin Tsui, an associate professor at Clemson University in the US, said Hong Kong officials should rethink the requirement that people arriving in the territory spend up to 21 days in hotel quarantine. "If other countries are doing the same thing, then we are not in a disadvantaged position," he told RTHK. "But given the fact that other countries are trying to open up the borders, even countries like Singapore which is our competitor, that's an additional factor that makes foreign companies reconsider [whether] they should have their headquarters in Hong Kong." Tsui said other places don't have such "rigid" quarantine requirements as Hong Kong, as long as travellers are vaccinated. "I think it's kind of a wake-up call to Hong Kong that the government should pay attention to," Tsui said, noting that it's unclear how long the the city will adopt a "zero-Covid" strategy. The government has said its priority is to resume quarantine-free travel with the mainland. Meanwhile, AmCham has issued a statement thanking Joseph for her service and saying the board will launch a global search for a replacement. "The Chamber was saddened to learn that Tara was stepping down, and appreciates her service and investment in the future of AmCham Hong Kong. A date has not been set; the chamber is grateful for Taras leadership and support of the transition into 2022," the statement said. Hong Kong reports three new imported Covid cases Hong Kong's latest imported Covid-19 cases are from Pakistan and South Korea. Image: Shutterstock Health authorities on Wednesday reported three new Covid-19 infections involving patients flying in from Pakistan and South Korea. The three patients are fully vaccinated and were found to be carrying the L452R mutant strain. A man from Pakistan tested positive upon arrival at the airport on Monday. In another case, a woman flying in from South Korea last week tested positive during hotel quarantine. Meanwhile, a 45-year-old man from Pakistan, who is a close contact of two previously confirmed cases, tested positive in the Penny's Bay quarantine centre. Health officials also reported two suspected re-positive overseas cases, who had returned from Indonesia and Singapore in October. They involved a 29-year-old foreign domestic helper from Indonesia and a fully-vaccinated 65-year-old man from Singapore. Meanwhile, health authorities said Covid-19 was found on the package of a parcel sent to Hong Kong from Inner Mongolia during a routine check. It said the recipient had disposed of the package immediately upon receiving the parcel and had washed the clothes contained in it. Authorities said the recipient had been asked to take a Covid test. They also said environmental samples at a local logistics warehouse where the parcel had been kept came back negative, and staff who might have had contact with the parcel were asked to undergo tests. It added that the risk of the parcel carrying a transmissible live virus after arriving Hong Kong is relatively low, as the virus generally cannot survive over a few days under a non-chilled environment. Authorities also said they are banning Air India flights from New Delhi for two weeks from November 17 after a passenger of one of its flights was confirmed to have Covid-19 while another passenger was found to have flouted infection control measures. For those looking to spend more time eating turkey this Thanksgiving, and less time in the kitchen preparing it, these 18 local restaurants have you covered. The restaurants that follow are either serving pre-cooked, to-go Thanksgiving dinner meals that only require reheating before enjoying, or are offering both take-out and in-person dining (noted by the *) on the holiday. 135 Grill Steak House 672 Waverly St., Framingham This restaurant is offering Brazilian-style take-out options in orders serving either 10, 20 or 30 people. There are five options for meat, including turkey, a maca de peito (the thicker end of a brisket) and pernil assado (slow-roasted pork leg or shoulder). Sides include dishes like rice with vegetables, beans and salads. To order, call 774-432-5744. *3 Restaurant 461 West Central St., Franklin This contemporary bistro is offering a three-course meal in its dining room on Thanksgiving Day from noon to 6 p.m. Next to a 10- to 14-pound whole roasted turkey costing $95, several other entrees will also be offered, including butternut squash ravioli and rigatoni bolognese, and other starters and desserts. To book a reservation for a party of any size, call 508-528-6333. Thanksgiving dinner packages to-go are also being sold, running for $399 and individual dinners costing $39. Orders must be placed by 9 p.m. Nov. 18. Call 508-528-6333 to order and confirm a pickup time for either Nov. 24 from noon to 4 p.m. or Thanksgiving Day from 9 a.m. to noon. Shopping for Thanksgiving ingredients?: We compare prices at three local grocery stores Alumni Restaurant and Bar 391 East Central St., Franklin This family restaurant is offering Thanksgiving take-out orders with either oven-roasted turkey breast or spiral ham with glaze. The turkey dinner includes seven sides, including butter-whipped mashed potatoes, butternut squash and buttered corn, and the ham dinner includes mashed potatoes with gravy, corn, glazed baby carrots and dinner rolls. Each dinner serves 4-6 people and costs $120. Pies, including apple, Boston creme, pumpkin and lemon meringue, are $12.99 each. Story continues Orders can be placed by phone at 508-528-8804 or through email at alumnirestaurant391@gmail.com. Orders can also be placed via a Google Form on their Facebook page. Orders must be placed by Nov. 22 with pickup being Nov. 24 from noon to 8 p.m. Farm-To-Table in MetroWest: Know where your turkey was raised and prepared this Thanksgiving Arturos Ristorante 54 East Main St., Westborough This Italian restaurant is offering Thanksgiving meal kits to-go, which includes 5 pounds of cooked and sliced all-white turkey breast, a quart of gravy, stuffing, roasted butternut squash with cranberries, garlic mashed potatoes, roasted brussels sprouts with crispy pancetta and cranberry orange compote. Meals cost $175 and feed 6-8 people. Kits can be picked up the day before Thanksgiving from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.; only 50 are available. To order, visit arturosristorante.com. BR Takeout 326 Concord St., Framingham This Brazilian restaurant is offering limited packages of family-style take-out dinners. The first features Greek-style rice with turkey, pork loin and chicken salad. A second features carne assada, chicken with white sauce, white rice and beans. The third meal includes mashed potatoes, vegetables, carne assada with madeira sauce and chicken breast with bacon. Prices range from $267 to $567, depending on which dinner and size you choose, which includes a 10-person meal, a 25-person meal and a 45-person meal. Order online at Brtakeout.com or call 508-872-3312. Orders can be picked up or delivered. Civic Kitchen and Drink 121 West Main St., Westborough To-go Thanksgiving dinner packages are being offered, available in two-person ($39) and four-person ($78) serving sizes. The meal includes sliced roasted turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, butternut squash, corn, cranberry sauce and dinner rolls. Sangria for four can be added for $30 extra. Orders must be placed by noon Nov. 23 and can be picked up the next day between 3-9 p.m. To order, call 508-329-5178 or place an order at civickitchenanddrink.com. At Firefly's BBQ, an apple cider brined wood-smoked turkey is one of the take-out dinners it'll be offering for Thanksgiving Day. Fireflys BBQ 350 East Main St., Marlborough This popular barbecue restaurant is offering take-out dinner packages featuring apple cider brined wood-smoked turkey, spiral sliced honey maple glazed artisan ham, wood-smoked beef brisket, homemade corn bread and a dozen sides like collard greens, mac n cheese and sweet potato pecan pudding. Freshly-baked pies and apple crisp can also be ordered, ranging from $15-33. Firefly's BBQ is offering take-out dinner packages for Thanksgiving Day, which includes meats like wood-smoked beef brisket and sides like collard greens and corn bread dressing. Complete dinners range from $120-$310 and items can also be ordered separately. Meals must be ordered by Nov. 20 and picked up Nov. 24. To order, call 508-357-8883. *Framingham Station 417 Waverly St., Framingham This Brazilian steakhouse is serving both Thanksgiving dinners to-go and will be open for dine-in eating. Framingham Station will be open on Thanksgiving Day. Here, Fran Medeiros shows off a slow roasted turkey, Nov. 12, 2021. For take-out orders, the restaurant will serve slow-roasted turkey with stuffing, gravy, orange cranberry sauce, corn bread, rice, potato salad and pineapple farofa. The restaurant will also be serving the same meals in-house that day, along with its all-you-can-eat Brazilian barbecue rodizio, which includes other cuts of meat like beef, lamb, pork and chicken. From left, Ze Pereira (with beef ribs), owner Bruno Oliveira and Monike Santos (with pork sausage) at Framingham Station, Nov. 12, 2021. The restaurant will offer in-house dining on Thanksgiving Day. To place an order, call 508-424-5911 or book a reservation online at framinghamstation.com/thanksgiving. GlenPharmer Distillery 860 West Central St., Franklin Thanksgiving dinners to-go for 4-6 people are being offered, which include sage and apple-roasted turkey breast, house cornbread sausage stuffing, sour cream whipped potatoes and pecan pie made with GlenPharmers Dark Tide Rum. Some of the distillerys other festive spirits include its BOG vodka, which is infused with cranberries from Decas Farms in Carver, and its Reserve Spiced Rum, which is distilled from 100% molasses and blends nine warming spices and flavors including Madagascar vanilla, clove, cardamom and cassia cinnamon. GlenPharmer Distillery in Franklin is offering a complete Thanksgiving to-go menu along with its festive GlenPharmer BOG vodka, which is made with infused with cranberries from Decas Farms in Carver. Orders may be placed online at glenpharmer.com or by calling 508-528-4000 before 5 p.m. Nov. 21. Orders can be picked up from 2-8 p.m. Nov. 24. Kith + Kin 40 Washington St., Hudson This modern restaurant is offering $15 individual dinners to-go, featuring roasted, white and dark sliced turkey, gravy, Yukon gold mashed potatoes, local sourdough stuffing and cranberry sauce. Additional sides are also offered, like truffled cauliflower mash and green bean casserole with caramelized onions. Pies from Harvard Sweet Boutique will also be sold, including apple, gluten-free apple, and pumpkin. Orders must be placed by Nov. 18 and can be picked up Nov. 24 until 7 p.m. Visit bit.ly/KnKThanksgiving to order. La Cantina Italiana 911 Waverly St., Framingham This cozy Italian restaurant is offering turkey dinners to-go, which includes 3.5 pounds of roasted white meat turkey, 3 pounds of stuffing, 3 pounds of mashed potatoes, 3 pounds of butternut squash, a quart of gravy and a pint of cranberry sauce. Apple and pumpkin pies can also be ordered for $14 each. The dinner runs for $99 and feeds 4-5 people. Orders can be placed at golacantina.com/online-ordering/ and must be made by 2 p.m. on Nov. 22. Meals can be picked up on Nov. 24 before 6 p.m. Streaming on Peacock: 'It was insane': Ashland teen teams with grandmother on 'Top Chef Family Style' *Longfellow's Wayside Inn 72 Wayside Inn Road, Sudbury This famously historic restaurant is open for both take-out and in-house dining on Thanksgiving Day. For dining, the Thanksgiving buffet will return for parties of 13 or more, serving roast turkey and traditional sides like cornbread and whipped potatoes. Several other options are included, from Dijon-crusted salmon and roast prime rib of beef to lobster bisque and salads. A three-course meal will also offered with those same options and more. For take-out, two family meals are being offered: roast turkey breast ($295) and roast prime rib of beef ($395). Meals feed 8-10 people. Included in the turkey meal are eight sides, which includes two quarts of clam chowder and a pumpkin pie. The prime rib meal includes all those same sides, except the cornbread. To book a reservation or order for take-out, call 978-443-1776. Take-out orders must be received by 2 p.m. Nov. 21 and can be picked up Nov. 24 in the afternoon or 10-11 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day. New England Steak and Seafood 11 Uxbridge Road, Mendon One size, to-go turkey dinners with all the fixings are being offered for Thanksgiving, fit to feed about 10 people. The $299 meal includes an approximately 20-pound turkey with cranberry sauce, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, peas with pearl onions and an apple pie. Other items include cinnamon rolls, onion rolls and pumpkin bread, which all run for $15.99 per dozen. Apple pies cost the same. Orders must be placed by Nov. 20 and picked up on Thanksgiving Day between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. To order, call 508-478-0871. PJs Smoke 'N' Grill 112 Main St., Medway A $325 Thanksgiving dinner is being offered to-go, including smoked boneless turkey breast, cornbread or stuffing, Red Bliss mashed potatoes, smoked butternut squash, pan gravy and cranberry sauce. It also comes with a choice between apple pie, pumpkin pie or apple crisp. Dishes can also be ordered separately. To order, call 508-321-1193. All orders must be placed by Nov. 19 and can be picked up Nov. 24 between 3-5 p.m. or before noon on Thanksgiving Day. Prezo Grille and Bar 229 1/2 East Main St., Milford A takeout package for Thanksgiving is being offered, costing $99 and serving about six people. Included is either turkey or ham, a root vegetable medley, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce and dinner rolls. To place an order, call 508-634-0101. Orders can be picked up from noon to 5 p.m. Nov. 24. Primavera 20 Pleasant St., Millis This family restaurant is offering three sizes of takeout dinners. The basic meal ($199) feeds 4-6 people and includes 5 pounds of turkey breast with mashed potatoes, butternut puree, stuffing, cranberry sauce, gravy, dinner rolls and a cannoli kit. The deluxe meal ($299) feeds 6-8 people and includes 6-8 pounds of turkey with the same sides, but also with salad, mashed sweet potatoes, roasted Brussels sprouts, peas, corn and a choice of apple, pumpkin, pecan or blueberry pie. Finally, the feast ($399) feeds more than 15 people and includes 16-20 pounds of turkey with all of the above sides. Add-ons, like stuffed shells and eggplant parmesan, can also be ordered. To do so, call 508-376-2026. Restaurant 45 45 Milford St., Medway Thanksgiving meals to-go are being offered, with each meal including boneless roast turkey breast, stuffing, Red Bliss mashed potatoes, whipped butternut squash, green beans almondine, homemade gravy, cranberry sauce and Italian bread. Meals serving up for five people cost $110 and meals serving up to 10 people cost $220. Restaurant 45's regular full catering menu will be available. Orders must be placed Nov. 21 and picked up 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Nov. 24. To order, call 508-533-8171 or visit 45restaurant.com. Zaftigs Delicatessen 1298 Worcester Road, Natick This traditional Jewish eatery will be offering three to-go Thanksgiving meal packages and the option to order a 25-pound turkey $120 uncarved, $15 extra to carve. Numerous sides, like challah bread stuffing, knishes, honey-roasted carrots, Brussels sprouts and apple pies, will also be sold. Its first meal package, featuring a 10-pound turkey, runs for $149.45. A second package, featuring a 12-pound turkey, runs for $220.95, and the third package features a 14- to 16-pound turkey running for $310.95. Each package includes sides. Orders are due by Nov. 19 and can be made by calling 508-653-4442 or emailing natickcatering@zaftigs.com. Pickup occurs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 24. Lauren Young writes about business and pop culture. Reach her at 774-804-1499 or lyoung@wickedlocal.com. Follow her on Twitter @laurenwhy__. This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: Thanksgiving dinners: Restaurants serving dine-in and take-out meals The development follows a 22-month investigation into the case Two of the three men convicted of killing Malcolm X will have their convictions thrown out following a lengthy investigation into who killed the civil rights leader. The development follows a 22-month investigation into the case that was conducted by the Manhattan district attorneys office and the Innocence Project, which represents the two men, Muhammad A. Aziz and Khalil Islam. Investigators found that prosecutors, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the New York Police Department withheld key evidence that would have led to the mens acquittal, per The New York Times. Breaking News: Two of the men found guilty of the assassination of Malcolm X are expected to have their convictions thrown out, validating long-held doubts about who killed the civil rights leader. https://t.co/SwkXOS5rlE The New York Times (@nytimes) November 17, 2021 This wasnt a mere oversight, said Deborah Francois, a lawyer for the men. This was a product of extreme and gross official misconduct. Malcolm X was gunned down in Harlems Audubon Ballroom during a speech on Feb. 21, 1965. Three members of the Nation of Islam were ultimately arrested and charged with the assassination. At the time, Mujahid Abdul Halim was known as Talmadge Hayer and Thomas Hagan, Aziz was known as Norman 3X Butler, and Islam was known as Thomas 15X Johnson. All three were found guilty of the murder and sentenced to life in prison. Former Nation Of Islam leader and civil rights activist El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (aka Malcolm X and Malcolm Little) poses for a portrait on February 16, 1965, in Rochester, New York. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) Islam and Aziz maintained their innocence but were convicted despite the lack of physical evidence and the contradictory testimony of several eyewitnesses. The men spent decades in prison before Aziz, 83, was released in 1985. Islam was released in 1987 and died in 2009. Halim was reportedly granted parole in March 2010 and was released from prison a month later. Story continues These men did not get the justice that they deserved, District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said of Islam and Aziz. Both men are expected to be cleared Thursday, according to the report. Vance and the Innocence Project confirmed to NBC News that they would move to vacate the wrongful convictions of two individuals for the murder of Malcolm X on Thursday afternoon. The investigation did not identify who really killed Malcolm X. This latest development comes months after lawyers representing Malcolm Xs estate requested that his case be reopened in light of new evidence that may reveal the conspiracy to have him killed, theGRIO reported. circa 1962: American political activist and radical civil rights leader, Malcolm X (1925 1965) standing at a podium during a rally of African-American Muslims held in a Washington, DC arena. (Photo by Richard Saunders/Hulton Archive/Getty Images) According to ABC News, the family and attorney of former undercover NYPD officer Ray Wood disclosed the discovery of a death bed confession letter in November 2020. The letter allegedly states that the NYPD and the FBI conspired to ensure the killing of Minister X. Last February, Netflix released the docuseries Who Killed Malcolm X, which chronicled historian Abdur-Rahman Muhammads years-long research to unravel inconsistencies in the Malcolm X murder case. In the series, Muhammad worked to reveal evidence that two of the three men convicted for Malcolm Xs death were in fact not present at the Audubon on the day of this murder. Its really pulled back the veil on this historic crime, that was really an open wound, in not just the African-American community, but the world community, Muhammad said in an interview with PBS. And, you know, the fundamental understanding of who pulled that shotgun, who were involved. Yes, we answer that question. Have you subscribed to the Grio podcasts, Dear Culture or Acting Up? Download our newest episodes now! TheGrio is now on Apple TV, Amazon Fire, and Roku. Download theGrio today! The post 2 men who served decades in prison for killing Malcolm X to be exonerated appeared first on TheGrio. PROVIDENCE A 34-year-old Providence man whose body was found under a highway overpass in the Olneyville neighborhood is the city's 22nd homicide, the police said Tuesday. Providence police Maj. David Lapatin identified the man as Augusto Alonzo Cortiz and said he could not comment on the nature of his death. Cortiz's body was mostly covered by an object when construction workers discovered it in an area near Route 6 and Troy Street around 8:30 a.m. Monday, Lapatin said. More: Two arrested in the fatal shooting of Jorge Garcia at a Providence breakfast counter Investigators do not believe Cortiz was killed at that location, he said. Cortiz's family had lost touch with him a few days prior to the discovery of his body, Lapatin said. "Everything is fluid," Lapatin said. "We're moving along." The case presents "a lot to look at," he said. There were 18 homicides in Providence in 2020, 13 in 2019 and 10 in 2018. More: Providence's gun deaths are up in 2021, but that's just part of the story More: 6 men indicted in Providence shooting that wounded 9 More: RI's child porn task force faces an uphill fight, with cases on the rise This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Providence identifies victim of city's 22nd homicide of 2021 A complaint filed against the Sacramento County Sheriff's Office alleges it worked with federal immigration agents in violation of a California law protecting undocumented residents. The California Values Act, or Senate Bill 54, prevents state and local resources from assisting federal immigration enforcement, and that schools, hospitals and courthouses are deemed safe spaces. The bill was signed into law October 2017 and went into effect in 2018. The American Civil Liberties Union's complaint mentions that Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones has touted cooperation with U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement "and has fiercely opposed SB5 and similar laws. Motley Fool Setting a clear goal for retirement savings is one of the first steps in planning for your future. One of the simplest ways to set retirement goals is to figure out what your ending annual salary will be and assume you'll need 10 times that amount. You can figure out your final salary by estimating the number of years left to retirement and assuming you'll get a 2% annual raise from your current salary. Chinese dissident Ai Weiwei has warned about political correctness in the U.S., saying its perpetuation has already turned the country into an authoritarian state without people knowing it. About Ai Weiwei: Ai, 64, is a contemporary artist who openly criticizes the Chinese Communist Party. In 2011, he was imprisoned for 81 days during a government crackdown that targeted writers, human rights lawyers and other activists. Ais protest against government oppression is reflected in his work. His 2014 project @Large transformed San Franciscos infamous Alcatraz prison into a gargantuan exhibition that featured 176 portraits of prisoners of conscience and political exiles from all over the world, according to The New York Times. Ais passport was revoked at the time. Upon its restoration in 2015, he moved to Berlin to start a new life; however, it wasnt until the summer of 2017 that he got to see the portraits, which were made from 1.2 million Legos, at the exhibition in Washington, D.C., as per Smithsonian Magazine. Ai now resides in Portugal after living in Berlin and the U.K. What hes saying: Ai shared his bleak outlook of the U.S. while promoting his memoir in a new interview on PBS Firing Line. He pointed out that authoritarians cannot be by themselves and instead must rely on a system that supports their views. In his book, Ai described Mao Zedongs directives during the Cultural Revolution, which were distributed at night. He compared them to former President Donald Trumps midnight tweets. Ai disagreed, however, when asked if he thought Trump was authoritarian. He stated that the U.S. is already behaving like an authoritarian state, and much of it has to do with efforts for people to be unified in a certain political correctness. In many ways, youre already in the authoritarian state. You just dont know it, Ai told Firing Line host Margaret Hoover, who asked him to elaborate. Ai explained that with todays technology, we know so much more than we actually understand. The information [has] become jammed, but we dont really ... have the knowledge, because you dont work. You dont have to act on anything. You just think youre purified by certain ideas that you agree with. That is posing dangers to society, to an extremely divided society, he said. Reactions: Ais remarks have drawn mixed reactions on social media. Meanwhile, an opinion piece for the Chinese state-run Global Times noted that the artist, who is typically hailed as an outspoken hero by Western elites, did not receive the usual praise for his comments. Story continues Political Correctness is NOT the Language of a Free People, one YouTube user wrote. Another paraphrased his comment as: Everything woke turns to sh*t. The Global Times piece, for its part, criticized American hypocrisy: The U.S. elites often preach that If you are not free to criticize, then praise is meaningless in countries it regards as a foe. But when it comes to criticizing its own system, the U.S. elites are hypocritically not so tolerant. Featured Image via PBS/Firing Line with Margaret Hoover Enjoy this content? Read more from NextShark! 5 Asian Art Collections Available Online for Asian Pacific Heritage Month Japanese 'Picture Brides' Was Our Ancestor's Version of Catfishing 10 Surprising Facts About Asian American Civil Rights You Never Learned in School Third-ever historical resolution by CCP paves way for Chinese President Xi Jinping to have third term Families and friends traditionally gather to express gratitude during this time of year. Many also participate in acts of service and charity as a way of giving back to their local communities. As communication scholars who study intercultural communication, we have studied how the many languages around the world have their own unique words and expressions for saying thank you. In turn, these expressions reveal very different assumptions about how human beings relate to one another and about the world we collectively inhabit. Not everyone says thank you Americans are known the world over for saying thank you in many everyday situations. Though some of these thank yous are undoubtedly heartfelt, many are also routine and said without much feeling. Given how often Americans say thanks, it might be surprising to know that in several other cultures around the world, people rarely say thank you. In many cultures in South and Southeast Asia, including in India, where the expression in Hindi is , spelled out as dhanyavaad in English. A deep degree of unspoken gratitude is assumed in interpersonal relationships through this expression. In an article in The Atlantic, author Deepak Singh, an immigrant from northern India to the United States, explains that in the Hindi language, in everyday gestures and culture, there is an unspoken understanding of gratitude. A Sikh man folding hands in a namaste before another man. In many relationships for instance, between parents and children or between close friends saying thank you is considered inappropriate in these countries because it introduces a sense of formality that takes away the intimacy of the relationship. Thank you is appropriate when it is deeply and truly felt, and in situations where a person goes above and beyond the normal expectations of a relationship. Then too it is said with great solemnity, with eye contact, and perhaps even with hands at heart center in namaste position. The economic rhetoric of gratitude Story continues In American English, many of the expressions of gratitude are couched in transactional language that involves expressions of personal indebtedness. We say, I owe you a debt of gratitude, Thanks, I owe you one, One good turn deserves another, and How can I ever repay you? Thinking of gratitude as a kind of transaction can indeed encourage people to form mutually beneficial relationships. But it can also lead people to see their personal and impersonal relationships in economic terms as transactions to be judged by market criteria of gain and loss. The American language of gratitude tends to reflect the fact that many of us might see relationships as interpersonal transactions. But if we were to enter into relationships only on the premise of what benefits us personally, and potentially materially, then it can be very limiting. This is why, we argue, it can be enlightening to look at other languages of gratitude. Thanking earth, sky and community Many Chinese people, for example, use the phrase , or xie tian, which literally means thank sky as a way to express gratitude to all things under the sky. In a famous essay included in many high school textbooks called Xie Tian, writer Zhifan Chen noted, Because there are too many people that we feel grateful to, lets thank sky then. The writer redirects individuals gratitude toward an all-encompassing universe, one that includes all things and all beings. In Taiwanese, people say , or kam-sim, which means feel heart, to express gratitude. In complimenting a good deed, the word is also meant to highlight how people who witness the act but do not directly benefit from it are touched by the benevolence. It encourages people to recognize that the impact of good deeds is not limited to its direct recipients but to other members of the community as well. [More than 140,000 readers get one of The Conversations informative newsletters. Join the list today.] To say kam-sim is to recognize that our actions have effects that ripple outward, potentially strengthening and solidifying the social fabric, which ultimately benefits us all. Every time we express gratitude, we invoke a social world. Often, we invoke a world without realizing its full force. For instance, when we use a language of gratitude characterized by economic metaphors, it can shape our view of the world and our social relationships, encouraging us to see life itself as a series of transactions. Being more conscious about our linguistic conventions and the potentials of our choices can empower us to create a world we really desire. Learning from other languages of gratitude, perhaps we can make our thank you less casual and more heartfelt. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Jeremy David Engels, Penn State and Elaine Hsieh, University of Oklahoma. Read more: The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. (Bloomberg) -- Cher Scarlett, an Apple Inc. engineer who created a protest movement within the company over pay transparency and other workplace issues, is leaving the iPhone maker after reaching a settlement. Most Read from Bloomberg Scarlett wouldnt provide details about the settlement, but her lawyer said she is requesting a withdrawal of a complaint she filed with the National Labor Relations Board. In a Sept. 1 filing with the agency, Scarlett alleged that Apple human resources had interfered with efforts by employees to gather wage data, and that management had engaged in coercive and suppressive activity that has enabled abuse and harassment of workers organizing. The matter was settled privately and the request for withdrawal is pending before the board, Scarletts lawyer, Alek Felstiner, told Bloomberg News. We hope the crucial organizing work at Apple will continue. Scarlett said her departure from Apple was voluntary and that her last day is Friday. Other Apple workers who publicly raised concerns about working conditions -- including Ashley Gjovik and Janneke Parrish -- were fired after speaking out and have filed their own recent labor board complaints. Apple said both of those former employees were terminated for sharing private information. Apple declined to comment about Scarletts departure. The company has said previously it doesnt comment on specific cases out of respect for the privacy of any individuals involved. For several months, Scarlett had been a leader in a movement inside Apple via Slack channels and other forms of social media that came to be known as #AppleToo -- a riff on #MeToo. It spurred many staffers to speak out online about conditions, both publicly and anonymously. The protest was a rarity inside a company known for keeping employees quiet about their work. Story continues Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook expressed frustration in a September memo about employees leaking information. His email followed media reports about a companywide internal meeting at which management fielded questions about pay equity and Texas anti-abortion law, as well as reports that revealed details of a product launch event ahead of time. In a filing with the NLRB, Gjovik alleged that Cooks email and various Apple employee handbook policies violated the National Labor Relations Act, which protects U.S. workers rights to communicate with one another and engage in collective action about workplace issues. (Updates with additional context in second paragraph.) Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek 2021 Bloomberg L.P. NextShark Sunisa Suni Lee, a first-generation Hmong American Olympian who won three medals at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo, was named alongside swimmer Caeleb Dressel as Athletes of the Year at the 2021 Sports Illustrated Awards. New achievement: Lee, 18, was named by the American sports magazine as Female Athlete of the Year, while Dressel was named the Male Athlete of the Year. The awards show was held at Hollywoods Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Florida on Tuesday, according to Sports Illustrated. Min Xiao-Fen and River Guerguerian perform Nov. 21, 2021, at Isis Music Hall. Renowned local percussionist River Guerguerian was actually in California performing when he heard a Nation Public Radio story about a Chinese-born pipa master moving to Asheville. Even more astounding to Guerguerian was that this uber-talented musician, Min Xiao-Fen, would perform a local show with an old touring mate of his. I was intrigued that a Chinese musician was moving to Asheville and bringing her traditional and new sounds to the area, said Guerguerian, who performs with the jazz trio Free Planet Radio, among others. It blew my mind that the concert she was doing in town (in June) was with an old musician friend of mine, Rez Abbasi. Rez and I played in an experimental trio together between 1988 and 1992 in New York City. I rushed over to the Orange Peel after a gig to see them and hang a little. That initial encounter has led to a musical bond between Xiao-Fen and Guerguerian and to an upcoming show. The duo will perform together, for the first time, at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 21 at Isis Music Hall. I was surprised to learn that River and I have many things in common: we both share a background in traditional music, but we enjoy crisscrossing cultural genres. We also lived in New York City and worked with Grammy and Oscar-winning composer Tan Dun, said Xiao-Fen, who plays a pipa, which is a four-string plucked lute. The two missed each other in New York City, she said, so we never have a chance to meet each other, yet somehow, I felt like I already knew him. Later, I went to his studio and attended a Free Planet Radio concert. I was impressed by his masterful skills, creative sounds and rhythms. Plus, River is a great human being. Im really looking forward to our first collaboration and feel so honored to work with him. The show with these two masterful musicians will include a variety of solos and duets on multiple instruments, including some quite ancient instruments. They will also perform two newly composed pieces, Echo in the Valley and Follow the Dragon. Story continues Xiao-Fen said she first visited Asheville in 2019 when she attended the Brevard Summer Music Festival. She and her husband made the decision to move after only four days of visiting when, she said, we quickly fell in love with the natural beauty, artistic energetic and super friendly people. Asheville has already begun to inspire my musical journey. Chinese traditional music has always been associated with nature, she said. The pipa has over two thousand years of history, and one of the most important styles in its large repertoire is the lyrical style. This music describes nature: flowers, trees, water, mountains and the four seasons. The melodies are subtle and sensitive, expressing inner feelings of love and sorrow. Guerguerian researched Xiao-Fen checking out her website and talking to mutual collaborators before he invited her to jam together. I was totally fascinated by her story and music. We shared a lot of things in common, like learning traditional styles and jazz, yet mostly being interested in creating new music, he said. I am looking forward to the possibilities that Min and I have for collaborating together, fusing the variety of musical traditions that we have studied and exploring the shared vision of creating new sounds. 2 big shows downtown Jeff Dunham is scheduled to perform in Jacksonville in June. Downtown Asheville will host two big shows Nov. 21, as a comedian with his puppets and the son of a legendary drummer will both perform. Jeff Dunhams Seriously Tour will stop at the ExploreAsheville.com Arena for a 3 p.m. show. while Jason Bonhams Led Zeppelin Evening will be at 7:30 p.m. at the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium. Dunham, who is known for his mature audiences only shows even though puppets participate, has had a string of Netflix stand-up specials and is a renowned comedian who also performs as a ventriloquist with characters like Peanut, Walter, Jose Jalapeno, Bubba J. and Achmed the Dead Terrorist. He has grown a large following through social media and has had numerous performances on the Comedy Channel and late-night shows. Jason Bonham, pictured at the Coral Sky Amphitheatre on August 1, 2017 in West Palm Beach, Fla. Jason Bonhams father, John, was the drummer of the legendary rock band Led Zeppelin and he has carried on that bands music over the years. He will perform a set of the groups music as part of a five-piece band that meticulously recreates the Hall of Fame bands songs. Blues-Soul guitarist at Salvage Station Atlanta native Eddie 9V got his first guitar at the age of 6 and fell in love with performers like Muddy Waters and Howlin Wolf. Eddie 9V, the on-stage moniker for Brooks Mason, has played in other bands in the past, like The Georgia Flood and Preachervan, before he became a solo performer. Now at 25-years-old, the blues guitarist is showcasing his own stellar playing to the country. He recently released his second album, Little Black Flies, and is out on the road. He plays at 8 p.m. Nov. 20 at Salvage Station. Roots rockers to play Jack of the Wood Little Lesley and the Bloodshots will bring its roots rock, rockabilly and Americana sounds to town again with an 8 p.m. show Nov. 20 at Jack in the Wood. The group, led by singer Lesley Swift, is known for its playing around the Carolinas, bringing a high energy show each time it performs. The group released Love Songs on Western Star records in 2020. This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Asheville events: Jeff Dunham, Jason Bonham, River Guerguerian, more KMSP The Minneapolis Police Department is warning residents after an uptick in robberies and home invasions. In these scenarios, they say two or more suspects follow a person to their homes, then rob and sometimes assault them. One family living near Lake Nokomis thinks they could be the latest victims of this sort of brazen crime. WASHINGTON (AP) American officials are unsure why Russian President Vladimir Putin is building up military forces near the border with eastern Ukraine but view it as another example of troubling military moves that demand Moscow's explanation, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Wednesday. Well continue to call on Russia to act responsibly and be more transparent on the buildup of the forces around on the border of Ukraine, Austin told a Pentagon news conference, adding, Were not sure exactly what Mr. Putin is up to. He said the troop buildup has the Pentagon's attention and that the Russians should be more transparent about what they're up to. Austin also criticized Russia for using a missile to shoot down one of its old satellites on Monday, an action that created hundreds of pieces of space debris that U.S. officials have said will be a long-term hazard to space operations. Whats most troubling about that is the danger that it creates for the international community, Austin said. It undermines strategic stability, and as you know, theres a debris field there now thatll be there forever. And its a safety concern. And so we would call upon Russia to act more responsibly going forward." Austin's language on Russia's use of an anti-satellite missile was milder than that of Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who has called the move dangerous and irresponsible. Blinken on Monday said it showed Russia is willing to imperil the exploration and use of outer space by all nations. Russias Defense Ministry on Tuesday confirmed destroying a defunct satellite that has been in orbit since 1982, but it insisted the U.S. knows for certain that the resulting fragments, in terms of test time and orbital parameters, did not and will not pose a threat to orbital stations, spacecraft and space activities. It called remarks by U.S. officials hypocritical. The Russian military buildup near Ukraine is of potentially bigger concern. Ukraines Defense Ministry said last week that about 90,000 Russian troops are stationed not far from the border and in rebel-controlled areas in Ukraines east. Russia has supported a separatist insurgency in Ukraines east that erupted shortly after Moscows 2014 annexation of Ukraines Crimean Peninsula and has left more than 14,000 people dead. Earlier this year, a massive buildup of Russian troops in the Russias west raised concern in Ukraine and in the West, fueling fears of an escalation of hostilities. Russian officials said the troops were deployed for training, casting them as part of measures to counter security threats posed by the deployment of NATO forces near Russian borders. CANADA-FLOODING-ENVIROMENT A view of flooding in the Sumas Prairie area of Abbotsford British Columbia, Canada, on November 17, 2021. (Photo by Don MacKinnon / AFP) (Photo by DON MACKINNON/AFP via Getty Images) British Columbia Premier John Horgan has declared a state of emergency after flooding and landslides devastated the southern part of the province. Horgan says the declaration will preserve basic access to service and supplies for communities across the province. He says the government will bring in travel restrictions to ensure that essential goods and medical and emergency services are able to reach the communities that need them. The Canadian Press President Joe Biden called on US regulators Wednesday to look into the causes of the nationwide spike in gasoline prices, which he says are hurting workers. The president last week made fighting inflation a top priority after data showed consumer prices hit a 30-year high in October, fueling a slump in his public approval. In a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Biden took aim at oil companies he says are raising prices at the pump even as their expenses decline and profits soar. He instructed the agency to look into whether "illegal conduct" is behind the energy price spike. "I do not accept hard-working Americans paying more for gas because of anti-competitive or otherwise potentially illegal conduct," Biden said in the letter. Despite signs the US economy has bounced back strongly from the damage inflicted by the Covid-19 pandemic, Biden has paid a political cost as global supply chain snarls have caused shortages and driven an uptick in prices of everything from cars to food to gasoline. Biden said the prices at the pump are not justified by the fundamentals of the market, noting that while the cost of unfinished gasoline has dropped more than five percent over the past month, retail prices rose three percent. At the same time, oil companies "are generating significant profits," with the two largest on track to nearly double net income compared to 2019 and planning major stock buybacks, he said in the letter. Biden instructed the FTC to "bring all of the commission's tools to bear if you uncover any wrongdoing." The agency declined to comment on its investigations, but spokesman Peter Kaplan told AFP, "The FTC is concerned about this issue, and we are looking into it." In response to a previous request over the summer from Biden to examine gas prices, FTC Chair Lina Khan pledged to investigate any collusion that might be fueling the inflation, as well as take a closer look at mergers in the industry that reduce competition. Story continues In June, the regulator ordered 7-Eleven and Marathon Petroleum to sell off nearly 300 gas stations after their $21 billion merger violated antitrust rules by leaving hundreds of communities without alternatives to buy fuel. Average US prices at the pump fell to $3.41 a gallon as of Monday, 11 cents higher than a month ago, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA). That average is 81 cents more than in 2019, before the pandemic hit and kept most Americans at home. "Unfortunately, the ongoing tight supply of crude oil will likely keep gas prices fluctuating, instead of dropping, for some time," AAA spokesperson Andrew Gross said in a statement this week. hs/cs President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to arms control talks as the communist nation looks to beef up its nuclear stockpile, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday. The world leaders held their most extensive talks to date Monday with a virtual three-hour meeting, during which Biden raised the need for "strategic stability" as tensions with China remain heightened. CHINA SAYS ITS AN 'IMAGINARY ENEMY' OF US, CLAIMS HYPERSONIC MISSILE TEST WAS 'ROUTINE' "The two leaders agreed that we would look to begin to carry forward discussions on strategic stability," Sullivan said during a virtual panel with the Brookings Institute. "It is now incumbent on us to think about the most productive way to carry it forward from here." US President Joe Biden meets with China's President Xi Jinping during a virtual summit from the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC, November 15, 2021. Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images Neither the White House nor Chinas foreign ministry mentioned any plans to hold such talks following the summit, but agreeing to discuss arms control would mean a stance reversal by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). China flatly rejected nuclear treaty talks after Donald Trump threatened not to renew the New START Treaty, a 2010 agreement between the U.S. and Russia that places limits on the nation's nuclear stockpiles. The treaty was ultimately renewed by the Biden administration, but Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the White House would continue to push China on countering its expanding nuclear arsenal. CHINA CLAIMS BIDEN DENOUNCED 'TAIWAN INDEPENDENCE,' BUT WARNS US IS 'PLAYING WITH FIRE' Sullivan said any talks with China would not reflect the same kind of long-held dialogue with Russia, noting those agreements are "far more mature." "What President Xi and President Biden really reinforced to one another at multiple points last night was that this relationship needs to be guided by consistent and regular leader-to-leader interaction," the national security adviser said. It remains unclear what nuclear arms talks with China would look like, as the communist nation has repeatedly pointed to its relatively small arsenal as justification for its continued efforts in developing warheads. Story continues According to data from the Arms Control Association, Russia has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world with more than 6,255 warheads on hand. The U.S. comes in second with 5,550 warheads. China ranks a distant third with 350 nuclear warheads. Sullivan said the virtual talks Monday were "fundamentally different" from previous calls the leaders have held, adding the discussion was a "more intense, engaged session." Biden and Xi described their conversation as candid, though neither leader offered solutions to some of the biggest geopolitical hurdles facing U.S.-China relations. President Biden meets with China's President Xi Jinping during a virtual summit from the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., Nov. 15, 2021. MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images While Chinas alleged commitment to engage in nuclear non-proliferation talks with the U.S. would be championed by the Biden administration, Sullivan said the White House would not view such actions as a "favor." "Chinas act of good faith on global issues is not a favor to the United States," he added. "It is something that is expected of all responsible states." Associated Press The NCAA has placed the Auburn men's basketball program on four years probation for unethical conduct involving former associate head coach Chuck Person and imposed a two-game suspension on coach Bruce Pearl for failing to monitor his assistant and adequately promote compliance. An NCAA Committee on Infractions panel issued its findings Friday. The NCAA, however, mostly accepted Auburn's self-imposed penalties in the case dating back to September 2017, when FBI agents arrested Person as part of a wide-ranging investigation into corruption in college basketball. The new infrastructure legislation sets aside $65 billion for Americas spotty broadband system, the culmination of a years-long effort to make changes to how Americans get online. And the money may mean a break on your internet bill as well as the promise of new providers and faster speeds, especially in rural areas. It's "certainly pretty significant considering we havent seen these kinds of stimulus support in this industry ever, Charlie Vogt, CEO of DZSi, a telecommunications company based in Plano, Texas, told Yahoo Finance Live. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will oversee much of the broadband money. She recently told reporters the focus now is on implementing this in partnership with our partners on the ground to achieve the president's goal of making sure that every American, regardless of where they live or the color of their skin or their income, has access to broadband. It represents a generational and hopefully transformational investment, the head of US Telecom, an industry group, said about the provisions. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo speaks about broadband provisions in the infrastructure deal at the White House Nov. 9. (MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images) Relief on your internet bill The $65 billion is divided into a few areas, including $42.45 billion for grants to states for broadband projects and $14.2 billion for a program to provide vouchers. There are billions more for things like digital inclusion projects and rural broadband programs. As Raimondo has noted on the new voucher program, "affordability is just as important as access [because] it does a family no good if there's broadband in their community but they can't afford it." The program will create a permanent $30-a-month-subsidy program to give low-income Americans a break on their internet service expenses. It will replace a temporary program, which offers up to $50-a-month for some Americans. The previous program, called the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program, was signed into law by then-President Trump in 2020 and has enrolled over 6 million households this year. It allocated $3.2 billion for vouchers. The new infrastructure bill puts aside over 4 times more for that purpose. Story continues The money is designed to flow through existing internet providers which will pass along the savings to customers. Raimondo said everyone who gets a penny of this money is required to offer a low-cost, affordable plan, and be more transparent about pricing. In a recent statement, the National Consumer Law Center praised the provisions. This bill makes great strides in closing the digital divide, said Olivia Wein, staff attorney for the NCLC. President Joe Biden (3rd-R) talks to Speaker of the House Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) (2nd-R) as Senate Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) (R) and Vice President Kamala Harris (L) look on after signing the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act as he is surrounded by lawmakers and members of his Cabinet during a ceremony on the South Lawn at the White House on November 15, 2021 in Washington, DC. The $1.2 trillion package will provide funds for public infrastructure projects including improvements to the countrys transportation networks, increasing rural broadband access, and projects to modernize water and energy systems. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images) A push to have cities offer internet service directly The bill includes $42 billion for grants to states, that they can then use for a broadband projects like laying new or better cables to provide access or higher speeds. Data from Microsoft has found that somewhere around 120 million Americans even those who have a nominal connection dont currently use the internet at broadband speeds, defined as download speeds of 25 mbps and upload speeds of 3 mbps. Vogt highlighted how the bill is structured to direct money to the least-connected states. While every state gets $100 million automatically for broadband programs, that leaves $37 billion to be allocated based on each states justified need. Jonathan Spalter, president and CEO of USTelecom, has said the deal recognizes the private model of broadband deployment in the United States with targeted public support in unserved or hard to reach communities is the key to achieving 100 percent connectivity. USTelecom is a Washington-based group that represents broadband and technology companies like AT&T (T), Verizon (VZ), and scores of smaller network providers. The group also calculated in a recent Broadband Capex report that private companies invested about $80 billion in broadband and networks in 2020, approximately twice the amount the infrastructure bill has set aside for deployment in coming years. A technician makes some repairs on a cell tower near Meeker, Colorado. Broadband in Rio Blanco county and Meeker is some of the best in the state for rural areas. (Helen H. Richardson/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images) Raimondo promises to work closely with business, and said we have to make sure that we don't spend this money overbuilding, referencing an industry concern that an influx of government money could end up creating duplicate networks. The money will be managed by states and overseen by the Commerce Department, and is expected to support private companies. Some voices are calling for more government-run providers, and the funds could spur new city-run internet services. According to the latest data, there are more than 600 communities currently served by some form of a municipal network and an effort led by Vice President Kamala Harris would encourage more of them. Advocates for municipal networks have examples of positive effects when a municipal network competes with a private company. Christopher Mitchell, director of the Community Broadband Networks Initiative, has noted in the past that when a community starts offering a service, the prices typically drop. The debate essentially boils down to whether the Biden administrations goal of 100% coverage is achievable through existing broadband providers and strategic public/private partnerships for hard-to-reach areas. As Spalter noted, the nitty gritty implementation details will matter a lot. Ben Werschkul is a writer and producer for Yahoo Finance in Washington, DC. Maximizing infrastructure impact means 'routing new dollars through old plumbing': Transportation Secretary Bidens infrastructure plan could push more cities to offer internet service directly Microsoft president: Shame on us if we fail' to provide broadband internet to more Americans Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, LinkedIn, YouTube, and reddit. Davidson WOOSTER - Buehlers Fresh Foods announced in a recent news release that Mike Davidson has been promoted to president and CEO of the Ohio-based supermarket chain effective Jan. 2, 2022. He will take over from Dan Shanahan who announced his retirement in early November, according to the release. On behalf of our board of directors and ESOP trustee, we couldnt be more proud in naming Mike as president/CEO," Shanahan said in the release. "Mike has been with us for six years as EVP of store operations and more recently as EVP of sales and marketing. Hes had a significant impact on the success of our company and our culture. We are confident that he has the leadership skills to take Buehlers to the next level." Previous to joining Buehlers, Davidson was with Price Chopper supermarkets in Schenectady, New York, as senior vice president of store operations. Prior to Price Chopper, Davidson worked with Ahold companies Finast and Tops Markets. While at Tops, Davidson was regional VP of operations and VP of operations and merchandising. Davidson holds a bachelors degree in accounting, a masters degree in business and attended the Cornell University food executive program. He is chairman of the Ohio Grocers Association, past board member with the Muscular Dystrophy association, board member of the Wooster Christian School and is a member of Rotary. He and his wife Joanna reside in Wooster; have three children and 10 grandchildren living throughout the United States. I would like to thank Dan and our Board of Directors for the confidence they have placed in me," Davidson said in the release. "Since our management-led buyout in 2017 a solid foundation has been established at Buehlers Fresh Foods and I look forward to building on that. Being an ESOP allows all of our employees to think and act like owners. I am honored to be leading the team. This article originally appeared on Ashland Times Gazette: Buehlers Fresh Foods promotes Mike Davidson as its new president/CEO PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) A court in Cambodia on Wednesday denied the bail requests of 14 detained members of a dissolved opposition party who have been charged with treason for taking part in nonviolent political activities over the past several years. The Phnom Penh Municipal Court said it denied the requests from the former members of the disbanded Cambodia National Rescue Party because their cases will come to trial soon, on Dec. 7 and 9, said Am Sam Ath, a representative of the local human rights group Licadho. After an appeals court last week freed 18 activists from prison, including a prominent labor leader who has been a longtime critic of the government, there had been hope among friends and family of the 14 that they would be released. But the denial of bail tamped down speculation that last weeks releases signaled a liberalizing trend for the government of Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has been in power for 36 years and has often been accused of heading an authoritarian regime. The 14 are charged with conspiracy to commit treason and incitement to commit a felony, and all have been in pre-trial detention for more than a year. Defense lawyer Sam Sokong said most of the defendants are accused of organizing a failed trip back to Cambodia in November 2019 by former opposition leader Sam Rainsy. Sam Rainsy, the co-founder of the party, has been in exile since 2016 to avoid serving prison sentences on defamation and other charges. He says the cases against him are politically motivated, and his attempted return was blocked by the government. Separately, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court announced this week it has ordered the sale of a building owned by Sam Rainsy that had been used as the party headquarters. Money from the sale is to go to several top government officials and the government itself for legal judgments they won against Sam Rainsy. As the sole opposition party in Parliament, the Cambodia National Rescue Party had been expected to present a strong challenge to Hun Sens ruling Cambodian Peoples Party in the 2018 general election. But in late 2017, Hun Sen launched a sweeping crackdown on his opponents and the CNRP was forced by the high court to disband and its lawmakers were removed from Parliament. Many people believe the court acted to ensure that Hun Sens party won the polls. It ended up sweeping all the seats. Story continues The wife of Kak Komphear, one of the defendants to stand trial next month, said the group pleaded at Wednesday's court hearing for their release on the grounds they are in poor health and their families are suffering because their money earners are in prison. Prum Chantha, a member of Friday Wives, a group organized to support the defendants, said they also promised not to flee and to appear in court when summoned. Her husband has been in detention since May 2020. Their 16-year-old son, Kak Sovannchhay, who is autistic, was convicted earlier this month of incitement to commit a felony and public insult for comments he made in a Telegram chat group defending his father, and for sharing Facebook posts criticizing Hun Sen. He was sentenced to eight months in prison but released on Nov. 10 after his case drew international attention. Canada is sending the military to help evacuate and support communities hit by "catastrophic" flooding, with the death toll expected to rise after record rainfall on the Pacific coast triggered a state of emergency Wednesday. Officials said downpours in British Columbia this week trapped motorists in mudslides that left at least one dead and four missing, forced thousands of people to flee their homes, and cut off Vancouver and its port. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in Washington ahead of meeting with his US and Mexican counterparts, said the heavy rains caused "historical and terrible flooding that has disrupted the lives and taken lives of people across BC." "I can confirm there are hundreds of Canadian Armed Forces members currently headed to British Columbia to help with everything from supplies to evacuation to whatever is needed," he said. British Columbia Premier John Horgan declared a state of emergency and imposed a travel ban, telling reporters "catastrophic" rains, winds and flooding "have devastated entire communities of our province." "We expect to confirm even more fatalities in the coming days," he added. This week's extreme weather comes after British Columbia suffered record-high summer temperatures that killed more than 500 people, as well as wildfires that destroyed a town. "These events are increasing in regularity because of the effects of human-caused climate change," Horgan commented, just days after world leaders met in Glasgow for the COP26 climate conference. - Airlifted to safety - By Tuesday afternoon the torrential rains had let up. An estimated 300 motorists trapped on highways by mudslides have been airlifted to safety and a few evacuation orders have been rescinded. But Henry Braun, mayor of hard-hit Abbotsford east of Vancouver, told a briefing: "We're not out of this yet." "If we have another weather event like we just went through, we are in deep doo doo," he said. Story continues Meanwhile, searches continue for more possible victims, after a woman's body was recovered from a mudslide near Lillooet, 250 kilometers (155 miles) northeast of Vancouver. Motorist Kathie Rennie told public broadcaster CBC she witnessed "the whole side of the mountain coming down and taking out these cars... everything just being swept away. Just complete panic." Canadian police, Staff Sergeant Janelle Shoihet told AFP late Wednesday, "have received a fourth missing person report related to the Lillooet mudslide." As the season's first snow flurries started falling over inland towns covered in mud and partially inundated, residents scrambled for food, heat and water. Many grocery store shelves were empty, as supply chain disruptions led to panic buying. Horgan urged citizens not to hoard: "You do not need 48 eggs. A dozen will do, and leave the rest for somebody else." On the outskirts of Vancouver, livestock were pulled from hundreds of flooded farms on the Sumas Prairie -- including a cow towed behind a jet ski through a meter of water to higher ground. "We have thousands of animals that have perished," with many more in "difficult situations," said British Columbia Agriculture Minister Lana Popham. Overnight almost 200 people were airlifted from the area to safety. - Vancouver cut off - Key highways remain closed. As a result, motorists wanting to travel to or from Vancouver have to go south to the United States and back up into Canada. Landslides also cut off rail traffic to and from Vancouver -- one of Canada's busiest freight sea ports. "We're working diligently to assess the damage and make sure that we can get those supply roads back in shape as quickly as possible," Horgan said. "But the conditions are severe." Environment Canada said up to 250 millimetres (almost 10 inches) of rain -- what the region normally gets in a month -- fell Sunday and Monday in and around Vancouver, which was also hit last week by a rare tornado. Meteorologists blamed an "atmospheric river," or narrow strip of moisture carried from tropical regions toward the poles, for the deluge. amc/dva Nov. 16The Freeman Caregiver Support Group will present attorney Luke Boyer, from the Boyer Law Firm, during the group's monthly meeting from 10:30 a.m. to noon Thursday at the Freeman Hospital East conference rooms. Boyer will discuss options for planning a trust or will. He will also talk about the importance of having power-of-attorney documents. The support group is facilitated by Jennifer Berry, assistant director of adult outpatient services at Ozark Center. Physical distancing and mask wearing are practiced. Refreshments and door prizes are provided. RSVP to Kathy Mason at kdmason@freemanhealth.com or 417-347-8463. A businessman preparing to buy a California caviar company stayed with state Treasurer Fiona Ma and her aides at a property they were renting for work trips, the lawyer for a former employee suing the treasurer said. At the time, Ma and the businessman were copied on emails about a potential tax break for the company. The company ultimately did not file an application for the tax break, which is administered by Mas office. Waukeen McCoy, who is representing former Treasurers Office employee Judith Blackwell, told The Bee that Eugene Fernandez, who purchased Sterling Caviar in October 2020, stayed with Ma and her staff more than five times that year at a short-term rental the Treasurers Office used for state business trips. The claim that a non-state employee stayed with the treasurer and her staff is the latest issue to raise questions about Mas conduct as the states banker, a position she was elected to in 2018. Previous reporting by The Bee revealed Ma is the only statewide official who routinely expenses lodging in Sacramento, where she would frequently stay with staff. Experts have said its inappropriate and risky for a superior to share lodging with a staff member. McCoy is representing Blackwell in a lawsuit that alleges Ma sexually harassed her while the two stayed together on business trips in Sacramento. Ma has denied the allegations in the lawsuit, and says she is confident the truth will come out in court. During the time Ma and her staff were staying at rentals, a company that works with businesses to secure tax breaks from the state was communicating with Fernandez about helping Sterling apply for a sales tax exclusion program run by her office, according to the state emails, which The Bee obtained through a California Public Records Act request. McCoy said Ma rented the property first, then Fernandez did. He said he could not provide further details on the timing. McCoy said his client told him Fernandez would stay in one of the rooms of the rental while Ma and her staff stayed in other rooms. Fernandez would eat at restaurants with the treasurer and other staffers and would bring caviar for them, which they ate at the restaurants and at the rental property, McCoy said. Story continues I did not stay at corporate housing rentals with non-state employees, Ma responded in a statement. This is the latest in a series of false public allegations by Judith Blackwells attorney in a desperate attempt to use the media to coerce settlement and avoid a trial, where the facts will come out. Ma did not respond to follow-up questions about what she meant by corporate housing rentals, whether she had ever stayed with Fernandez at any kind of rental or whether he had ever brought caviar to rental properties or meals with her and staff. In response to a question about whether he had stayed with Ma in Sacramento, Fernandez said he never stayed at a rental property where Fiona Ma or the state paid the bill. He said he has known the treasurer for more than four years. Asked if he ever brought caviar to Ma and her staff, he wrote in an email that he would on occasions bring Caviar for social gatherings like I still do with friends. Elected officials must report any gifts, including meals, that they receive from any source who gives them more than $50 worth of gifts in a year, and cannot accept gifts from a source totaling more than $520 in a year. California makes exception for gift exchanges on birthdays, holidays and similar occasions, where officials can exchange gifts of roughly equal value with others. Mas financial disclosure forms do not list any gifts from Fernandez. She has reported gifts from other sources, including a $70 bottle of wine from the Napa County Farm Bureau and $4,800 in airfare, lodging and meals for trips to Portland and Seattle from the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy. If Fernandez did bring Ma and her staffers caviar, or if she ever stayed in a rental he paid for, she likely should have reported it, said Dan Schnur, the former head of Californias political ethics watchdog agency. Its one thing if he bought the treasurer and her staff a hamburger or a soda, but caviar in any type of quantity almost certainly would require gift reporting, said Schnur, who teaches politics at UC Berkeley, Pepperdine University and the University of Southern California. In May 2020, Alex Tran of California Incentives Group, a company that helps businesses apply for tax breaks, wrote to Fernandez saying, Hi Eugene as a follow up to our call. See below for the opportunities that we believe we can secure for Sterling Caviar by year end. The email included a description of how California Incentives Group could help Sterling apply for two sales tax exclusions through the California Alternative Energy and Advanced Transportation Financing Authority, a program within the Treasurers Office that gives tax breaks to advanced manufacturing and transportation companies working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Tran forwarded the pitch to Mas Gmail account in June 2020, the emails show, and attached several memos drawn up by the California Incentives Group for Sterling about applying for the tax breaks. Tran did not return a call from The Bee asking about the emails. Ma did not respond to a question about whether she had discussed the possibility of Sterling applying for a tax exclusion with Fernandez. Fernandez told The Bee he had NEVER explored applying for a sales tax exclusion through Mas office. He did not respond to a follow-up question about the email and memos from the California Incentives Group. Sterling does not appear to have formally applied for or received one of the sales tax exclusions, according to a list of companies that have applied. Five days after Tran emailed Ma about Sterling, one of her staffers emailed her saying he wanted to talk about Grants for Eugene and linked to a webpage on grant programs administered by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. Ma forwarded the email to Fernandez with the message: Check these out? Schnur said the emails dont suggest Ma did anything improper related to Fernandez, as long as she acted similarly when dealing with other business owners. Theres nothing wrong with elected officials helping business owners. It only becomes a problem if theyre showing preferential treatment, Schnur said. If she didnt do anything for him that she wouldnt have done for others in a similar situation, then she simply needs to make that clear publicly. Loyola Law School Professor Jessica Levinson said the actions McCoy described and the records obtained by The Bee dont suggest that Ma violated any laws or regulations, but she noted that the situation described was weird. A lot of what this brings up is larger questions about how shes spending taxpayer dollars and who might have influence in her office, said Levinson, whose work focuses on politics and government ethics. Blackwell couldnt understand the relationship between Ma and Fernandez and didnt know why he was staying with them, McCoy said. Expense reports filed by the treasurer show that she rented properties in Sacramento for four four-night business trips in May and June 2020. The expense reports make no mention of Fernandez, but one does specify that the treasurer stayed at a three-bedroom rental property with 4 staff. Another notes that a property was rented for 2 guests, but gives no further details. Expense reports for the other rentals dont specify whether other people stayed with the treasurer. Ma declined to say who stayed with her at the rentals, saying she could not answer the question because of the pending litigation. In her lawsuit, Blackwell says that, while she was working in the Treasurers Office as the director of the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee, Ma encouraged her to share rooms and lodging with her in Sacramento instead of making a one-hour commute home after work. While the two were staying together in hotel rooms and at a rental property, Blackwell says Ma exposed herself and crawled into bed with her. Ma has denied the claims in the lawsuit. Mas chief of staff Genevieve Jopanda, who frequently shared lodging with Ma, reported renting rental lodging for six additional trips from August through December of 2020. She doesnt specify in her expense reports whether she stayed with other people in those rentals. A Sacramento Bee review of Mas travel expenses previously revealed that Ma frequently shared lodging with staff. Business experts told The Bee that the practice is risky for a public official like Ma because it opens her office to liability and puts staffers in a position where they may not feel they can say no if they dont want to share lodging with their boss. Historians, Native American leaders and a descendant of Capt. John Mason will gather at the state Capitol Thursday to debate the future of a statue honoring the colonial-era war hero who lead a massacre of Pequot Indians in 1637. It is the latest in a national reckoning over how to recognize once-revered historical figures, from Mason to Christopher Columbus to Thomas Jefferson. The Mason statue presides over the exterior of the north side of the Capitol, just a few blocks from the statute of Columbus that the city of Hartford removed last year. Nearly 350 years after the deputy governor of Connecticuts death, critics saying the statue must be removed because of Masons participation in the genocide that virtually eliminated native people from the New World. Some scholars counter that Masons statue should remain with the addition of statues of Indigenous leaders, such as the Mohegan sachem Uncas and the Pequot Sachem Sassacus. Is this a man we should celebrate posed Rodney Butler, Chairman, Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Council, in testimony submitted in advance of Thursdays hearing. He urged the committee to move the Mason statue to the Old State House where Masons place in history can also be viewed in the context of the atrocities he committed. There is no doubt Mason engaged in what we now call genocide. The question for us in the year 2021, is whether a man who burned alive over 500 men, women, and children, systematically hunted and slaughtered any remaining members of the tribe, and attempted to eradicate an entire cultural identity, language, and heritage deserves a place of distinction on the face of Connecticuts state Capitol? I submit to you that he does not.' Masons victories led to his appointment as a major general with control of the Connecticut militia. He also was given hundreds of acres of land in southeastern Connecticut, including Masons Island, at the mouth of the Mystic River, and much of what is now Norwich. Later in life, he was repeatedly elected deputy governor of the colony, and held the position until his health failed. He died at 72 in Norwich. It was an ugly, complicated and conflicted past, State Historian Walter Woodward said earlier this year. There are no good guys in this. It was not a case of the terribly bloodthirsty English and the mild-mannered, peaceable Indigenous people. There was enough atrocity on both sides to make your head spin. In our desire to correct for centuries of injustice to Indigenous people, we have adopted an interpretation of much of the past events that downplays one side of the story and builds up another side of the story. Woodward is scheduled to speak to Thursdays hearing, along with other historians and scholars of Connecticut and Native American history. Also on the agenda is Marcus Mason Maronn, a descendant of Mason, who wrote in the New London Day last year that John Mason was the commander in the Pequot War but he was no more of a genocidal butcher than Uncas or Sassacus. Actually, they were all prominent warriors, who fought for their survival. President Joe Biden speaks about COVID-19 vaccinations after touring a Clayco Corp. construction site for a Microsoft data center in Elk Grove Village, Ill., Thursday, Oct. 7, 2021. The fate of Biden's vaccine mandate for larger private employers may come down to cases now heading for the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. Challenges to President Joe Biden's COVID-19 vaccine mandate for private employers will be consolidated in the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, a panel dominated by judges appointed by Republicans. The Cincinnati-based court was selected Tuesday in a random drawing using pingpong balls, a process employed when challenges to certain federal agency actions are filed in multiple courts. The selection could be good news for those challenging the administration's vaccine requirement, which includes officials in 27 Republican-led states, employers and several conservative and business organizations. They argue the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration does not have the authority to impose the mandate. The challenges, along with some from unions that said the vaccine mandate didn't go far enough, were made this month in 12 circuit courts. Under an arcane system, it was up to the clerk of the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict litigation to select a pingpong ball from a bin to choose where the cases would be heard. It was a favorable outcome for Republicans. Eleven of the 16 full-time judges in the 6th Circuit, which sits in the Potter Stewart Federal Courthouse in downtown Cincinnati, were appointed by Republican presidents. Accounting for one of the Republican-appointed judges, Helene White, who often sides with judges appointed by Democrats, and adding senior judges who are semi-retired but still hear cases, the split is 19-9 in favor of Republicans. Six of the 6th Circuit's full-time judges were appointed by former President Donald Trump. One Trump appointee to the 6th Circuit, Amul Thapar, was one of those in the running when Trump named a replacement for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. Judge Raymond Kethledge, a George W. Bush appointee to the 6th Circuit, also was under consideration for the nomination that went to Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The 6th Circuit covers cases from Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee. Story continues Another court where a majority of judges were nominated by Republicans, the New Orleans-based 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, issued a ruling that put the mandate on hold. It's not clear whether the court that will hear the case will act as the 5th Circuit did and side quickly with the Republican challengers. But legal experts have become increasingly concerned in recent years about the politicization of both federal and state courts, raising questions about whether justice is fairly administered or dispensed through a partisan lens. Allison Orr Larsen, a professor at William & Mary Law School, coauthored a study published this year that found growing partisanship in federal judicial decisions. For decades, the study found that rulings on cases in which all judges in a circuit weighed in generally were not decided along party lines based on the presidents who appointed the judges. We did see a concerning spike starting in 2018 that led us to wring our hands, Larsen said in an interview. The increasing partisanship in a branch of government that is supposed to be blind to partisan politics was seen in judges appointed by presidents of both parties, but Larsen said it's not clear why that was or whether it will last. Some of the federal courts moved to the right when Trump was president and Republicans controlled the U.S. Senate, which confirms judicial nominees. Trump appointed 54 judges to the circuit courts, which are one step below the U.S. Supreme Court, including filling one seat twice. That represents nearly 30% of the seats on the circuit courts, where cases are most often considered by three-judge panels. Trump's appointees flipped the 11th Circuit in the South to Republican control and expanded the GOP-appointed majorities in the 5th, 6th and 8th circuits in the Midwest and South. Biden's three appointees switched the New York-based 2nd Circuit to Democratic control. Republican state attorneys general and conservative groups mostly filed their challenges in circuit courts dominated by conservative judges, while the unions went to circuits with more judges nominated by Democratic presidents. In all, 34 objections have been filed in all 11 regional circuits plus the one for the District of Columbia. Thats where the pingpong balls came in to play. How the cases ended up in Cincinnati Under federal law, cases challenging federal agency actions get consolidated upon the agency's request if they are filed in multiple circuit courts. Each circuit where a challenge is filed within the first 10 days of the agency taking action has an equal chance of being selected. It was up to the judicial panel's clerk, John W. Nichols, to select a pingpong ball from a bin, according to a Tuesday court filing by the panel. The office denied a request by the Associated Press to allow media access to the drawing. Previously this year, the lottery had been used to assign just two cases. One involved fallout from a National Labor Relations Board ruling on an anti-union Twitter message by Tesla founder Elon Musk where objectors filed in two circuits. The other was over orders from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in which objectors filed in three. The employer vaccine mandate is higher profile and further reaching. It calls for businesses with more than 100 workers to require employees to be vaccinated by Jan. 4 or wear masks and be tested weekly for COVID-19. Exemptions are provided for religious reasons and for those who work at home or only outdoors. Because it's an unusual rule from the workplace safety agency, there is no consensus among lawyers on how the challenges will go. OSHA has issued just 10 emergency rules in the half century since it was formed. Of the six challenged in court, only one survived intact. The Biden administration has insisted its on strong legal footing. It also has the backing of the American Medical Association, which filed papers in support of the mandate. The AMAs extensive review of the medical literature demonstrates that COVID-19 vaccines authorized or approved by FDA are safe and effective, and the widespread use of those vaccines is the best way to keep COVID-19 from spreading within workplaces, the group said in its filing. Among those challenging the rule is a consortium of construction contractors. They say they want their workers vaccinated, but that a requirement only on larger companies is just pushing vaccine-hesitant workers to take jobs with companies that have fewer than 100 employees. Crafting an unworkable rule that will do little to get construction workers vaccinated is an approach that is not only wrong, but likely counterproductive, said Scott Casabona, president of Signatory Wall and Ceiling Contractors Alliance. Officials with the workplace safety agency say theyre considering extending the mandate to smaller employers. A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit extended the stay of the OSHA rule in an opinion released last Friday, expressing skepticism that the agency had authority to implement the vaccine requirement. The 6th Circuit could modify, revoke or extend the stay. It had not yet been determined which judges from the 6th Circuit will be on a three-judge panel to hear the case, or whether it will be considered by all the judges. The U.S. Department of Justice declined to comment on the selection of the court. This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: U.S. appeals court in Cincinnati to decide COVID-19 vaccine mandate Associated Press A former deep-sea treasure hunter is preparing to mark his sixth year in jail for refusing to disclose the whereabouts of 500 missing coins made from gold found in an historic shipwreck. Research scientist Tommy Thompson has been held in contempt of court since Dec. 15, 2015, for that refusal. Despite an investors lawsuit and a federal court order, Thompson, 69, still won't cooperate with authorities trying to find those coins, according to court records, federal prosecutors and the judge who found Thompson in contempt. WASHINGTON Less than two weeks into the effort to vaccinate children between the ages of 5 and 11, the White House is seeing encouraging uptake statistics for this youngest cohort, according to internal Biden administration figures shared with Yahoo News, with more than 2.5 million already partially vaccinated. At least 2.6 million children are on their way to being protected from COVID-19, thanks to the presidents efforts to prepare an entirely new infrastructure to reach parents and their children where they are with vaccines, a White House official told Yahoo News. With our kids' program just hitting full strength 10 days ago, we are already seeing that our effective rollout is helping parents and families across the country breathe giant sighs of relief. Related: Your questions on coronavirus vaccines for children, answered >>> If the current pace holds for the rest of the week, and all the children who have received their first dose of the vaccine also receive their second (childhood dosing calls for three-week spacing, as is the case with adults), as many as 3 million young early adapters could be fully vaccinated by Christmas Eve. Individuals are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after the second dose, as that period gives the immune system sufficient time to develop antibodies against the coronavirus, according to public health officials. That could be a monumental gift for family holiday gatherings in late December, though too late to make for an entirely worry-free Thanksgiving. The 2020 holiday season aligned with only the earliest vaccine distribution efforts, meaning that much of the anxiety about traveling and gathering with others remained in place for many Americans. A 9-year-old receives a dose of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine in New York City. (Mary Altaffer/AP) This year, though, vaccinated Americans should be confident about celebrating with others, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top medical adviser to President Biden, said earlier this week. Inoculations of 5- to 11-year-olds began on Nov. 3, shortly after a modified dose of the Pfizer vaccine one-third of what adults receive received final approval from Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Twenty-eight million children became eligible for vaccination with that decision. Vaccines for children below the age of 5 have not yet been approved. Story continues A White House official who shared childhood vaccination figures with Yahoo News explained that the estimate of 2.6 million childhood vaccinations by the end of the day on Wednesday was reached by correlating state-level data, including from pharmacies and state health departments. The CDC has not yet released a public-facing tracking tool for childhood vaccination, as it has for other demographic groups. Last week, the White House announced that 900,000 first shots had been administered in the first week of childhood vaccinations. Since then, the pace appears to have doubled, suggesting a high level of enthusiasm in many parts of the country. And with months of experience, public health officials appear to have mastered distribution logistics too, with the White House estimating that 30,000 sites around the United States are now vaccinating children. The internal document shared with Yahoo News pointed out that, whereas it took less than two weeks to vaccinate 10 percent of eligible children, adults needed 50 days to reach the same threshold when vaccines first became available in late 2020. First lady Jill Biden and U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy visit with children getting the COVID-19 vaccine in Houston. (Justin Rex/AP) The childhood vaccination effort is being closely watched, because after more than a year of remote learning in many parts of the country, the desire to keep schools open is running high. Moreover, simply getting more people vaccinated regardless of age gives the coronavirus less ability to spread. Vaccinated people are much less likely to become infected with or transmit COVID-19 than unvaccinated people. According to the internal documents, which are expected to be the focus of a White House pandemic response team briefing on Wednesday morning, 12 states have already surpassed the 10 percent benchmark for inoculations of children ages 5 to 11. Those states, the White House says, are Maryland, Virginia, Hawaii, Colorado, Utah, Oregon, Minnesota, Maine, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont and Illinois. The childhood vaccination figures are a bright spot for a White House that has seen 60 million eligible adults and adolescents decline to get immunized, despite having been eligible for weeks or months. _____ Explore how the Delta variant correlates with the national political landscape in this 3D experience from the Yahoo immersive team. A group of organizations hoping to improve youth mental health in Colorado released The Children and Youth Mental Health Playbook on Tuesday, which leaders in the health community said gives local, state and federal governments solutions to the ongoing crisis. The plan calls for $150 million to be allocated from the state's budget to address youth mental health. The release of the playbook and call for funding comes six months after Childrens Hospital Colorado, one of the agencies on this project, declared Colorado in a state of emergency due to its youth mental health crisis. In October, the same step was taken on the national level as the Children's Hospital Association declared a national emergency for children's mental health. Government officials at the local, state and federal level have a responsibility in partnership with families, health care providers, advocates in schools to urgently prioritize mental health policies and funding allocations that will support children, youth and families, said Jake Williams, executive director of Healthier Colorado, another participant in the coalition. Rebecca Doughty, program director of Four Corners Youth Clinics and representative of the Colorado Association for School-Based Health Care, said the pandemic has clearly exacerbated an already existing problem for young Coloradans. Two years ago, one in five of our students were reporting depression and anxiety. Today, thats grown to four in five students now reporting depression and anxiety, she said. PSD's school-based health news: Lincoln Middle School is getting a health center. Here's what that means. The main solution this group is calling for? Better funding. The Playbook calls on government officials at each level to prioritize the American Rescue Plan Act funding for youth mental health, Williams said. ARPA funding is meant to help all of us recover from the pandemic. We cannot fully or equitably recover without addressing the mental health crisis exacerbated by COVID-19. Story continues In his proposal for next years budget, Gov. Jared Polis allocated $550 million to address behavioral health issues. In June, $100 million of that was spent on Senate Bill 21-37, which works to expand the states behavioral health offerings. This coalition is now asking Polis to allocate $150 million of the remaining money one-third of it to childrens behavioral health, noting that children make up about one-third of the states population. Much of that money, if received, would go to workforce support and building a stronger network of youth mental health providers, said Zach Zaslow, senior director of government affairs for Childrens Hospital Colorado. In addition to strengthening the pipeline and training new folks, doing loan repayment programs, we also need to multiply the workforce, Zaslow said, with the goal of having kids be able to get service in their area rather than reaching a crisis point and getting care in an emergency setting. Connor Cahill, a spokesperson for the governor's office, confirmed the state set aside $500 million of ARPA funding "to transform our behavioral healthcare system." He said the state has called upon local governments who got ARPA funding and hospitals to "match our investment" for children and adult mental health. "We know that COVID-19 has put a tremendous strain on young people and the behavioral health continuum for children requires strategic investments to ensure appropriate care... While that is a tremendous investment we know its not enough to fully solve the problem," Cahill said. In addition to Children's Hospital Colorado and Healthier Colorado, the Colorado Education Association, Partners for Children's Mental Health, Colorado Association for School-Based Health Care and the Colorado chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics were involved with the playbook. Related: Colorado is offering children 3 free counseling sessions. Here's how to sign up. Jenna Glover, a clinical child/adolescent psychologist and director of psychology training at Childrens Hospital Colorado, said the playbook gives state and local leaders the ability to "take responsibility for failures of the current system" and work toward rebuilding a better one. COVID has taken a lot from our kids, and we truly at this moment have an incredible opportunity to give them something they desperately need, Glover said. It's a generational, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rebuild the system by strengthening the mental health workforce by building on the success of telehealth that we have experienced during the pandemic. Other solutions the playbook identified, specifically at the local level, were: Investing in respite care providers and programs to offer short-term support for caregivers with children and youth who have more complicated mental health needs. Utilizing existing local services to stabilize children and youth in the home setting while additional longer-term needs and services are assessed and identified. Establishing prevention programs to limit access to potentially lethal items. Establishing local programs that enable a mental health crisis intervention team to work in partnership with those who respond to emergency calls in the community. CSU ahead of the game: Colorado State police to launch mental health co-responder program Molly Bohannon covers education for the Coloradoan. Follow her on Twitter @molboha or contact her at mbohannon@coloradoan.com. Support her work and that of other Coloradoan journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today. This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: Advocates call for $150 million to improve Colorado youth mental health HONG KONG (Reuters) - China Evergrande Group has dissolved several district-level units of Fangchebao (FCB), its online real estate and automobile marketplace, due to shrinking capital and business, Chinese media outlet Cailianshe reported on Wednesday, citing sources close to the embattled developer. FCB had planned for an initial public offering (IPO) late this year or early next year. Evergrande in March sold 10% of the company to 17 investors for $2.10 billion, at a pre-financing valuation of over 150 billion yuan ($23.48 billion). Evergrande did not immediately respond to request for comment. The world's most indebted property developer, with more than $300 billion in liabilities, has been scrambling for funds to pay its many lenders as well as contractors. It had hoped to spin off businesses including FCB and bottled water to raise fund. ($1 = 6.3880 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Clare Jim; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan) Columbus City Council approved the creation of a housing fund this week to ease the resettlement process of about 350 Afghan evacuees who fled their home country earlier this year and are set to start their new lives in the city. The initiative, called the Afghan Neighbors Rental Assistance Fund, will set aside $50,000 to cover rent costs for Afghan families should they default. The goal is to reassure landlords that they will get their payments even in the event that tenants fall behind on rent, said councilmember Emmanuel Remy, who sponsored the legislation. Like other refugee groups, all Afghan evacuees are entitled to a one-time federal stipend of $1,225 to cover personal expenses. A portion of that money goes toward paying for their rent before they find a job. Despite the federal assistance, however, landlords are sometimes reluctant to rent to refugees because most new arrivals do not have rental histories, credit scores or incomes when they first come to the United States, Remy said. Afghan evacuees: Hundreds of displaced Afghans are coming to Columbus. Here's how to help. This is a great example of public-private partnerships in solving a problem that we saw with the Afghans that are being relocated, Remy said. It appears that Congress did not address their housing problem, so it's fallen on local governments like us to try to come up with creative solutions to make sure that these people have adequate housing. Columbus two resettlement agencies, Community Refugee and Immigration Services and US Together, will hold on to the money from the city program and reimburse landlords if a tenant cannot pay rent. At the end of the 12-month program, the agencies will give back to the city any unspent money. Remy said that given past experience, he does not expect many families to default on their rent, and he believes agencies will use only a small percentage of the fund. Councilmember Emmanuel V. Remy Immigrants have demonstrated that they work very hard to provide for their families, Remy said. We know once they get here, they'll find a job, so we just need the landlords to understand that the city is backing their residency for 12 months. Story continues Afghan evacuees: First Afghan families, evacuees start to arrive in Columbus, hundreds more to follow The city also is working with the Columbus Apartment Association and Columbus Realtors to have landlords waive the Afghans application fees, streamline the approval process and accept background checks that the United States government conducted when the evacuees first entered the country. The challenges will be the tight housing market that we are experiencing in Columbus and placing large families, said Laura Swanson, executive director at the Columbus Apartment Association. CAA will work with the city and begin contacting our members as soon as we have more program details in place. Nadia Kasvin, director at US Together, said she hopes the new initiative will help open the door for landlords to work with other refugee groups in the future. In addition to the approximately 350 evacuees from Afghanistan, Columbus two resettlement agencies are preparing to welcome about 1,600 refugees from other countries this fiscal year. We just want to have the door open to us so we can explain to them all the support that refugees are getting and how the default rate is low because of their early employment and self-sufficiency, Kasvin said. My hope is that this fund will allow us to develop relationships with more landlords and then we will be able to secure housing for other refugees as well. Refugees: Columbus' resettlement agencies expect 1,600 refugees in new fiscal year as Biden raises national refugee cap Yilun Cheng is a Report for America corps member and covers immigration issues for the Dispatch. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation at https://bit.ly/3fNsGaZ. ycheng@dispatch.com @ChengYilun This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus' new housing initiative to help Afghan refugees with housing Protesters marched through the nearby town of Street The shoe retailer Clarks has agreed to allow mediators to help resolve a strike at its warehouse in Street, Somerset. The conciliation service Acas confirmed that it is in contact with the company and the union about arranging talks. Staff at the warehouse have been on strike since 4 October over pay and conditions. Clarks wants the workers to accept new contracts, which would cut pay for a number of long-serving employees. The Community union, which represents the strikers, says Clarks is using the controversial "fire and rehire" tactics, where a company dismisses workers and re-employs them on less favourable contracts. An Acas spokesperson said: "Acas is in touch with both sides involved in the Clarks dispute to work towards having talks as soon as possible." Conciliation is a dispute resolution process held by an independent, neutral third party. Acas says nine out of 10 workplace disputes can be resolved this way. This weekend Adrian Axtell, Community's national secretary, called for mediation but told the BBC "it has got to be a serious attempt to try to resolve this matter". On Tuesday, a spokesperson for the trade union confirmed that it had been approached by Acas and agreed immediately to meet with them and Clarks."If reports are correct and the company have agreed to meet with us and Acas we look forwards to entering the process," they said. "We are hopeful that we can come to a resolution that works in everybody's interests, protects our members livelihoods and recognises their loyalty to the company." The BBC understands that Clarks is not likely to submit to binding mediation, but the company hopes that Acas's non-binding conciliation process will help resolve the dispute. Clarks says that 69% of warehouse workers have accepted the new contracts, up from 53% last week, though some of those who have signed are still taking part in the strike. Story continues Last week Clarks improved its proposal to all affected employees by 5.6% to 10.03 per hour. This would still represent a pay cut for long-standing workers, who say they stand to lose out by as much as 20%. Community says that between 120 to 230 workers are taking part in the strike, though Clarks says the true number is lower. The dispute has become increasingly bitter in recent days. The union accused Clarks of using agency workers to cover the duties of striking workers - Clarks says it has always acted within the law. Last week Clarks also wrote to Community to complain about alleged harassment and intimidation at the site. The union says it has always acted in accordance with the law, and has addressed concerns about behaviour at the picket. This weekend workers held a protest march in the town. Clarks has been restructuring its business to reduce costs after the company was hit with disastrous losses during the pandemic. Sales were down 44%, and the company lost 172m last year. The Clark family, which has owned the business since its founding nearly 200 years ago, sold a majority stake to the Hong Kong-based private equity group LionRock in March to ensure the company's survival. Since then Clarks has cut hundreds of jobs and imposed new terms and conditions in other areas, including its head office. Clarks declined to comment on the talks. A Colombian nun who was kidnapped and held by jihadists in Mali for more than four years returned to her home country on Tuesday. "Welcome, welcome, our heart welcomes you," sang a dozen nuns waiting for her at the airport in Bogota, while Sister Gloria Cecilia Narvaez hugged each one of them. The 59-year-old nun was taken hostage on February 7, 2017 in southern Mali near the border with Burkina Faso, where she had been working as a missionary. "The Lord gave me the joy of having brothers and sisters," said the nun, who was freed on October 9. "I thank you with all my heart." "Your strength amazes me," said Colonel Gustavo Camargo, deputy director of the anti-kidnapping police who had gone to Mali to press for her release. Returning to her homeland, which was itself plagued by kidnappings in a conflict that lasted more than half a century, Narvaez spoke out for victims of abduction. "I was thinking of all the suffering that people go through when they are kidnapped right here in Colombia, in the whole world, there in Mali, how many people are left," said the nun, whose mother died in September 2020 while awaiting the release of her daughter. Kidnappings are common in Mali, mired in unrest of its own, and especially in the center of the country, a hotbed of jihadist violence. Since March 2012, several areas have been in the hands of groups linked to Al-Qaeda. Before returning to Colombia, the nun visited Pope Francis at the Vatican. lv/vel/ag/jh/caw The Columbia City Council on Monday for a third time this year voted down a request to replat lots at 1611, 1615 and 1617 University Ave. The Columbia City Council on Monday night for a third time this year voted down the Fyfer's Subdivision replat and development on University Avenue after extensive public comment and council discussion. Matt Pitzer was the lone council member in favor of the proposal, which was denied 6-1. If passed, three lots would have been replatted to allow the development of three apartment buildings each three stories tall which would house 72 students combined in the East Campus neighborhood. The lots would be about the same size as the current lots, attorney Robert Hollis said on behalf of the applicant. "We must replat in order to obtain building permits," he said in his presentation Monday. Many residents spoke during public comment in opposition to the revised plans the developer brought before the council, citing concerns about noise and parking. Ann Mehr, a representative from the East Campus Neighborhood Association Board, spoke on behalf of residents against the proposal. "We're opposed to the request because the proposed development is detrimental to the adjoining properties and the neighborhood," she said. Previously: After Columbia City Council denies replat at East Campus, another moves forward at Greek Town Reasons for opposition include lowering property values, adding to traffic congestion, and the destruction of the William C. Knight House, which is part of the East Campus Neighborhood Historic District, she said. The neighborhood association board unanimously voted against the development, agreeing the planned changes would be detrimental to the neighborhood. Ruth Tofle, a homeowner in the area of the proposed development, spoke on her concerns related to the buildings causing potential issues with stormwater as well as the high-density nature of housing planned for the new plats. Pitzer spoke in favor of the replatting, saying the newly revised plan would create lots very similar to the ones that already exist in the neighborhood. Story continues "I am a little bit concerned about what we are saying in voting this down," Pitzer said to his colleagues. "I hear and understand the concerns of the neighborhood ... but I think we are going down a dangerous path by not allowing something that is completely consistent with most of the other lots on that same block." From May 2021: City Council votes unanimously to protect historic East Campus from development Similar plats in other neighborhoods would likely be passed with no opposition, he said. Pitzer cited how Hollis said the decision was based only on the plat rather than the actual land use, while most opponents at the meeting spoke just about the land use. In the original design brought before the council May 17, developers sought to combine the three lots into one for an apartment building housing over 50 people. Developers brought a modified plan to the council Aug. 2. Council members unanimously voted down the design plans in both May and August. There is no rule that keeps developers from continually returning to the council with design changes to reconsider, said Tim Teddy, community development director. This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: Columbia votes down Fyfer's Subdivision replat for third time ARCADIA Just in time for holiday baking, the Pecan Harvest is set for Saturday, Nov. 20, at the Arcadia Farmers Market. Recently harvested pecans, most from Oklahoma groves, will be sold whole and shelled during the outdoor market from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Division Street and historic Route 66. For customers who prefer that someone else do the cooking for them, vendors also will offer pecan-laden pies, candy and other ready-to-eat treats, said Lori Seagraves, manager of the Arcadia Farmers Market. Lending atmosphere to the festive day will be a fire pit with smores, a petting zoo, a bounce house and live music by Joe Baxter and the Round Barn Ramblers. Food trucks will offer breakfast, lunch and hot drinks. In addition to the bounteous pecan harvest, vendors will be on hand with autumn and holiday decorative items, home-canned jelly, pickles and syrup, fall produce, local honey, handmade furniture and doll clothing sewn with love. Vendors also will offer handmade pottery, handcrafted soap and candles, gluten-free baked goods and gourmet coffee and tea. The Arcadia Farmers Market General Store, 210 N Odor St., also will be open during those hours with much of the same merchandise, as well as locally raised meat, farm-fresh eggs and Oklahoma-made cheese and yogurt. The general store is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. every Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. For more information or to reserve booth space for the Pecan Harvest, call Seagraves at 405-226-0346. This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Pecan Harvest is coming up at Arcadia Farmers Market Congress is about to repeal a president's authorization to use military force for the first time in about half a century, kicking off a debate about restoring its role in authorizing future wars. Why it matters: Democrats are eager to declare they've succeeded in facilitating an official end to America's "endless wars." The 2002 AUMF that justified the Iraq war was cited as recently as the January 2020 assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in a drone strike in Baghdad. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. Critics say the authorization was never intended for such an operation and letting it linger could trigger misuse by future presidents. Some Republicans fear repealing it could embolden Iranian-backed militias in Iraq, which have carried out attacks against U.S. troops stationed there. Biden, who supports repealing it, has acknowledged the U.S. has "no ongoing military activities that rely solely on the 2002 AUMF as a domestic legal basis." The repeal of another resolution passed in 2001, which also has been exploited, would be a heavier lift. Between the lines: The 2002 authorization gave President George W. Bush the domestic authority to invade Iraq and topple the government of Saddam Hussein. Nearly 20 years later, the number of U.S. troops in Iraq is down to 2,500 from a peak of about 170,000, and the Iraqi government is an ally of the United States. The Senate on a rare bipartisan basis is expected to vote as early as this week to repeal it as a component of approving the National Defense Authorization Act. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) concedes it will be repealed but is expected to speak out against the move, aides told Axios. Driving the news: Part of the Democratic impetus is to rebound from the heavy criticism Biden and their party took for the administration's botched withdrawal from Afghanistan. A repeal of the 2002 AUMF also would lay the groundwork for another effort to replace the 2001 AUMF for the post-9/11 "war on terror." Critics label it a blank check cited for operations in Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Niger, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and the Philippines. It's also been used to justify the indefinite detention of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. Lawmakers who support repealing and replacing the 2001 authorization insist they're a long way off from that vote. Instead, they see their plans to deal with the 2002 AUMF as a necessary first step. Story continues Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), who's been leading the effort, said he and other members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee are in discussions with the White House about repealing and replacing the 2001 AUMF. "But the idea was always we would get another [AUMF] repealed first, he said. What they're saying: Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), chairman of the foreign relations panel, told Axios: "I think that when Congress authorizes the use of force, when the purpose of its use has ended, then it should repeal it so no one can misuse it. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) was evasive, saying, I am a strong believer in Congress exercising its authority of war fighting." "At the same time, some of the Democratic efforts in this area are really about giving a green light to Iran and the ayatollah, and trying to tie the hands of any military response to a nuclear Iran," Cruz said. "I think thats a mistake." Menendez cautioned that acting on the 2001 AUMF "is much more difficult." He said, "2001 is not just about repeal; its about replacement." Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a proud libertarian, told Axios: "I think it would be great" to repeal the 2002 AUMF. But he also warned the 2001 AUMF, which he supports repealing, is "a bigger hurdle. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), told Axios he's far more interested in repealing the 2001 AUMF because its been interpreted by a president to do just about anything he wants to." "And I dont agree with that interpretation. But now four administrations have interpreted 2001 as broad powers," Cardin said. More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free Nov. 16WATERFORD A Waterford man was charged Monday with second-degree threatening after state police said he made several threats to Gov. Ned Lamont on Twitter. Jonathan D. Wright, 41, of 18 Laurel Crest Drive was served with an arrest warrant Monday at his residence. According to the warrant application, state police began investigating Wright on Oct. 26 for a tweet made on Oct. 23 in response to a tweet by Lamont. The tweet, posted under the profile name Jonathan Wright (@Jonatha661946), stated, "You are scum living on borrowed time. President Trump knows what you did to the elderly Covid patients that were sent to nursing homes. All is known and you will meet your maker courtesy of a noose and a trap door. Treason = Death." State police said they also uncovered two other tweets made by Wright previous to the post on Oct. 23. In response to Lamont's posts, one tweet on Oct. 20 stated: "Where you are going, it's not going to matter. Crimes against humanity = DEATH PENALTY." On Oct. 21, Wright tweeted: "You shouldn't be proud of any of us because we are not proud of you whatsoever. And we will NOT be happy until Justice is served and you are IN PRISON or take a one-way NUREMBERG CODE trip to Guantanamo Bay." In his post, Wright also claimed the tweet was approved by Donald J. Trump. State police visited Wright's residence on Oct. 28. Wright, who admitted to making the posts, said he did not mean anything threatening when he wrote them. He said he was just angry about what he had heard. Wright told the investigators he is a veteran who served in the Air Force for eight years, and that he held a top-secret clearance. His reasoning behind the tweets was based largely on incorrect information. In a written statement, Wright said he signed into a Twitter account about a month ago. He stated he'd heard that Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York had resigned in regards to his handling of COVID-19 patients. Story continues While he and his administration were facing criticism for undercounting COVID-19 deaths linked to nursing homes, Cuomo resigned as governor of New York in August after that state's attorney general released results of an investigation that found he had sexually harassed at least 11 women. Wright also claimed that nursing homes were making money off of COVID-19 deaths and deaths were wrongfully labeled as COVID deaths. He heard erroneously that government leaders had been putting COVID-19 patients into nursing homes to get the elderly sick. He said he thought if Cuomo was guilty of those actions, then Gov. Lamont could be guilty of them, as well. He said if the governors were guilty, they should not get a "get out of jail free card." Wright posted a $30,000 bond that had been set by the court. He is scheduled to appear in New London Superior Court on Nov. 29. j.vazquez@theday.com COVENTRY Police on Tuesday identified and arrested a student in connection with an overheard threat about having a weapon that led to a four-hour lockdown at Coventry High School on Monday. No weapon was found in Monday's search of the entire school, everyone in it, and all their belongings. In a news release, Coventry police said the student does not have access to firearms. The person was charged with disorderly conduct and the case was referred to Family Court, the news release said. Coventry High locked down: All 1,500 students searched, but no gun found dnaylor@providencejournal.com (401) 277-7411 On Twitter: @donita22 This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Student arrested in connection with overheard threat at Coventry High School NORTH DAKOTA- North Dakota Senator Kevin Cramer joined Senator John Boozman (R-AR) on a letter to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy questioning the U.S. Postal Services authority to implement a banking pilot program that includes check-cashing services. In the letter, the senators call the new USPS pilot program a threat to mail delivery and a misguided attempt to federalize financial services. We are concerned that the pilot program exceeds the Postal Services legal authority and fails to comply with relevant regulations and procedural requirements, the members wrote. The USPS launched its postal banking pilot program in September without notifying Congress. It comes on the heels of losses of more than $75 billion from 2007-2019. Last month the USPS announced it will further slow service and increase prices in attempt to fix its own notoriously poor financial footing. Given that these losses occurred during a period of time in which the Postal Service was exclusively focused on mail delivery, it would be imprudent to shift attention and resources toward an area in which the agency lacks expertise," the letter said. "It is essential that the Postal Service address this revenue shortfall by focusing on fixing inefficiencies with its mail delivery system, not pivoting to financial products and offerings with which the agency has no expertise, the members continued. This article originally appeared on Devils Lake Journal: Cramer denounces postal services misguided banking expansion By Jill Serjeant LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -A crew member working on the Western movie "Rust" said in a lawsuit on Wednesday that the script never called for a gun to be fired during a scene that Alec Baldwin was rehearsing when he killed a cinematographer last month. Script supervisor Mamie Mitchell alleges Baldwin should have checked the gun himself for live ammunition rather than relying on the assistant director's assertion that the Colt .45 revolver was safe to use. "In our opinion, Mr. Baldwin chose to play Russian Roulette when he fired a gun without checking it and without having the armorer do so in his presence," Mitchell's attorney Gloria Allred told a news conference. Mitchell, who said she was in the line of fire, alleges assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and deliberate infliction of harm and is seeking unspecified damages in the lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. "I relive the shooting and the sound of the explosion from the gun over and over again," said Mitchell, who made the emergency call to authorities immediately after the Oct. 21 incident. The lawsuit, the second to be lodged over the incident, names Baldwin, the movie's producers, assistant director Dave Halls and Hannah Gutierrez, the armorer who was in charge of the weapons used in the movie. Representatives for Baldwin, the producers, and Halls did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for Gutierrez said he had yet to see the lawsuit. Baldwin has said he is heartbroken and is cooperating with the law enforcement investigation. Production company Rust Movie Productions is conducting its own probe. Authorities in New Mexico have said they are investigating how a live bullet ended up in a gun Baldwin was using as he rehearsed a scene inside a church on Bonanza Creek Ranch near Santa Fe. No criminal charges have been filed. Cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed and director Joel Souza was wounded when a gun Baldwin had been told was safe fired off a live bullet, investigators have said. Story continues Other live rounds have also been found on the set. The lawsuit said the "Rust" script called for three tight camera shots for the scene - one of Baldwin's eyes, another of a bloodstain, and a third on Baldwin's torso "as he reached his hand down to the holster and removed the gun." Baldwin "intentionally, without just cause or excuse, cocked and fired the loaded gun even though the upcoming scene did not call for the cocking and firing of a firearm," the lawsuit asserts. Allred said she believed Baldwin's behavior on the set was "reckless" and alleged that other safety protocols had been flouted or ignored. Last week, chief electrician Serge Svetnoy filed a negligence lawsuit https://www.reuters.com/world/us/rust-crew-member-files-negligence-lawsuit-over-fatal-shooting-2021-11-10 against the producers. (Reporting by Jill Serjeant and Lisa Richwine;Editing by Mark Heinrich and Howard Goller) 1. "I had an interview at a job that didn't have an address. They proceeded to give me very complicated instructions, like, 'Turn left when you see the green building.' I got lost multiple times getting there and ended up being over an hour late. During the interview, I asked how they got mail delivered, and they said they didn't receive mail. When I walked out of the building after the obviously failed interview, I looked around and found their building number on the side of the building behind some bushes. I still wonder to this day if I failed some strange interview test." hammerb123 2. "In 1990, I had an interview with a natural cosmetics store. I was well groomed and clean but never got the interview. The manager refused and threw me out of the shop for having acne. She said, 'We don't have people with spots working here. Staff here look clean!'" jborrett793 3. "When I interviewed for residency positions, I did one-month-long rotations at my top-choice hospitals to see if Id be a good fit. The last week of one of my rotations, I was supposed to meet with the two program directors. I met with one in the morning, and he asked some personal questions, like if I was planning on getting married or having kids. He probably wasn't supposed to ask these things, but I answered honestly and said no to both. I felt like it was going well I was being myself, cracked a few jokes. Well, later that day I went to knock on the other program director's office door for our meeting, and I heard her and the other director talking. He was talking about my interview, mocking my answers and calling me a freak. I still interviewed with her and made it through the rest of the week, but I really wish Id been brave enough to say something." Story continues marmalady 4. "I had two companies interview me in the same week. As I was pulling up to an interview at the second company (which I was less excited about), I got a call from the other place saying I'd gotten the job. YAY! I figured I would follow through and tell the interviewer that I had accepted another position, thank you, etc. I wasn't even fully seated before she berated me for what I was wearing (black pants, white blouse, black cardigan). Then said she only did this interview out of courtesy for my friend who referred me, and that I wouldn't be getting the job. I smugly told her that it was OK, I got hired elsewhere. Why this shocked her, no idea. What a bitch." witchyribbon84 5. "I had an interview at a youth crisis shelter. I was super interested, and the first interview went well. They scheduled me for a second one where I'd be 'shadowing' a worker in one of the emergency placement shelters. I showed up, and the woman from my first interview walked me in and said she'd be back soon. I sat down and got to know the kids there a bit, played some card games, asked the staff on duty some questions about the job. Several hours had gone by, and she never came back. I kept asking if someone could contact the front office for me and get ahold of the interviewer, but they kept brushing me off. "I was there so long, a shift change happened. Because they didnt give me any sort of visitor pass, the next set of staff thought I was a teen living there! It was a high-security shelter, and nobody believed that I wasnt a resident. I was there for six hours in total. When I finally got someone to call the office, the original woman thought I had been let out and left after an hour. She called me for a third interview, but I just let the phone ring." toriwarrior 6. "Owner to me: 'Youre not a feminist, are you? Because (ha ha) none of us are!'" tuffyrama 7. "I interviewed for a hostess position at a top restaurant in Manhattan. The chef was very well known and had several restaurants across the world. He was conducting the interview himself, which I found unusual but went along with it. The first thing he did was tell me to 'let down my hair' from its bun because 'presentation is everything' and I'd be the face of the restaurant. Then he asked me to show him my boobs. WTF? When I just stared at him wondering if I'd really heard him correctly, he doubled down by repeating that 'presentation is everything' and he wants all his girls to be beautiful and hot." lunallee212 8. "I was interviewing for a new job, and they asked why I'd left my old one. I explained that the place I'd been working at closed because of legal issues I had no part in. They demanded to know why, and while I didn't have the specifics I tried to explain the best I could. These motherfuckers pulled out a newspaper op-ed article that went into detail about the closing, then said, 'How do you explain this?' I mean, how could I explain someone else's opinion? This obviously wasn't going to work, and I said it was best for me to leave. For some reason, they tried having me come back in for a second interview." mirandroidj 9. "When I was in the teaching credential program at my college, we had to go on 'mock' interviews at a real school district where we could potentially be offered a job if the staff liked us enough. Understandably, I was very nervous I stuttered several times and didnt do my best overall. But instead of the teachers/principals that interviewed me being understanding or sympathetic because I was in training, they laughed in my face. It was horrible, and I left feeling completely dejected and decided that teaching was not for me after all." Cats4EverBoysWhatever 10. "I had an interview during which the job's hours were revealed to me, and they were all over the place: 102 on Monday, 14 on Tuesday, 49 on Wednesday, etc. I told the interviewer that the job wasn't for me, and she started CRYING! She told me tearfully that she and her team were so impressed with my CV and that they'd been trying to fill the job for months. I awkwardly thanked her for her time as she tearfully led me out of the building." aaronh18 11. "When I was maybe 20, I applied for a bartending job. The job interview went pretty well, until the owner of the bar asked if I had a boyfriend. I was so confused as to why this would be an issue. As a gay woman, I tend to feel unsafe in situations regarding my sexuality (especially in a basement of a bar), so I said yes. The owner then asked me more invasive questions, like when was the last time I had sex, what kind of sex did I like, and how old was I when I lost my virginity. I tried to leave, but the owner stood between me and the only exit. He didn't let me leave until I told him I'd call the police. After this, I have always recorded my job interviews. I have thankfully never had an issue like this again, and every interview since, I've always interviewed in an open area." lunaed 12. "I had an interview where the dude was literally like, 'We said $30 on the posting because that's what we used to pay, but we've realized that with the economy as it is, we can get great applicants anyway, so we're only paying $15. If you don't take it, someone else will, but you can work up to the normal wage in five years or so if the economy improves.'" tanya 13. "A few years ago, I was interviewing with a hospital for an admin position. We decided over email that the interview time was 1 p.m. The day of the interview, the same person called me at 10 a.m. pissed that I wasn't there. When I referenced our email, she got all annoyed and asked if I could come in right now. I hadn't even gotten out of bed yet that day! I said I couldn't, and we still met at 1 p.m., but she was clearly annoyed at me for her mistake. IDK why I went to the interview after that first phone call, tbh. That should've been red flag number one." caaklemm 14. "At an interview years ago, I was asked if I was taking any medications, and if so, they wanted to know what I'd been prescribed. Holy cow, not cool!" shauna_malwae-tweep 15. "I applied for a job as a cookie decorator at a popular cookie and cake bakery in my hometown. I sent in my resume and a portfolio of all my art, and the woman was so impressed, she called me in for an interview right away. "Now, I'm mixed Im Afro-Cuban and Italian. I have ear gauges, tattoos, and dreadlocks. I understand that not everyone is OK with hiring people who look like me, but this was something different. I showed up to the interview, she looked me up and down, and she then pointed out all of the things about me that she would never accept in an employee. "She said my hair made me look like a 'feral child' who had never seen a brush or a shower. She said that the fact that I thought my tattoos were OK proved that I wasn't fit for this or any job. She criticized my makeup and said my ear gauges were 'the most repulsive thing' she'd ever seen and that she didn't want her customers 'vomiting on the food' because of how disgusting my appearance was. "I was only 16 years old, and the whole experience really fucked up my self-esteem and confidence for a while. Eventually I just left." Mmmermzeep The death toll from a weekend attack by suspected jihadists on a gendarmerie in northern Burkina Faso has risen to 53, the government said Wednesday. The attack was one of the deadliest to hit the West African country's defence and security forces since jihadist violence erupted six years ago. Gunmen travelling on pick-up trucks and motorcycles attacked the Inata gendarmerie near the Malian border before dawn on Sunday, leading to drawn-out clashes, a security source on the same day said. On Monday the death toll was reported as 32. But government spokesman Ousseni Tamboura said Wednesday that a total of 53 people were killed, 49 gendarmes and four civilians. "Fortunately, we have found 46 gendarmes" alive, he said after a cabinet meeting. However local sources said that around 150 gendarmes were stationed at the facility in Inata, meaning the toll could yet rise further. Hundreds of people protested in several cities across the country on Tuesday to demand resignations over the "inability to stop the terrorist attacks". President Roch Marc Christian Kabore on Wednesday criticised "substantial dysfunction" within the army, including in food provision. "It's inacceptable, and that's why I really do understand the... angry reactions," he said as he left the cabinet meeting. Tamboura said earlier that the head of the armed forces in the north of the country had been removed from his post following Sunday's attack. The country has been declared in mourning from Tuesday until Thursday. Burkina Faso has been hit by jihadist attacks since 2015, mostly in the northern and eastern regions close to Mali and Niger -- countries facing their own struggles against jihadists. Jihadist attacks in Burkina Faso, often coupled with ambushes and attributed to movements affiliated to the Islamic State group and Al-Qaeda, have killed more than 2,000 people and forced more than 1.4 million to flee their homes. ab/pid/ah/pvh A donkey. Illustrated | iStock The generic congressional ballot a national poll question on which party should control Congress has been moving toward the Republicans. While there is some variation among pollsters, the RealClearPolitics polling average has the GOP ahead by over 3 points, and FiveThirtyEight has the parties effectively tied. These numbers are probably better than what Republicans need to erase the Democrats' razor-thin congressional majorities in the midterm elections. And this lead is coming earlier in President Biden's term than a comparable ruling party slump in former President Obama's administration and without the same kind of organized opposition supplied by the Tea Party. (Granted, the angry parents at local school board meetings who helped turn the Virginia governor's race evoke memories of protesters at congressional town hall meetings discussing ObamaCare.) Maybe that's a good thing for Republicans. The public has gradually lost confidence in Biden's ability to restore normalcy and even in his basic competence. To register their disapproval of Biden and the Democrats, voters have little choice but to vote for Republicans even if they still don't like them very much. It's also an ironic thing for Biden. He won in large part because he succeeded well enough in defining the election as a referendum on the incumbent president rather than a left-right binary choice. His party may lose power in the midterms and he himself may be defeated in 2024 because voters still see the election as more of a referendum on the incumbent. Republicans are no longer defined by one leader, despite Virginia Democrats' best efforts to keep former President Donald Trump at the forefront (not to mention Trump's own efforts to the same end). Now Democrats are under scrutiny, and voters have turned against them. Democrats know they need to change that to win the midterms, let alone the next presidential race. They had some success with this strategy in the California recall election, where conservative commentator Larry Elder was easier to tie to Trump than Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin (R) in Virginia. But that is an especially blue state. Trying the same tactic with parents who take issue with their children's public school curricula, as some Democratic operatives reportedly propose doing to opponents of critical race theory, is much riskier in terms of the potential backlash, albeit not a complete longshot. Story continues Unless Democrats can succeed at making the midterms a binary choice, Republicans are poised to mirror Biden's 2020 win. It's their turn to benefit from joining forces with voters outraged by the political system in general. Rinse and repeat. You may also like A Harry Potter reunion is happening, reportedly without J.K. Rowling Report: House to vote Wednesday on censuring GOP Rep. Paul Gosar over video Virginia local school board reverses ban of 'sexually explicit' books after public outcry The Daily Beast GettyThe parents of one of the survivors of the deadly Oxford High School shooting last week have accused the school principal of brushing off warnings of potential violence days before the bloody rampage.In twin $100 million federal lawsuits filed Thursday, Jeffrey and Brandi Franz, the parents of two students caught in the middle of the massacre, place the blame for the bloodshed squarely on school officials. Their daughter Riley was struck in the neck during the Nov. 30 shooting, and her sist In the video Bui Tuan Lam, a 38 year-old beef noodle seller from the central city of Danang, flamboyantly sprinkles green onions into a bowl of noodle soup and ceremoniously slices meat in the signature style of chef Nusret Gokce, also known as "Salt Bae," who went viral on the internet in 2017. Last week, Gokce uploaded a video of himself feeding Vietnam's Minister of Public Security, To Lam, the gold leaf steak at his London restaurant, where a steak sells for up to $1,960. Many in Vietnam questioned how such a high-ranking Communist Party official allowed himself to be filmed indulging in such expensive food amid crackdown on corruption. Lam, who described himself in a Facebook post uploaded alongside the video as "Green Onion Bae" said his video was not made to mock any particular individual. "The video I made was for fun and for advertising my beef noodle shop. More customers have been coming since I posted it," said Lam, who added it was not clear if the police summons was because of his video. He has previously criticised authorities on Facebook - he said police had previously summoned him for a meeting in April, without saying why. Danang police did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. SpaceX's Starlink could provide internet to remote areas in Brazil and help monitor deforestation in the Amazon rainforest. Britta Pedersen/Pool/AFP via Getty Images Elon Musk met a Brazilian minister to discuss a partnership between the government and SpaceX. SpaceX's Starlink could provide internet to people, schools, and health centers in rural areas. Starlink could also monitor illegal deforestation, which Brazil wants to stop by 2028. Elon Musk met Brazil's communications minister in Texas Monday to discuss bringing SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet to the Amazon rainforest, the Brazilian government said. The government said in a translated press release Tuesday that Starlink technology could provide internet to indigenous communities, remote schools and health centers. Starlink could also help monitor illegal deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, according to the release. Satellites have previously been used by conservation organizations to track environmental changes, such as forest fires. Brazil announced at the recent COP26 climate summit in Glasgow that it was bringing forward to 2028 a previous commitment to end illegal deforestation by 2030, Reuters reported. Fabio Faria, Brazil's minister of communications, posted a video on his Twitter account on Tuesday of himself and Musk talking about a new partnership. "We're looking forward to providing connectivity to the least-served people of Brazil," Musk said in the video. "With better connectivity we can help ensure the preservation of the Amazon." Faria said in the press release that SpaceX and the government are working towards closing "this important partnership." "Our objective is to bring the internet to rural areas and remote places, as well as to help control fires and illegal deforestation in the Amazon rainforest," Faria said in the press release. Faria also met with SpaceX's COO Gwynne Shotwell in California, according to the press release. Starlink currently serves around 140,000 users in 20 countries, and has 1,800 satellites in orbit, according to a presentation filed by the company to the Federal Communications Commission dated November 10. The company recently set up a wholly-owned subsidiary in India with plans to roll out 200,000 user terminals in the country, signalling its expansion into Asia. Read the original article on Business Insider (Reuters) - The Estonian government summoned 1,700 reserve soldiers on Wednesday for an unannounced exercise which will include installing a razor wire barrier along 40 km of its border with Russia, as the migration crisis in nearby Belarus intensifies. The EU has accused Belarus of flying in thousands of migrants from the Middle East and Africa and pushing them to cross into EU and NATO members Poland, Lithuania and Latvia in retaliation for sanctions already imposed on Minsk. Belarus has denied deliberately fomenting the crisis. The EU neighbours of Belarus, which is a close Russian ally, have warned that the crisis could lead to a military clash, and have declared states of emergency and deployed military forces near their borders. Estonia has a similar geopolitical history to Lithuania and Latvia, although it has no border with Belarus. The snap exercise is scheduled to last until Nov. 25 and was called to test rapid response of the national chain of command, the Estonian government said. The reserve solders will help install 40 km of razor wire in places along Russian border, where risks of illegal crossings are highest, Estonian police and border guard said in a statement. "What is happening in Poland, Lithuania and Latvia also requires the strengthening of the border infrastructure in Estonia," said chief of Police and Border Guard Elmar Vaher. (Reporting by Andrius Sytas in Vilnius; Editing by Toby Chopra and Peter Graff) (Reuters) - The European Union urged Armenia and Azerbaijan on Wednesday to disengage their troops and respect the ceasefire agreed the previous day, after reports that seven Azerbaijani soldiers were killed in border clashes. The president of the European Council, Charles Michel, discussed the situation in phone calls with the leaders of Azerbaijan and Armenia, Ilham Aliyev and Nikol Pashinyan, and called for urgent de-escalation, according to an EU statement. The bloc also reiterated its offer to work with both countries to overcome long-running tensions between them. On Tuesday, they agreed to a ceasefire at their border after Russia urged them to step back from confrontation following the deadliest clash since a war last year over the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave that killed at least 6,500 people. (Reporting by Sabine Siebold; Editing by John Chalmers) The European Union should be prepared for more migrant crises like the ones on the Greece-Turkey and Poland-Belarus borders, the head of the EU's border agency told AFP in an interview. Frontex chief Fabrice Leggeri also said the agency was working with Polish authorities to organise repatriations of up to 1,700 migrants to Iraq by charter flights in the coming weeks. "This is not the first time that the EU has been faced with attempts at -- call it blackmail, call it geopolitical blackmail, call it a hybrid threat," Leggeri said. He compared the current situation to the days of clashes seen in February 2020 when Greece tried to block tens of thousands of migrants who were deliberately let through by Turkey. "It should open the eyes of people who have not understood that migration flows can be manipulated for political ends against the European Union to obtain something," he said. "We have to prepare ourselves for situations like this which can arise quite quickly," he said, speaking at Frontex's headquarters in a Warsaw skyscraper. - Charter flights planned - Created in 2004, Frontex has become the first EU agency to build up a standing, uniformed force. It aims to have 10,000 border guards by 2027, up from the current 2,200 officers. While it is not directly involved on the Poland-Belarus border, it has around 100 border guards and 40 vehicles stationed on the Lithuania-Belarus border. Leggeri said Frontex was also working with Polish authorities and the EU to obtain necessary permission from Iraq to set up a series of charter flight for repatriations. "We will have potentially 1,500 or 1,700 people to repatriate in the coming weeks," he said. A few thousand migrants are believed to be currently at the border between Poland and Belarus, including a group of around 1,800 near the Bruzgi-Kuznica border crossing. The EU accuses Belarus of deliberately bringing the migrants to the border as a way of putting pressure on the EU. Story continues Belarus denies this and says Poland should let them in. Leggeri said there were 25,000 Polish soldiers and border guards deployed in the area, as well as thousands more police. Poland has also said it will begin building a permanent barrier on the border next month -- a plan that Leggeri said would help the work of border guards because it would reduce the number of irregular crossings and therefore of controversial returns. "At least when there is a barrier we are not accused of pushbacks because we know where the border is and people physically cannot create a situation that is legally ambiguous for us," he said. "A very annoying part of the job for border guards is when there are legal ambiguities," Leggeri said. Poland has been heavily criticised by non-governmental organisations for its policy of pushbacks, which have left many migrants stranded between the two countries often for weeks on end in dire conditions and freezing temperatures. Frontex has itself been accused by non-governmental organisations of failing to intervene in illegal pushbacks of migrants on the Greece-Turkey maritime border. dt//pvh (Bloomberg) -- The European Union unveiled new rules for companies selling six major commodities in a bid to curb global deforestation. Most Read from Bloomberg The European Commission, the 27-nation blocs executive arm, wants the regulation to cover soy, beef, palm oil, wood, cocoa and coffee, as well as some derived products such as chocolate, leather and furniture. The plan will require backing from member states and the European Parliament to enter into force. Its about our responsibility as one of the largest economies, which unfortunately drives deforestation and forest degradation in other regions, EU Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius said in an interview. With this proposal were sending a very clear message that were leading the way in addressing this issue. The bloc also unveiled measures to make it easier to ship waste between member states in a bid to boost recycling, while curbing exports to non-EU countries. About 15% to 30% of waste shipments may currently be illegal, equivalent to around 9.5 billion euros ($10.7 billion) each year. Separately, the commission wants to address soil health within the region and will propose legislation by 2023. The EU seeks to be the worlds leader in the fight against climate change. The deforestation proposal will help preserve biodiversity and cut annual carbon emissions by at least 31.9 million tons, according to commission estimates. That would translate into economic savings of at least 3.2 billion euros a year. Under the proposed law, operators would have to collect the geographic coordinates of where the commodities originated and competent authorities in member states will ensure that only deforestation-free products enter the EU market. The rules will prohibit the placement of commodities and products produced on land deforested or degraded after Dec. 31, 2020, or in breach of the country of productions laws. Story continues The rules will be the same for all companies, both from the EU and third countries, who want to sell their products to Europe, according to Sinkevicius. We received a lot of support from companies, he said. Some are already doing that and theyre happy that were finally going to apply the regulation to all and that theres not going to be any greenwashing or fooling the consumer. There will be a benchmarking system run by the commission to classify countries according to their level of risk for deforestation and that information will be used to determine the obligations on companies and member states. For example, due diligence will be simplified for goods from lower-risk areas, while more stringent demands will be placed on products coming from higher-risk ones. Companies and member states will have about a year from the adoption of the rules to fully prepare, according to Sinkevicius. The commission plans to routinely update the regulations, potentially adding new products as scientific data becomes available and deforestation patterns change. This is already a very ambitious, ground-breaking proposal, which hasnt been proposed anywhere in the world, Sinkevicius said. (Updates with proposal on waste in fourth paragraph.) Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek 2021 Bloomberg L.P. Aerial view of the Bryan County megasite. The nature of the economic development game is a deal isn't really done until the new facility is built, open and producing goods. Even then you can't take anything for granted. My mother, who worked in the Honda sedan manufacturing plant in Ohio for years, often spoke of how all the assembly line equipment, including the fixed machinery, was on wheels. She wasn't joking. So it came as little surprise this week to learn that the early favorite to become the tenant on the Bryan County megasite, electric vehicle maker Rivian, is close to committing to another site. According to reports from our colleagues at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Rivian is in discussions with Georgia's economic development leaders about locating a new plant along Interstate 20 east of Atlanta. That joint popping sound you hear is Savannahians shrugging their shoulders. The reality is we've heard little about the Bryan County site since the state closed on the properties in August. At the time, Savannah's lead economic development official, Trip Tollison, predicted the site wouldn't be tenant-less for long. But again, time is relative in economic development. The site is raw. It was attractive because of its location - behind the I-16 weigh station near the Black Creek exit - not because of its infrastructure. We've seen activity on adjacent properties and at the existing Interstate Centre across I-16 in the time since, but the megasite remains mega-quiet otherwise. Meanwhile, the local economic development authority is seeing successes elsewhere, such as on the "old megasite" - the one in Pooler home to Mitsubishi and soon to Amazon and newly announced paper recycler Celadon. Recruitment continues for the Savannah Advanced Manufacturing Center and the Rockingham Farms e-commerce/warehouse park as well. As for Rivian, Savannahians are relegated to the spectator's role. The automaker is in "late-stage" negotiations with state officials on the I-20 site, the exact location of which has not yet been disclosed. Story continues We'll wait for that intel as well as the details. Then the facility buildout, the hiring of the workforce and those first trucks and SUVs to roll off the assembly line. Only then will the deal be done. Scroll down for the week's best opinion columns. Also check out On the Commute podcast, Coastal Health District Director Dr. Lawton Davis unpacks the latest on COVID-19 ahead of the Thanksgiving ho. The Difference Makers podcast is on sabbatical but will return in the months ahead. Subscribe for free to listen: Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Written by Opinion Editor Adam Van Brimmer. Read more posts like this in the Savannah Town Square Facebook group. This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: EV automaker may be headed for Georgia, just not Bryan County ... By Andreas Rinke BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany's outgoing chancellor, Angela Merkel, marked her 50th birthday by listening to a lecture by a neuroscientist - and her 60th with a talk by a historian. As the famously cerebral politician ages, her interests are shifting away from the natural sciences on which she spent the first part of her career, Merkel told Reuters in an interview. Now 67, she said she planned to devote her retirement to the big questions of social and historical development. "Thats the direction that my thoughts are increasingly going in," she said. "How can we understand the course of history, how can we compare it at the global level? How has China developed over 2,000 years? What about Europe?" Merkel has previously hinted that she might return to academia, but otherwise given few clues about how she will occupy herself on leaving the chancellery after 16 years. On Tuesday it was announced that she would maintain a staff of nine at public expense after the chancellorship, two more than her predecessor Gerhard Schroeder took into retirement. That suggests she plans to remain active. She will not, however, return to the quantum chemistry that she researched in East Germany in the 1980s. Too much time has passed and she is no longer up to date - though she said she was very excited about the way her field had developed. "I can see myself regularly speaking out about the connection between our prosperity, research and innovation but Im sure I wont be doing any scientific work," she said. (Reporting by Andreas Rinke; Writing by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Kevin Liffey) With its latest $400 million funding round, announced Tuesday, online wholesale marketplace Faire is now worth $12.4 billion a whopping increase of nearly $5.5 billion in just five months. Durable Capital Partners, D1 Capital Partners and Dragoneer Investment Group led the Series G. With its third round in just over a year, total funding-to-date climbed above $1 billion, according to the company. Roughly this time last year, its $170 million round put its valuation at $2.5 billion. In June, which brought $260 million, Faire was worth $7 billion. More from WWD The company launched operations in the U.S. in 2017, then announced its expansion to 15 more markets across Europe and the U.K. this summer, essentially connecting small businesses to Europe. The latter move notably outperformed the initial domestic business: according to the company, it only took six months for its annualized sales volume in Europe to blow past $150 million, a benchmark that took almost three years to achieve in North America. In the region, Faires brand base jumped more than 10 times, it said, with total products for sale increasing 800 percent and allowing access to more than 400,000 unique items. It facilitated more than 160,000 orders between North America and Europe, with over 2 million connections between platform businesses. In all, the business now connects more than 300,000 retailers with 40,000 brands globally, tripling the size of its marketplace in just one year. And it took less than five years to break annual volume of $1 billion. The wild success of its overseas expansion stood out to investors. With their continued investment in the U.K., Europe, and beyond, we believe that Faire will transform the global wholesale market, Anouk Dey, partner of Durable Capital Partners LP, was quoted as saying in Faires announcement. Story continues Essentially, the company offers smaller stores a way to connect with global brands, carving a path typically defined by the massive purchasing power of retail giants like Walmart and Amazon. Faires meteoric rise might have happened anyway, at least eventually, but the appeal of cross-border distribution, online tools and data intelligence is hard to overestimate, especially with the pandemics heightened pressures on retail. Add services like shipping, payments, shopping features and marketing, and the business may seem like a godsend for mom-and-pop operations. With our global reach, Faire is providing an even greater opportunity for the independent retail community to compete against big-box giants, explained Max Rhodes, Faire cofounder and chief executive officer. By removing the traditional growth hurdles our customers face, we have enabled more opportunities, more connections, and more possibilities for the entrepreneurs who use the platform. Our ability to deliver local and cross-border demand to brands, and in turn offer retailers access to a more expansive, data-driven selection is how Faire will define the future of retail. The news comes as the peak holiday season approaches, buoyed by what looks like a growing appetite for consumerism: on Tuesday, the U.S. Commerce Department announced an uptick of 1.7 percent in retail sales last month. Alicia Greene and her daughter, Khloe Harris, 9, place signs and teddy bears at a small, makeshift memorial near a crash site in 2018 in Rochester. Three kids from the same family were hit and killed by a pickup as they crossed Indiana 25 to board a school bus. A fourth child was hit and critically injured in the crash. ROCHESTER Recently obtained records reveal that a school corporation in Fulton County paid nearly $3.5 million in a settlement to the families of the victims in a 2018 crash that killed three children and seriously injured another. The settlement, from the Tippecanoe Valley School Corp., was signed in June 2019, less than seven months after Alyssa Shepherd hit and killed 9-year-old Alivia Stahl and the girls 6-year-old twin half brothers, Xzavier and Mason Ingle, at a Fulton County bus stop. The crash also severely injured 11-year-old Maverik Lowe, who is unrelated to the three siblings. According to a copy of the settlement obtained by the Tribune, the Tippecanoe Valley district paid $2.575 million to the parents of the three children who died in the crash, with approximately $1.24 million going to an estate created in the childrens names, $206,250 to the father of Alivia Stahl and a little over $1.13 million to the mother of the children, Brittany Ingle, and her husband Shane Ingle. In addition, the district paid $900,000 to the family of Maverik Lowe. Representatives from the Tippecanoe Valley School Corp. provided a copy of the settlement after the Tribune submitted a records request, but did not respond to multiple messages seeking comment on the agreement. More:Families of kids killed in Rochester bus crash seek restitution, oppose driver's release Shane Ingle declined to comment Tuesday, citing a confidentiality clause in the settlement. Attorneys who represented the Ingles and Lowes in the proceedings did not return phone calls from the Tribune. The settlement was agreed to around nine months before an investigation into the crash by the National Safety Transportation Board concluded the school districts inadequate safety assessment of school bus routes was a contributing cause in the crash. Emergency personnel responded to a scene of a collision that killed three children crossing Ind. 25 as they were boarding their school bus north of Rochester, Indiana on Oct. 30, 2018. The report published by the NTSB a federal agency that investigates major transportation crashes listed Shepherds failure to stop for the school bus on the early morning of Oct. 30, 2018 as the primary cause of the crash, even though the bus had clearly visible warning lights and a stop arm, in addition to a roadway sign indicating an upcoming bus stop. Story continues However, the report also found the corporation had inadequate safety procedures for bus stops. The bus stop where the crash occurred on Indiana 25 in Fulton County required children to walk across a 55-mph speed limit road to board the bus. The school district also failed to establish a clear policy for bus drivers to determine when it was safe to signal students to cross a road, the report said. As a result of its investigation, the NTSB recommended that the school district keep track of parent, student and bus driver complaints about the safety of routes and to train drivers and students on safe crossings. Dangerous bus route: Unsafe school bus route was a factor in Rochester crash that killed 3 kids, report says In the days after the crash, the school district moved the stop on Indiana 25 into a nearby mobile home park and established a transportation safety review committee. The settlement stipulates the district does not admit liability regarding the crash. New school bus safety laws were also adopted in 2019 as a result of the Rochester crash. The report also found that Shepherd was driving a pickup truck 41 mph when she struck the children. Shepherd has said she didnt see the bus or the children until it was too late. Shepherd was sentenced in December 2019 to four years in prison, with three years of house arrest followed by three years on probation. Due to Indianas jail time credits and Shepherd completing a bible study course while in prison, she could be released as early as Dec. 20 of this year. Fulton County Prosecutor Michael Marrs and family members of the victims have opposed Shepherds early release into a community transition program. Judge Greg Heller could rule on Shepherds release by the end of the month. Lowes family is also waiting to hear what Hellers ruling on restitution will be. The family is hoping to receive $36,556 in restitution payments from Shepherd to pay for lost wages, lodging expenses and a handicap-accessible car, though Shepherd's attorney contends state law does not allow restitution to be paid for the items Lowe's family is requesting. Email Marek Mazurek at mmazurek@sbtinfo.com. Follow him on Twitter: @marek_mazurek This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Bus crash that killed 3 kids ends in settlement with school district Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Susan Walsh-Pool/Getty Images US daily COVID-19 cases need to fall below 10,000 to get "a degree of normality," Dr. Fauci said. The US recorded more than 80,000 cases per day over the past week, Johns Hopkins data shows. Fauci said high case numbers were "predictable" when 60 million Americans remained unvaccinated. For the US to get back to "a degree of normality" the number of new daily COVID-19 infections must drop by at least 70,000, Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden's chief medical advisor, has warned. Fauci told CNBC on Tuesday that if new daily cases fall "well below 10,000, I think that would be a level that I think would be acceptable to us to get back to a degree of normality." The US recorded about 85,000 cases per day on average in the week to Wednesday, Johns Hopkins University data shows. The number of new US daily infections hasn't dipped below 10,000 since March 2020, according to Oxford University's Our World in Data. Fauci said that case numbers leveling above 80,000 showed the country had "really bad control" over the pandemic, per CNBC. The US could be "in for some trouble" heading into winter if people didn't take precautions, he said. Fauci told CNBC that cases might need to fall as low as 3,300 before the US gets control of the virus. He cautioned that his figures were estimates, not "definitive statements." In a separate interview on Monday, Fauci told "The News with Shepard Smith" that getting to 80,000 cases per day was "predictable" when about 60 million Americans eligible for a COVID-19 shot remained unvaccinated. "And those eligible to be boosted, go get boosted," Fauci added, citing data from Israel that suggested boosters reduce the risk of severe COVID-19. Fauci urged people to get vaccinated, have a booster when eligible, and wear a mask indoors when they don't know if others are vaccinated. But there's no reason not to avoid "a typical" Christmas or Thanksgiving with close friends if you're all vaccinated, he said. Read the original article on Business Insider Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Public Domain To hack an FBI email system, it takes a lot of motivation, even more technical skill, and, perhaps, a dash of humor. Over the weekend, someoneor a team of someonescompromised an FBI email system and sent out a flurry of bogus messages to state and local law enforcement about a supposed cyberattack. But instead of trying to wreak havoc, the purpose of the hack seems to have been to troll one particular information security executive: Vinny Troia, the founder and head of security research at Shadowbyte. At least, thats Troias version. The tale turns out to involve a number of mysterious characters, including Troia, a hacking collective thats been going after the likes of Netflix and Montana schools, and someone that goes by the online alias of Pompompurin. Why MAGA Social Media Is a Hackers Wet Dream As of Wednesday, the FBI hadnt confirmed Troias suspicions about why he was named in the email, and it didnt respond to a request for comment for this story. What isnt disputed, however, is that someone accessed an FBI email system and sent a message pinning a cyberattack that didnt happen on Troia. We identified the threat actor to be Vinny Troia, whom [sic] is believed to be affiliated with the extortion gang TheDarkOverlord. We highly recommend you to check your systems, the hacker wrote in the duped messages. Stay safe. TheDarkOverlord, an extortion-focused hacking collective, has run hacking schemes that have garnered headlines around the nation in recent yearsthe collective is behind the attack against Netflix in 2017, when it leaked Orange Is the New Black episodes before airing. Its the same collective that has been hitting health care organizations for years, and a group by the name TheDarkOverlord Solutions, suspected to be the same collective, which ran an extortion scheme against schools in Montana, while issuing a healthy dose of death threats and ominous references to school shootings. Troia, whose company recently rebranded to Shadowbyte from Night Lion Security, published a report in July 2020 detailing what he claims are the identities of the members and puppeteers of TheDarkOverlord hacking collective. And he told The Daily Beast that he believes the hacker behind the fake FBI email is somehow linked with TheDarkOverlord. His theory is they named him in the message as revenge for exposing members of their collective. Story continues For now, Troias story remains unconfirmed. He published a blog post about his suspicions Tuesday that does not confirm with certainty who was behind the attack. But Troia has been known to fudge the reality of events in previous hacking incidents. In a recent publication, Troia admitted he staged a hack against his own site, and then bragged about it on a cybercrime forum, ostensibly to see which criminals clamored for more. He has also attempted to sell leaked data on a cybercrime forum, only to claim he later didnt really intend to sell it, according to investigative reporter Brian Krebs. This time, however, there appears to be some credence to Troias story about the FBI hack. For one, Krebs reports that a hacker that goes by the alias Pompompurin told him in an interview this week that they were behind the FBI compromise and the fake emails. The hacker claimed they discovered a poorly set up email system and then sent the messages to spread awareness about the misconfiguration so the FBI could fix it. Inside a Ransomware Negotiation: This Is How Asshole Russian Hackers Shake Down Companies Its unclear who runs the Pompompurin aliasPompompurin did not return a request for commentbut Troia does have a long-standing rivalry with this Pompompurin. Troia and the alias send barbs back and forth over Twitter with frequency. Troia says Pompompurin has accused Troia of being a pedophile. And Troia has claimed Pompompurin previously hacked his Twitter account to send out explicit, sexual messages to his contacts. Just for the Lulz Regardless of who took over the FBI email system briefly this weekend, the entire incident has left cybersecurity pros and law enforcement officials scratching their heads at why whoever is behind the incident didnt take advantage of their access to the FBI email to issue more damaging fake messages. For instance, they could have laced the legitimate-looking emails with malware or malicious attachments that could have compromised the FBIs trusted partners. And yet, the emails didnt appear to contain any malware, and were likely not aimed at this kind of broader hacking campaign, according to Spamhaus, a non-profit that tracks spam and digital threats. Instead, the hacker or hackers behind this operation appeared to just be messing around, Carel Bitter, the head of data at Spamhaus, told The Daily Beast. There are far, far worse things you could do than this. If you have this, you say, Im just going to have fun with it? Thats just a big middle finger, said Bitter, whose group first caught onto the bogus message flurry. They made the FBI look bad. Using something like that for something thats sort of a joke like this is quite brazen. The fact that the hacker or hackers didnt lace any malware or malicious attachments in the messages indicates they could have just stumbled across the misconfiguration and decided to take advantage to gain a name for themselves in the underground forums, where showing youre capable of hitting high-value targets earns street cred, said Austin Berglas, the former chief of the FBIs New York Office Cyber Branch. A Mysterious Network of Twitter Bots Promote Alleged NRA Hack In Berglas telling, the hackers could be looking to say, Hey guys were the group responsible for compromising the FBI unclass email, and use that to elevate their status on the forums. It would have been very, very easy for someone to load up that email that went out with malicious attachments and own hundreds of thousands of additional accounts, Berglas added. But the movehacking for shits, giggles, and maybe personal vendettasis a bit unusual these days. The age of cybercriminals just hacking to play pranks has been on a bit of a downturn in recent years. I think the lols and the jokey, doxxing type has really reduced also because a lot of the splinter cells and the collectives have not been as proliferating, added Berglas, who investigated one of the most prominent groups, Lulzsec, which hacked websites to embarrass them. Making a big show of it is one way for the hacker or hackers behind the operation to say, look I exploited weak code in the portal, I got in there and I didnt use it to its fullest capacity. I just used it as a way to send out a silly message. And oh, by the way, thats because I can get into anything, Berglas told The Daily Beast. Hackers do that just to show they can. The FBI, for its part, did issue a statement over the weekend about the breach, noting it was aware of a software misconfiguration that temporarily allowed an actor to send fake emails. Once we learned of the incident we quickly remediated the software vulnerability, warned partners to disregard the fake emails, and confirmed the integrity of our networks, the FBI said. Read more at The Daily Beast. Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. Ferrari chief Mattia Binotto has backed the idea of Formula 1 drivers lining up in reverse order for sprint races. This season has seen sprint races trialled at the British, Italian and Brazilian Grands Prix, with those Saturday events serving as qualifying sessions for the main event on Sunday. Each sprint race has had its own qualifying session on a Friday, but Binotto believes that those sessions should be scrapped. Instead, drivers should simply line up in reverse order from the result of the last grand prix, the Italian has said. I think it does [increase drama] honestly, because of so many overtakings, and so much fun, he told Motorsport.com. I think we should really consider it, and thats obviously for the sprint race format. Having seen what happens, I think its even not debatable. A penalty meant Lewis Hamilton was forced to start at the back of the grid for last Saturdays sprint race at the Brazilian Grand Prix, and the Briton produced a stellar performance to finish fifth before winning Sundays race from 10th on the grid. However, Hamilton has previously criticised the concept of a reverse grid for sprint races, saying the idea was conceived by people who did not know what they were talking about. Hamiltons old rival Sebastian Vettel shared the Britons views when the idea was floated last year, saying it was complete b******t. Read More Lewis Hamilton tipped to take another engine penalty for Qatar Grand Prix Timo Glock on what really happened with Lewis Hamilton on infamous final lap in 2008 Red Bull want answers over unraceable Mercedes Nov. 16Two people were taken to the hospital for smoke inhalation after an overnight fire at a Medford hotel room converted into a shelter for Almeda fire survivors. The room was "severely damaged," fire officials said. The fire at 200 N. Riverside Ave. site of the former Inn at the Commons, which is being redeveloped into an apartment complex known as The Merrick at the Commons was reported at 12:27 a.m. Monday, according to Medford Fire Department Deputy Fire Marshal Mark Shay. Firefighters knocked down the fire 12 minutes after the first call, and contained the fire to a single room, according to Shay. Four nearby units are out of commission due to smoke damage, but Shay said "there was no fire intrusion." The remainder of occupants in the building are back inside. The building had been used as temporary shelter for Almeda fire survivors. Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Just a few months after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis press secretary got called out by the Associated Press for abusive behavior toward a reporter, shes at it againbut this time with a notorious antisemitic conspiracy theory. Amid a flurry of tweets mocking pandemic-related restrictions, Christina Pushaw singled out the Republic of Georgia for its new policy requiring citizens to hold a Green Pass in order to enter public establishments like restaurants and theaters to try to contain the coronavirus pandemic. (The passes do not require that one be vaccinated; those who have recovered from the virus and can provide proof of a negative COVID test can also use the passes.) While the system largely resembles similar measures put in place worldwide, Pushaw appeared to employ some deeply revolting (and flawed) logic to suggest the system is part of a nefarious Jewish plot. Georgia decided to enact a Green Pass system (biomedical security state). Immediately after that, the Rothschilds show up to discuss the attractive investment environment in Georgia (lol). No weird conspiracy theory stuff here! she wrote Tuesday. Pushaw attached a screenshot of a tweet from the Government of Georgia as supposed evidence of the Rothschild family having their hand in the countrys COVID response. The tweet said that the Georgian prime minister had, in fact, met with the managing director of Rothschild & Co.but that meeting was way back in June. Twitter The Rothschilds have long been used as a kind of antisemitic boogeyman to fearmonger about Jewish families secretly controlling the world and global banking. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) put forth perhaps the most batshit conspiracy theory ever when she argued in a now-infamous 2018 Facebook post that lasers in space owned by the Rothschilds might be to blame for Californias deadly forest fires. The belief that the Rothschilds manipulate currency and influence global events for personal enrichment and world domination is a staple of antisemitic conspiracy theorists, the ADL Florida said in a statement after Pushaws comments. Its deeply disturbing to see these kinds of conspiracies promoted by a member of @GovRonDeSantis staff. Story continues As Pushaws tweet was met with mounting outrage Wednesday, she said the comment was really an attempt at sarcasm that could have been misinterpreted. The Rothschilds feature prominently in conspiracy theories, and I felt that the government of Georgialike other governmentsis intentionally feeding existing conspiracy theories around vaccine passports so that they can dismiss anyone who opposes vaccines passports as a conspiracy theorist, she told The Daily Beast. It was not immediately clear how the Georgian governments Green Pass initiative is feeding existing conspiracy theories. Pushaw deleted the tweet in question after being asked to clarify it, though she told The Daily Beast she took it down when she realized how it could be perceived, insisting that she is completely opposed to anti Semitism and would never want to inadvertently fuel anti Semitic tropes. After being asked about the tweet, Pushaw also preemptively warned her followers of an imminent hit piece against her, tweeting out this reporters author profile. This is not the first time Pushaw has raised eyebrows on Twitter. In late August, the platform temporarily suspended her account after the Associated Press called her out for harassing behavior against a reporter. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. So much has changed for Jordan Travis since his last trip to Boston College. Leading up to the Seminoles' trip up to Chestnut Hill in 2019 -- the first game after head coach Willie Taggart was fired -- FSU was 4-5 and needed two wins in its final three games to reach bowl eligibility. Travis, a redshirt freshman quarterback who had transferred from Louisville the previous offseason, had not yet made his FSU debut. That day, just over two years ago on Nov. 9, 2019, Travis made one of the more unexpectedly promising debuts in recent program history. The other side of FSU's game-winner: FSU wide receiver Andrew Parchment building off huge catch as he looks for strong finish Listen in: NoleSports Podcast: After a rivalry win vs. Miami, can FSU carry that momentum forward? FSU men's basketball: Florida State men's basketball team looking to execute better coming off loss to Florida On his first touch in an FSU uniform, he rattled off an awe-inspiring 26-yard touchdown run that showed his athleticism. He followed that up with a 66-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter that put that game out of reach, finishing with a pair of touchdown runs and 94 rushing yards on three carries. "It feels like yesterday. That changed my career, in reality," Travis said of his first career appearance at BC. "(Interim head) Coach Odell (Haggins) and (offensive coordinator Kendal) Briles put me in the game and blessed me. ... If I didn't get in that game there, I have no idea where I would be at right now. That day really changed my life. It was a blessing from the man upstairs." This time, Travis heads to Chestnut Hill having established himself as the starting quarterback for the second straight season. The Seminoles (4-6, 3-4 in ACC) need a win over the Eagles (6-4, 2-4) in their noon game on Saturday to keep their hopes of bowl eligibility alive. In his first game at FSU back in 2019, Jordan Travis had two touchdown runs on three carries in the Seminoles' 38-31 win at Boston College. Travis is coming off what FSU head coach Mike Norvell deemed the best game of his career in the Seminoles' comeback win over Miami. Story continues "Everybody will always point to his legs, but you look at the times where he was able to step up into the pocket to make those decisive throws..." Norvell said. "Thats the growth you need to see. Sometimes we get caught up, Jordan is still very young in the process of starting games. Hes been very productive in the opportunities that he's had, but were excited with what were seeing from him... "You see the confidence emerging. For it to show up in that moment (on the fourth and 14 pass to Andrew Parchment), it was critical, it was a game winner. Thats what you need from your starting quarterback and you see that confidence thats really starting to come from him play in and play out." This season, Travis is sixth out of 14 eligible ACC quarterbacks in passer rating (153.84). In eight games -- the same number he played in 2020 -- he's completed over 9% more of his passes, thrown nearly twice as many touchdowns (11 to 6), fewer interceptions (5, down from 6) and thrown for slightly more yards and more yards per pass attempt. His legs have again been a major factor as he's run for 405 yards and six touchdowns this season after leading the Seminoles in rushing yards last season. But he's changing the narrative around his present and potentially his future, something the FSU coaching staff is all too happy to point out. In eight games this season, Jordan Travis has thrown 11 touchdowns, nearly twice as many as the six touchdown passes he had in eight games last season. "I couldn't be more pleased with his development as a quarterback, not a runner. Everybody keeps saying runner, runner, the kid's a quarterback and there's no question about that..." FSU offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham said. "I knew he had the ability, I believed in it, I saw it and it was let's get you consistent with your feet and then I'm gonna believe in you and I'm going to support you. I think he believes in himself now and that's one of the most important things. He believes in himself. I think people are starting to believe in him. And whenever other people start to believe in you, that obviously helps, which hasn't always been the case around here. I think he's making some people start to believe in things that I saw 20 months ago. I just couldn't be happier for the kid." FSU offense on a run of red-zone success The limitations of FSU's offense have been a factor in the Seminoles' lack of consistency at times this season. That being said, FSU has definitely been making the most of its prime scoring chances over the last two months. Entering Saturday's game at Boston College, FSU has scored points on its last 25 red-zone trips, a streak that dates back all the way to the start of its fourth game of the season against Louisville. It's the longest-such active streak in the ACC and third-longest active streak in the country. It's FSU's longest streak of consecutive red-zone scores since the Seminoles scored on 31 straight red-zone trips across the 2016 and 2017 seasons. "We try to emphasize that throughout the course of the season, fall camp. We invest a lot of time in that," Norvell said of the red-zone success. "Whether it's study for us as a staff to make sure we're putting our guys in the best position to achieve success and then the guys have ownership of it. Early in the season, we struggled and there were some moments where it really cost us games. I will say that the guys understanding the importance of it, really buying into that and continuing to build upon those experiences has helped us." FSU looks to avoid letdown at BC: After worthy celebration of Miami win, Florida State turns its attention to Boston College What time is FSU's rivalry game at UF?: Florida State football vs. Florida: Kickoff time, network announced After FSU started off scoring on just six of its 10 red-zone trips over the first three games of the season, it has been on a tear lately. Led by three games where FSU scored on all six of its red-zone trips against Syracuse, UMass and Miami, the Seminoles' 88.57% red-zone scoring percentage is now fourth-best in the ACC. Perhaps even more impressively, 19 of FSU's 25 red-zone scores over that recent stretch have been touchdowns (76%). This recent stretch has boosted FSU to a 71.43% red-zone touchdown percentage that is best in the ACC and tied for 18th nationally. This and that Norvell said Wednesday at his final media availability before Saturday's game that he's "very confident" that running back Lawrance Toafili will be available in some capacity against BC. Toafili has missed the last two games after suffering an injury on the final play of FSU's loss to Clemson Oct. 30. 2022 four-star defensive lineman Tyre West was out at FSU practice Wednesday morning. West, the No. 89 overall recruit and No. 14 defensive lineman in the 2022 class out of Tifton, Ga., has been committed to Georgia since December of 2020. However, a run of multiple crystal ball predictions from recruiting experts expecting his commitment to flip to FSU have been submitted since Tuesday afternoon. Florida State at Boston College When: Saturday, noon Where: Alumni Stadium, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts TV/Radio: ACC Network/94.9 FM Reach Curt Weiler at cweiler@tallahassee.com or follow him on Twitter @CurtMWeiler. No one covers the Noles like the Tallahassee Democrat. Subscribe using the link at the top of the page and never miss a moment. This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FSU football: Jordan Travis growing as quarterback since debut vs. BC The Daily Beast WikiCommonsThe FBI is on alert after a number of local media outlets in Albany, New York, received disturbing letters from someone purporting to be the Chinese Zodiac Killer.The contents of the letters have not been disclosed, but they have prompted the Bureau to ask all media outlets not to open any forthcoming letters to try to preserve forensic evidence. Did the Zodiac Killer Lead a Bomb-Making, Bear-Slaying Youth Posse?Police have determined that the Zodiac Killer is responsible for the Fujifilm has unveiled the Instax Mini Evo, its new flagship instant film camera with a premium build, higher resolution than previous models and improved smartphone integration. As with other Instax cameras, you can take photos and instantly develop them to Fujifilm's credit card-sized Instax Mini film, but it offers a number of features not available on previous models. As a hybrid camera, you can review photos on the LCD monitor and choose the ones you want to print. However, the new model is the first Instax camera with a print lever and lens/film filter dials. That lets you take a picture then choose among 100 combinations of effects (including "Soft Focus," "Light Leak," "Monochrome" and "Retro") and print the image afterwards by pulling the print lever. Fujifilm said the camera also delivers better quality prints as it has twice the exposure resolution of previous models. Fujifilm's hybrid Instax Mini Evo camera has double the resolution of past models The Instax Mini Evo is also effectively a mini-printer for your smartphone. You can transfer images from your phone to the Evo Mini wirelessly, then print them using the "Direct Print" button. And for the first time, you can transfer snaps you take with the Mini Evo back over to your smartphone, complete with the film border. Finally, you can use your smartphone to take pictures remotely with the camera. Fujifilm also unveiled a new Instax Mini film format called "Stone Grey" with a gray background. The new camera arrives in Japan on December 3rd and will come to the US in February with a price of $200. MOSCOW (Reuters) - Georgia's hunger-striking former president Mikheil Saakashvili is being mistreated in a prison hospital and urgently needs special treatment in intensive care, a Georgian human rights group said on Wednesday. Saakashvili, who has been on hunger strike in prison for more than a month and a half, may soon face various health complications, including heart failure, gastrointestinal bleeding and coma, the Public Defender of Georgia, or human rights ombudsman, said in a statement. "As the patient's condition is critical, it is immediately recommended to continue his treatment in a functional and well-experienced... hospital, in particular in the intensive care unit," the Public Defender said. Experts have visited the clinic where Saakashvili is being treated kept and concluded that the requirements of the 53-year-old former president, including high-tech examination, cannot be met by the prison, according to the rights group. The Public Defender group said earlier this week the prison hospital treating Saakashvili lacks proper medical equipment and other inmates there have threatened and abused him. Saakashvili was arrested on Oct. 1 after returning from exile to Georgia to rally the opposition on the eve of local elections, in what he described as a mission to save the country. He faces six years in prison after being convicted in absentia in 2018 of abusing his office during his 2004-2013 presidency, charges he rejects as politically motivated. Saakashvili is the most prominent and divisive living figure in Georgia's post-Soviet history, having come to power via a peaceful "Rose Revolution" in 2003 and led the country into a disastrous war with Russia five years later. His case has drawn thousands of his supporters onto the streets in recent weeks and raised political tensions in the country of 3.7 million people. The state security service has accused him of plotting a coup. Georgian authorities have said Saakashvili will not be pardoned. (Reporting by Andrey Ostroukh) A vaccination centre in Gibraltar. (Getty Images) Gibraltar has cancelled official Christmas celebrations after it saw a spike in COVID cases. Despite being one of the most heavily vaccinated parts of the world, the government announced there would be no official parties, receptions and similar gatherings due to a rise in infections. Gibraltar, a small British territory on the southern tip of Spain with a population of around 33,000, has seen 212 new coronavirus cases since Monday, with a total of 564 active cases. Officials said the public should exercise their own judgment when deciding to hold Christmas functions but added it strongly advises against having them in the next four weeks, while the vaccine booster programme is rolled out. Gibraltar daily COVID infections and deaths. (Reuters) The government said in a statement: Given the exponential rise in the number of cases, the government, for example, intends to cancel a number of its own functions including official Christmas parties, official receptions and similar gatherings. The public, at this stage, are ultimately called upon to exercise their own judgment in this respect bearing in mind the current advice given. It added: "The government strongly advises against any large informal social events, parties or receptions being held over at least the next four weeks while the vaccine booster programme is rolled out." The vaccine rollout in Gibraltar has been phenomenally successful, the territory administering 94,937 COVID jabs so far, including 39,815 second doses, with an additional 14,241 booster jabs - a vaccination rate of 139.5%. Their actions send a warning signal to nations across Europe amid fears a new wave of the virus is bearing down on some populations. On Monday, UK prime minister Boris Johnson urged people to come forward for COVID booster shots to avoid the need for a Christmas lockdown. As of Wednesday, 46,065,838 people have been fully vaccinated against coronavirus in the UK, with 13,494,890 receiving a booster. The UK has an 82.1% vaccination rate for people over the age of 12. Story continues The prime minister also warned that storm clouds are gathering" over parts of Europe with a new wave of COVID sweeping through the continent. Read more: Second European country to force lockdown rules on unvaccinated people 'Monster' who raped seven teenagers and women dies from COVID in prison Chart shows how badly countries are being hit by new COVID wave Soaring infections across the Continent are prompting governments to reintroduce unpopular lockdowns. Austrian coronavirus infections hit a new daily record on Wednesday, on the third day of a lockdown for those not fully vaccinated. Around 65% of Austria's population is fully vaccinated against the virus, one of the lowest rates in western Europe. It also has one of the highest infection rates on the continent, with a seven-day incidence of 925 per 100,000 people. A man receives his booster jab in east London. (Getty Images) The Netherlands re-imposed some lockdown measures last weekend for an initial three weeks to slow a resurgence of coronavirus, but infections have continued to spread. On Tuesday, the National Institute for Health (RIVM) reported a record of more than 110,000 cases in the week ended 16 November, an increase of 44% from the week before, with the strongest rise among children aged 4-12. Germany's coronavirus situation is dramatic, chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday, calling for a push to distribute booster shots faster and appealing to those sceptical of vaccination to change their minds. On Wednesday, it reported 52,826 new infections a jump of a third compared with a week ago and another daily record, while 294 people died, bringing the total to 98,274, as the pandemic's fourth wave tightened its grip on Europe. Watch: Prime minister unclear if Europe COVID wave will 'wash up on UK shores' Data: Google Trends; Maps: Jacque Schrag/Axios The issue of critical race theory is most potent in the Boulder area not, as some might expect, in conservative congressional districts according to an Axios analysis of Google Trends data. What we found: One year out from the 2022 midterm elections, Axios and Google Trends are launching a first-of-its-kind project to track which political issues voters are searching for in each congressional district. Stay on top of the latest market trends and economic insights with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free The first installment covers Nov. 24, just after the 2021 election. Why it matters: Both parties will try to use data and technology to pinpoint issues that resonate locally, and wage political battle for voters' short attention spans through the 2022 midterms, writes Axios' Stef W. Kight. What you're searching: On four main issues critical race theory, inflation, immigration and unemployment Colorado's congressional districts are mostly on par with national trends. In the state, interest in critical race theory is highest in the 2nd District, where Democratic U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse represents Boulder. In the 3rd District, a seat held by Republican U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, searches for inflation are below the national average. What's next: Look for us to revisit the data in coming months. Go deeper More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free WASHINGTON The U.S. Air Force conducted a test of its Rapid Dragon palletized munition system concept Nov. 3, which could one day pave the way to launching a barrage of cruise missiles out of the back of mobility aircraft. The Air Force Research Laboratory said in a Tuesday release that it deployed a long-range cruise missile separation test vehicle basically a cruise missile without its engine or warhead from an MC-130J Commando II aircraft. During the flight demonstration at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, the MC-130s crew an operational group from Air Force Special Operations Command obtained new targeting data for its onboard battle management system while it was flying to the drop zone, the release said. The battle management system then uploaded that new data to the weapon on the pallet, allowing it to find its new target. This was the first time the battle management system, using a beyond line-of-sight command-and-control node, received and uploaded new targeting data into such a separation test vehicle, the Air Force said. The services previous beyond line-of-sight retargeting demonstrations had used a cruise missile emulator. When the MC-130J neared the target, it airdropped the Rapid Dragon deployment system carrying the unarmed cruise missile, as well as three weights each simulating the mass and shape of cruise missiles. Within a few seconds, parachutes deployed to stabilize the pallet, and the cruise missile and the weights began to release sequentially to avoid collisions. The missiles wings and tail popped out, it began to pull up, and then it glided toward its new target. AFRL said this could lead to the first deployment of a live long-range cruise missile, operating under powered flight, from an MC-130J flown by Air Force Special Operations Command. And future programs following up on this effort will look at whether Rapid Dragon can handle other types of weapons and multiple effects capabilities. Story continues An airdropped palletized munition system is shown carrying a production long-range cruise missile with no warhead or engine immediately after being airdropped from an MC-130J. (U.S. Air Force) In future conflict scenarios against strategic competitors, the ability to cost-effectively deliver long-range standoff weapons en masse from nontraditional platforms expands warfighting flexibility and introduces new deterrence options, Rapid Dragon program manager Dean Evans said. AFRL spokesman Bryan Ripple said the next test will be a live-fire event, expected to take place in December. The Air Force Strategic Development Planning and Experimentation Office is leading the Rapid Dragon program. The other organizations that took part in the demonstration were the Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren, the Standoff Munitions Application Center, Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, System Technologies, and the Safran Electronics and Defense subsidiary Parachutes USA. AFRL said in the release that the demonstration also showed previous successful tests could be replicated, such as conducting high-altitude airdrops, jettisoning multiple weapons from Rapid Dragon, and deconflicting weapons during their release by cleanly separating the unarmed cruise missile and the three other simulated missiles. And AFRL said Rapid Dragon would be able to easily roll on and off of mobility aircraft without any modifications to the planes. Once parachutes stabilized the falling palletized munition deployment system, the cruise missile and three weights were released sequentially. This photo shows the successful separation of the cruise missile following the weapon release, followed by the deployment of its wings and tail. (U.S. Air Force) The Air Force has been looking for ways to arm its airlift planes with multiple weapons strapped to smart pallets, which could upload targeting information to the weapons. This bomb bay in a box concept, as the Air Force once termed it, is intended to allow aircraft such as the C-130 and C-17 to release several weapons that could strike enemies from a distance, while itself staying out of danger. But while the Rapid Dragon program could represent an advancement in the way the Air Force launches palletized munitions from mobility aircraft, it would not be the first time weapons were delivered from those planes. In 2017, an MC-130 from a special operations unit at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico dropped a GBU-43/B known as the MOAB, or Massive Ordnance Air Blast, on a tunnel complex in Nangarhar, Afghanistan, used by the Islamic State Khorasan militant group. ATHENS (Reuters) - Thousands of Greeks marched peacefully through the capital Athens on Wednesday to commemorate a 1973 protest in which dozens died when the army cracked down on students opposing military rule. Hundreds of police guarded the peaceful march to the Embassy of the United States, which provided tacit support to a seven-year military dictatorship that collapsed in 1974. At the front of the procession, individuals held a blood-stained Greek flag which belonged to students engaged in the revolt that triggered an army crackdown. Dozens are thought to have been killed when army tanks smashed through the gates of the Athens Polytechnic in 1973, where students had been staging a protest against the colonels ruling Greece since 1967. The junta unravelled in 1974, amid a public outcry over a coup they instigated in Cyprus, triggering Turkey's invasion of the island just days later. The annual march is often a focal point for the public to vent anger at authorities. More than 20,000 people participated in the demonstration, which brought most of central Athens to a standstill. Police deployed about 6,000 officers and two helicopters hovered over the city centre. (Reporting By Lefteris Papadimas and Costas Baltas; Editing by David Gregorio) Hallie Jackson Getty Images In a segment of Hallie Jackson's new show, Hallie Jackson Now, the NBC News and MSNBC political journalist sits outside talking to her producer about the "deep shame" she's been working through in regard to her mental health. The segment was shot at a wellness retreat in North Carolina, which Jackson attended in both a professional and personal capacity. For the show, she interviewed other attendees including healthcare workers and a man who lost three family members in the Surfside Condo collapse this summer who were present to process burnout and grief. But Jackson also attended sessions to work through her own mental health issues and the set up put her in an unusual position, one in which she's both reporting as a journalist, feeling as a human being, and navigating between the two roles. Jackson's new daily primetime show launches today on NBC News NOW, the network's two-year-old streaming service, and with it Jackson attempts to strike the balance to create an accessible, engaging show that reconfigures how people relate to and engage with news, and to decide how and when to bring her personal life into the stories. Hallie Jackson Now covers general news, Jackson says, not politics. Though viewers know her as a senior Washington correspondent for NBC News and host of Hallie Jackson Reports on MSNBC (Jackson also co-hosted a Democratic presidential debate in 2020), the new show has expanded her scope of storytelling. She searches for stories that have flown under the radar in the hustle of political coverage, or for a different way to talk about the big story of the day. Coverage spans national and international news, culture, sports, and tech including stories on "virtual influencers" (influencers that have millions of followers but aren't human), and "stalkerware" apps, the invasive software that helps abusive spouses monitor and control victims. Story continues "This is the news for people who like the news," Jackson tells InStyle during the last day of rehearsals ahead of the show's premiere, which she describes as "awesome and terrifying." Part of the goal of the show, she says, is talking about the news on air with the same energy and in the same way Jackson talks with correspondents, producers, and reporters on the scene. Hallie Jackson Getty Images The show is broken into segments that allow Jackson to dive deeper into specific stories. Originals, for example, features a story you're not seeing anywhere else, containing original reporting from Jackson or another correspondent. Then there's Backstory, one of Jackson's favorite segments, in which reporters show how a story came together, taking audiences behind the scenes of how it was created and what gets included. In tech rehearsal, journalist Antonia Hylton joined Jackson to talk about her exclusive story on James Whitfield, who was suspended from his job as the first Black principal of Texas' Colleyville Heritage High School for emails in which he insisted on the existence of systemic racism. (He was accused of pushing "critical race theory," the misappropriated catchall often used by conservatives.) Jackson spoke to Antonia about how she came to the story, who she spoke with, who wouldn't talk to her, and where the story is headed next. The segment offers new context, and is another way to tell an important narrative. Still, Jackson is quick to clarify the show isn't media analysis; it's about giving reporters and correspondents and their stories a chance to shine. Jackson has long known that she lives and breathes Washington politics, but the new show, she says, has given her the chance to try different ways of telling the story. "We are really trying to figure out how we can peel back the curtain a little bit, tear down that fourth wall," Jackson says. "The idea is: let's talk like normal human beings, just have a conversation the way that normal humans would actually speak and talk." But for Jackson, part of drawing back the curtain on news means figuring out what it means to reveal parts of herself along the way, something she's frank in acknowledging is not a place of comfort for her. Topics like mental health are inherently political, profoundly impacted by political policy and who has what resources. They're also inherently personal, and sometimes that makes Jackson bristle. But the streaming space feels more intimate, she says, and it feels more natural to talk about her own experiences. There's still a line she's not willing to cross, though. In the segment on mental health and burnout, parts of the sessions Jackson participated in were too personal for the show to air. "I come out of one of these sessions and my face is streaked with tears and my producer is like, 'Oh my god, are you OK?'" Jackson says. In that moment, she reevaluated her role, telling herself "OK, let me not be a journalist for this hour. I'm going to be like a participant here." She reiterates that it's uncomfortable, despite a retreat leader's private reassurance that if she can bring her authentic self to the space, her journalism would be better as it related to the topic. "I thought that was really powerful because I am not somebody who ever really feels OK connecting my personal life to my journalistic life," Jackson adds. RELATED: NBC News' Hallie Jackson Gets Personal in a New Special on Pandemic Parenting "My own sort of mental health issues predated the pandemic," she adds. Her network was supportive, she says, but "I felt really ashamed of talking about it. I still do." As Jackson tells it, she's a type-A go-getter, something that has served her well professionally. That mentality became problematic in her personal life around the time she was the Chief White House Correspondent leading coverage on the end of the Trump presidency, the election, and the transition. It didn't help that her daughter, Monroe, was born in March 2020, right as the world began shutting down due to the coronavirus pandemic and right before Jackson embarked on coverage of 2020 presidential campaign events and conventions. "It was, in some ways, agonizing to feel like I was going through a lot of this in my own personal life, but then still working 18 hours a day and doing the newscast, all of those things that I love doing," she says. She recalls a story she did in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 insurrection, interviewing Rep. Dan Kildee, who opened up about his PTSD from that day. When she followed up with him, she heard he'd gotten a mixed response to the interview: Some people thanked him for sharing his story, but a vocal minority also attempted to shame him for struggling. "And to see that, it just made me realize that we've come a long way as it relates to mental health coverage, but we still have a really long way to go," Jackson adds. While she's excited for the new show, which comes in addition to her reporting for nightly news and the TODAY show, she recognizes it all adds up to time out of her day. There are moments she looks at her daughter and thinks, as every working parent does, about whether she's spending enough time with her. She misses her. About a month and a half ago, Jackson called a timeout: She wanted a break before the show launched, which the network supported. "It's tough to be at the top of your game professionally if you're having a hard time personally," she explains. "Listen, I don't know what's going to be like in 10 years when people are talking about mental health." All she knows is that perhaps she can do a bit to open those doors, to commit to covering it and talking about it. "Then maybe those little steps will add up to make a difference down the road." COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - The head of the far-right Danish People's Party (DPP), once a dominant force in Danish politics and in the vanguard of a populist surge across Europe, said on Wednesday he would step down following disappointing results in local elections. The elections held on Tuesday were also a disappointment for the ruling Social Democratic Party, popular for its early lockdowns in the coronavirus pandemic but facing an investigation into its handling of an illegal mink cull last year. Kristian Thulesen Dahl, DPP leader since 2012, said he would request an extraordinary party assembly to elect a new chairman. He would not run for re-election, he said. The DPP has been part of the political establishment for more than two decades and used to be the toughest on immigration. But with most other mainstream parties backing harder immigration measures, the nationalist party has lost its edge since gaining more than one-fifth of votes at the 2015 national election. At the last election in 2019, support for the party plummeted to 8.7%. In Tuesday's municipal election, support more than halved from the previous election four years ago to 4.1%, according to results released on Wednesday. MINK PROBE Support for the Social Democratic Party, led by Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, slipped 3.9 percentage points in support in elections to 98 municipal councils. Still the party remained the biggest with 28.5% of votes. Frederiksen ordered the country's entire mink herd culled last year in response to the rising spread of coronavirus from mink to people, denting support for the party. "Mette Frederiksen faces her most serious political crisis as prime minister," broadcaster DR's political analyst, Christine Cordsen, wrote in an analysis. The votes have been counted in 89 of 98 municipalities and the Social Democratic Party has so far won 39 mayoral posts, compared with 47 at the last election. The party managed to cling on to the three largest cities, including the capital Copenhagen. (Reporting by Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen; Editing by Nick Macfie and Angus MacSwan) Seized products HENDERSON, Ky. -- Henderson police recently seized over $30,000 of marijuana products from local businesses. Following a tip received in July, the Henderson County Police Department began investigating products distributed to local businesses that they suspected contained amounts of Delta 9, or marijuana, which is illegal in Kentucky. The products were labeled Delta 8 and Delta 10, two derivatives of the cannabis plant which are legal in the state. At a state narcotics conference in September, Henderson Police Department Detective Daniel Burden learned that similar incidents had occurred in eastern Kentucky, which prompted Henderson police to perform controlled buys at 10 locations throughout the city. I had to find a test kit to see if stores in my area were testing positive for marijuana, said Burden. More: Henderson district offers teachers $11 an hour to clean schools According to the detective, Delta 9 was found in vape cartridges and gummies at all 10 locations. Police say the gummies looked like childrens candy. Burden declined to name the locations involved. My biggest concern was the fact that it looked like candy, Burden said. A kid that is 4 or 5 or 6 or 7 years old is not going to know not to eat it so you have that problem. The other problem is that those products are going to appeal to your high school age kids. Its one thing for adults to be using these products but another thing for high school kids, and heaven forbid a young kid. From Oct. 26 through Nov. 10, police seized merchandise from the businesses. According to Burden, store owners were "shocked" at the findings, and all of them cooperated. They all seemed upset but nobody was mad or upset with me. They were upset they had been deceived, as well, said Burden. The businesses receive product from different distributors and its still unknown where the mislabeled packages originated. The incident is still under investigation. No charges have been filed. This article originally appeared on Henderson Gleaner: Illegal marijuana products seized by Henderson police Chicara Hearns, deputy for the Gadsden County Sheriff's Office, is recovering after a suspect shot her Tuesday. Sheriff Morris Young said her bulletproof vest saved her life. HAVANA Robert Rodriguez and his wife were at their home down a secluded dead end road in Havana on Tuesday when they heard a loud bang followed by multiple gun shots. He opened his front door and saw a Gadsden County deputy later identified as Chicara Hearns crawl out of her patrol car, bleeding and injured. He helped her up the porch stairs into the living room. As she lay on the couch, she told him to lock the door and call 911. Everything happened so fast, Rodriguez said. I couldnt believe it. Taking instructions from a 911 dispatcher, he untied and removed Hearns bloody bulletproof vest, and his wife, Melody, applied pressure to a gunshot wound. At approximately 11:45 a.m., a Gadsden County Sheriffs Office (GCSO) Deputy was intentionally rammed by a suspected stolen vehicle on Jamieson Road just south of Forest Drive North in Gadsden County. Within minutes, an off-duty deputy arrived and rendered first aid. Not long after, the deputy stood her up, walked her to his car and rushed her to Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare. The shooting happened along a secluded stretch of Jamieson Road in Northern Gadsden County, after Hearns came upon a stolen truck she and other officers were trying to find. The man behind the wheel was Dexter Lawson, a 38-year-old felon from Quincy. Deputy Chicara Hearns: Gadsden Sheriff's Office: Man fired multiple shots at deputy after ramming her patrol car She noticed him, said Lt. Anglie Holmes, a spokeswoman for the Gadsden County Sheriffs Office. He was heading in her direction and just rammed her head-on and pinned her in a ditch. (He) got out and opened fire on her. A grey work truck rammed into a Gadsden County Sheriff squad car on Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021. Lawson fired three rounds, with two stopped by Hearns' bulletproof vest and another striking her, Sheriff Morris Young said in a news conference Wednesday. It missed all of her major organs but remains inside her, Young said. Doctors hope to remove it later. This vest along with the good Lord saved our deputy yesterday, Young said as he held up her bulletproof vest. Lawson, his stolen truck disabled from the crash with Hearns patrol car, fled into nearby woods. More than two dozen Florida Highway Patrol troopers scoured the area, calling in police dogs and drones to find Lawson. Story continues He was apprehended within hours and taken to the Leon County Detention Facility, where he remains without bond. He's facing charges of attempted murder, grand theft of a motor vehicle and tampering with evidence. Hearns continues to recuperate in the hospital. Young said she wanted to thank the community and fellow law enforcement officers for their outpouring of support and help. Shes in high spirits, Young said. She is so grateful of her law enforcement community who came to assist and backed her up. Sheriff: 'I hope and pray he goes away for a long time' Lawson, a designated violent felon, has been in and out of jail or prison for much of his life, according to court records. He first went off to prison in 1999 when he was just 15 years old for armed robbery and stealing a car. He served five other prison stints on charges that include dealing in cocaine and marijuana. A Gadsden County Sheriff's Office vehicle is riddled with bullet holes. He was twice convicted of fleeing and eluding law enforcement. In 2005, he got a two-year sentence for battery after throwing bodily fluids at a correctional officer in Santa Rosa County. In 2017, he was arrested in Orange County after police pulled over a Dodge Dart stolen out of Tallahassee. Lawson, a passenger in the car, was found with marijuana, crack cocaine and stolen credit cards, according to police reports, and later sentenced to 60 days in jail. Young called Lawson a "career criminal" with more than 25 felony and multiple misdemeanor arrests who didn't want to go back to prison. I hope and pray that he goes away for a long time, the sheriff said. State prison records show Lawson was last incarcerated for a single day in April after he was sentenced for violating his probation in the Orlando case. He was sentenced to two years in prison but given the same amount of credit for time served. More recent Tallahassee-area shootings: 'A wonderful human being and a hero' Deputy Hearns, who was born and raised in Havana, graduated from the Pat Thomas Law Enforcement Academy in 2017, earning a bachelor's degree in criminology from Florida State University that same year. She worked at Wakulla Correctional Institute before joining the Sheriff's Office in 2019. In a Facebook post last year honoring Women's History Month, the Sheriff's Office said she was working as a bailiff at the courthouse. Her favorite scripture is from First Corinthians: "Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be courageous; be strong." Rodriguez, the Good Samaritan who helped her, said he recognized Hearns as she limped to his porch from an earlier domestic violence call involving a family member and her boyfriend. Robert Rodriguez, 72, stands on his porch reflecting on his experience helping an injured deputy on Nov. 17, 2021. I had to help her because she helped us before, he said. She was an awfully sweet woman that was friendly and tried to help ... as much as she could." Rodriguez said he and his wife prayed for Hearns' recovery all night after the shooting. I am so happy to hear that shell be alright," he said. "Shes a wonderful human being and a hero. Contact Christopher Cann at ccann@tallahassee.com and follow @ChrisCannFL on Twitter. Never miss a story: Subscribe to the Tallahassee Democrat using the link at the top of the page. This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Gadsden County deputy Chicara Hearns recovering after confrontation, shooting HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong's Disneyland will close for a day on Wednesday for staff to take compulsory COVID-19 tests after authorities found one person who visited the theme park over the weekend was infected with the coronavirus. Disneyland, majority-owned by the city government with Walt Disney holding a minority stake, said in a statement the closure was out of "an abundance of caution" and advised visitors to reschedule. Any person who visited the park, which had to close multiple times for prolonged periods since the start of the pandemic, on Nov. 14 between 11:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. would also have to get tested by Thursday, the government said separately. Despite barely recording any local coronavirus cases in recent months, authorities in the global financial hub have tightened up quarantine and patient discharge rules. Hong Kong is following Beijing's lead in retaining strict travel curbs, in contrast to a global trend of opening up and living with the coronavirus. The city government hopes the tighter rules would convince China, its main source of economic growth, to gradually open its border with Hong Kong. At Shanghai Disneyland last month, guests who were already inside were told to undergo tests at the exit related to COVID-19 investigations linked to other Chinese provinces and cities. International business lobby groups have warned Hong Kong could lose talent and investment, as well as competitive ground to rival finance hubs such as Singapore, unless it relaxes its restrictions on travel. The president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong said on Tuesday she is resigning as she cannot appeal to authorities to ease COVID-19 restrictions at the same time as having to undergo quarantine herself. JPMorgan Chase & Co Chief Executive Jamie Dimon, who was in Hong Kong on Monday and was exempt from quarantine under current rules for some executives, said the city's COVID-19 policy was making it tougher to retain staff. (Reporting by Twinnie Siu and Marius Zaharia; Editing by Stephen Coates) The House of Representatives voted Wednesday to censure Representative Paul Gosar (R., Ariz.) and remove him from his committee assignments after he posted a violent animation of him killing Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.). The resolution to censure Gosar passed in a 223 to 207 vote; Representative Liz Cheney (R., Wyo.) voted in favor of the resolution, while Representative David Joyce (R., Ohio) voted present. During a House debate on the issue, Representative Mary Gay Scanlon (D., Pa.) argued that lawmakers cannot dismiss Representative Gosars violent fantasies as a joke because people look up to us and take our lead. So, when a member posts a video of himself killing a colleague, thats obviously going to have an impact on the way people approach their politics, Scanlon said. The controversy began last week when Gosar tweeted out an anime-style cartoon that was created by his congressional staff and showed him killing the progressive Squad member and attacking President Biden. The congressman said in a statement last week that the video was meant to be a symbolic cartoon about immigration policy and that he does not espouse violence or harm towards any Member of Congress or Mr. Biden. The video depicts the fight taking place next week on the House floor and symbolizes the battle for the soul of America when Congress takes up Mr. Bidens massive $4 trillion spending bill that includes amnesty for millions of illegal aliens already in our country and was not meant to depict any harm or violence against anyone portrayed in the anime, he said. However, the censure resolution argued that the January 6 Capitol riot shows that such violent rhetoric can cause real threats against lawmakers, particularly female legislators. The House Rules Committee on Wednesday, meanwhile, adopted an amendment to the resolution that will remove Gosar from the House Oversight and Reform Committee and the House Natural Resources Committee. Story continues The House has only ever censured one if its members 24 times including Gosars censure in its history. Representative Tom Cole (R., Okla.) noted that the video was provocative and inappropriate during debate on Wednesday, but expressed concern about the precedent that would be set by removing Gosar from his committees. Throughout the history of the House of Representatives, the majority and minority have respected the right of each of their conferences to assign their respective members to committees, Cole said. This continues to set an extremely. dangerous precedent for future Congresses. More from National Review Youngkyu Park Illegal copies of "Squid Game" are circulating in North Korea after being smuggled into the country, a new report says. The North Korean government imposed stiff punishments for anyone caught enjoying South Korean entertainment. A Pyongsong resident said North Koreans can relate to the financial struggles felt by characters in the show. Illegal copies of popular Netflix hit "Squid Game" are now spreading in North Korea amid the country's crackdown on foreign media, Radio Free Asia reported Tuesday. The popular dystopian Korean survival drama, which debuted on Netflix in mid-September, follows 456 adults with mounting debt playing children's games to win 45.6 billion won (about $38 million USD). Those who are unable to complete the challenges are literally eliminated from the series of games killed by either the deadly consequences of the activity or by the mysterious mask-donning workers operating the games. In January, the North Korean government threatened to punish anyone caught enjoying South Korean entertainment with stiff fines or prison time, Reuters reported. Despite the threat of retribution, smuggled copies of the South Korean series still made their way into the country, RFA reported. "'Squid Game has been able to enter the country on memory storage devices such as USB flash drives and SD cards, which are smuggled in by ship, and then make their way inland," a resident of Pyongsong, north of the capital Pyongyang, told RFA. The Pyongsong resident said one of the show's characters, Kang Sae-Byeok (Player 067), portrayed by actress Jung Ho-Yeon, was of particular interest to North Korean audiences because Kang is a North Korean defector who participated in the deadly games with hopes of using the prize money for her younger brother and to help her mother escape the country. "One of the characters is a North Korean escapee and they can relate to her," the source said, adding that young people in the North Korean capital Pyongyang "secretly watch the show under their blankets at night on their portable media players." Story continues Like many South Koreans who say the show emulates their life in their country amid a mounting national debt crisis, the Pyongsong resident, who remained unidentified, told RFA that the show resonates with North Koreans as well. "They say that the content is similar to the lives of Pyongyang officials who fight in the foreign currency market as if it is a fight for life and death," the resident said. "They think the show's plot kind of parallels their own reality, where they know they could be executed at any time if the government decides to make an example out of them for making too much money, but they (government officials) all continue to make as much money as possible," they continued. Read the original article on Insider Illinois State Police are investigating the Nov. 13 death of a man found dead in the Greene County town of Roodhouse. Jarrod E. McDonald, 44, was found dead along Northeast 450 Avenue, according to a news release from state police in Collinsville. The Division of Criminal Investigation Zone 6 was asked to investigate. ``The official cause and manner of death will be released by the Greene County Coroners office once a final autopsy and toxicology reports are received, the release states. Roodhouse police, the county sheriffs office and the coroners office assisted in the investigation, according to the release. This is an active and ongoing investigation, and no additional information will be released at this time, the release states. MUMBAI (Reuters) - India is likely to bar the use of cryptocurrencies for transactions or making payments, but allow them to be held as assets like gold, shares or bonds, the Economic Times reported on Wednesday. Citing sources familiar with the government's thinking, the newspaper said this approach would avoid implementing a complete ban, though the government was keen to stop crypto companies, including exchanges and platforms from actively trying to attract new investors. The crypto community has made several representations to Indian authorities asking to be classified as an asset rather than as a currency, in order to gain acceptance and avoid a ban. India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week chaired a meeting to discuss the future of cryptocurrencies amid concerns that unregulated crypto markets could become avenues for money laundering and terror financing, sources had said on Saturday. A person aware of discussions at that meeting said that the overall view within government is that steps taken should be proactive, "progressive and forward-looking" as cryptocurrencies represented an evolving technology, the newspaper reported. Sources told the newspaper that details of a bill were still being finalised, and the cabinet could receive the proposed legislation in the next two to three weeks for its consideration. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) could be designated as the regulator, though that has not been finalised, the newspaper reported. The Reserve Bank of India has so far appeared very reluctant to accept cryptocurrencies, expressing concerns over potential risks to macroeconomic and financial stability, and capital controls. India's digital currency market was worth $6.6 billion in May 2021, compared with $923 million in April 2020, according to blockchain data platform Chainalysis. RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das reiterated the central bank's concerns at an event on Tuesday, saying there was a need for deeper discussions, and noting the lack of a well-informed debate in the public domain. (Reporting by Swati Bhat; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore) While the Indian government has recently softened its stance on cryptocurrencies, the countrys central bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) remains against them. The blockchain technology has been there for 10 years and can grow without cryptocurrencies, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das said at the SBI Banking and Economics Conclave on Tuesday. When the central bank says we have serious concerns from the point of view of macroeconomic and financial stability, there are far deeper issues involved. Das criticized industry players for cursory discussions on the issues involving cryptocurrencies and called for serious analysis. The RBIs anti-crypto stance is well known by now. The central bank had banned all regulated lenders from holding or facilitating cryptocurrency transactions in April 2018. However, the decision was set aside by the Supreme Court of India in March 2020. Das latest comments come on the heels of the Indian governments assurances to take progressive and forward-looking steps on cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. Das had also said earlier that the number of Indians reported to be investing in crypto could be exaggerated. The Indian government is looking to ban the use of crypto as a payment method, but will allow and regulate trading of crypto as assets, according to a report. Heritage Images At 1 p.m. on July 22, 1981, the rabbi in charge of Judaisms most sacred place of worship received a phone call from his construction manager. He told me about an amazing discovery of a big hall behind the Western Wall, wrote Rabbi Yehuda Getz in his diary. Excited, Getz rushed from his office by the Western Wall Plaza to a nearby metal door. Unlocking the gate, he walked briskly through ancient, vaulted rooms originally excavated by British archaeologist Charles Warren more than a century before. Then he entered the well-lit but perpetually damp passage leading north. Begun in secret by Israeli rabbis after the Six Day War in 1967, the tunnel was intended to expose the foundations of the massive wall that lay concealed beneath the citys Muslim Quarter. The passage was, on average, five feet wide and seven feet high, bored through the stone of medieval foundations and floored with wooden boards that covered yawning cisterns. The lower courses of the Western Wall were on his right. Beyond them, to the east, lay the honeycombed interior beneath what Jews call the Temple Mount, the site of the Jewish temple destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. For Muslims, it is the Noble Sanctuary, a platform supporting the Dome of the Rock marking the spot where the prophet Mohammad was said to have embarked on a mystical journey to heaven. Near the tunnels end, Getz reached an ancient gate uncovered by Warren that once led into the interior of the sacred platform but had been walled up centuries before. There he found what he later said was a two-foot-wide hole puncturing the long-sealed entrance leading into the sacred platforms bowels. Under the prevailing status quo, no one was permitted to broach this border. The rabbis diary does not explain who made the opening or why. A long hour I sat there, helpless, with boiling-hot tears running down from my eyes, wrote Getz. Eventually, I gathered courage and with awe and compassion I entered. The rabbi seated himself on the stairs leading into the chamber and said the Tikkun Chatzot, the midnight prayer expressing mourning for the destruction of the temple. Story continues Then he stood. A set of stone stairs led down from the inside of the gate into a vaulted hall. Twenty-six feet wide, thirty-three feet high, and nearly one hundred feet long, it was partially submerged in the typical underground Jerusalem cocktail of water, mud, and sewage. Getz suspected the passageway was used by priests to access the Jewish temple before it had been blocked on both the eastern and western ends to create the cistern. He consulted with his excavation engineer. The two agreed that the first step was to remove the water and muck. Then he ordered the hole to be temporarily sealed for security reasons and called Israels chief rabbis: Shlomo Goren, the leader of the faiths Ashkenazim, and Ovadia Yosef, the leader of the Sephardim. Getz also called the minister of religions, Aharon Abuhatzira, nephew to a famous Kabbalah sage from Morocco. By 6 p.m., the four men were examining the interior of the cistern. Goren chanted a few Psalmssomewhat theatrically, according to Getzand assured him that no one would stop his excavation team. He walked Getz to his Jewish Quarter home, saying mysteriously, Now we will know the whole truth. Im blessed that I got that privilege. The next morning, Getz ordered the project electrician to install lights in a corner of the cistern. The water pump, however, proved ineffective at draining the cistern. The following day, he called the director of Jerusalems fire department, who agreed to provide a more efficient electric pump and suggested sending a crew of Arab workers to help. We refused, of course, the rabbi wrote. On the afternoon of July 30, Rabbi Yosef and several rabbinical judges arrived to discuss turning the drained cistern into a synagogue. Entering the Noble Sanctuary was a Jewish religious taboo. Since the location of the Holy of Holiesthe innermost part of the vanished temple--was not known, it might be tread upon by accident. The rabbis, however, believed that it was acceptable to worship beneath the Temple Mount. But word of the rabbinic discovery leaked. At 8:00 a.m. on August 27, the hourly bulletin on Israel National Radio opened with a report on the tunnel. Early that same afternoon, Arab workers sent by administrators of the waqf, the Islamic charitable trust charged with managing the Noble Sanctuary, entered the cistern from two manholes in the ceiling and began carrying building materials into the space to seal up the wall. Alerted to the news, Getz rushed from his home in the nearby Jewish Quarter. His alarmed wife followed and was shaken to find him standing in the cistern, now filled with Arabs holding tools. She ran out of the tunnel to the plaza and called on worshippers to protect the rabbi from what she thought was certain death. I stood alone in front of them, he said later. I was not about to go down quietly. He shone a bright construction light on the workers to intimidate them, and then left to call Goren on a nearby phone to beg for help. Getz went back to the cistern to face the Muslims by himself. I found that the Arabs had entered the synagogue intending to block the entry and allow their men to build a wall, he wrote in his diary. Backed alone in the corner, I could not stop them. One report had him pulling a gun on the Arabs. When Goren arrived at the Western Wall, he saw what he described as hundreds of police, including the chief of police, and hurried to the opened underground gate. He claimed there were also hundreds of Arabs in the cistern coming in from all sidesand crying and shouting. Goren said he called for help from students from a nearby yeshiva, a Jewish religious school, and a few hundred came with weapons. Isam Awwad, the waqfs chief architect, told a less dramatic tale. He and his colleagues had been closely monitoring the Israeli incursion and decided it was time to stop the invaders. We sent ten of our Arab workers into the cistern with bricks and mortar to seal up the wall, he said in an interview. I was there inside with them. Whatever the precise numbers, Jewish worshippers broke into the space and began to fight with the Arab workers, one of whom was injured by a broken bottle. A border policeman had to be restrained from opening fire with an M-16 automatic rifle, and the two sides were persuaded to withdraw, according to the Guardian. Two people were slightly injured in the brief scuffle, and the police arrested several Jews and at least one Arab. A bloodbath was narrowly prevented. The waqfs decision to quickly seal the gate and an immediate Israeli government denial of any role in the penetration of the sacred platform prevented what might have sparked a regional war. That night, before going to sleep, Getz wrote bitterly, I have never felt the humiliation of Jews like todayand in our own sovereign state! Police later questioned the rabbi, noting that witnesses claimed he gave orders to kill Arabs, which he dismissed as a lie. He was never charged with any crime and maintained his important position until his death in 1995. In his diaries, Rabbi Getz comes across as a deeply pious man, one who simply wanted to create a prayer space as close to the Holy of Holies as possible. Yet his writings dont tell the full story. What exactly was the mysterious inheritance that he longed for on the night of September 4, as he stood beside the now-sealed gate? And what was the whole truth that Goren had alluded to? It was only much later that the true goal of Getz, and the secret participation of senior Israeli government officials in the effort, came to light. They had been seeking the Ark of the Covenant, the sacred box that the Hebrew Bible said contained the Ten Commandments and which had sat in the Holy of Holies in the temple built by King Solomon. They were guided in part by Maimonides, the twelfth-century Jewish philosopherknown by some as the Ark of Godwho wrote that Solomon anticipated the temples destruction and built a structure in which to hide the Ark, down below in deep and twisting concealed places. That belief persisted. Getzs daughter, Lily Horowitz, confirmed the quest. Dad was striving to find the Ark of the Covenant buried beneath the Temple Mount by King Josiah of Judah, she said. He wanted to find the Ark of the Covenant to bring salvation closer. Because of its sacredness, my father was willing to risk his life. This was part of the redemption that comes with resurrection. One of the rabbis grandsons, Adiel Getz, added that his grandfather had long been convinced that the cistern could lead to the chamber where the Ark is concealed, and above it, on ground level, to the place of the altar. Another grandson, Yiftach Getz, said that the dig for him had a messianic meaning. With the discovery of the place of the altar, he hoped, the righteous Messiah could reveal himself. He wanted to find the Ark of the Covenant. He hoped it would be found in the tunnels. Decades later, a more detailed version of Getzs incursion implicated one of Israels most notorious intelligence agents in the operations planning and execution. That man was Rafi Eitan, best known for leading the team that captured Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi official who helped devise the Holocaust. In 1960, Eitan brought him from Argentina for trial in Jerusalem, where Eichmann was hanged. As the excavation of the tunnels progressed, I met with Rabbi Getz almost daily, he told author Hila Volberstein. Together with him, I studied the structure of the Holy Temple and its dimensions. We drew conclusions as to the location of the Holy Temple and the Holy of Holies. He was eager to explore beyond Warrens Gate, which they both believed had been used by the temple priests to access the sanctuary. We assumed that if we made an opening in the wall to the east, we could move forward and eventually reach the Holy of Holies. This was where they expected to find the ark, along with other valuable temple treasures. But we waited for the right time to make the opening. Eitan was not the only senior official aware of the search for the Ark. The incident alarmed the U.S. ambassador to Israel, who was already fuming at the countrys recent bombing of an Iraqi nuclear facility and an attack on Beirut that killed hundreds of civilians. Under pressure from the Americans, the Israeli government set up a panel to investigate the Temple Mount penetration. The committee determined that the hole made in the gate was no accident, and that Defense Minister Ariel Sharon had personally given the green light. A surviving member of the panel, Israeli archaeologist Meir Ben-Dov, later said that the minister of religious affairs ordered that conclusion stricken, and the blame instead put on a botched attempt to fix a water leak. How could we otherwise show our faces to the Americans? Ben-Dov recalls him saying. Until shortly before his death, Getz remained publicly silent on the true goal of the excavators. In the early 1990s, however, he insisted that he had seen the Ark with his own eyes before being foiled in his effort to recover the sacred artifact. I can confirm to you that we know the exact location of the Ark, he wrote in response to a 1993 query. It is a claim that archaeologists consider to be as fantastical as the Harrison Ford movie. Yet Muslim officials on the Noble Sanctuary remain on alert. Twice a day, their guards measure the water levels in the many cisterns beneath the platform, to see if the Israelis have drained water to access the subterranean world beneath their feet. Forty years later, Ark fever still exerts a grip on the imaginationand a threat to world peace. Adapted with permission from Under Jerusalem: The Buried History of the World's Most Contested City by Andrew Lawler. Courtesy of Doubleday. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia's counter-terrorism police have arrested a member of a top Islamic council on charges of raising funds for the al Qaeda-linked Jemaah Islamiah (JI) group blamed for deadly bombings, police said on Wednesday. The raid was carried out near Jakarta on Tuesday during which Ahmad Zain An-Najah, a member of the Indonesian Ulema Council, was arrested along with two associates, national police spokesperson Rusdi Hartono said. JI set up a charity organisation to get funding "for education, social activities...some of the funds are used to mobilise JI," Rusdi told a news conference, adding that Ahmad was a member of the charity's religious board. The organisation operated in cities on Sumatra and Java islands, including Jakarta, he said. Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim-majority country and a resurgence in militant attacks in recent years has been linked to hundreds of Indonesians who went to Syria and Iraq to fight for Islamic State before returning. JI is accused of orchestrating the 2002 bombings of Bali nightclubs, which killed more than 200 people. Ahmad was a member of the Ulema Council's commission that issues Islamic edicts, said the body's head Cholil Nafis. His work at the council had nothing to do with militant activities, he said. (This story corrects paragraph 3 to show the charity was set up by JI, not by Ahmad, who was a member of the charity's religious board) (Reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa; Writing by Stanley Widianto; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani) The Israeli governments diplomatic efforts have been focused in recent days on securing the release of two Israeli tourists arrested in Turkey on espionage charges. Why it matters: The incident has the potential to become another major crisis in the already strained Turkish-Israeli relationship. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. The backstory: The Israeli couple, bus drivers in their 40s, visited the highest structure in Istanbul the Camlica Tower and began to take photos of the city, including of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogans residence. A worker at the tower's restaurant, who had apparently become suspicious of the couple, called the police. They were arrested and the case was transferred to Turkish intelligence. The Israeli government was not notified of the arrest and only learned of it two days later when the Turkish lawyer who was appointed to the couple contacted the consulate in Istanbul. The couple was indicted on Friday for spying, and their detention was extended until the beginning of a trial. Behind the scenes: Israel and Turkey don't have ambassadors in each other's countries and channels of communication are limited. Several days of inquiries from the Israeli side went unanswered, and it wasn't even clear at first if they had reached senior officials in Ankara. The head of Israel's Mossad spy agency also reached out to his Turkish counterpart to offer assurances that the couple did not work for Israeli intelligence. Bennett and Lapid also released unusual public statements stressing that the arrested Israelis were innocent civilians. The Turkish government has been largely silent on the issue in public, but Turkish officials have told the Israelis in private that their messages are being taken into consideration. Between the lines: Israeli Foreign Ministry officials say they still don't know if this was an incidental arrest that escalated or whether there is political motivation behind it. Story continues The officials say they're concerned Erdogan might want to use the couple as bargaining chips to extract some kind of concession from Israel. What to watch: The Israeli couple appealed the decision to extend their arrest until the trial. Israeli officials hope the appeal might present an off-ramp and that the couple might be deported to avoid a deeper crisis. Worth noting: Just last month, Turkey's Sabah newspaper reported that 15 alleged members of a Mossad spy ring had been arrested in Turkey. Like this article? Get more from Axios and subscribe to Axios Markets for free. Jake Angeli, the Phoenix man who joined the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 with his face painted and his head topped with a fur hat with horns, was sentenced on Wednesday to 41 months in prison. Given the 11 months he has already served since his January arrest, Angeli will serve about 2 more years in a federal prison. The judge said he expected it would be a minimum security unit. Before the judge passed sentence, Angeli addressed the court for about 30 minutes and accepted responsibility for his crime. But he said he was not a danger to society. "I may be guilty of this crime, absolutely," he said. "But I am in no way, shape or form a dangerous criminal. I'm not a domestic terrorist. I'm not an insurrectionist. "I'm a good man who broke the law," he said. Angeli said that he was, in a way, grateful, for his confinement, giving him the time to evaluate his actions. "You really dig when youre locked up 22 hours a day," he said. Angeli said he asked himself how Jesus Christ or Mahatma Gandhi would act and decided that Jesus would respect and understand his captors and that Gandhi would accept responsibility. "The hardest part of all of this is, I know I am to blame," Angeli told the court. "Most people will never have any idea to know what it's like to look in the mirror and say, 'You know, you really messed up." Judge Royce Lamberth told Angeli that he thought he had genuine remorse, but could not justify deviating down from the sentencing guidelines for the felony crime. "Although you have evolved in your thinking, clearly, and reverted your thinking in many ways," the judge said to Angeli, "what you did here was horrific." Angeli, 34, was not accused of any violence nor property damage during his time in the U.S. Capitol. But, prosecutors said, Angeli played a key role by goading on the crowd through shouts blasted from his megaphone. Story continues For subscribers: How Jake Angeli went from being a Phoenix character to a face of the U.S. Capitol raid Angeli also took the dais of the U.S. Senate, which had been hurriedly cleared moments earlier, and left a note for then-Vice President Mike Pence that warned him: Its only a matter of time. Justice is coming! Speaking to Judge Lamberth on Wednesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kimberly Paschall said that note was particularly chilling because Angeli was not writing that from his Phoenix home, but while in D.C. while Pence was close by. Paschall said Angeli's actions have been described by himself and others as peaceful. But she showed videos to the court that showed Angeli entering the building and shouting an obscenity in the Senate chamber. "That is not peaceful. That is chaos," she said. "That is not peaceful. That is criminal obstruction." Angeli, who was charged under his legal name, Jacob Chansley, had pleaded guilty to a single felony count of obstructing a civil proceeding The government had asked that Angeli be sentenced to 51 months. Angelis lawyer, Albert Watkins, asked that his client be freed, arguing that the 11 months he has already spent in solitary confinement was punishment enough. In court on Wednesday, Watkins said the sentencing provided a unique opportunity for the judge to both "mete out justice" and to "bridge this great divide" in the country's political climate. Investigation: QAnon, false flags and baby-eating liberals: How Arizona Patriots build community around conspiracy theories Watkins has argued that Angeli thought he was acting at the behest of then-President Donald Trump, who had requested his supporters show up to D.C. on Jan. 6, the day a joint session of Congress would certify that President Joe Biden defeated Trump in the 2020 general election. He was not an organizer, Watkins wrote of Angeli. He was not a planner. He was not violent. He was not destructive. He was not a thief. Watkins has also, in interviews and in court briefs, discussed the mental deficiencies of his client. He has described Angelis life as being filled with abuse and neglect. In his filing to the court ahead of Angelis sentencing, Watkins said Angeli found the supportive community he had long craved among followers of Trump. Watkins said that Angelis mental health has deteriorated in custody, where he has been kept in isolation due to restrictions around the COVID-19 pandemic. He suffers from severe anxiety, panic attacks, and a constant feeling of claustrophobia while he is locked alone in his cell each day, Watkins wrote. Angeli had become a fixture at protests and marches throughout the Phoenix area since at least 2019. For subscribers: Before the US Capitol raid, Jake Angeli and other Trump supporters staged attempt in Arizona He originally painted his face black and white, but switched to red, white and blue during the 2020 election year. Angeli would parade around shirtless, showing off a chest decorated with elaborate tattoos, each he said a symbol of his shamanistic beliefs. He donned a fur helmet with tails that draped his face and was topped with horns. "You mess with the bull, you get the horns," Angeli would say when asked about the hat. Angeli also carried a 6-foot spear that had a real tip. Though, his attorney said in court filings, that it was not secured properly and would fall off if tilted too far. In interviews with The Republic, Angeli said he intentionally picked his outfit as a way to draw attention to himself and the message he would shout in a booming voice that resonated even without amplification. At times, he didn't need the excuse of a protest or march to get into his outfit. Angeli would at times, literally when he felt the spirit moved him, stand outside the Arizona Capitol or the building that housed The Arizona Republic newspaper, and unleash a steady stream of impromptu thoughts. His booming, guttural voice allowed his message to penetrate walls and windows. Angeli talked, or more accurately shouted, about corruption endemic in government and how it would soon be exposed. He carried a sign that said, Q Sent Me, showing his fealty to the QAnon movement. That false conspiracy theory believes that a person with Q-level top-secret military clearance was, through cryptic postings on obscure bulletin boards, sharing information about the looming end of global leaders. Followers, who debated and parsed meanings from Qs posts, expected mass arrests of political figures and celebrities as Trump would break up a massive global child sex trafficking ring. For subscribers: 'The audit is The Great Awakening': How QAnon lives on in Arizona's election audit Angeli had, at the ready, a well-rehearsed answer should someone ask who Q was. Q is the highest level in the military and the intelligence community, he would say in a rapid-fire response. Q was disseminating above top secret information to patriots in the republic like myself and the people in the Q movement to take back our country from evil globalists and communists," he would say, not pausing for breath, "who are attempting to monopolize all of the resources and all the labor in our country and all over the world so they can create a new world order, one world government. Angeli said he had long ago discovered what the so-called globalists were up to while doing his own research. He said that the Q movement verified much of what he already knew. Angeli, who had served in the U.S. Navy, said he made the self-realization that he was part of a top-secret cadre of super soldiers. That revelation, he said, made the twists and turns he had gone through in life make sense to him, finally granting him a cohesive narrative. In court filings, his attorney said that a military mental health examination found Angeli suffered from a personality disorder, but deemed he was fit to serve. And, his attorney wrote, the Navy did not tell Angeli he had the disorder, which his attorney named as schizotypal personality disorder. Watkins, in court Wednesday, said that since learning of his diagnosis, Angeli had become a "new man." Watkins said that was because Angeli "had an answer to a question he had been consumed with for all of his knowing life." Angeli self-studied as a shaman, giving himself the name Yellowstone Wolf. He offered lessons for $55.55 in topics such as spiritual self-defense through his virtual Starseed Academy. It provided what he said was his only, if spotty, income. Angeli drove to Washington, D.C., with others from Phoenix. He has not said whom he traveled with, but his attorney said that Angeli had been cooperating with authorities investigating the U.S. Capitol raid. He was one of the first people into the U.S. Capitol, prosecutors said, entering through a door that security camera footage showed had been busted open from the inside by rioters who had entered the building through smashed windows. Prosecutors said that based on an analysis of video footage that Angeli was in the Capitol building for about an hour. His final stop was the U.S. Senate chamber. As he left, prosecutors said, he shouted one final word: Freedom. Angeli gave an interview to NBC News the next day, while traveling back to Arizona, and downplayed his actions. I walked through an open door, dude, he said. Although he said he did feel a sense of accomplishment for making members of Congress run for cover. Angelis image was one of the first distributed by authorities hoping to identify him, with his costume earning him a nickname in the national media: the QAnon shaman. Aware he was being sought, Angeli contacted the FBI and arranged to go to the Phoenix office upon his return for what he thought would be a follow-up interview. He was arrested when he showed up and has been held in custody since. Agents searching his car found the fur hat with horns and spear inside. Angeli had planned, after the meeting with the FBI, to drive to the Arizona Capitol and start another one of his signature protests. This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Jake Angeli, QAnon shaman, sentenced to 41 months in Jan. 6 raid WINNIPEG, Manitoba (AP) Nikolaj Ehlers, Pierre-Luc Dubois and Mark Scheifele scored in the second period, and the Winnipeg Jets beat the Western Conference-leading Edmonton Oilers 5-2 Tuesday night. Adam Lowry and Kyle Connor also scored for the Jets, and Josh Morrissey had two assists. Connor Hellebuyck stopped 32 shots as Winnipeg finished 5-1-1 on a seven-game homestand. We needed some good defense, some physical play, good sticks, 1-on-1s, good offense, Dubois said. We needed a lot out there tonight and we did a good job of that. NHL-leading scorer Leon Draisaitl had a pair of power-play goals early in the third period for Edmonton, giving him 17 goals and 33 points on the season. Connor McDavid, second in league scoring, assisted on both goals to up his point total to 29 and give him at least a point in every one of the Oilers' 15 games this season. I dont think we were as bad as maybe it looked on the score sheet, but if you go down 4-0 youre probably not going to win, Draisaitl said. Mikko Koskinen stopped 22 of the 26 shots he faced before being replaced by Stuart Skinner to start the third period. Skinner had eight saves. The Oilers lost three of five on its road trip. I didnt like our game as much in St. Louis (but) we got a win there, Edmonton coach Dave Tippett said. And we came in here and you could tell we were low on energy to finish the trip. To get down early like that and chase the game, we just didnt have the oomph to come back. It was the first meeting between the clubs since the Jets swept the Oilers in the first round of last seasons playoffs. They have a rematch in Edmonton on Thursday. Lowry got the Jets on the scoreboard at 2:09 of the first period with a blooper goal Koskinen should have stopped. The Jets' forward got the puck near his blue line and headed toward the goalie. He took a shot from the top of the circle and the puck hit Koskinen, went under him and started dribbling toward the goal line. He tried to swipe it away with his stick but missed. Story continues Both goalies made some tough saves in the second. After Koskinen stopped Morrissey on a close shot during a power play, Ehlers scored at even strength with a slap shot from the top of the circle to make it 2-0 at 6:59. Sixteen seconds later, Draisaitl was given a four-minute minor for high sticking and Winnipeg took advantage when Dubois redirected Morrissey's shot for his ninth of the season at 10:01. Koskinen was screened for Scheifeles goal with 38 seconds remaining in the period to make it 4-0. Andrew Copp was called for tripping at 1:19 of the third, and Logan Stanley took a boarding penalty at 2:26 to give the Oilers a 5-on-3. Draisaitl scored his first goal 6 seconds into the two-man advantage at 2:32. His second goal at 3:38 was initially waved off for goalie interference, but Edmonton coach Dave Tippett challenged and it was determined the Oilers' player had been pushed into Hellebuyck. Hellebuyck made a key save with 5:05 left when Jesse Puljujarvi took a shot just outside the crease. Connor scored his team-leading 12 goal of the season into an empty net with 1:37 remaining. UP NEXT The teams meet again in Edmonton on Thursday night. HUNTINGTON WOODS, Mich. American journalist Danny Fenster, freed after nearly six months in jail in military-ruled Myanmar, said he feels incredibly fortunate" to be back home in suburban Detroit after his uncertain time behind bars. Fenster, 37, was greeted by family and friends Tuesday night as he returned to Huntington Woods. He was sentenced last week to 11 years of hard labor in Myanmar, but was handed over Monday to former U.S. diplomat Bill Richardson, who helped negotiate his release. He had been in detention since his arrest at Yangon International Airport on May 24. I feel incredibly fortunate to be home, I cant believe the amount of effort that went into it that was necessary to make this happen overwhelming gratitude, said Fenster, who returned to the U.S. earlier Tuesday on a flight that landed in New York. Fenster, the managing editor of online magazine Frontier Myanmar, is one of more than 100 journalists, media officials or publishers who have been detained since the Myanmar military ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February. More: Huntington Woods journalist Danny Fenster freed from Myanmar jail days after sentencing More: Myanmar court sentences journalist Danny Fenster to 11 years in jail American journalist Danny Fenster speaks at a news conference at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021, after arriving in the United States following a six month detention in Myanmar. He was convicted of spreading false or inflammatory information, contacting illegal organizations and violating visa regulations. Days before his conviction, Fenster learned he had been charged with additional violations that put him at risk of a life sentence. Now bearded and shaggy-haired, Fenster said he passed his time in jail by doing a lot of reading. A lot of sitting around thinking and staring at walls." He said bi-weekly visits from his wife kept him sane during his incarceration. She remains in Myanmar, but is expected to be back in the U.S. before Thanksgiving. She came when they let her which was every other week and delivered a huge food parcel to me and we wrote each other love letters, he said. Story continues Fenster said his release would not have been possible without help from his older brother, Bryan, saying he worked tirelessly with U.S. Rep. Andy Levin of Michigan and others to secure his release. Weve always been incredibly close, he said of his brother. This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Journalist Danny Fenster returns home to Huntington Woods HUNTINGTON WOODS, Mich. (AP) American journalist Danny Fenster, freed after nearly six months in jail in military-ruled Myanmar, said he feels incredibly fortunate" to be back home in suburban Detroit after his uncertain time behind bars. Fenster, 37, was greeted by family and friends Tuesday night as he returned to Huntington Woods. He was sentenced last week to 11 years of hard labor in Myanmar, but was handed over Monday to former U.S. diplomat Bill Richardson, who helped negotiate his release. He had been in detention since his arrest at Yangon International Airport on May 24. I feel incredibly fortunate to be home, I cant believe the amount of effort that went into it that was necessary to make this happen overwhelming gratitude, said Fenster, who returned to the U.S. earlier Tuesday on a flight that landed in New York. Fenster, the managing editor of online magazine Frontier Myanmar, is one of more than 100 journalists, media officials or publishers who have been detained since the Myanmar military ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February. He was convicted of spreading false or inflammatory information, contacting illegal organizations and violating visa regulations. Days before his conviction, Fenster learned he had been charged with additional violations that put him at risk of a life sentence. Now bearded and shaggy-haired, Fenster said he passed his time in jail by doing a lot of reading. A lot of sitting around thinking and staring at walls." He said bi-weekly visits from his wife kept him sane during his incarceration. She remains in Myanmar, but is expected to be back in the U.S. before Thanksgiving. She came when they let her which was every other week and delivered a huge food parcel to me and we wrote each other love letters, he said. Fenster said his release would not have been possible without help from his older brother, Bryan, saying he worked tirelessly with U.S. Rep. Andy Levin of Michigan and others to secure his release. Weve always been incredibly close, he said of his brother. SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) An Iraqi refugee initially accused of committing a killing for the Islamic State terror group before coming to the U.S. is eligible to be deported because he lied on his immigration papers, a federal judge decided Tuesday. Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Tara Naselow-Nahas ruled that Omar Abdulsattar Ameen lied when he was filling out his refugee application to gain entry into the United States. Among other things, she found he wasn't being truthful when he said he had never interacted with, knew or had involvement with various terrorist groups, including the Islamic State of Iraq. But she rejected other allegations, including that he provided support, engaged in terrorist activity, participated in harming another person, or misrepresented that he was a member of such a group. Naselow-Nahas found that Ameen interacted with a cousin who is clearly a member of an armed terrorist group. She also found the government proved that he lied when he said his father had been fatally shot and that his brother had been kidnapped. He should be deported to Iraq, or if not there to his last home of Turkey, the judge said, based on the governments recommendation. Attorneys for Ameen say he faces likely execution if he is returned to Iraq. Another federal judge in Sacramento in April refused to allow his extradition. U.S. Magistrate Judge Edmund Brennan said that cellphone evidence shows Ameen was in Turkey at the time of the slaying in 2014. Federal authorities have tried since 2018 to return Ameen to Iraq under a treaty with that nation, and he was quickly seized by immigration authorities after Brennan's ruling. Ameen will continue to fight deportation, and he will seek to be released on bond, said his lawyer, Siobhan Waldron. He can now object that he faces too much danger to be deported, even though he was found to be eligible. He will go before Naselow-Nahas for a week of hearings set for late January and early February, and if she rules against him can seek review by the Board of Immigration Appeals and then the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Story continues The fight is far from over, Waldron said. She contended that this is all based on unfounded rumors. FBI investigators testified over days of intermittent hearings scattered over several months that Ameen told inconsistent stories under questioning, and that close family members also have ties to terrorist groups. Ameen has argued he felt under duress during the interviews out of fear for his family. Federal prosecutors said he returned to Iraq that same month and killed a police officer in the town of Rawah after it fell to the Islamic State group. Ameen arrived in the United States five months later to be resettled as a refugee in the Sacramento, California, area. The Iraqi government said Ameen was part of a four-vehicle Islamic State caravan that opened fire on the home of the Rawah police officer. Iraqi documents said Ameen then fired a fatal shot into Ihsan Abdulhafiz Jasims chest as he lay on the ground. Islamic State later claimed responsibility for the slaying on social media. The Department of Homeland Security alleged that Ameen kept his membership in two terrorist groups secret when he applied for refugee status, and again when he later applied for a green card. Ameen fled to Turkey in 2012. He was granted status as a refugee in the United States in June 2014 on the grounds that he was a victim of terrorism. Brennan said in April that cellphone records showed Ameen was in Turkey, not Iraq, on the day of the murder. The judge noted Ameen passed a lie detector test and said he had serious doubt on the reliability of witnesses who placed Ameen in Iraq at the time of the killing. Nov. 16A federal judge in Portland has suppressed drug evidence that a Maine State Police trooper accused of racial profiling obtained during a traffic stop more than two years ago. The decision from U.S. District Judge Nancy Torresen marked the second time in 13 months that drugs Cpl. John Darcy obtained during stops of Black drivers and passengers had been tossed out of federal court or led to a case's dismissal. The decision to suppress evidence could lead to the dismissal of charges stemming from the June 26, 2019, traffic stop in which Darcy pulled over a vehicle on I-95, about six miles north of the York toll plaza. The U.S. attorney's office said Tuesday that it is reviewing Torresen's suppression order and had no comment on whether the charge would be dismissed. Shannon Moss, spokesperson for the Maine State Police, also said the agency is reviewing "the ruling and the supporting investigation documentation. "It would be inappropriate for us to provide a statement without such a review," she said. Darcy pulled over the vehicle, driven by a Black driver with a Black female passenger, because it allegedly was going just 45 mph, because it crossed out of the lane and into the breakdown lane at least three times, and because it was late at night. But Torresen found that video from Darcy's dashboard camera contradicted the trooper's testimony at a suppression hearing held last month. She found that the video did not show the vehicle crossing from the right lane over the fog line and going into the breakdown lane, as Darcy testified. Torresen also cast doubt on Darcy's claim that the vehicle was traveling 45 mph, based on the time that elapsed between Darcy's call to a dispatcher to run the license plate number and his pulling the vehicle over. The traffic stop came six minutes after that call to the dispatcher, and it happened about 6 miles north of where Darcy first spotted the minivan, meaning the vehicle was likely traveling about 60 mph, the judge wrote. Story continues "These reasonable inferences further undermine Darcy's claim that he pulled the vehicle over in part because it was traveling forty-five miles per hour," Torresen said. Even if the car was going 45 mph, as Darcy claimed, that is the lowest legal speed limit on the interstate, the judge noted. She also rejected the trooper's contention that his decision to stop the car was due to the late hour, 10:24 p.m. In the August 2019 stop on Interstate 95 northbound in York, Darcy was recorded talking to another trooper on a cruiser microphone saying that the motorist "looks like a thug" because "he's wearing a wifebeater" and "he's got dreads," according to court documents. A "wifebeater" is a reference to a sleeveless undershirt. Darcy told the other trooper he was not racially profiling the driver. "I hate when people try to make it seem like that's what it is," Darcy said. "I care about where people are from, and the way they seem, you know what I mean? Do they seem like they can be involved in drug dealing or gangs or something? I don't give a [expletive] if someone's Black or white." Federal prosecutors dismissed the charges in the case stemming from the August 2019 stop after a motion to suppress the drug evidence was filed. The Maine chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union filed a "friend of the court" brief in the case stemming from the June 2019 stop, arguing that the evidence should be suppressed. "This case is just one example of the racial profiling that is pervasive in Maine and across the country," Emma Bond, legal director of the ACLU of Maine, said Tuesday. "The Maine Legislature has approved a law that requires law enforcement officers to collect demographic data about every stop they make. We need data to understand the scope of the problem, so that we can tailor appropriate solutions. It is incumbent on Maine law enforcement agencies to wholeheartedly support and implement this law." The ACLU defines racial profiling as the discriminatory practice of "targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual's race, ethnicity, religion or national origin." Darcy was named 2019 Trooper of the Year by the Maine State Police. In July, the Maine State Police's Office of Professional Standards, in consultation with the attorney general's office, examined more than 1,000 of Trooper John Darcy's traffic stops and found no evidence or patterns of racial profiling, according to Moss. Kansas City police officers generally should not shoot at a moving vehicle but are given the latitude to do so if they are in split-second, life-threatening situations, according to a police spokesman. An officer fired shots at a vehicle late Monday after it allegedly was speeding and drove toward the officers patrol car. No injuries were reported in the shooting near U.S. 40 and Interstate 435. The departments firearms policy addressing that, generally officers should not fire into moving vehicles, said Sgt. Jacob Becchina, a police spokesman. But it does relieve latitude, obviously for life-threatening situations. Each situation is its own and to be taken in conjunction with the totality of circumstances. An officer on patrol near East 31st Street and Van Brunt Boulevard reported shortly before 11 p.m. that a vehicle was speeding eastbound on 31st Street. A second officer near U.S. 40 and I-435 noticed the vehicle still speeding eastbound. That officer shot at the vehicle after its driver allegedly drove toward the officers patrol car, police said. The vehicle then sped away from the shooting. Becchina said investigators have not determined whether anyone was struck by the officers gunfire. They also did not have a complete description of the vehicle or a description of the driver. The departments violent crimes unit is investigating the shooting. They will determine how fast the vehicle was traveling when the officer opened fire. The traffic unit will likely reconstruct the crime scene. Police have not said exactly where the officers were standing when the vehicle sped towards them. He wasnt aware if the patrol officers had time or enough space to deploy a tire deflation device to force the vehicle to stop. Thats why we bring all those investigators into it to get a really accurate picture of them, Becchina said. So that we are able to say upon completion of that, we are able to answer all of those questions. We have the same questions you guys do at this point in time. Story continues In October, a federal judge approved a $100,000 settlement for a toddler who was shot in the foot six years ago by an on-duty officer who fired his service weapon into a car that eluding officers. That officer fired nine rounds, striking a 1-year-old girl, in August 2015. The lawsuit alleged the officer acted outside of the police departments policy at the time by firing at the car. That policy was recently updated and allows officers to evaluate the totality of the circumstances at that time, when using force, Becchina said. He said in a 1989 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court set the standard for police uses of force. And the use of force is objectively reasonable, given the totality of the circumstances at that time, he said. Thats why that verbiage is exactly the way it is in that policy to say that generally they shouldnt. Although, it does have latitude. SRINAGAR, India (AP) Police in Indian-controlled Kashmir late Wednesday detained over a dozen relatives of two civilians killed in a controversial gunfight, eyewitnesses said, hours after they staged a protest in the disputed regions main city while pleading with authorities to return the bodies so they could bury them. Police officials wearing flak jackets and carrying assault rifles swooped on a protest site in Srinagar minutes after lights were turned off in the locality. They dragged the relatives into a police van amid slogans by the family members in the freezing cold, eyewitnesses said. In dramatic video clips that circulated on social media, one family member grabbed the barrel of a rifle from a police official and pulled it to his chest while shouting: Shoot me, terrorists. Four people, including two civilians and two suspected rebels, died Monday night in a raid by government forces on alleged militants in Srinagar, police said. They said the rebels included a Pakistani citizen, but offered no evidence. Police said the civilians died in the crossfire between government troops and the rebels. However, witnesses and families of the civilians said Indian troops used them as human shields during the standoff. Indian authorities later secretly buried the bodies in a remote northwestern village as part of a policy that started in 2020. Since then, authorities have buried the bodies of hundreds of suspected rebels and their alleged associates, including civilians, in unmarked graves in remote areas, denying their families proper funerals. The family members of the two civilians, identified as trader Mohammad Altaf Bhat and Mudassir Ahmed, a dental surgeon and real estate dealer, assembled in an area of Srinagar where several media offices are located and demanded the return of the bodies. They shouted slogans and some carried signs reading Stop innocent killings & atrocities and We want justice. Saima Bhat, a relative of Bhat, said they had little hope of justice. Story continues Justice is a long journey. We just plead right now that the bodies of our loved ones be returned, she said. At least respect the dead and allow us to give them a dignified burial. The protest continued into Wednesday night and the victims' relatives held a candlelight vigil despite the severe cold. Also Wednesday, government forces were deployed in half a dozen villages in the southern Gool area to enforce a ban on the assembly of more than four people, after family members of one of the men slain in Mondays raid threatened to block a highway. The man, 24-year-old Amir Magray, whom police described as a militant, was a salesman at a shop in Srinagar, his father, Abdul Latief, said. Latiefs home has been protected by police guards since he killed a militant with a stone in 2005. Denial of the body of my son is the reward of the fight against terrorists. My home is still guarded by police, Latief was quoted by New Delhi Television as saying. Tomorrow the security guards can kill me and claim that I was a militant. Authorities say the policy of not returning rebels' bodies to their families is aimed at stopping the spread of the coronavirus and to avoid potential law and order problems during funerals. The policy has added to widespread anti-India anger in the region and some rights groups have fiercely criticized the move, calling it a violation of religious rights. Kashmiris for years have accused Indian troops of targeting civilians and committing abuses with impunity. Such allegations include staging gunfights and then saying the innocent victims were militants to claim rewards and promotions. Indian officials acknowledge the problem but deny abuses are part of a strategy. They say the allegations are mostly separatist propaganda meant to demonize troops. Meanwhile, police late Wednesday said government forces killed five suspected rebels in two separate gunfights in villages in southern Kulgam district. A tweet attributed to the region's head of police, Vijay Kumar, said one of the slain men was a local commander of the Resistance Front rebel group. Officials did not immediately provide any other details and there was no independent confirmation of the incidents. Both India and Pakistan claim the divided territory in its entirety. Rebels in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhis rule since 1989. India insists the Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. Pakistan denies the charge, and most Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict. (Independent) Police officers were seen removing a man armed with a rifle from outside the courthouse where the jury is deliberating the verdict in the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse. Video posted online by Fox News shows two officers asking the man for identification and for his permit to carry a concealed weapon close to the steps of the Kenosha County Courthouse in Wisconsin on Wednesday morning. The man was wearing body armour and carrying a rifle slung across his body. What happened to saving water? 18-million-gallon wave park 16.6-acre private use wave pool. What? I was absolutely appalled when I read the Desert Sun article Nov. 12. The article focused on the 80-foot lighting proposal (what about the Dark Skies plan) and concerns from adjacent communities about the impact of traffic and noise. What about water use and other environmental effects? I find it ironic that the developer is working with the city of La Quinta and planning commission for approval during excessive drought in Southern California and the Southwest and during negotiations by 200 countries seeking solutions at the COP26 climate summit. My response was simply you have got to be kidding! I would like to know how much water will evaporate daily and what its source is. The planning commission should not approve developments that include manmade lakes with lakefront homes, plus water feature parks. We are in an extremely serious situation with agriculture, wildfires and bird migration all experiencing the effects of water shortages. The decision to move forward with the wave park is irresponsible, short sighted and counter to the efforts of sensible individuals and local and state agencies that are committed to saving and carefully using our valuable water resources. Jan Olson, Palm Desert A new handout for illegal immigrants From Fox News, something that I believe everyone should be made aware of: "Tucked away on page 1647 of the Build Back Better Act, the Democrats' social spending package, is a provision that would repeal the Social Security number requirement to obtain child tax credits. This change would expand child tax credits to parents of illegal immigrants who don't have Social Security numbers." This could ultimately cost taxpayers billions of dollars. Wonder why we have an influx crossing the border? Kay Hillery, Indian Wells Democrats' skepticism of Trump proven right Richard A. Lanpheer's letter of Nov. 16 attempted to establish a false equivalency between Aaron Rodgers' belief in crackpot remedies to both prevent and cure COVID, in lieu of medical science and vaccination, and the initial skepticism expressed by Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and Andrew Cuomo in connection with vaccines first being developed to prevent COVID. Story continues Biden, Harris and Cuomo recommended at the time that these vaccines be tested by labs outside the Trump administration because they didn't trust the Trump FDA. Mr. Lampheer must have missed the disclosures last week that the Trump administration manipulated and suppressed CDC research and guidance in connection with COVID, solely to advance the political ambitions of Donald J. Trump, who believed that full transparency in connection with the severity and the spread of COVID would hurt his re-election. It would appear that at the time, the suggestion of independent testing of the vaccines was not ill-founded. Franc Martarella, Rancho Mirage This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: La Quinta wave park is a terrible idea in the midst of drought A syringe is filled with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for ages 5 to 11 at Native Health Central clinic in Phoenix, Arizona, on Nov. 5. Lawrence County has administered more than 44,047 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, as of Nov. 15, according to data from the Indiana Department of Health. That's up 1.76% from the previous week's tally of 43,284 COVID-19 doses administered. In Lawrence County, 45% of people living in Lawrence County are fully vaccinated as of Nov. 15. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers someone fully vaccinated two weeks after they've been given a single-dose shot (Johnson & Johnson) or a second shot (either Pfizer or Moderna). Indiana reported 1,055,549 total cases of coronavirus, an increase of 2% from the week before. The five counties with the highest percentage of their population fully vaccinated in Indiana as of Nov. 15 are Hamilton County (72%), Boone County (67%), Hendricks County (62%), Hancock County (60%) and Warrick County (59%). Here are the latest numbers on COVID-19 vaccinations in Lawrence County as of Nov. 15: How many people in Lawrence County have received a COVID-19 vaccine? 48% of people in Lawrence County have received at least one dose of the vaccine, for a total of 21,946 people 45% of people in Lawrence County are fully vaccinated, for a total of 20,656 people For a county-by-county look at the vaccination rollout, see our COVID-19 vaccine tracker, which is updated daily. How many people in Indiana have been vaccinated so far? 56% of people in Indiana have received at least one dose of the vaccine, for a total of 3,685,442 people 51% of people in Indiana are fully vaccinated, for a total of 3,384,472 people COVID vaccinations for kids and boosters The percentages in this story reflect the total share of the population that has received vaccines. That now includes people as young as 5 years old, for whom vaccines have been authorized. These weekly stories will be updated as more data on vaccination rates in children, as well as booster vaccination rates, are released. We pull data on local vaccine distribution on a weekly basis. Check back for our next weekly update mid-week for the latest numbers. This article originally appeared on The Times-Mail: Lawrence County Indiana vaccine rate: How many people are vaccinated? SALEM, Ore. (AP) Amanda Metzler, a licensed cannabis grower, has beefed up security around her property and no longer dares to go out alone after dark because of illegal marijuana farms in her region. Elin Miller, a vineyard owner, said the illegal sites have lured away so many field workers that grape growers and wineries are suffering labor shortages, particularly at harvest time. Jackson County Sheriff Nathan Sickler says the crime rate, associated with the thousands of illegal marijuana farms that have sprung up this year in southern Oregon, has gone through the roof. Weve had stabbings, robberies, thefts, burglaries, homicides, sex crimes, motor vehicle accidents, DUIs, all related to the influx of the marijuana-cannabis industry in our in our valley, Sickler said. It is certainly an issue we deal with on a daily basis here. The three were among witnesses who testified Tuesday before a committee of the Oregon Legislature, in an effort to seek help in stemming the proliferation of illegal grow sites in southern Oregon. The managers of the sites which were brazenly erected last spring primarily in Jackson and Josephine counties in the largely rural region near the California state line have stolen water from rivers, creeks and aquifers during a severe drought and abused immigrant workers, officials have said. Many illegal marijuana farms are operating under the guise of being legal hemp farms. Steven Marks, director of the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission, said that tests conducted at some 400 self-proclaimed hemp sites from July 28 to mid-September showed that most plants had higher amounts of THC, the component that gives cannabis its high, than is legally allowed for hemp. So the upshot is 54% of all the tests we successfully conducted were positive and presumptive for marijuana, Marks said. Managers of 73 sites told state inspectors to go away, and barred access. Many sites are guarded by gunmen. Sickler described an explosion of growth in marijuana farms. Story continues We dont have the resources in Jackson County to deal with something like that, Sickler told the House Interim Committee On Economic Recovery and Prosperity. Rep. Pam Marsh, a Democrat from Ashland in Jackson County, agreed. I can tell you that on the ground, the ubiquitous presence of these structures, often with very little effort meant to shield them from the public view, has been shocking, Marsh said. There arent enough inspectors to test for THC content at each site to determine which ones are legal and which are not, officials have said. Police said they do not have the capacity to raid all the suspicious sites, with each raid requiring an investigation and search warrant. First and foremost, we need to allocate significant funding to support law enforcement and code compliance operations," Marsh told the committee. "Jackson County alone has estimated a cost of $7.3 million a year to enable the county to adequately tackle illegal grows. Josephine County is likely to have a similar need. Vineyards are also feeling the impact of the illegal pot farms, said Miller, chair of the Oregon Wine Council. We are already facing challenges finding enough workers to support our operations, particularly during peak harvest seasons, Miller said. The unfair and often illegal labor practices of these illegal operations are compounding that issue by paying workers in cash at significantly higher wages than those of us who ... are adhering to all labor laws. With tons of marijuana having been recently harvested and the illicit business largely conducted in cash, gunmen are now preying on the illegal farms and marijuana processing sites. Crews from eight different states have come to Jackson County to perform home invasion robberies of marijuana farms or individuals associated with marijuana industry with money, Sickler said. Rep. John Lively, the committee chairman, said its members would draft legislation to help the situation. But he pointed out that the next legislative session, which starts in February, is a short one, lasting barely a month, giving little time for a raft of bills to pass committees and both the House and Senate. And so the more complex the legislation, the more problematic its going to be, Lively said. So how many issues do we try to address or not address in the short session, versus something else? Marsh warned that there won't be a quick fix. We know that it will take several years of significant effort, perhaps three to five before we can expect to have the issue corralled, she said. The illegal farms produce tons of marijuana that is sold outside the state. Officials believe that foreign cartels selected southern Oregon because its part of the the fabled marijuana-growing Emerald Triangle, a zone in which Californias Humboldt, Mendocino and Trinity counties form the major part. Federal drug agents and representatives of the U.S. Attorneys Office in Oregon met on Tuesday with local law enforcement and other officials to hear about the challenges theyre facing. Josephine County Sheriff Dave Daniel called it a beginning coordination meeting between agencies. We all are being affected by the illegal market in so many ways that we need to work together as united as we can be, Daniel said in an email. The illegal marijuana market has no borders or boundaries. ___ This story has been updated to correct the details of testimony by Amanda Metzler. ___ Follow Andrew Selsky on Twitter at https://twitter.com/andrewselsky Editorial cartoon Urge senators to advance voting law Do you want free, fair and secure elections? Would you like to know what billionaires are donating to Super PACs and buying our elections? Are you against partisan gerrymandering where elected officials choose their voters rather than the other way around? Do you want access to vote by mail? Do you want consistent voter identification laws? How about requiring our voting machines to be made in America eliminating any question about foreign countries' influence? All of these provisions are in the Freedom to Vote Act (FTVA.) The FTVA is a bipartisan bill that passed the House of Representatives but that Senate obstructionists will not even allow to go forward for debate. Both Florida senators are on the wrong side of this issue for the fifth time! Please contact Sen. Rubio and Sen. Rick Scott and ask: Senator, please allow the Freedom to Vote Act to come to the Senate for debate and the opportunity to pass this important law. Linda Richardson, Port Charlotte Enough of governor's tactics Gov. DeSantis has punished school boards by withholding funds if they defy state law concerning vaccine and mask mandates. He is threatening businesses with fines if they follow federal OSHA regulations concerning similar mandates. Our federal system gives federal law precedence over state law. Perhaps the federal government will retaliate by withholding federal funds the governor is counting on to balance the budget. Enough already. Peter Fagan, Naples State hasn't provided better COVID option I am a seasonal resident from a blue state. Back home the goal shared at the federal, state, and local level is to defeat COVID and get back to normal. The shared plan to meet the goal is get everyone vaccinated ASAP. Mandates like we had for diseases like polio or smallpox are OK when community health is in jeopardy. Here in Florida, the state and local governments are at odds with this plan, but they dont seem to have a better or more fair plan to get the job done. They seem intent on obstructing efforts to get people vaccinated and have no alternatives to offer. There may be alternatives like financial incentives, but nobody seems willing to pay. If there is a better option to mandates, lets hear it. Story continues Bob Schmidt, Sanibel Polarization prevents progress Its OK to agree with our political rivals once in a while. We might hope that cooperation among those who represent us wouldnt inspire a backlash from the small-minded. Regrettably, the Republicans in the House (13) and the Senate (19) who voted for the infrastructure bill have been targeted as traitors by the obstructionists who hate to give Biden a win. The very nasty twice-impeached ex-president and his particularly odious acolytes like Gaetz, Greene, Cruz and McCarthy were less than gracious. For these and other hardliners, its their way or the highway. The naysayers actually wanted an infrastructure bill when it was touted by the former promising prez who failed to deliver. But when it was proposed by a Democrat, the popular bill to rebuild our roads and bridges, increase internet access, and clean our water was unacceptable to Trump worshippers. For them, partisanship trumps good government. There is stubbornness on both sides. Six progressive Democrats couldnt bring themselves to accept half a loaf. They too get poor grades in getting along with others. Polarization prevents progress. Both sides have to be willing to compromise. If we cant get consensus on the easy stuff, the country is in big trouble. Kevin McNally, Bonita Springs Hope for return to normalcy Maybe there is hope. Perhaps a nation divided along political and racial lines can be saved by party moderates. In the recent elections in Virginia and nationwide, pundits and polls missed the mark badly. Ignoring extremists in both parties and disruptive factions like The Proud Boys and Black Lives Matter, voters spoke loud and clear. They sought a return to normalcy. For decades Backs and other minorities have bought into the artificial benevolence of the Democratic Party but are becoming more receptive to Republican messages, seeking more than unfulfilled promises. They are demanding full equality. For America to rebound from our current malaise we have to stop buying into political propaganda further perpetuated by a biased media. Throwing money at problems by an inept leader is not a viable solution. Neither is supporting a former president with a dictator mentality. America needs new faces offering fresh ideas instead of dubious promises of progress. Genuine progress benefits all, not a select segment of either party. Gerald Ponder, Cape Coral Editorial cartoon This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: Letters to the editor for Wednesday, November 17, 2021 FREEHOLD - A former Long Branch police officer accused of turning his basement into a methamphetamine lab is facing a 10-year prison term after pleading guilty to two crimes related to the discovery in May of the illegal facility. Christopher Walls, who had been a 19-year veteran of the Long Branch Police Department making $125,531 a year, pleaded guilty Tuesday before Superior Court Judge Jill G. OMalley to creating a widespread risk of injury, a second-degree crime carrying a prison term of five to 10 years, and manufacturing methamphetamine, a third-degree crime carrying a prison term up to five years, acting Monmouth County Prosecutor Lori Linskey said. Walls plea agreement calls for a 10-year prison sentence with no chance for release on parole before serving two years, Linskey said. The agreement also calls for his permanent forfeiture of public office as well as forfeiture of his firearms and firearms identification card, the acting prosecutor said. Defense attorney Mitchell Ansell said Walls had served on the Long Branch force for 19 years without a blemish, and he expects his client would be released from prison after serving two years. How they reacted: Arrest of Long Branch cop on charges of running a meth lab in his home stuns department Christopher Walls is a police officer accused on running a meth lab out of his Long Branch basement Walls, 50, of West End Avenue, Long Branch, had faced a more serious charge of first-degree maintaining or operating a controlled dangerous substance facility, as well as additional charges of possessing a firearm during a drug offense, child endangerment and possession of methamphetamine. "The Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office recognized that what Chris was doing did not rise to the level of a first-degree crime and accordingly extended a plea offer to Chris that he believes was fair, in light of all the factors and circumstances involved," said Ansell, of the Ocean Township law firm Ansell, Grimm and Aaron. In 2019, Walls began experimenting with chemicals as a hobby, and that led to his purchases of chemicals and glassware that he used to conduct experiments in a shed in his backyard, Ansell said. Story continues "Eventually, this experimenting led to the production of methamphetamine, something that Chris obviously knew was illegal," the defense attorney said. Long Branch crime: Man killed in hail of police bullets in Long Branch had lengthy criminal record In entering his guilty pleas, Walls admitted that his experimenting with chemicals, which led to the production of methamphetamine, created the potential risk of widespread injuries to neighbors within close proximity of his shed, Ansell said. "He is extremely remorseful for putting his family and neighbors in a potentially harmful situation by conducting these experiments," the defense attorney said of his client. Long Branch Public Safety Director Domingos Saldida declined to comment on Walls' guilty plea. "When this incident occurred, we were all outraged at Mr. Wall's betrayal to his oath of office, to the Long Branch Police Department and the community as a whole,'' said Long Branch Mayor John Pallone. "We're grateful to the Office of the Monmouth County Prosecutor for bringing this matter to a close.'' Walls has been compared to Walter White, the fictional chemistry teacher in the hit television series Breaking Bad," who turned to manufacturing and selling methamphetamine to provide financial stability for his family after being diagnosed with cancer. The drug lab was discovered on Walls' property on May 15 when police were called to his home on a report of a domestic disturbance. When police responded, Walls wife told them she suspected her husband was involved in suspicious drug activity, according to the affidavit of probable cause to arrest Walls. Walls wife provided police with photographs she took of books belonging to her husband about making methamphetamine, explosives and poison, the affidavit said. The New Jersey State Police Hazmat Unit responded to the home and, in the basement and a shed on the property, found all the materials needed to make methamphetamine. In addition, they found residue of the drug on glassware, as well as a large, open and unsecured gun safe accessible to a child living in the home. The gun safe contained two long guns, four handguns, eight high-capacity magazines and a large quantity of ammunition. At Walls detention hearing before Superior Court Judge Paul X. Escandon in May, Assistant Prosecutor Melanie Falco said the defendant had a conversation with a fellow officer about the main character in Breaking Bad." The defendant made a statement indicating Walter White made a lot of money making meth," Falco said at the hearing. I think there are some parallels between the fictional story of 'Breaking Bad' and Walter White to Mr. Walls situation," Escandon said at the hearing. He then went on to order Walls release from jail. Judges with the appellate division of Superior Court, however, reversed Escandons decision, and Walls remained jailed without bail to await the outcome of the case. OMalley scheduled Walls sentencing for Jan. 15. Kathleen Hopkins, a reporter in New Jersey since 1985, covers crime, court cases, legal issues, unsolved mysteries and just about every major murder trial to hit Monmouth and Ocean counties. Contact her at khopkins@app.com. This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Long Branch cop who ran meth lab pleads guilty to charges BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) Louisianas governor said Wednesday that he will definitely sign a posthumous pardon for Homer Plessy, whose 1892 arrest for refusing to leave a whites only railroad car wound up making separate but equal U.S. law for a half-century. Gov. John Bel Edwards said he wants relatives of people on both sides of Plessy v. Ferguson, which allowed Jim Crow laws discriminating against Blacks, to be with him when he signs the pardon. Keith Plessy, a descendant of one of Plessys cousins Homer Plessy had no children and Phoebe Ferguson, a great-great-granddaughter of Judge John Ferguson, created a foundation to advocate for civil rights education. The pardon should draw proper attention to just how historic this is to take away that conviction for something that should have obviously never ever been a crime, Edwards said on his monthly radio call-in show. The 30-year-old shoemaker's purchase of a ticket and his seating choice sprang from a late 19th century effort to overturn a segregation law. Instead, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1896 that as long as accomodations were equal, it was fine to make them separate. The decision thus sanctioned state and local governments to segregate housing, neighborhoods, schools, transportation and other public accomodations. Plessy pleaded guilty in 1897 to violating the Separate Car Act and paid a $25 fine. The conviction was on his record when he died in 1925. Louisiana's Board of Pardons voted unanimously Friday to recommend a pardon. The Orleans Parish district attorney got the issue before the board at the request of Keith Plessy and Phoebe Ferguson. Keith Plessy told the Board of Pardons that members of a 20th century civil rights group told him that Homer Plessy was the first freedom rider. By James Davey and Juby Babu LONDON (Reuters) - British retailer Marks & Spencer warned the UK government on Wednesday that proposals set out by the European Union to ease the transit of goods to Northern Ireland risked increasing the administrative burden rather than reducing it. In a letter to UK Brexit Minister David Frost seen by Reuters, M&S Chairman Archie Norman said the EU's proposals "sound reasonable, but could result in worsening friction and cost and a high level of ambiguity and scope for dispute." Last month, the EU offered Britain a package of measures which stopped short of the overhaul that London is demanding. The EU's executive said the measures could halve customs paperwork and cut checks on meat, dairy and other food products coming to Northern Ireland from mainland Britain by 80%. In return for concessions, the EU wants proper sharing of live data, reinforced monitoring of supply chains and labelling to ensure British products do not slip into the EU single market via a Northern Ireland back door. Norman said the proposals could end up more costly to implement than full EU custom controls, with the relief offered in lighter touch border controls insufficient to offset the extra cost of labelling. He said that labelling the circa 90 million products M&S sells annually in Northern Ireland would cost the retailer 9 million pounds ($12.1 million) a year. Norman also noted that under the proposals a vet would need to oversee certification of 95% of product volume sent from the UK to Northern Ireland. "This adds cost and a minimum of 4 hours per day into the supply chain which - with the other delays - means goods will take 1.8 days (45 hours) more to get to store than prior to the UK's departure from the European Union," he said, adding that the product range available for consumers would be impacted. Norman said the best solution is for Britain and the EU to agree a time-limited equivalence arrangement. Story continues Frost said on Wednesday Britain's preference is to strike a deal to improve post-Brexit trade arrangements for Northern Ireland and that the agreement can be reached by Christmas. Norman's letter to Frost was first reported by the Financial Times. ($1 = 0.7412 pounds) (Reporting by James Davey in London and Juby Babu in Bengaluru; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Stephen Coates) Stella Cook had just arrived in Florida when she received a call, informing her that her husband had been attacked while he was at work in Clarksville. Cook testified Tuesday morning about those moments and the ones that followed, when her family was forced to do the unthinkable. (L to R) Shelby Silvey, Tavares Harbison, Jevon Brodie, and Vicki Carriker watch a 2018 video of the Teddy Cook laundromat attack during trial in Montgomery County courthouse Nov. 16, 2021. We had to make the decision to unplug him," Stella Cook said, crying on the stand while she testified during the trial of two teenagers, accused of beating her husband Teddy Cook, 71, to death. The widow said Cook suffered from serve seizures after the incident. The two had been together for 28 years before he died in 2018, she said in court. Previous coverage: Motive takes center stage as trial begins in Teddy Cook laundromat beating death Teddy Cook was working at the Clarksville Super Suds Laundromat and Car Wash on May 30, 2018, when he was attacked. He'd only worked there for a handful of years, his wife said. By the end of the night, Teddy Cook was being treated in a local hospital. Nine days later, he died. Police identified three teens as suspects in connection with Cook's death: two 14-year-olds and one 13-year-old. The three allegedly robbed Cook of $34, stole his truck and beat him that night. Jevon Brodie, Tavares Harbison and Harrison Smith, now ages 17 and 18, were each charged as adults with first-degree murder and especially aggravated robbery. Smith pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in connection with Cook's death earlier this year, and he may testify this week. 'I can hardly stand up' During trial, jurors listened to the 911 call Teddy Cook made after the attack. CPD detective Nathan Lee shows a Montgomery County jury a BB gun rifle used to assault Teddy Cook in the 2018 laundromat attack, Nov. 16, 2021. On the phone, Teddy Cook described how he was beaten badly by three boys and needed assistance, as he was alone and bleeding from the head. They kicked me. They stomped me," Teddy Cook said, his voice recorded during the 911 call. I just need some help. "I can hardly stand up." The jurors watched footage of the incident from several different cameras inside the laundromat. According to a witness who worked at the laundromat, there were three cameras inside and two outside the business. Story continues Discovery in shed Clarksville Police Detective Nathan Lee testified how officers arrived at Smith's home and discovered a nearby, door-less shed the day after Teddy Cook's assault. Inside the shed were clothes, multiple small piles of coins that totaled to $34.15, laptops and backpacks. There was also a BB gun rifle hanging inside the shed, Lee said. Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Forensic Expert Gregory Fort told the jury Tuesday afternoon that he'd performed a DNA analysis on the rifle found in the shed, matching Brodie's DNA. There was a second DNA match, but the results were inconclusive, Fort testified. Medical experts: Manner, cause of death Tristar Skyline Medical Center Trauma Medical Director Darrell Hunt detailed Teddy Cook's injuries and cause of death Tuesday afternoon. Teddy Cook was considered a level two trauma transfer when he arrived at Tristar, Hunt said, noting the patient was stable for the first 2-3 days of his stay in the hospital. His health started to decline over time. Teddy Cook had several strokes, continuous brain bleeding and blood clots, Hunt testified. Teddy Cook Teddy Cook had a brain surgery intended to help with blood drainage, but he did not regain consciousness afterwards, Hunt said. After signs of declining health, Hunt recalled telling the family, "we were in a no-win situation." Multiple kicks to the head started the brain bleed, Hunt said. It was determined that Teddy Cook did not have skull fractures to the head, but visible abrasions to the face and body. The defense looked into Cook's previous medical history and medications. Stella Cook testified that her husband had two open heart surgeries in the 1990's, leading to the installation of a mechanical heart valve. Teddy Cook took blood thinner medication and had a history of hypertension. Defense Attorney Shelby Silvery pointed out that Teddy Cook's health declined after the brain surgery. She also mentioned that Teddy Cook had more bleeding in the brain after being put back on blood thinner medication following the surgery. But Hunt was quick to argue that despite Teddy Cook's medical and or health conditions, "without being kicked in the head, Mr. Cook lived a normal life." Metropolitan Nashville Chief Medical Examiner Feng Li, who performed the autopsy on Teddy Cook, said despite his significant health conditions, Teddy Cook's cause of death was the result of complications from blunt force trauma and the manner of death was homicide. Trial is set to resume Wednesday morning. Alexis Clark can be reached at aclark@gannett.com or 931-217-8519. Follow her on Twitter @Lexclark_. To support her work, sign up for a digital subscription to TheLeafChronicle.com. This article originally appeared on Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle: Teddy Cook's cause of death discussed during laundromat beating trial A groundbreaking lawsuit in New Mexico could serve as a blueprint for how government officials deal with armed militia groups that deploy to public spaces and act like law enforcement officers despite having no authority to do so. The civil suit, filed by a district attorney in Albuquerque and the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at the Georgetown University Law Center, seeks an injunction against members of the New Mexico Civil Guard, an armed group that sent its members to demonstrations last year under the pretense of providing security. The injunction would ban the group and its members from engaging in behavior the plaintiffs argue is dangerous and unlawful. But the case has hit a snag: The plaintiffs argue that they need Meta, the company that runs Facebook, to provide key evidence linking members of the New Mexico Civil Guard to posts on the social media site. Meta has dragged its feet for 10 months, the plaintiffs say, and the company now says it can't provide the records because they were deleted when the militia members were banned from Facebook. Albuquerque police detain members of the New Mexico Civil Guard, an armed civilian group, following the shooting of a man during a protest over a statue of Spanish conquerer Juan de Onate on Monday, June 15, 2020, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The plaintiffs' attorneys don't believe that. They've asked Meta's chief technology officer to sign a declaration saying the records no longer exist, but the company has refused to do so. Monday, the plaintiffs filed a petition against the company in California to force it to cough up the records or provide proof that they have been permanently deleted. "If Facebook is going to allow itself to be used as a platform for recruiting and training and directing extremist, malicious activity, then at a minimum, they have a basic ethical and legal responsibility to maintain account information," said Raul Torrez, the Bernalillo County district attorney who brought the lawsuit. Illegal militias: Why haven't authorities cracked down on armed groups? The case against Grandmaster Jay: Black people formed one of the largest militias in the US. Now its leader is in prosecutors' crosshairs. Story continues Rare action against an unauthorized militia group In June 2020, a protest in Old Town Albuquerque over the proposed removal of a statue of Juan de Onate, the Spanish conquistador and colonial governor of New Mexico, turned violent. Dozens of protesters calling for the statue's demolition faced off against counterprotesters, including heavily armed men wearing military-style fatigues members of the New Mexico Civil Guard. This bronze statue of Juan de Onate leading a group of Spanish settlers outside the Albuquerque Museum in New Mexico was at the center of a protest that turned violent in June 2020. One man was shot in the scuffle. Though militia members were not involved in the shooting, their presence as an unlicensed, unsanctioned, armed security force in a public space got Torrez's attention. "They're invading the province of traditional police authority, which is a highly regulated space that the state and the government must maintain a monopoly over," Torrez said. "The police have the authority to use deadly force under very limited circumstances, but we expect them to be highly trained." Torrez began searching for a legal mechanism to prevent members of the group from intervening in protests or pretending to have authority they don't possess. He started working with Mary McCord, executive director of Georgetown Law's Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection. McCord and her team have been sounding the alarm on illegal armed militia groups for years. They have collated a wealth of information about laws across the country against such groups, and they've long questioned why prosecutors don't take an active role in enforcing laws against such groups. New Mexico's Constitution forbids private military units from operating in the state. Statutes outlaw engaging in paramilitary activity like firearms training or, particularly relevant to the 2020 case, exercising the functions of a peace officer. All 50 states have similar bans, ranging from prohibitions in state constitutions some of which are somewhat vague to criminal statutes outlawing paramilitary activity and training. Gun rights advocates and members of unauthorized militia groups gather in Richmond, Virginia, on Jan. 20, 2020, to protest potential gun control bills. Prosecutors have been slow to use these laws, McCord said, even as armed groups have become a more visible and dangerous feature of the political landscape. Armed protests hit a peak in 2020 and began rising again after a cooling-off period following the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, according to data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project. Protests where arms are present are six times more likely to turn violent as protests where no guns are present, the group concluded in a recent study. "I really applaud Raul's willingness to say: 'I do have this tool. I'm going to use this tool under my statutory authority,'" McCord said. "But too few very few have done anything similar." Paul Kennedy, the Albuquerque attorney representing the New Mexico Civil Guard defendants, did not respond to a request for comment. Case hits a snag The lawsuit against the New Mexico Civil Guard claims that Facebook posts by its members outline illegal activity and recruiting efforts. Facebook was a major organizing platform for the group, plaintiffs say. The plaintiffs say they have reams of evidence posted publicly on Facebook by accounts connected to the group. There's just one problem: The company removed the accounts connected to the New Mexico Civil Guard in 2020 under its Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy. Plaintiffs don't have the metadata that would definitively connect those posts to the defendants and show who the administrators of the militia-related pages were. The plaintiffs first asked for these records in June 2020. In a court filing, they say they have been asking for them ever since. Meta spokesman Andy Stone sent USA TODAY a statement saying the company always responds to requests from law enforcement to preserve account information. The company "will provide it, in accordance with applicable law and our terms, when we receive valid legal process. When we preserve data we do so for a period of time, which can be extended at the request of law enforcement, Stone said in the statement. McCord said Meta is essentially hiding behind its processes to avoid giving up the records. Somewhere in the company's vast data banks these records must still exist, McCord said. And if they don't, the plaintiffs have offered Meta an alternative: to have the company's chief technology officer sign a sworn declaration that the deleted records can't be retrieved. Meta has declined to do so. Are the records gone? In lieu of the declaration sought by the plaintiffs, Meta has offered to have an official custodian of records for the company make a sworn declaration that the records no longer exist. McCord said that's insufficient. The records may not exist in their original form, and a custodian of records can state as much, but that doesn't mean Meta doesn't retain the data in some other form, she said. Federal law governing the retention of customer data by social media companies is so outdated that even the companies have called for it to be updated. William Null stands in the gallery of the Michigan Senate Chamber in the Capitol during a rally organized by Michigan United for Liberty to demand the reopening of businesses in April 2020. McCord and Torrez said there's a problem with Meta's position in the case: If the company intends to ban people it labels "dangerous individuals," how can it learn from its past when it keeps no record of which people have been banned for violating its policies? "This is a company that literally is built on monetizing every last, tiny, insignificant bit of everyone's personal information on their site," Torrez said. "Yet, when they find an organization or an individual that's too dangerous to be on the site, they delete it and put it in some form that can never be accessed again. "If that's true, that's troubling. And if it isn't true, that's also troubling." This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: New Mexico DA sues militia group but needs Facebook records MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexico will deploy a battalion of National Guard troops to its Mayan Riviera in the wake of a spate of shootings that have put the crown jewel of the countrys tourism industry on edge. Defense Secretary Luis Cresencio Sandoval, speaking Wednesday in Cancun, said that 1,445 guard members will be sent to Quintana Roo states Caribbean coast to reinforce the regions security. The deployment will include the establishment of a base in the beach town of Tulum, where two foreign tourists were killed and three wounded Oct. 20 in the crossfire between drug dealers. He said the Navy would contribute an additional 100 elements to the effort and increase intelligence gathering efforts in the area. The additional security will begin operations by Dec. 1, Sandoval said. The more recent incident was a Nov. 4 shootout on a beach in Puerto Morelos south of Cancun, involving a squad of armed men who left two alleged drug dealers dead. The daytime bloodshed sent tourists scrambling for cover at two large hotels where local drug gangs were apparently competing for drug sales. That cant happen again, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said. We have to avoid that happening. Thats why theres this plan to reinforce security. Earlier this month, Quintana Roo state prosecutor Oscar Montes de Oca said authorities had detected 12 gangs running street-level drug sales in Tulum and Puerto Morelos. Mexico has continued to struggle with stubbornly high levels of violence through the first three years of Lopez Obradors administration. He has been criticized for his heavy reliance on the military rather than reformed policing, while also insisting that a previous strategy of pursuing drug kingpins was mistaken. COVID-19 boosters will soon be available to anyone who wants one here in Minnesota. Driving the news: Department of Health commissioner Jan Malcolm said Tuesday that the state will expand booster eligibility to all Minnesotans this week, whether or not the federal government gives the green light. The announcement comes as the Biden administration prepares to expand authorization to all adults in the coming days, per Axios' Caitlin Owens. Why it matters: Minnesota currently has some of the highest case rates in the nation. On Tuesday, the average seven-day test positivity rate exceeded 10% for the first time in almost a year. Booster shots are an added layer of protection against illness amid the ongoing surge. Stay on top of the latest market trends and economic insights with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free Context: Data shows that while the shots continue to offer strong protection against serious illness, vaccine effectiveness has waned over time and with the rise of Delta, Caitlin writes. While there's disagreement among some experts about whether all adults need a booster, studies show the extra doses, administered months after the first shots, can restore protection to higher levels. What they're saying: Malcolm told reporters in a press call that concerns about the current surge and an increase in breakthrough cases drove the decision to move ahead. "The data are so compelling on the value of boosters to increase that level of protection that we think it's quite urgent to move," she said. Yes, but: Demand for boosters or additional doses has been relatively low so far among those already eligible, a population that includes seniors, people with health conditions that make them more vulnerable and anyone who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine. About 715,000 third or booster doses have been administered in Minnesota so far. For context, more than 3 million residents are fully vaccinated, per MDH data. Between the lines: Approval from state and federal officials could encourage more Minnesotans to seek the booster dose, but many residents are already eligible given the current criteria. Story continues Existing guidelines, for example, allow anyone with a BMI over 25 to get a shot. Two-thirds of the population meets that criteria. What to watch: Given the current levels of community transmission, upcoming Thanksgiving gatherings and travel could worsen or elongate this fall surge. More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free LOS ANGELES Hollywood studio Miramax sued director Quentin Tarantino on Tuesday over his plans to sell digital collectibles based on his 1994 film "Pulp Fiction." Tarantino recently announced that he will sell a series of unique non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, based on his handwritten screenplay for the 1995 Palme d'Or winner, a movie described by the Cannes film festival as a set of "dime-store stories set in lowlife LA." A website for the NFT sales says they will include a digital version of the film's profane and "iconic 'Royale with Cheese' scene," as well as a recording of Tarantino revealing "secrets" about the project. The lawsuit by Miramax, which produced the film and is owned by Bein Media Group and ViacomCBS, alleges that Tarantino also plans to sell NFTs of page scans and digital film props. Tarantino's attorney, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement to NBC News on Wednesday, Miramax is wrong plain and simple." "Quentin Tarantinos contract is clear: he has the right to sell NFTs of his hand-written script for 'Pulp Fiction' and this ham-fisted attempt to prevent him from doing so will fail," Freedman said. "But Miramaxs callous decision to disclose confidential information about its filmmakers contracts and compensation will irreparably tarnish its reputation long after this case is dismissed." According to the suit, which seeks unspecified damages, a lawyer responded to Miramax's Nov. 4 cease-and-desist letter by saying Tarantino holds reserved rights to print publication of the script. Miramax argued in the suit that print publication and NFTs are not the same. "The proposed sale of a few original script pages or scenes as an NFT is a one-time transaction, which does not constitute publication, and in any event does not fall within the intended meaning of 'print publication' or 'screenplay publication,'" the suit says. "The right to sell NFTs of such excerpts of any version of the screenplay to Pulp Fiction is owned and controlled by Miramax." Story continues In the suit, which was filed in federal court in Los Angeles, Miramax argues that Tarantino essentially signed away rights to "all media" for "Pulp Fiction" in perpetuity when the film was under development in 1993. "Miramax holds the rights needed to develop, market, and sell NFTs relating to its deep film library," the suit says. CORRECTION (Nov. 17, 2021, 8:21 p.m. ET): A previous version of this article misspelled Quentin Tarantinos attorneys first name. He is Bryan Freedman, not Brian Freedman. Elijah Lewis, the five-year-old son of Danielle Dauphinais, who compared the boy to serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer four months before his body was found in the woods (New Hampshire Attorney Generals Office) A mother in New Hampshire sent her friend a text comparing her five-year-old son to the prolific serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer months before the boys body was found in the woods. "I want him gone," the woman, Danielle Dauphinais, allegedly wrote to her friend, according to The Boston Globe. The recipient of the texts, Ms Dauphinais' friend Erika Wolfe, shared the messages with the paper. According to Ms Wolfe, she had not spoken with her friend in several years, but Ms Dauphinais reached out to sympathise over a post Ms Wolfe had made on Snapchat complaining about her teenager's attitude. I call him the next Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer, Ms Dauphinais wrote about her five-year-old son Elijah Lewis. Its so sad but I have no connection with this child. Ms Dauphinais told Ms Wolfe that she had been keeping Elijah in his room because she could not "trust him anymore," and suggested the boy would play in his own faeces and urinate on his clothes and bed. Hes been getting worse and worse, she told Ms Wolfe. I want him gone. I cant handle it anymore. She described life with her son as a "nightmare that I can't wake up from." The boy had been living with his mother for less than a year. Before moving in with his mother, he had lived with his father, but was sent away for reasons that are still unclear. According to the newspaper, Elijah's father had previously called his ex-wife "violent and impulsive" and claimed she had "a history of domestic violence and substance abuse." New Hampshire authorities began searching for Elijah on 14 October, though his mother had not reported him missing prior to that date. Law enforcement searched five states for the boy, eventually discovering his body in the woods in Massachusetts on 23 October. Days prior, on 17 October, Ms Dauphinais and her boyfriend, Joseph Stapf, were arrested and charged with witness tampering and child endangerment. Story continues The witness tampering charges allege that they each asked other people to lie about Elijah and where he was living, knowing that child protection service workers were searching for Elijah, local authorities said in a statement on 17 October. The endangerment charge alleges that they violated a duty of care, protection or support for Elijah. Ms Wolfe said she forgot about the messages until she saw news reports that Elijah was missing. She then sent the texts to a relative a day before Ms Dauphinais' arrest. The family member reportedly forwarded the texts to the police. According to Ms Wolfe, she was never questioned about the messages. Ms Dauphinais and Mr Stapf have pleaded not guilty, and have not been charged with the murder of or in connection with Elijah's death. The boy's cause of death has yet to be determined. Three Munroe Falls officials have signed an agreement to end a 3-year legal battle that a fired police sergeant waged against the city. Bob Post is set to receive more than $500,000 from the city and various insurance policies as part of the agreement signed by Mayor James Armstrong, Law Director Thomas Kostoff and former Police Chief Jerry Hughes. The city has spent at least $111,525 on legal costs in the case since 2018, with more fees expected to be billed next month. More: Former police Sgt. Bob Post, Munroe Falls agree to settlement "We're proud of this result as it allows Mr. Post to receive his full back wages and retire with dignity like he deserves," Post's attorney Chris Lalak said. "It allows the parties to put the matter behind them.." Hughes announced in April 2018 that Post was relieved from his dutiesfollowing an investigation as the result of a citizens complaint. Post's complaint, filed in December 2018 and handled in U.S. District Court in Youngstown, named the city, Armstrong, Hughes and Kostoff as defendants, accusing them of First Amendment retaliation, defamation, malicious prosecution and civil conspiracy. He sought compensation for lost earnings and benefits, as well as damages, court costs and attorney fees. According to the agreement, Post will receive $522,976.41, including: $256,089.48 in back wages, including contractual raises, through his retirement eligibility date of Nov. 17, 2021. $49,937.45 from the Ohio Police and Fire Pension Fund. $196,049.48 for attorneys fees and costs incurred. An additional $20,000. As part of the settlement, the city and the three officials "do not admit any violation of law, liability or invasion of any rights," with the defendants expressly denying the accusations. Earlier this month, Munroe Falls City Council approved a resolution to contribute up to $135,000 out of the general fund to contribute to the settlement, and on Tuesday Armstrong said that the city contributed about $131,000, or roughly 25% of the total settlement. Story continues More: Munroe Falls to pay former police sergeant up to $135,000 The majority of the remaining balance will be paid from the city's insurance policy, and about $50,000 will be paid from homeowner insurance policy shared by Armstrong and his wife. Armstrong said neither Hughes nor Kostoff are contributing to the settlement. "[The city's] insurance approached mine, and my insurance carrier stepped up and basically covered me on the case," Armstrong said. "Now, why mine was the only one, I can't really speak specifically to that." He said he was satisfied that the terms of the settlement meant Post could not return to his job with the city and that the cost to taxpayers was less than the litigation costs. "We estimated [legal costs] were going to be $180,000 to $200,000 because we had the trial, the court of appeals case and an entire two or three day hearing under arbitration," Armstrong said. "The only reason to try the case was my own ego, and I wasn't willing to use taxpayer dollars for that." The settlement comes as the three city officials named in the suit are in transitional periods of their careers. Hughes retired Nov. 1 after five years as police chief, and Armstrong announced he will resign in January to become director of legal services with Summit County Developmental Disabilities Board. More: Jerry Hughes announces retirement as Munroe Falls Police Chief More: Munroe Falls mayor stepping down in January Meanwhile, Kostoff's appointment as law director expires Jan. 31. Council is currently considering his reappointment, and the resolution to rehire him for a a one-year term had its first reading on Tuesday. Council President Chris Ritzinger, however, recommended that the legislation be tabled at the second or third reading in December. "This is in no way any negative with Mr. Kostoff," Ritzinger said. adding that after Armstrong retires "it will be council president after the Jan. 3 meeting who becomes mayor. I feel that person should have some input in that...that gives that individual and the mayor some time to talk and help with that decision." Reporter Krista S. Kano can be reached at 330-541-9416, kkano@thebeaconjournal.com or on Twitter @KristaKanoABJ. This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Munroe Falls, former police sergeant finalize settlement over firing "I Voted" stickers. Ethan Miller/Getty Images A Las Vegas man whose claim he had evidence of fraud in the 2020 presidential election was amplified by the Nevada Republican Party pleaded guilty on Tuesday to voting more than once in the same election. Last November, Donald "Kirk" Hartle told KLAS that someone cast a ballot in the election for his wife, Rosemarie Hartle, who died of breast cancer in 2017. It was "sickening," he said, and "made no sense to me, but it lent some credence to what you've been hearing in the media about these possibilities and now it makes me wonder how pervasive this is?" The Nevada GOP pounced, tweeting video of the interview with a caption asking, "How did the forged signature pass Clark County's signature verification machine? And this isn't the only case of a deceased person voting in NV." The Nevada secretary of state and attorney general's offices, which investigate allegations of voter fraud, filed charges against Kirk Hartle, accusing him of mailing in his late wife's ballot and voting twice in the election. Hartle agreed to plead guilty to avoid serving time in prison, and was sentenced on Tuesday to probation and ordered to pay a $2,000 fine. "Ultimately to me, this seems like a cheap political stunt that kind of backfired and shows that our voting system actually works because you were ultimately caught," Judge Carli Kierny said. In a statement, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford said that "though rare, voter fraud can undercut trust in our election system. This particular case of voter fraud was particularly egregious because the offender continually spread inaccurate information about our elections despite being the source of fraud himself." The Nevada GOP has not deleted its tweet about Hartle's false claims, or responded to KLAS's requests for comment. You may also like A Harry Potter reunion is happening, reportedly without J.K. Rowling Virginia local school board reverses ban of 'sexually explicit' books after public outcry The Democrats need a unified adversary in 2022 Vincent Conte and Ron Marinosci are sipping from small paper cups on the sidewalk patio at Tivertons Coastal Roasters (1791 Main Rd, Tiverton). Retired and relaxed as they soak in the early autumn sun, the two meet here most mornings to shoot the breeze and drink coffee. I come from Warren for this coffee, says Conte, holding up his cup. For me, its worth the trip. Its so fresh, says Marinosci, the more garrulous of the two. It doesnt get much better. Plus, I come for the company, he smiles. Coffee beans are processed at Coastal Roasters in Tiverton. An average of 400 customers visit Coastal Roasters each day, for the company, the view of the Sakonnet River, and some of the freshest, best-tasting coffee around. We roast between 45,000 and 50,000 pounds of coffee every year, says Donald Machado, who owns and operates Coastal with his ex-wife, Lisa. Dressed in a yoga tank top and his trademark flip flops, he exudes the chill vibe of Tivertons laid-back style. I think our customers like to see that what theyre getting is as fresh as it can be. From crop to cup. They see me roasting and they feel good about what theyre buying. Our customers were telling us that there was no good coffee in town and we listened. Donald and Lisa opened Coastal back in 2002. They both had corporate backgrounds but were feeling burned out. An opportunity arose to buy the space a former fish market, among other things and they jumped on it without thinking. Although Donald had done a little home roasting of his own, I dont know what possessed me to think that I could run a coffee business just cause I could home roast, he says. But I did. With Lisa running operations and staffing, Donald devoted his efforts to roasting, sourcing product and absorbing the coffee arts. He learned commercial roasting on the fly and was able to determine after giving away lots of free cups of coffee what his customers were looking for. Initially, I envisioned just roasting coffee for a living. I really wasnt planning on being a cafe operator, he says. But our customers were telling us that there was no good coffee in town and we listened. By the fall of 2002, the so-called Third Wave of Coffee a phenomenon referring to the post-Starbucks local cafe scene had kicked in and Coastal became a fully operating cafe. Story continues Donald Machado roasted beans at home before opening Coastal Roasters. While buying high-quality green coffee beans in bulk from trusted sources (largely fair-trade coffee growers) is labor-intensive, controlling the roasting process is more profitable and provides consumers with a gently artisan, bespoke product. And when the roasting is done in-house, it builds a dedicated local clientele, and gives that clientele a special place to invest their time and money a community sanctuary. Roasting gave us a fresh product and total control over the entire process, Donald says. We are in touch with the coffee brokers, we do the cupping as well as the roast profiling, and so we know exactly what were selling to our customers. People would come in and see me roasting in the back of the store and think it was a novelty. It wasnt, but my customers got a kick out of it. As a roaster, Donald sticks to the basics. Many Third Wave roasters experiment with different approaches to different beans, seeking out exotic coffees with unique flavor profiles. Not Donald. The science hasnt evolved over the years, he says, pushing a few windblown strands of blonde hair off his tanned forehead. The machinery hasnt changed, either. Theres not a lot I can do with it. Im happy not to. I know that theres more going on in the industry and newer, younger people pushing the roasting process. But Im fine with the established style that we have, and my customers really like it. Over in Middletown, a lovable old dog named Blue pads into Custom House Coffee at 796 Aquidneck Avenue, his owner seeking a fresh cup of coffee. There he is, theres Blue! says one of the baristas. The reception is overwhelming, and the happy dog is soon attended to by a half-dozen members of the Custom House staff. Bob Mastin checks the beans as theyre roasting. The beans are heated to around 420 degrees for a lighter roast and 460 degrees for a darker roast. Bob Mastin, the establishments president, general manager and roaster, loves the welcome Blue gets because, he observes, it says a lot about his place and the homey vibe his customers feel when they come in. Were like a family here, he says, literally opening his arms to the scene. I feel like the father figure, and Im very grateful for all of them. A Navy veteran with a background in both accounting and engineering, Mastin started at home with a simple air roaster and some green coffee beans he purchased online. Now he has a successful business with a staff of 20 and two coffee roasting machines responsible for roasting between 1,000 and 2,000 pounds of beans a week. I left the Navy knowing I wanted to start this business, and its been a real journey ever since, he says. Bob Mastin stocks the display at Custom House Coffee. The bean selection includes 20 different varietals and 1015 blends. The shops original machine, a Diedrich IR-12, roasts in 26-pound batches. Their current workhorse (by the same manufacturer) doubles that capacity and requires an afterburner to keep excessive smoke and ash from escaping into the environment. Back in 2001, when I had just gotten started, I flew out to Idaho to meet with Stephen Diedrich, the guy who designed these roasters, Mastin says. He taught me everything I know about running a production like this and roasting great coffee. Mastin takes a classic, conservative approach to his roasting. Over the years, he has determined what his customers like a medium- to dark-roasted coffee and has served it up, as fresh as possible, to his regular clientele. You can experiment all you want with flavor profiles, he says, but your customers might not like it. Id rather just focus on giving them the kind of coffee they like to drink. More: An entrepreneur leaves his mark on Tiverton Four Corners. In his two decades of coffee roasting, Mastin has built a steady, successful business with that approach, both retailing and wholesaling his fresh-roasted coffee beans. Forty percent of his roasted beans are wholesaled to clients like Clements Marketplace, and both Cru and Belles cafes. The operation requires attention to detail especially trying to keep all of those roasted beans fresh. Oxygen is the enemy of freshness, he says. Custom House Coffees Bob Mastin examines a shipment of green coffee beans. Mastin now offloads most of the roasting responsibility to his staff, including his head roaster, Steve Demeter (better known as The Coffee Guy, for his frequent appearances at local farmers markets and festivals). Also helping with roasting are Felicity McDonough, the green coffee buyer, assistant general manager Jessica James, and store manager Kaitlin Welch. Like everything else at Custom House Coffee, roasting is a team effort. Still, Mastin controls the final product. His roasts, like the roasts at Coastal, are traditional. He doesnt dabble much in light-roast, as most regular coffee drinkers prefer their beans a little darker. Medium-roast coffees reach between 400 and 430 degrees Fahrenheit and are typically roasted a little beyond first crack, but not all the way to second crack, Mastin explains, noting that the first crack is a stage where the vapors inside the beans break through the outer wall and create a cracking noise. Thats the sweet spot, he says. But some beans have a different sweet spot. You just have to work a little to find it. More: Looking for a new furry friend? This new cafe in Tiverton lets patrons meet and adopt cats Over on Broadway in Newport, in the Empire Tea & Coffee nerve center (aka roasting room), its business as usual. CJ Barone and Tim Boughton are filling a 32-gallon container with freshly roasted beans. Barone shovels out a handful with a big metal scoop. This is our light roast, he says. Theres no surface oil on the bean. He walks over to another barrel. This is our espresso. The bean is nearly as light, with only a hint of surface oil. And so our discussion about the nuances of roasting coffee beans begins. More: Eight places you've got to try to get coffee around Newport County Empire Fills a void in Newport Barone started Empire in 2004, but the company began roasting its own beans just eight years ago. There was a void in Newport at the time, he says. There were few places offering specialty coffees back then, besides a few competitors and Starbucks. The cafe started out wholesaling its coffee from Mastin at Custom House Coffee, then diversified their sources. Finally, they invested in roasting machines to gain full control of the process. Empire Tea & Coffee owner CJ Barone prepares tp check the flavor of a roast a process called cupping. At first, we were roasting some coffee and were doing it really light, he says. Since Barone and his coworkers dont take their coffee with cream or sugar, they were very pleased with the results. Unfortunately, their customers, who usually add cream and sugar, didnt think so. When you add cream and sugar to a light roast, those things became overpowering, and they told us it tasted like water, Barone says. A darker roast, like the coffee at the Custom House, stands up to cream and sugar really well. It didnt take Barone long to recalibrate, and to start roasting for his customers tastes. Still, that didnt pre-vent him from focusing on the lighter side of roasting, but finding the fullest flavor possible. If you like really dark roasts, were definitely not the place for you in general, he admits. We tend to be more in the medium to just-past-medium roast range. But even our dark roast is not dark. Its roasted for a dark profile, so it has a ton of great flavor, but its not oily. Empire Tea & Coffees Jarron VanCeylon makes a pour-over mug of coffee. People ask for my advice on coffee all the time, he adds. I just tell them, However you like it, thats how you should make it. In the end, however, coffee is only part of the story. Were all just here to add a place for you to have a conversation, a great cup of coffee, Barone says. Why should we try to move the world in any other way than being a place to come, relax and enjoy getting away from everything else? Theres enough competition in this world. Theres enough to worry about. It can just be about us spending time together. This article originally appeared on Newport Daily News: Newport-area coffee roasters work the beans to bring you a better cup COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) In their first four games, the No. 3 Maryland Terrapins have won by an average of 31 points. After their latest win, a 98-57 romp over Mount St. Marys coach Brenda Frese said that the teams biggest victory of the season wasnt good enough for her. I still wasnt pleased tonight, Frese said. If theres a team thats a lesser opponent than us, were looking for perfection in everything that were doing. Angel Reese scored 18 points and had a career-high 15 rebounds, Mimi Collins scored 18 points and grabbed nine rebounds, and Ashley Owusu had 16 as Maryland rolled to a 98-57 win over Mount St. Marys on Tuesday night. Katie Benzan had 14 points and eight assists. Chloe Bibby added 13 points and nine rebounds. and Shyanne Sellers had 12 points and 11 rebounds. Mount St. Marys was led by Aryna Taylors 21. Kendall Bresee had 12 points and eight rebounds. Maryland (4-0) scored the games first 16 points and didnt allow a field goal until Taylor hit a 3-pointer with 2:13 left in the first quarter. The Terrapins led 23-7 after one, and increased their lead to 53-28 at halftime, shooting 61.1% in the first half. Mount St. Marys (1-2), which rolled over Division III Valley Forge 102-15 on Saturday, had no answer for bigger, more athletic Maryland. The Terrapins outrebounded the Mount 51-31. Weve just got to make it uneasy, Mount St. Marys coach Antoine White said. Some of their looks were a little bit too easy. Owusu, who rolled her left ankle early in the third quarter in Sundays game at James Madison, practiced on Monday, and showed no ill effects during her time in the game. Maryland played without star junior guard Diamond Miller, whos missed the first four games with a sore right knee. BIG PICTURE Mount St. Marys: After their lopsided win against overmatched Valley Forge, and this difficult loss against a highly ranked team, the Mount has two games, against Lehigh and Howard that they should be competitive in. Story continues Maryland: The Terrapins continue to methodically defeat their opponents, and beginning Sunday face a tough week of games against No. 6 Baylor, No. 5 NC State and No. 7 Stanford. HOT START Frese had no complaints about how quickly Maryland began the game. I loved our start, Frese said. I loved that first quarter. When youre talking about seven points, I thought it was a pretty complete game for us. Walker, in his first season as Mount St. Marys coach had a different perspective about Marylands big start. They were practice shots for this team, and if you give this team practice shots, theyre going to knock them down a a high clip. STAT OF THE GAME Maryland had 20 assists to nine turnovers while Mount St. Marys had 13 assists and committed 19 turnovers. REESES NUMBERS With so many difficult teams in the near future, Reese tried to make certain the team didnt let up. I was letting the game come to me per usual, she said. My teammates were feeding me, and they were much smaller than us, and taking advantage of the inside-out was a big thing. UP NEXT Mount St. Marys: Visits Lehigh on Friday Maryland: Hosts UNC Wilmington on Thursday ___ More AP womens college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/womens-college-basketball and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25 A Hamilton, Ontario youth under the age of 18 has been arrested and charged for alleged involvement in the theft of $46 million worth of cryptocurrencies bitcoin and bitcoin cash. Hamilton Police say the victim was located in the United States. The arrest was the result of a joint investigation with the Federal Bureau of Investigations and the United States Secret Service Electronic Crimes Task Force that started in March 2020. "The victim had been targeted by a SIM swap attack, a method of hijacking valuable accounts by manipulating cellular network employees to duplicate phone numbers so threat actors can intercept two-factor authorization requests," Hamilton Police allege in a news release. "As a result of the SIM swap attack, approximately $46 million CAD worth of cryptocurrency was stolen from the victim. This is currently the biggest cryptocurrency theft reported from one person." Police say the alleged perpetrator was arrested for theft over $5,000.00 and possession of property or proceeds of property obtained by crime. Police say a gaming username led to the arrest. "The joint investigation revealed that some of the stolen cryptocurrency was used to purchase an online username that was considered to be rare in the gaming community," allege Hamilton Police. "This transaction led investigators to uncover the account holder of the rare username." According to Hamilton Police, it seized $7 million worth of cryptocurrency, and that the matter is now before the courts. Under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, those under 18 years of age charged or convicted of a crime cannot be named. Hamilton Police say it is not looking for anyone else involved in the alleged theft. Jessy Bains is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jessysbains. Download the Yahoo Finance app, available for Apple and Android. (Bloomberg) -- Traffic at Canadas largest port has been cut off by what local officials are calling the storm of the century, the latest snag to hit the North American supply chain. Most Read from Bloomberg Days of torrential rain have pelted British Columbia, triggering floods and landslides that have blocked the tracks of the nations two major railways and washed away parts of its main east-west road artery, the Trans-Canada Highway. Its the second time in less than five months that British Columbia -- a major conduit to Asian markets and home to one of the busiest ports on the West Coast -- has been paralyzed by extreme weather: wildfires and a record heat wave choked the region in the summer. This time the disruptions threaten the movement of goods ahead of the busy winter holiday season. Flooding has halted rail services to and from the Port of Vancouver and also shut all main routes by road, the port said in a statement. Its not yet known when Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. and Canadian National Railway Co. will be able to re-open their lines, it said. Nearly 1,000 rail cars carrying grain are idled in the Vancouver corridor, according to estimates from Ag Transport Coalition. British Columbia Transportation Minister Rob Fleming called it the worst weather storm in a century at a news conference late Tuesday. Highway 3, an older route that runs roughly parallel to the U.S. border, may be the first to re-open, he said, without providing a time frame. The Trans-Canada and another major artery, known as the Coquihalla, will take longer, he said, noting the dramatic images emerging out of the region, including chunks of highway falling into rushing waters. The infrastructure damage there is significant. This has been an extreme weather event, said Mike Farnworth, the deputy premier of British Columbia. The impacts have been significantly greater than expected. Story continues About two-thirds of containers in British Columbia are transported by rail, said Dave Earle, chief executive officer of the B.C. Trucking Association. Theres going to be disruption, he said by phone. We just dont know how much for how long. There is enough grain at port terminal elevators to keep exports moving for a few days and perhaps a week, said Mark Hemmes, president of Quorum Corp., a grain transportation monitoring company in Edmonton, Alberta. After that, its about the wait. Port Congestion Port terminals rely largely on railways to deliver containers to load on ships, as well as transport imported and exported goods. When the cycle of inbound rail cars stops, thats when congestion starts to build at the port terminals, Hemmes said. Canadian Pacific said its track remains closed near Hope, about 150 kilometers (93 miles) east of Vancouver. Canadian National said multiple mudslides and washouts have damaged tracks and that repairs are progressing, but that outbound and inbound traffic in Vancouver is still affected. The flooding is also disrupting energy infrastructure. Enbridge Inc. shut a segment of the Westcoast Pipeline, which delivers gas from the interior to the Vancouver region, as a precautionary measure early Tuesday due to heavy rain and increased river flow, spokesman Jesse Semko said by email. Some of the worst flooding has been in Merritt, whose 7,000 residents were ordered to evacuate on Monday. The town lies only 60 kilometers east of Lytton, which grabbed global headlines in June when it burnt to the ground after recording the highest temperature ever in Canada -- 49.6 degrees Celsius (121 degrees Fahrenheit). Earlier this week, some 275 people were airlifted by helicopters to safety after their vehicles were trapped on a highway between two landslides. So far, one fatality has been confirmed by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek 2021 Bloomberg L.P. JERUSALEM (AP) A Palestinian teen was fatally shot on Wednesday after stabbing two Israeli border police officers in Jerusalem's Old City, Israeli police said. The Israeli police officers were hospitalized, one in moderate condition and another with minor injuries, police said. Private security and police officers shot the teen, identified by police as a 16-year-old from east Jerusalem, and paramedics with the United Hatzalah rescue service pronounced him dead. Security camera footage of the incident released by police appeared to show the teen attack the officers, who were patrolling near a section of the Via Dolorosa. The assailant appeared to stab one of the officers with a knife, at which point the second officer begins grappling with the attacker, who then is shot by a third person. Palestinians have carried out dozens of stabbing, shooting and car-ramming attacks targeting Israeli civilians and security personnel in recent years. Palestinians and rights groups contend some of the alleged car-rammings were accidents and accuse Israel of using excessive force. The incident took place on a main thoroughfare of Jerusalems Old City, which is home to holy sites to Christians, Jews and Muslims and is the emotional epicenter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel captured east Jerusalem, including the Old City, along with the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war. It later annexed east Jerusalem in a move unrecognized by most of the international community. The Palestinians seek the occupied West Bank and Gaza for a future independent state, with east Jerusalem as its capital. WALL Parents and residents spoke out with frustration and anger about the ongoing investigation into alleged hazing by some members of the Wall High School football team during an emotional school board meeting that included calls for resignations. One graduate told the Tuesday night crowd that the controversy brought back memories of similar abuse from long ago. About 200 people, some sporting Wall football attire, filled the high school auditorium for what marked the first public discussion of the investigation launched last week that already has prompted the suspension of three coaches, Athletic Director Tom Ridoux being placed on administrative leave and the cancellation of two football games, including the annual Thanksgiving Day match-up. Before anyone had a chance to speak, the controversy took another turn as it was announced that board member Russell Gartz had resigned. The parent of a football player, Gartz was not in attendance, but his resignation letter was read to the crowd prior to other action being taken. More: Monmouth County Prosecutor takes control of Wall football hazing probe More: Wall football Thanksgiving game canceled amid hazing investigation He wrote that his service on the board is "not worth the risk anymore," citing "visceral, mean-spirited comments about many children and their families over recent days" that have "made being in a volunteer position no longer valuable for me and my family." Wall Township parents at the Nov. 16 Board of Education meeting where several spoke out about the ongoing football team alleged hazing investigation Then, for more than an hour, those in attendance addressed the board with a mix of criticism about how the probe has been pursued and concern over the impact on the students involved. I have a big problem with how this whole thing was handled, resident Betsy Cross told the board. I sent a number of emails, nothing gets replied to, nothing. What is going on here? We do not see this in neighboring towns. We dont trust you. On several occasions meeting attendees shouted out complaints and demands for information, while a few urged that board members resign. Story continues Mike Buono, a high school parent, said information was not properly disseminated and people were left to guess the facts. These boys sat for a week without any direction from you guys, you didnt support them emotionally, you didnt tell them when practice was, he said about the football players. By doing what you did and not doing what you didnt do you created a big firestorm and you further victimized a greater number of people by canceling a playoff game that these kids worked for for 12 years. It is important. He added, You further victimized another 30, 40, 50 kids, the cheerleading staff, the marching band and people who look forward to Thanksgiving. Several alumni offered up their views of past incidents, saying this is not the first time alleged hazing and abuse by students on classmates has occurred. This is nothing new, said Alison Connolly, a past graduate and one-time board president. I do hope that you are listening, there is a toxic culture in this district and this community, and it is literally killing children. Rebecca King, who graduated in 2020, offered a similar recollection. I have personally heard stories of racism, homophobia, sexual assault and sexual harassment. It is clear to all Wall alumni that these are not isolated incidents. They speak to a larger corrupt pattern of administration shrugging off incidents in order to save face and protect those they deem most valuable students. More: Wall superintendent blasts 'misinformation' around high school football hazing allegations Eric Duchak, a member of the Class of 1997, recalled two occasions when he said he was attacked in the football locker room and found no help from administrators. I was kicked, whipped with towels and helmets, he said. Duchak said he had reported the incident and school officials did nothing. He described the experience as a profound personal violation that I have carried with me for 27 years. Superintendent Tracy Handerhan opened the meeting with a declaration that nothing was being brushed aside and said that officials had taken appropriate action from the beginning. In response to the rumor that Wall Township Schools is sweeping this under the rug my response to that is that it is absolutely false, she said to the crowd. When we heard rumors we actively sought information to determine validity. But she said while many were spreading information on social media and among the community, the district was having difficulty gathering facts from those who might know. There were reports of what people had seen and had been aware of, but they did not report it to us, she said. The school and the school district can only act upon information that it has. She then urged calm, Now is the time to come together and support each other. It is time to take a collective breath. Board member Chris San Fillipo agreed: As a community we need to sort of step back from ourselves and Facebook and things that are posted. Im heartbroken for this school, Im heartbroken for every single kid who has had to suffer trauma. Elections: Wall school board, not for the faint of heart, awaits count of nearly 2,000 write-in votes District leaders earlier Tuesday canceled the annual Thanksgiving game against longtime rival Manasquan and effectively ended the season, while the Monmouth County Prosecutors Office announced the investigation had been taken away from local police to avoid the appearance of impropriety because two of the coaches involved had police ties. Since Board President Ralph Addonizio first acknowledged last week that an investigation was underway related to a student matter, district leadership had been silent about details of the alleged locker room incident. At the same time, however, rumors of hazing and physical abuse and the apparent existence of at least two videos purporting to show the conduct in controversy have circulated, joined by social media posts accusing school officials of secrecy and spreading unsubstantiated charges. Handerhan first addressed the situation in a letter to parents Friday that attacked what she termed a circulation of misinformation surrounding the ongoing investigation, but she has so far declined to discuss what has been turned up in the inquiries. She also urged residents to avoid spreading rumors and to wait until an investigation is completed. More: Wall High School state playoff football game canceled amid hazing allegations I am aware of many social media posts and media reports that are grounded in rumor, Handerhan said in a letter to district parents late Friday. This circulation of misinformation is compounding an already difficult and challenging situation. Contributing to this type of messaging is hurtful to the students, school community, and to the greater Wall Township community. District officials also have provided counseling for students who wish to discuss the situation and partnered with a local mental health group for further guidance. Several senior parents issued a statement Friday defending their youngsters and criticizing the initial district response. This is by no means the culture of Wall football and it is terrible to have this negative light shined on us because of the actions of a few individuals, the statement read, in part. This incident in no way involved our entire team. School officials have not commented on the existence of videos purporting to portray the alleged conduct. Some media reports have alleged that physical abuse and even the use of a broomstick or other foreign objects were involved, but with no first-hand accounts. Two parents who claim to have seen two videos contend it shows nothing more than harmless locker room antics and wrestling with no sign of assault or hazing. I would describe them as boys being boys in a locker room, said one of the parents who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation. Boys are boys, they wrestle and goof off and jump around and squeeze each other and a lot of these boys have been buddies forever. That view is counter to reports claiming other parents described the actions in the videos depict criminal wrongdoing. Joe Strupp is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience who covers education and several local communities for APP.com and the Asbury Park Press. He is also the author of three books, including Killing Journalism on the state of the news media, and an adjunct media professor at Rutgers University and Fairleigh Dickinson University. Reach him at jstrupp@gannettnj.com and at 732-413-3840. Follow him on Twitter at @joestrupp This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Wall high school football hazing: Parents pack out emotional meeting Authorities in Pennsylvania on Tuesday night were searching for two elementary school-age girls who officials said were taken by gunpoint by their father, a former police officer. The girls "may be at special risk of harm or injury," a Pennsylvania State Police bulletin said. State Police identified them as Aaminah Vicosa, 6, and Giana Vicosa, 7, and police said they were searching for Robert Vicosa, 42. Joy Stewart, a spokeswoman for Maryland's Baltimore County Police Department, said Vicosa had worked as an officer until he was terminated in August. Officials did not detail why he was fired. Robert Vicosa. (York Area Regional Police Dept. via Facebook) He is accused of committing a home-invasion robbery at gunpoint and holding a woman captive before grabbing the girls and fleeing in the woman's vehicle, according to authorities in York County, Pennsylvania. The invasion happened in Windsor Township in York County, and a vehicle was later found in the nearby borough of Red Lion, the York Area Regional Police Department said in a statement. "Vicosa's children are to believed to be in extreme danger," the statement reads. "Do not approach Vicosa as he is armed with at least one firearm." Arnold Westbrook Jr. was appointed as the Interim City Councilor for Petersburg in Ward 7 on Nov. 16, 2021. PETERSBURG - Petersburg City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to appoint Arnold Westbrook Jr. as the interim councilor for Ward 7. He succeeds former councilor John Hart, who resigned from his seat earlier this month. Westbrook comes to the city with a background in education. He is currently a Professor in Virginia State University's English Department and does work with its honors college. Before that, he also worked at Petersburg City Public Schools. He comes from a line of educators - his father was also a professor at VSU and his mother was a teacher at PCPS. Westbrook says one of his greatest achievements is the creation of the #crownHIM initiative for Black Male empowerment. He previously served on the Appomattox Regional Water authority. Westbrook has also worked with at-risk city youth through Trio Upward since 2011. He earned a master's degree in American and English Literature at VSU and a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Management and Economics from Morehouse College. Mr. Westbrook has the experience, commitment and passion needed as we move Petersburg forward, said Mayor Sam Parham. He was born and raised in Petersburg and has continued to be involved in the community by mentoring city youth and serving as Chairman of the Social Services Advisory Board. Mr. Westbrook is a team player with vision. The city appointed Westbrook to the interim position less than two weeks after Hart's resignation. He assumes the remainder of his predecessor's term, which expires in Dec. 2022. The city received two applications for the Ward 7 vacancy. Westbrook was immediately sworn in Tuesday evening where he took part in his first legislative meeting. He introduced himself as a member of First Baptist Church on Harrison street, where he was baptized, and now attends Good Shepherd Baptist Church. He outlined three specific areas where he wants to make an impact - the first being education. Through his experience on advisory boards he also wants to help residents get access to services they need. The third area mentioned was economic development, amid Petersburg's growing profile. Story continues A city press release also outlined other objectives: Improving health outcomes by supporting programs and activities that help people make healthy choices More revitalization programs and overall city cleanup Poverty reduction Infrastructure and technology upgrades Respecting and promoting the Citys history while enhancing the tourist experience for younger and diverse visitors. I am committed to help grow Petersburg and improve quality of life for all, said Mr. Westbrook. To love something, as I do Petersburg, you must give of yourself and stay dedicated to community service and residents. You can reach Sean Jones at sjones@progress-index.com. Follow him at @SeanJones_PI. Follow The Progress-Index on Twitter at @ProgressIndex. This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: Petersburg names Arnold Westbrook Jr. to vacant Ward 7 council seat By Karen Lema MANILA (Reuters) - The son of late Philippines dictator Ferdinand Marcos, an early frontrunner for the May election, is facing a second petition seeking to bar him from the presidential race, centred on a tax evasion conviction nearly three decades ago. The complaint, filed on Wednesday at the election commission by a group called the Campaign Against the Return of the Marcoses and Martial Law, argued the conviction should have perpetually disqualified Ferdinand Marcos Jr from holding or running for office. He was found guilty in 1995 of failing to file income tax returns from 1982 to 1985 while governor of Ilocos Norte province, a verdict upheld two years later by an appeals court. "He has continuously neglected his penalty and disrespected the rule of law by running and filing his candidacy knowing in fact that he is a convicted criminal," lawyer Howard Calleja told reporters after the filing. Marcos's spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The internal revenue code states that a public officer convicted of a tax crime will be barred for life from holding public office, voting and participating in any election. Since his conviction, however, Marcos has been elected governor, congressman and senator and ran unsuccessfully for the vice presidency. The Marcos family is one of the most famous dynasties in the Philippines and despite its fall from grace after a 1986 "people power" revolution, it has retained its wealth and far-reaching and powerful connections. Sara Duterte-Carpio, the president's popular daughter, will be the running mate of Marcos. Antonio La Vina, a law and politics professor at the Ateneo de Manila University, said election authorities would typically only disqualify a barred candidate if a complaint is made first. "People will only complain if you are winnable," he said, adding the case against Marcos could go either way. Asked if Marcos had ever faced a disqualification case, election commission spokesperson James Jimenez said: "Not that I can recall, no." Story continues Marcos, whose father ruled the Philippines for almost two decades, much of that a harsh era of martial law, led an opinion poll conducted last month on preferred presidential candidates. The poll body has scheduled a preliminary conference for Nov. 26 on an earlier disqualification complaint against Marcos filed by a group representing political detainees, human rights and medical organisations, who has said that petition "is without merit and has no legal basis". (Reporting by Karen Lema; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan, Martin Petty) Race is never an easy conversation to have. I believe it's the glass-shattering moment, sending us to an uncomfortable and awkward place that makes it hard for these conversations to be had. I too have experienced these glass-shattering moments. Last weekend, for instance, I went to my hometown of Tullahoma, Tennessee to visit family and friends. While eating lunch with my friends, a conversation about the city's two community centers came up. It was then that I learned CD Stamps Community Center, named after long-time Davidson Academy Principal and Educator Crosby Dewitt Stamps, is located in the historic Black neighborhood of the city, while the D.W. Wilson Community Center is located in what was the white side of town. I've lived in Tullahoma since I was a child and never put one and two together. And when I asked my friends, "Why hasn't anyone addressed this?" they all just stood frozen, hoping to leave this awkward recollection of history. Critical race theory is a collective-glass shattering moment our country has taken, well, not so good. Critical race theory in Tennessee: Tennessee lawmakers banned critical race theory, but educators teach facts, not feelings | Opinion Gov. Lee inflames the discussion with 'American exceptionalism' tweet Tennessee has banned the K-12th grade teaching of CRT in hopes to keep the mirror safely in its place. But we should also keep in mind that CRT was not taught in any school in the state. As children head back to class, the CRT debate will heighten as teachers and school boards determine what curriculum falls under the theory. Efforts have already been made to seemingly gloss over CRT. On Aug. 11, Gov. Bill Lee announced the schools and districts who've earned the 2020-21 Tennessee Excellence in Civics Education while unveiling the Governors Civics Seal at McConnell Elementary in Hamilton County. "In TN, our students will be taught unapologetic American exceptionalism," Governor Lee tweeted on the same day. Story continues In TN, our students will be taught unapologetic American exceptionalism. Gov. Bill Lee (@GovBillLee) August 11, 2021 We cannot achieve American exceptionalism, as the governor put it, if we treat CRT and its guidance as a boogeyman. The first step towards getting our minds around this theory is to dig into the books and studies that men and women have worked on for the last four decades since CRT was formed. But sadly, many opponents and skeptics of critical race theory frankly have no grasp of the theory or how it came to be. That is dangerous. Stop Critical Race Theory demonstration outside of Northwest Local School District Monday, August 10, 2021. Debunking critical race theory myths To gain a better sense of CRT, I began to read "Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, Third Edition" by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefanicic. The theory is built upon two social movements, critical legal studies and radical feminism. Beginning as a legal theory, CRT is still in the process of forming into an educational curriculum. Those most associated with the theory, whether you believe me or not, actually discredit the effectiveness of liberalism. "Critical race scholars are discontented with liberalism as a framework for addressing America's racial problems. Many liberals believe in colorblindness and neutral principles of constitutional law." Hardly a Marxist view. (State lawmakers wrote in a June 2 guest essay in The Tennessean that they voted to ban CRT because the "tenants of CRT are based on the Marxist ideals of critical theory"). Your state. Your stories. Support more reporting like this. A subscription gives you unlimited access to stories across Tennessee that make a difference in your life and the lives of those around you. Click here to become a subscriber. What do Black Tennesseans say critical race theory is? Just giving the scholarly definition would be enough to change minds. So I tried a different approach and reached out to members of the Black Tennessee Voices Facebook Group, regular people like you and me, to hear their personal definitions of CRT. Here's what three members gave: Critical race theory is an academic concept that has existed for more than 4 decades. The core idea is that race is a social construct and that racism is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies that we all navigate each day. Alyssa Dituro Critical Race Theory is an academic framework whose function is quite simple: To look at a given outcome and ask, Is this outcome inequitable along racial lines? If so, why? This question should always be asked about outcomes for large groups, never individuals. And it should always be followed by, And why is that? several times in order to find actionable root causes. Finally, it should eventually lead us to ask, What can I do about that? Jeff Stewart Critical race theory is a legal framework derived from a group of scholars who analyzed legal cases and made explicit connections to the racial biases that were inherent within those cases and subsequently within structures of society. Critical race theory acknowledges that there are racial biases within the systems and policies that we interact within. To negate this when we have so much evidence - past and present - for how racism persists to suppress groups of people is literally another example of the oppression and suppression that critics of CRT are denying. My concern for secondary schools is that although critical race theory isnt taught, educators will steer away from addressing/discussing/engaging in the realities that the construct of race and racial discrimination have had on the progress and lack of progress of groups of people over time, the ways in which people continue to be oppressed and thwarted from opportunity, and the reckoning that must take place in order to progress from the warped ideology (e.g. myth of white supremacy) that has haunted our nation. Lagra L. Newman People are actively researching and seeking knowledge of what critical race theory is. We can have our differences on the matter but having the facts will create civility in the CRT debate. Is critical race theory pessimistic or optimistic? To further iterate my beginning thought, race is a less than desirable topic. But the current condemnation for people brave enough to stay in this space needs to stop. Paraphrasing a prompt in the book, is medicine pessimistic because it focuses on the disease? Is someone bad because they look deeper into situations more than others? American exceptionalism is a pinnacle citizens cannot reach without accepting the truths about our country's past. Governor Lee and others like him turn cold to the idea of systemic racism Fear, currently, has shown to be a huge factor in how Americans conduct themselves. Sometimes that fear is validated, and sometimes it be turned into a moment of clarity by simply opening a book. We can disagree, but let us do it with logic, not fear. LeBron Hill is an opinion columnist for the USA TODAY Network Tennessee and the curator of the Black Tennessee Voices newsletter. Feel free to contact him at LHill@gannett.com or 615-829-2384. Find him on Twitter at @hill_bron or Instagram at @antioniohill12. How do you define critical race theory? Send your definition of critical race theory in 250 words or less to letters@tennessean.com by Wednesday at noon CST. Include your name, city or town and ZIP code. The Tennessean will work publish a selection of the responses on Sunday, Aug. 22. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Critical race theory debate: Tennesseans must use knowledge not fear Several spiritual leaders, including one who offered to exchange his life for Julius Jones's life, tried unsuccessfully to meet with Gov. Kevin Stitt on Tuesday as Jones's scheduled execution drew closer. Julius Jones, 41, is on death row for the fatal shooting of Paul Howell during a 1999 carjacking in Edmond. He has maintained that he did not commit the murder. Jones is scheduled to be executed on Thursday. Staff members in the waiting room outside the governor's office told the ministers and Jones's sister, Antoinette Jones, that Stitt was unavailable. More: Julius Jones' mother, supporters seek meeting with Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt A receptionist in Gov. Kevin Stitt's office talks to the Rev. John A. Reed, left, and Rev. Derrick Scobey on Tuesday as the Rev. Marvin L. Morgan of Charlottesville, Virginia, waits. "I am here on behalf of my family. I feel like if he (Stitt) can meet with the Howell family, then he can definitely meet with the Jones family," Antoinette Jones said, referring to reports that the governor had met with Paul Howell's family members. "As citizens of Oklahoma, he is for the people, not just for certain particular people." The Rev. Marvin L. Morgan, of Charlottesville, Virginia, was also told the governor wasn't available to meet with him. He submitted a letter to the governor's staff in which he asked to take Julius Jones's place in the execution chamber if the death-row inmate is denied clemency. Julius Jones execution: Oklahoma governors have granted clemency to men facing execution before Julius Jones supporters stand vigil outside Gov. Kevin Stitt's office on Tuesday at the Oklahoma Capitol. "I am here in Oklahoma today because I've made an offer to Gov. Stitt that if another Black man is going to be killed under the guise of capital punishment, that it could be any Black man," he said. "So I would like the governor to allow me to lie on that table and to die in place of Julius Jones." Morgan, an interim pastor in the United Church of Christ denomination, said he had made such an offer several years ago in Georgia for another death-row inmate, Troy Davis, but the state of Georgia executed the man. More: Gov. Kevin Stitt challenger Joy Hofmeister says she would grant Julius Jones clemency Story continues The Rev. Marvin L. Morgan of Charlottesville, Virginia, waits in the hall outside the governor's office on Tuesday at the state Capitol. The minister said the situation in Oklahoma is different from Georgia because it is up to Stitt to decide if he will grant clemency. "One person holds the key to life or death for Julius Jones. The governor holds that key," he said. Morgan said he wasn't a "lone ranger" and had the backing of many ministers across the country, including the Rev. Malika Cox, who is a minister at The Table OKC. He said he made his "genuine" offer to the governor because there would be backlash against the elected official should he accept the unusual request, showing how capital punishment is wrong. 'Part of justice is fairness': Thunder's Mark Daigneault among NBA voices to address Julius Jones case More faith leaders call on Gov. Kevin Stitt to grant Julius Jones clemency Meanwhile, several local pastors and Antoinette Jones said they had hoped to persuade Stitt to consider his own Christian faith and morals and grant clemency for Julius Jones. "We are here just to ask the governor to make the right decision, to accept the decision made by the parole board, and that he make his decision based on the spiritual and not the political," said the Rev. John A. Reed, leader of the Concerned Clergy for Spiritual Renewal and Oklahoma City Baptist Ministers Association. Antoinette Jones, the sister of death-row inmate Julius Jones, prays with ministers and other Julius Jones' supporters in the waiting room at Gov. Kevin Stitt's office. Antoinette Jones offered similar comments. She said she was optimistic about the governor's decision because she is a person of faith and an optimist at heart. She said she was also frustrated that a decision had not come by early Tuesday afternoon. Jones said she is not angry that Stitt was unavailable to meet with her. She said she is simply praying that he has heard her family's pleas on behalf of her brother. "I'm praying that he's heard my mother's words, my words, my brother's words and my family's words," she said. "He said he was going to make a decision swiftly. I'm just wondering what 'swift' means to me. We're asking that he takes the recommendation of his pardon and parole board. That's why I'm here today." This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Preachers, Julius Jones' sister denied meeting with Gov. Kevin Stitt El Salvador and Honduras nationals seeking asylum in the United States sit outside the El Chaparral border crossing on February 19, 2021 in Tijuana, Mexico US President Joe Biden entered the White House promising to tackle immigration challenges that have remained unsolved for decades. Yet since he took office in January, the US has seen a record influx of migrants at its southern border, prompting criticism of the administration's policies from across the political spectrum. Some two million "encounters" between government agents and migrants near the border are expected by the end of 2021, Mr Biden's Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told US senators on Tuesday - including about 125,000 unaccompanied minors who have already been taken into the government's care. In a contentious hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee, Mr Mayorkas repeatedly defended the Biden administration's handling of immigration and border issues. But he admitted that rebuilding "a broken immigration system" will take time. Will things get worse before they get better? Here's what we know about the situation. Why the spike under Biden? While the number of migrants at the border had been steadily increasing since April 2020, the numbers spiked sharply after Mr Biden took office. Economic problems in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Cuba worsened during the pandemic, forcing some to take on a long and perilous journey north. Gangs and violence have also been given as reasons why some left home. There was also a sense shared by some that the new US president would adopt a more relaxed border approach than his predecessor Donald Trump. US-Mexico border crossing graphic Though he has avoided Mr Trump's rhetoric, Mr Biden has repeatedly called on migrants, including asylum seekers, not to attempt the journey to the US. Despite the slight decline in September, the number of migrant encounters still represents about a 33% increase from the 144,000 recorded in May 2019 - the highest total of the Trump administration. There's also been a sharp increase in the number of children crossing the border. Story continues How do they get into the US? Migrants cross the border in one of two ways. Those who believe they "have suffered persecution or fear that they will suffer persecution" in their home country are eligible to apply for asylum when they present themselves at a port of entry for admission into the US. Others may evade border officials by hiding in cars or travelling undetected across unprotected - and often treacherous - parts of the US-Mexico border. According to the Pew Research Center, at least 40% of unauthorised migrants in the country entered legally on short-term visas and overstayed. Biden defends a Trump policy On Covid, Mr Biden kept a Trump-era emergency policy to automatically expel almost all undocumented migrants seeking entry, bypassing normal immigration laws and protections. The policy - known as Title 42 - is aimed at preventing the spread of Covid-19 in holding facilities, officials say. The measure sparked controversy in September when the Biden administration used Title 42 to deport nearly 4,000 Haitian migrants who had been detained at the border city of Del Rio, Texas. The Biden administration has defended the Trump-era policy in courts, where civil rights groups have argued that it violates existing US asylum laws. Politicians from Mr Biden's own Democratic party have also spoken out against the policy. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in August that the policy will remain in effect until the spread of Covid by non-citizens stops being a "serious danger" to public health. It plans to review the situation every 60 days. In contrast to Mr Trump, however, Mr Biden has decided not to refuse entry to unaccompanied minors and some families. Separating families One of the most substantive changes in border policy under Mr Biden has been a shift in how the government deals with migrant families. A so-called "zero-tolerance" policy under Mr Trump meant families divided by US authorities, in some cases with parents being deported back to their home countries without their children. Mr Biden has reversed that specific practice, and some families - but not all - have been reunited. A task force set up by the president estimated that 3,913 children had been separated from their parents. As of September, authorities were still trying to reach the parents of 303 children separated from their families, according to a court filing. Unaccompanied children As mandated by US anti-trafficking laws, Mr Biden's administration has been transferring non-Mexican minors to shelters overseen by the government. Critics of the administration previously suggested that holding children in those facilities harkened back to a Trump-era policy, though children were being held for less time under Mr Biden. In May, the number of children held in detention facilities declined by nearly 90% after they were transferred to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for temporary resettlement. Remain in Mexico policy On Mr Biden's first day in office, his administration suspended a controversial Trump-era policy that forced asylum seekers to wait in Mexico for their US immigration hearings. Since it was introduced in January 2019, about 70,000 migrants were enrolled in the programme informally known as Remain in Mexico. In February, the Biden administration began to gradually process these would-be asylum seekers, allowing them into the US while their cases are heard. It has since allowed about 13,000 people to enter the country to await the outcome of their cases. The initiative has become the focus of intense legal wrangling. In August a federal judge said that ending the Remain in Mexico programme was unlawful after two states brought suit against the Biden administration. Democrat Joe Biden has promised to undo the 'cruelty' of Trump-era immigration policies The decision was appealed, but in late September, Texas' attorney general filed a lawsuit to try to force the administration to reinstate the Trump policy. Border wall Mr Biden signed an order on his first day in office to pause all wall construction and to end the national emergency declaration on the southern border. He later ordered that military funds Mr Trump had tapped for the project be diverted, leading to a Republican-requested inquiry into whether Mr Biden had inappropriately re-directed congressionally approved funds. Property owners near the border have complained that despite the pause, the government is still seeking to seize borderlands for future construction using a process known as eminent domain. Dozens of eminent domain cases brought by the federal government remain open and could take years for the courts to decide. Some wall construction sites remain abruptly abandoned, with building materials strewn about, as construction had continued right up until the moment of Mr Biden's order to halt. Refugee cap On 27 September, the US Department of State announced that the government plans to increase the number of refugees allowed into the US to 125,000 for the fiscal year that began on 1 October. With the move, Mr Biden fulfilled one of his campaign promises. During his presidential bid, Mr Biden repeatedly criticised Mr Trump's decision to set the annual refugee cap at 15,000 - a historic low. Mr Biden had stunned his supporters in April by announcing plans to only allow 15,000 refugees into the US in 2021. The annual refugee cap was set by Mr Trump the year before. Following intense public backlash, he raised the number to 62,500 refugees. About 110,000 refugees were admitted to the US in the last year of President Barack Obama's final term. Mr Biden also called for more refugees to come from Africa, the Middle East and Central America, and for an end to restrictions on resettlements from Somalia, Syria and Yemen. The new logo aims to champion the brands London heritage (Pret A Manger) Pret has unveiled a rebranding for its US coffee shops that emphasises the chain's London "touch" in a bid to appeal to American consumers' love of the capital. Prets American cafes will soon be fitted out with the new "Pret: London 1986" logo. Bosses said the new logo aims to "champion" the brand's London heritage. The chain's founders, friends Julian Metcalfe and Sinclair Beecham, launched their first Pret A Manger (the French for "ready to eat") 35 years ago on Victoria Street. The cafe's French moniker - and the sophistication it implies - appealed to Londoners, along with its organic produce. They broke into the US coffee market in 2001, opening a store on New Yorks Broad Street, and the US is now the chain's most significant market outside the UK. Today, announcing the rebrand, Pret's US president Jorrie Bruffett said: What were bringing is that touch of London while serving delicious food with friendly service. The rebrand is set to coincide with the launch of a refurbishment across the chain's American estate. Pret, synonymous with office life and a somewhat unwilling pandemic bellwether, has closed more than 70 stores and slashed 3,771 jobs since Covid hit. It was forced to secure emergency bank funding in April 2020, before receiving an 185 million capital injection from its owner, Luxembourg-based group JAB. Bruffett added: Its been an incredibly tough few years but we are focused on reinvesting and innovating to improve the customer experience while staying true to what we do best. Weve got a great future ahead. Pret's chief executive Pano Christou, who took the reins in October 2019 after a 20-year career with the company, has been aggressively adapting the UK business model to the reality of hybrid work - including launching a delivery service, dinner menu, frozen croissants for retailers, and a 20 monthly coffee subscription. Story continues It has also opened a small number of shops within large Tesco stores as the retailer also looks for ways to attract customers into bricks and mortar sites. Sainsbury's also launched a similar trial with Carluccio's owner Boparan Restaurant Group this summer. Read More FTSE 100 Live: Inflation surges to 4.2%, Bank under pressure to raise rates As Lidl GB increases staff wages, this is what rival supermarkets are paying House of Fraser to shut iconic Oxford Street store Psychiatric centers fail many children. North Carolina keeps spending gobs of money on them. When North Carolina puts a child in a psychiatric residential treatment facility, it costs taxpayers hundreds of dollars every single day for just that one child. The costs mount across the Carolinas and seven other states where children have been placed, week after week reaching more than $100 million in a year. Some of the cash goes to for-profit companies, who do very well. The toll these centers take on some kids lives is expensive, too. A 94-pound boy suffered a broken arm when a 6-foot-6, 220-pound worker at a psychiatric residential treatment facility pressed a door open against him. A youth at another facility could be heard yelling Stop choking me, before a worker uttered a homophobic slur and said, The only reason you are here is because your parents dont love you. Words on a notebook at Piney Ridge treatment center in Arkansas capture feelings about the locked psychiatric facility. Failed therapy and other problems one boy experienced at Piney Ridge are a common part of life in psychiatric residential treatment facilities that North Carolina relies on to help children who have been abused and neglected. Our review of state inspection records, documents and interviews with former clients and workers shows the state continued to pay facilities when they repeatedly broke rules meant to ensure the safety and well-being of clients. These are children; were not in a third-world prison, said Randy Hood, an attorney representing a North Carolina family over care in a psychiatric center they had to find in South Carolina because of lack of treatment options nearby. Were in the United States with children. Hood pulls no punches when discussing psychiatric residential treatment facilities, labeling them the modern day versions of insane asylums of the 1940s and '50s. The psychiatric centers siphon money out of Medicaid, the joint state and federal program that helps pay for healthcare for the poor, including children in the state foster care system. North Carolina pays facilities an average of $423 per day for each child. In some cases, advocates for children say, the state spends as much as $800 a day for kids with complex needs. A state report released earlier this year harshly criticized North Carolina for spending more money on psychiatric residential treatment facilities and other institutional care than community-based programs. Research shows community programs are cheaper and better at improving kids lives. Story continues Spending more in the long term Amy Hannon has spent months wishing she could see her two teenage sons again. She adopted the siblings as small children after they were removed from the custody of their biological mother, who struggled with drugs and alcohol. As they began to grow, however, the trauma they suffered appeared to impact their behavior more and more. They threatened Hannon with violence, they ran away from home and stole from a store. Her sons grew up with a normal childhood in North Carolina, including sports, the outdoors and family vacations, said Amy Hannon. But as they got older, symptoms from likely fetal alcohol syndrome appeared. They stole, threatened violence and were sent into the troubled North Carolina teen residential center system. Adopted sons of Amy Hannon. [PHOTO COURTESY OF AMY HANNON] When they were young, Hannon believes, the state should have paid for the boys to be tested for fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, a condition that can impact learning and behavior that is caused when the mother drinks alcohol during pregnancy. There are only a few places in the state that offer such testing and the state is hesitant to authorize it because the exams can cost thousands of dollars, advocates for children said. Instead, the state paid to send Hannon's sons to psychiatric residential treatment facilities, where they did not get better. It just hurts my heart, she said. No tracking of children's outcomes North Carolina officials dont know what they are getting for taxpayers money. The state did not promise to start tracking what happens to children after they leave each psychiatric residential treatment facility until this year, roughly 15 years after the first such facility opened in North Carolina. The state Department of Health and Human Services plans to track educational outcomes, engagement in treatment and involvement in the criminal justice system three months and six months after discharge. There is no proof psychiatric residential treatment facilities are effective, said Paul Lanier, a University of North Carolina professor. There is not a lot of leverage the state has to incentivize these facilities to improve quality or to be accountable for anything, Lanier said. Amy Hannon's son, seen in this family photo, has suffered in the system for years, according to the mom. North Carolina did track some outcomes at selected facilities during a one-year period in 2019 and 2020, state officials said in a written response to questions from USA TODAY Network. Less than a third of children discharged from the centers went to a community-based program, a desired goal. Some were sent to another psychiatric residential treatment facility, a possible sign that treatment failed. Paul Lanier, a professor of social work at the University of North Carolina, is part of a research team that found there is no proof psychiatric residential treatment facilities are effective. There is not a lot of leverage the state has to incentivize these facilities to improve quality or to be accountable for anything, Lanier said. The state has very few tools they can use to hold them accountable. In written responses to questions from USA TODAY Network, North Carolina officials said they are attempting to build up the number of community-based programs in the state. They said keeping children in psychiatric residential treatment facilities for lengthy periods is sometimes necessary because of a lack of alternative services. Big business for long stays Some psychiatric residential treatment facilities are operated by nonprofits, while others are for-profit businesses driven by earnings. One group, Strategic Behavioral Health, is run by a company started by one of the richest and most well-known families in Memphis, Tennessee. The Dobbs family, whose business empire was started in the 1920s with car dealerships and restaurants, now reaches into furniture manufacturing, construction equipment, trucking parts and beer distribution. On his first night at Carolina Dunes Behavioral Health in Leland, said one child, his air-filled pillow deflated when he rested his head. He slept on a towel instead, a practice he said he repeated every night during his five months at the facility. In 2006, Dobbs Management Service, LLC, launched Strategic Behavior Health, which operates psychiatric residential treatment facilities across the country, according to the company website. The company received at least $1 million from Medicaid from January 2019 to December 2020 for treating children from North Carolina in two centers that operated in the state during that time. That includes at least $576,000 from Carolina Dunes in Leland. What began as an argument between his child and his wife led to Bill Garrity's son, seen here at a younger age, becoming involuntarily committed into a psychiatric residential treatment facility in Garner and drugged with anti-psychotics without his parents' consent. The lead nurse told Jordan right in front of me that I was no longer Jordans father. She said she was now his father and mother. From January of 2019 to April 2021, state regulators have cited Carolina Dunes more than 40 times for rules violations. The citations ranged from cracked floors, graffiti and damaged walls in the building to allegations of sexual abuse. Strategic refused comment. Jordan was 16 when he spent five days at a different Strategic Behavioral Center near the state capital, Raleigh. On the Raleigh facilitys website, it says its highly trained medical and professional staff helps children find the self-acceptance and confidence they need to be successful in their families, communities, and schools. Instead, Strategic has been cited by the state Department of Health and Human Services for medication errors, physical abuse and a lack of documentation of fights or other incidents, police calls and rule violations. Jordan, during his stay in 2019, slept on a thin mattress in a cold room and he could hear the screams and distress of other kids in the facility at night. They were trapped behind military-grade doors that made the facility feel more like what he would imagine prison feels like. Not a wellness center. Jordan saw multiple fights break out between facility staff and children. He watched upset kids being physically restrained. Although Jordan struggles with obsessive compulsive disorder and anxiety, he had never taken medication before. At Strategic, he was given different anti-psychotic drugs that kept him sleepy and lethargic. Bill Garrity's son was 16 when he was treated at Strategic. The psychiatric children's center has been cited by the state Department of Health and Human Services for medication errors, physical abuse and a lack of documentation of fights or other incidents, police calls and rule violations. In March, the state released a report detailing violations by the facilitys operator. The report says nurses gave children medications like Benadryl, Vistaril, Zyprexa and Thorazine injections without notifying doctors or documenting the distribution. I think the people at the top just put (children) in those facilities and whatever happens, happens, said Jordans father, Bill Garrity. They say, were just going to look the other way. One of the main journalists on this project, Rachel Berry, is the Northern Kentucky reporter for The Cincinnati Enquirer. When she started the "Locked Away" project, she was a reporter for the Burlington Times-News, Asheboro Courier-Tribune and Lexington Dispatch in North Carolina. She can be reached at rberry@enquirer.com. UPCOMING Our final "Locked Away" installment Nov. 18 explains why one North Carolina family wants to keep their teen out of psychiatric centers and what alternatives there could be, if changes are made. MORE IN THIS SERIES Punching, predators, neglect. Traumatized NC children suffer inside dismal psychiatric centers. North Carolina ships abused, neglected kids to out-of-state facilities. Some are traumatized again. I miss my damn charmed life': At risk for suicide, Ariel navigated chaos in youth centers Foster kids just needed a bed. Lacking one, North Carolina sent them to psychiatric lockup instead. Psychiatric centers fail many children. North Carolina keeps spending gobs of money on them. 'They're the boss of your child.' Why one NC teen's parents want to keep her from a psych unit The team behind the Locked Away Investigation REPORTING: Fred Clasen-Kelly, Amritpal Kaur Sandhu-Longoria, Rachel Berry, Brad Zinn, Kristen Johnson, Brian Gordon VISUAL JOURNALISM: Ken Blevins, Andrew Craft, Amanda Rossmann, Kim Luciani EDITORS: Fred Clasen-Kelly, William Ramsey NARRATIVE STORYTELLING: Jeff Schwaner, Donnie Fetter DIGITAL DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT: Spencer Holladay FACT-CHECKER: Rachel Berry PROOFING: Amy Dunn SOCIAL MEDIA, ENGAGEMENT AND PROMOTION: Kara Edgerson This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: NC pays psychiatric units that break rules millions to care for youth Jacob Chansley Brent Stirton/Getty Images "QAnon Shaman" Jacob Chansley has been sentenced to over three years in prison for his role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. A judge on Wednesday sentenced Chansley, who prosecutors described as the "public face of the Capitol riot," to 41 months in prison and three years of probation after his release, CBS News reports. Chansley, who was seen wearing horns and fur during the riot, pleaded guilty to obstructing Congress during the certification of President Biden's election win. "What you did here was horrific, as you can now see," District Judge Royce Lamberth said during the sentencing hearing, per CBS News. Prosecutors asked for a sentence of 51 months for Chansley, who they said was "among the first 30 rioters to penetrate the U.S. Capitol building" on Jan. 6 and "stalked the hallowed halls of the building, riling up other members of the mob with his screaming obscenities about our nation's lawmakers, and flouting the 'opportunity' to rid our government of those he has long considered to be traitors." Prosecutors also said Chansley left a note for then-Vice President Mike Pence that read, "It's only a matter of time, justice is coming." During the hearing, Chansley expressed regret for his actions, saying "the hardest part about this is to know that I'm to blame," per CNN. "To have to look in the mirror and know, you really messed up. Royally." He spoke out earlier this year, telling CBS News the fact that then-President Donald Trump never pardoned him "wounded me so deeply" and "disappointed me so greatly." You may also like A Harry Potter reunion is happening, reportedly without J.K. Rowling Virginia local school board reverses ban of 'sexually explicit' books after public outcry The Democrats need a unified adversary in 2022 One of the women pulled off a plane at Doha airport and forced to undergo an invasive gynaecological search told AFP Wednesday that she feels "disrespected and disregarded" by Qatari authorities and is still "terrified" of travelling a year later. The French woman in her fifties, who asked not to be named, was among a group who were subjected to intrusive examinations in October 2020 as authorities tried to identify the mother of a newborn abandoned in an airport bathroom. The country's prime minister issued a public apology, while an airport police officer who oversaw the searches was reportedly convicted. Qatari officials said apologies had been conveyed through direct channels with Australia, while training was rolled out to airport staff to ensure the incident was not repeated. Seven women are now launching legal action against Qatar Airways and Qatari authorities, seeking redress for an ordeal that sparked condemnation and global attention ahead of the country hosting the 2022 World Cup. The woman said she remained "absolutely terrified" at the thought of travelling again. "I don't think that there's been a single day when I haven't thought about it," she told AFP. "It's still very much present in my mind." She was among a group of female passengers escorted off a Sydney-bound plane late at night without explanation. The woman said she grew increasingly nervous as they were led through Hamad International Airport and split into smaller groups, before being taken to the tarmac where armed officers stood near several parked ambulances. "It was intimidating because there were a lot of policemen around and they all (had) heavy guns," she said. Finally, an official told the assembled women they would be checked to see if one of them was the mother, sending her into "panic mode" at the thought of the gynaecological examination. "I didn't feel, and I think that none of the women felt, that we had a choice," she said. Story continues "They didn't ask for consent, they didn't say 'You have a right to say no'... They just said you do that, and then you go back to the plane." Women on 10 Qatar Airways flights from Doha were subjected to the searches, including citizens of France, New Zealand and Australia, where the legal case is now being brought. The woman, who was travelling alone, said the experience was "traumatic" and left the affected passengers in shock. - 'We've been disrespected' - Facing potentially devastating commercial and reputational damage when the incident became public, Qatar last year vowed to guarantee the future "safety and security" of passengers. "The subsequent procedures taken by the authorities at the airport, including examining a number of female passengers, revealed that standard procedures were violated," the government said in a statement on October 30. "Those responsible for these violations and illegal actions have been referred to the public prosecution office." The prime minister "expressed Qatar's sincerest apology for what some female travellers went through as a result of the measures". But the woman said she had not been contacted by the airline, the airport or the Qatari authorities in the wake of the incident, while fellow passengers had been similarly ignored. Qatar Airways directed AFP's requests for comment to the Qatari government, while the country's embassy in Canberra did not respond. The woman said she wanted a personal, written apology as well as compensation and evidence that Doha airport had overhauled its processes. "We don't want retaliation, but we want to be acknowledged. Because so far we feel we've been disrespected and disregarded and we want someone to be accountable for that," she said. The woman said she hoped the lawsuit would help bring her closure, and protect other travellers transiting through Qatar in the future. "I would like women to know, especially women travelling on their own, that they have to make decisions about the best companies to use and the best routes to use, because there are parts of the world that I wouldn't advise them to go," she said. Qatar is an ultra-conservative Muslim monarchy, where sex and childbirth outside of marriage are punishable by jail. Ahead of the 2022 World Cup, the country has struggled to reassure critics that its promises on women's rights, labour relations and democracy are credible. hr/arb/axn-dm/kir SheKnows Lourdes Leon has already proven that she is paving her own path. The 25-year-old dancer, choreographer, and model has landed some pretty major campaigns including Swarovski, collaborations with Stella McCartney, Rihannas Savage X Fenty and so much more. Each step of the way, Lourdes has completely set herself apart from her famous mom, and in [] Queen Elizabeth II on Wednesday held a face-to-face audience with Britain's highest-ranking military officer, almost a month after her last public appearance. The 95-year-old monarch withdrew from an annual event remembering Britain's war dead on Sunday with a "sprained back", the latest of several cancelled appearances that have added to fears about her health. But she welcomed chief of defence staff Nick Carter at her Windsor Castle residence west of London to mark his departure from the role. Carter was in full ceremonial uniform chatting to the queen, who was wearing a green, orange and white floral dress in the castle's Oak Room and standing unaided, weeks after she had been seen using a walking stick. Video footage showed Carter being greeted by the monarch's dachshund-corgi cross, Candy, who lay on the red-carpeted floor by the door as they spoke. It was the first time the queen had been seen carrying out an in-person engagement since hosting a reception at Windsor for global investors on October 19. The following day Buckingham Palace announced she had pulled out of a planned two-day trip to Northern Ireland and had been advised to rest on medical grounds. But within 24 hours, royal officials were forced to confirm a newspaper report that she had spent the night at a private hospital in central London after unspecified tests. Aides insisted the overnight stay was for "practical reasons" and she had resumed "light duties", including holding video calls with incoming ambassadors. Speculation about her health was fuelled on October 26, however, when she withdrew from a planned appearance at the UN climate change summit this month. Again, it followed "advice to rest" from doctors and instead sent a video message to world leaders, urging them to take collective action to halt runaway global warming. Her eldest son and heir, Prince Charles, 73, attended the event in her absence and is currently representing her on an overseas visit to Jordan and Egypt. Story continues Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson has sought to reassure the public about the queen's health. On Sunday, he said he had an audience with her, but without cameras, last Wednesday, telling reporters: "She was very well." Palace officials have blamed the queen's hectic schedule since she returned from her annual summer holiday to her Balmoral estate in northeast Scotland. She has kept up her public engagements since the death of her husband of 73 years, Prince Philip, in April, including hosting G7 leaders at a summit in Cornwall in June. phz/jwp/jxb Young Dolph Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for BET Rapper Young Dolph is reportedly dead at 36 after being fatally shot in Memphis, Tennessee. The rapper behind albums like Rich Slave was shot and killed at a Memphis bakery on Wednesday afternoon, law enforcement sources told FOX13. The owner of Makeda's Butter Cookies told the outlet he came into the store to buy cookies around 1:00 p.m. when someone drove up and shot him. The Memphis Police Department confirmed in a tweet that officers were on the scene and a male victim was pronounced dead, but officials didn't confirm the name of the victim. There was no information provided about the suspect. Young Dolph's attorney, Scott Hall, told TMZ he was in the area for a Thanksgiving giveaway and was on his way to hand out turkeys. "The world has lost an icon, a great man and beloved artist who has been taken too soon," a representative for the agency APA told Variety. "His dedication, drive, hard work and loyalty to all those around him always came first and he will be deeply missed." Young Dolph released his debut album, King of Memphis, in 2016, and his fifth solo album, Rich Slave, was released in 2020. He also collaborated with rapper Key Glock on the albums Dum and Dummer and Dum and Dummer 2, the latter of which debuted earlier this year. He had two children. LL Cool J tweeted Wednesday he was "sending love" to Young Dolph's family, friends, and fans, writing, "Rest in power young Brother. I pray your children and family are covered and lifted up by the almighty." Megan Thee Stallion also said she was "sick" and in "disbelief" over the death of "my friend" and "a true legend," while Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland called the shooting "another reminder of the pain that violent crime brings with it." You may also like A Harry Potter reunion is happening, reportedly without J.K. Rowling Report: House to vote Wednesday on censuring GOP Rep. Paul Gosar over video The Democrats need a unified adversary in 2022 Red Cross responders arrived to help after a fire at a multiple-family residence Tuesday afternoon in Madison. Nashville fire crews responded to reports of a structure fire at the 400 block of East Old Hickory Boulevard around 1:40 p.m., according to Nashville Fire Department spokesperson Kendra Loney. When they arrived, the scene had heavy smoke. There are no reported injuries, according to Loney. Loney said that the fire crews had extinguished the fire and were performing for salvage and overhaul at 2:06 p.m. Red Cross was on the scene to help those displaced by the fire by 4:09 p.m., according to Sherri McKinney, regional communications director for the American Red Cross in Tennessee. McKinney said that it sounded around three to four units were displaced, but she was unsure of the number of affected people at the time. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Multiple families displaced by residential fire in Nashville suburb Hundreds crossed the Bowen Bridge to protest the death of George Floyd in Asheville May 31, 2020. Two months later, the city passed a historic reparations initiative to repay Black residents for injustices from slavery to Jim Crow to present day inequities. Application submissions for the historic Asheville reparations commission will open on Nov. 19 after a month-long delay to collect more feedback, city officials said, and amid criticism ranging from the need for such a commission to inadequate outreach to the Black community. Submissions to become a member of the Community Reparations Commission were originally slated to begin on Oct. 18, but city spokesperson Polly McDaniel said timeline elements changed after the initial Oct. 12 presentation because Asheville City Council asked for it to be extended. The formation of the commission will drive the citys reparations process, which was supported by a unanimous resolution passed by council in July 2020 to account for centuries-old wrongs against Black Americans, from slavery to Jim Crow to current-day inequities in education, health care, criminal justice, income and elsewhere. The resolution does not mandate direct payments, but rather will make investments in areas where Black residents face disparities. Asheville Racial Justice Coalition Community Liaison Tre Williams said the group has been following the process closely. He said at the root of the process must be the individuals that the process is for, namely the Black population of Buncombe County and Asheville. While he said the city had made attempts to listen to community concerns by slowing down the application process to make time for a community engagement survey, the method of engagement was not enough to reach Black community members. Future efforts will require outside of the box thinking, he said, and the facilitators of the reparations process to be meeting community members where they are. The Black community is not a monolith, so if youre going to do reparations for the Black community, youve got to go around and actually talk to Black folks, Williams said. And thats whats lacking from the reparations process, so far. How the application process will proceed Story continues The city is accepting nominations and applications for the commission Nov. 19-Dec. 22, according to a city update Nov. 16. The 25-member commission will develop recommendations for what form of compensation Black residents should receive for historic wrongs. Thirteen seats on the commission, according to the initial outline, were to be reserved for representatives nominated by impacted neighborhoods, including Burton Street, East End/Valley Street, Shiloh, Southside, Stumptown and public housing communities. However, a Nov. 17 press release from the city said that number is now 15. Related: Asheville, Evanston, Tulsa reparations leaders call for Black census, grassroots movements Of the remaining 10 seats, five will be picked by the council and five by the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners. Those will be selected based on experience in criminal justice, economic development, education, health care and housing areas identified in the council's reparations resolution. According to the release, the Community Reparations Commission members will contribute approximately five to 10 hours per month over a two-year term. It also stated members will be compensated for their time and participation, and the city will work to remove barriers to service by providing support such as technology, transportation and childcare as needed. According to the update, the city will hold informational meetings for the community to ask question about the process on Nov. 18, Dec. 1 and Dec. 15. Registration is required to attend. The reparations effort is overseen by project manager Debra Clark Jones, president of Durham nonprofit TEQuity, which was picked for the $366,000 contract. Her hiring and the amount of the contract has been criticized by Keith Young, the former City Council member who wrote the city's historic initiative. Young said the work should have been done by the city's Equity Office instead of paying an outside consulting fee, which will come from $2.1 million currently set aside for reparations. The contract represents 17% of that fund. The city has yet to name an equity director. Brenda Mills was named interim director of the citys Equity and Inclusion Office in July. Brenda Mills is the acting director of Asheville's Equity Office. Rather than launch its application process in October, the city opened a survey on the process that ran Oct. 19 through Nov. 1. The survey sought input from residents about the contents of the application, proposed changes, community interest in the commission and other concerns. Related: Asheville George Floyd protest organizer, long-time activist Hayes running for mayor Mills said staff has been making updates to the application and process based on the feedback. According to data from the survey page, it received about 80 responses. Of those, about 52% of the responders were from the impacted neighborhoods, or parts of the city disrupted by urban renewal. 37% identified themselves as Black or African American on the survey, and 54% did not indicate race. Responses varied from outright objection to reparations as a concept, to interest in getting involved with the commission. Some respondents were still concerned that not enough time had been allotted for the applications, or enough effort made to reach the citys underserved communities. Others worried the time commitment of the commission would be a deterrent for many interested. Rob Thomas, strategic coordinator with the Racial Justice Coalition, said the survey was not sufficient and only succeeded in reaching those the city already was. I see it as an attempt to check off another box, Thomas said. He added the only way forward is involving every Black voice. According to the draft process outlined in the survey, neighborhood selections are not vetted by council and are determined by neighborhood groups. After conducting a nominee selections process, each group makes its decision and final nomination forms are submitted to the city. The first informational meeting is on Nov. 18. Residents can register online. An updated timeline provided as part of the survey anticipated that appointments would be finalized in February. For more information, visit the reparations webpage at publicinput.com/avlreparations or the city boards and commissions webpage at ashevillenc.gov/department/city-clerk/boards-and-commissions/. Information about how to apply or nominate someone will be posted on the reparations web page at publicinput.com/avlreparations or the city boards and commissions web page at ashevillenc.gov/department/city-clerk/boards-and-commissions/. Sarah Honosky is the city government reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. News Tips? Email shonosky@citizentimes.com or message on Twitter at @slhonosky. This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Asheville reparations commission starts accepting applications Nov. 19 Michael Rogers, director of the UF/IFAS Center for Citrus Research and Education, moderates a panel discussion between scientists and growers during the CREC Open House and Field Day in Lake Alfred on Tuesday. LAKELAND Researchers shared science-based tactics for growers to use against citrus greening disease during an open house Tuesday at the Lake Alfred experiment station. While there still remains no cure for the disease that has decimated the citrus industry in Florida, the latest research offered growers hope for making profits from infected groves throughout the peninsula. To kickstart the event, a morning discussion with University of Floridas Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences citrus faculty dived deep into nutrients, watering and environmental factors to help growers squeeze a profit from their groves infected with HLB, or Huanglongbing, the original name for citrus greening that was first identified nearly a century ago in Asia. More: Citrus World growers cooperative reports higher sales than last year More: USDA citrus forecast predicts 11% fewer Florida oranges and 8% fewer grapefruits this season More: Researchers to study using microbes to combat citrus canker Citrus researcher Fred Gmitter picks out a sample of a new mandarin variety for Bryan Long , a citrus grower from Fort Pierce, during the UF/IFAS Citrus Research and Education Center Open House and Field Day in Lake Alfred on Tuesday. HLB is a bacterial disease spread by an insect, the Asian citrus psyllid. Symptoms include blotchy or yellow-veined citrus leaves, among other signs of the disease. Generally, the disease reduces fruit size, increases fruit drop and negatively impacts the quality of the harvest, including the shape and taste of the fruit. The disease reached Florida in 2005 and within three years, it had spread to the majority of citrus farms. After the panel session, Michael Rogers, the Citrus Research and Education Center director, summarized the discussion entitled, What growers can do now to improve tree health, presented by UF/IFAS Citrus Research and Education Center panelists. "This is not one single solution," Rogers said. Each grove is different with its own environment and the spraying and watering regiment varies for each grower. But getting all of these balanced correctly can make citrus growing profitable, he explained. Citrus researchers answer grower questions during the UF/IFAS Citrus Research and Education Center's Open House and Field Day. "All of these things are cumulative for your success," Rogers said. Story continues After the panel, more than 20 hands-on exhibits featured the latest research findings to help growers keep their diseased trees productive, increase yield and fight fruit drop. The longest line at Ben Hill Griffin Jr. Citrus Hall was for an in-person tasting survey of many varieties of juices from oranges as well as fresh fruit samples of oranges, grapefruits and tangerines, among other citrus. Peter Chaires, executive director of the New Varieties Development and Management Co., stood anxiously awaiting the result of the taste-testing surveys by participants, which included many growers eager to learn which varieties will be the best to plant. "That information will be compiled and shared with the research team," Chaires said of the survey results. The NVDMC supports growers by helping to provide grants for new variety research in Florida for fresh and processed uses of citrus. The hope is that someday a variety will be developed that is immune to citrus greening. For now, the opinions of the growers and other industry taste testers will determine the most popular fruit from the varieties for drinking or eating. Dianne Busch and Dale Hemmelgarn taste test a sample of a new mandarin variety Tuesday. Regarding the flavors and sweetness of the samples, Chaires noted that as the ethnic diversity of the U.S. consumer of citrus has changed, so have the offerings at the taste testing. "We want to have things that are pleasing to everyone," he said. He explained that consumers with Caribbean ancestry, for example, may have a different palate than previous generations of Americans. While growers want citrus juice that tastes good, the fruit also needs to clear additional hurdles such as how many seeds are in each piece of the fruit, or is it the best size to meet the needs of processors, packers and shippers. Also in attendance was Michael Sparks, executive vice president of Florida Citrus Mutual. He said he was pleased to see the Citrus Research and Field Trial Foundation Inc. program now operating for a couple of years and starting to show results. Florida Citrus Mutual is the industry trade group. Its activities include lobbying state and federal legislators. The group, which claims a membership of 3,000 growers, was established in 1948 after the industry became unprofitable in the 1940s when the cost of production was too high and profits too low for growers to earn a living. The CRAFT program was designed to work as a cooperative effort between growers and researchers in order to provide examples of economically feasible production management practices and programs for Florida growers to utilize in the era of HLB. Citrus researchers Christopher Vincent , Tripti Vashisth and Nian Wang answer grower questions. Sparks noted that multimillion-dollar grants had been provided to UF/IFAS for the research that the growers learned at the event. Its good to finally see some of these dollars paying back, Sparks said. There is still work to do." Citrus greening is the leading cause for the steep decline in the industry. The peak of citrus production was 244 million boxes during the 1997-98 season. In October, the USDAs bellwether report forecasted 47 million boxes of Florida oranges for the 2021-22 season, which was down 11% from the 52.8 million boxes harvested the year before. In addition to disease, other factors have contributed to the decades-long decline, such as urbanization, hurricane damage to groves and the younger generation of grower families showing little interest in continuing the business. While the information from the researchers was a lot to digest, Lindsay Raley, who has been a grower for 35 years, remained optimistic about the citrus industry. He was walking the exhibits after hearing about nutrients and micronutrients, including zinc and magnesium, and kaolin clay spraying and irrigation research in addition to numerous other data. I think part of this is to filter down what is not pertinent to your operation, said Raley of Raley Groves in Winter Haven. Raley, 61, was not optimistic his children, who all work for companies outside of the original family business, would take over someday. But that hasn't been decided yet, he said. The afternoon session featured field tours, including the site of a new Jackson grapefruit trial featuring HLB-tolerant trees and a project looking at reflective mulch, kaolin clay, protective covers, and their impact on nutrition, irrigation, plant pathology and overall tree growth. Signaling a possible upturn for the industry in years to come, J. Scott Angle, senior vice president of Agriculture and Natural Resources and the leader at UF/IFAS, explained that of the recent citrus tree plantings, 30% have yet to start bearing fruit and will in the future. "Here at UF/IFAS we believe there are things that can be done," he said. This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Researchers share tactics with citrus growers fighting greening The cast of Harry Potter is reuniting for a TV special to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, from the blockbuster film franchise. Actors Daniel Radcliff, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint will join others in an HBO Max series titled Return to Hogwarts to discuss the making of the film. The director of the first two films, Chris Columbus, will also join the TV special to honour the magic behind the making of the films and the beautiful family created at Warner Bros Studios London two decades ago. Scheduled to be broadcast on 1 January 2022, the special wont be attended by writer JK Rowling, whose comments about transgender issues have been condemned by multiple stars. Rowling will however appear in the retrospective via archived footage. This retrospective is a tribute to everyone whose lives were touched by this cultural phenomenon - from the talented cast and crew who poured their heart and soul into this extraordinary film franchise to the passionate fans who continue to keep the Wizarding World spirit alive 20 years later, said Tom Ascheim, who is the president of Warner Bros. Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics. For the first time ever, the legendary cast returns to where the magic started. Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: #ReturnToHogwarts, streaming New Years Day, only on HBO Max. International release coming soon. pic.twitter.com/53bHAf0WTY HBO Max (@hbomax) November 16, 2021 All the stars including Robbie Coltrane (Hagrid), Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy), Helena Bonham Carter (Bellatrix Lestrange), and Gary Oldman (Sirius Black) will return to the original Hogwarts boarding school sets in London, where the first film was made. Story continues The TV special is one of the many events planned by Warner Bros, including a TV quiz contest for Potter fans hosted by Helen Mirren. In addition to its release on 1 January on HBO Max, the 20th anniversary special will also air on TBS and Cartoon Network in spring 2022, just before the theatrical release of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. Read More Harry Potter director backs release of 3-hour cut with fan-favourite character added Chris Columbus says he could barely speak after directing second Harry Potter film The 30 best childrens books of all time A protester carries a rifle outside the Kenosha County Courthouse, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021 in Kenosha, Wis., during the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial. AP Photo/Paul Sancya A rifle-toting demonstrator showed up outside the Kenosha County Courthouse on Wednesday. Inside the courthouse, jurors are currently deliberating in Kyle Rittenhouse's homicide trial. Meanwhile, law enforcement has been bracing for a verdict. A rifle-toting demonstrator showed up outside the Kenosha County courthouse on Wednesday where jurors are deliberating in Kyle Rittenhouse's homicide trial as law enforcement organizations brace for a verdict. The demonstrator was alone and carrying a megaphone, though it's unclear what he was saying, Kenosha County Sheriff's Department spokesman Sergeant David Wright told Insider. In a video tweeted by Fox News, Kenosha County Sheriff's Department officers could be seen asking the man for identification and a permit to carry the weapon. The man told officers that he did not have a valid permit, and the officers said he needed to have one in order to carry the gun within 1,000 feet of a school. He was then asked by officers to voluntarily put his gun away which he did, Wright told Insider. No other action was taken at the time, Wright said. Meanwhile, around 500 National Guard troops were activated by Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers on Friday ahead of a verdict in Rittenhouse's case. "We continue to be in close contact with our partners at the local level to ensure the state provides support and resources to help keep the Kenosha community and greater area safe," Evers said in a statement. Jury deliberations in Rittenhouse's homicide trial began on Tuesday. Protesters outside the courthouse have been demonstrating both for and against Rittenhouse, including Mark and Patricia McCloskey the St. Louis couple who pointed their guns at Black Lives Matter marchers in June 2020. Businesses have not been boarded up and there's no fencing around the courthouse, local news station ABC7 reported on Monday. Rittenhouse, 18, is charged with fatally shooting Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber and injuring Gaige Grosskreutz during a protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, following the police shooting of Jacob Blake in August 2020. He pleaded not guilty to all the charges he faced and has said he acted in self-defense. Read the original article on Insider Sedgwick County Jail When police responded to a shooting at a Wichita, Kansas home around 12:50 a.m. Tuesday morning, they found a 27-year-old man on the floor with multiple gunshot wounds. He was pronounced dead at the scene. The victim, identified in local reports as Matthew Rodriquez, made comments about taking his life before shooting himself once in the head, said investigators. That initial shot was deemed self-inflicted, Capt. Jason Stephens of the Wichita Police Department told reporters at a Tuesday press briefing. What happened next, according to Stephens, was murder. After Rodriquez fired the first bullet, his roommate, Charles Ian Burnham, 28, immediately thereafter retrieved the same gun and shot the victim two additional times, Stephens said. As a result we have booked Mr. Burnham into the Sedgwick County Jail for one count of first degree murder. Stephens would not provide additional details as to why Burnham was arrested on murder charges after Rodriquez had already shot himself, citing an ongoing investigation. But, he said, one of the elements of first degree murder is premeditation. So that being the case, there was, I can say this, conversation that took place between victim and suspect that led up to the suspects involvement in the shooting incident. Burnhams brother, who also lived in the home, was asleep in another room when the shooting occurred and is not accused of any wrongdoing, Stephens said. Burnham was booked into the Sedgwick County Jail shortly after 6 a.m. on Tuesday, according to jail records. Reached by phone, a relative of the Burnhams said she had nothing to say and asked for privacy. We don't have any comment, Deborah Burnham, 32, told The Daily Beast. I would like it if you did not contact any of the other family [members]. Rodriquezs family was unable to be reached. No further information about Rodriquez or Burnham has yet been shared by authorities. There is no indication at this time that drugs or alcohol played a role in the incident, said Stephens, who added that he doesnt have any information at hand that leads me to believe that weve had any problems with any of these individuals previously. Story continues Burnham is being held on $500,000 bond. Read more at The Daily Beast. Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now! Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more. By Vladimir Soldatkin and Susanna Twidale MOSCOW/LONDON (Reuters) - European gas prices surged again on Wednesday after a delay in the approval process for a major new pipeline from Russia, which German government sources said might not now be commissioned until March next year. Germany's energy regulator suspended https://reut.rs/3wUi5Vb the process for getting the Nord Stream 2 pipeline up and running on Tuesday, dimming hopes that it will provide any significant gas supplies to Europe in the crucial winter months. Delays in the approval process have raised fears that Europe, which gets a third of its gas from Russia, could face power outages https://reut.rs/30ABBdC due to low supplies. Nord Stream 2 has faced stiff opposition from the United States and some European states, which say it will make Europe too reliant on Russia for gas. But other European governments say the new link is vital to secure energy supplies, with higher prices already ramping up inflation rates. On Wednesday the price of gas next month in the Netherlands, considered a benchmark for Europe, jumped 8% to 101.60 euros per megawatt-hour (MWh). The contract has risen almost 60% in November, although it is still well below a 155 euro peak on Oct. 6. "I expect that the start of Nord Stream 2 could be delayed until March 2022," one German government source told Reuters. The German-Eastern Business Association said it trusted the regulator's independence even if it regretted that the decision would cause delays. The group added that it was in the interests of European gas customers as well as the pipeline operator that the project was "legally unassailable and can deliver energy to Europe reliably and safely". The price of gas at the beginning of next year also rose, with the market not now expecting any major flows through Nord Stream 2 until late in the winter heating season, by which time demand may have already peaked. The Dutch contract for gas in January leapt 7.8% to 101.61 euros per MWh, while the British wholesale gas price contract for the first three months of 2022 surged almost 12% to 2.45 pounds per therm. Story continues Some analysts said the certification process could drag on for months because Brussels will still need to give it the green light once German regulators have made their recommendations. "We now estimate that the certification can only be completed around April next year at the earliest, with ample potential for an extension through to August 2022, given the likelihood of an even more stringent evaluation at the next review stage of the European Commission," Rystad Energy's gas markets analyst Zongqiang Luo said. INFLATION Europe's governments are scrambling to soften the blow for consumers and businesses with measures such as price caps and subsidies. Higher energy prices in Europe and around the world are already feeding through to inflation, which may in turn push policymakers to raise interest rates sooner than expected. Data published on Wednesday showed inflation rates in both the European Union https://reut.rs/3Fseu42 and Britain https://reut.rs/3Fq6K2c jumped above 4% in October, more than double central bank targets, with gas prices paid by British consumers, for example, sky-rocketing 28%. Gas prices in Europe were also buoyed by a decline in exports this week from Norway, another key supplier to Britain and the EU, due to maintenance work on its infrastructure. Germany's energy regulator said it had halted the certification of Nord Stream 2 because the Swiss-based consortium behind the pipeline needed to form a German subsidiary under German law to secure an operating licence. In its first comments since news of the delay, the Kremlin said certification was a "complicated process" and that it did not see politics behind the decision. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the consortium deals with requests from the German regulator in a timely fashion and Russia must be patient. Interfax quoted Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova as saying that Moscow expects no change to the deadline for the certification process. Meanwhile, Russian gas flows through the Yamal-Europe pipeline to Germany were steady and above levels at the weekend, data from German network operator Gascade showed. The pipeline, which runs through Belarus, which is in the midst of a migrant crisis and a stand-off with the West, is one of the major routes for Russian gas exports to Europe. Adding to concerns about possible interruptions of gas exports from Russia, Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko has warned https://reut.rs/3qLNLLx that he may shut the pipeline in a row with the EU. Flows through the Yamal-Europe pipeline into Germany at the Mallnow metering point on the Polish border were running at an hourly volume of over 12,500,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) on Wednesday, roughly the same as Tuesday, the data showed. (Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin in Moscow, Susanna Twidale and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in London, Robert Muller in Prague, Vera Eckert and Andreas Rinke in Frankfurt, Kirsti Knolle in Berlin; Writing by Alexander Smith; Editing by David Clarke and Pravin Char) The second Black Friday of the pandemic is nearly underway, and Salisbury businesses are preparing for the high traffic shopping day. Vernon Powell Shoes, Kaiju Records and Barefoot Baby Boutique shared what they are anticipating ahead of the Christmas season this year. "Shopping local is extremely important for the community," Vernon Powell President Joe Wright said. "When (people) shop local, more dollars stay here. Think about that before trying to click and buy this year." Black Friday deals All three stores plan to offer special deals on Black Friday this year. Wright said Vernon Powell plans to offer some deals, though they could be more selective based on inventory availability. At Barefoot Baby Boutique, styles and prints of clothing in which there is only one item left will be discounted by 50%, according to owner Martha Ogburn. Barefoot Baby Boutique owner Martha Ogburn, holds some of the "folk festival" themed items that she will be offering in her store. Kaiju Records plans to discount used records by 10%. The record store will also extend its hours on Black Friday. Owner Shawn "Bip" Roberts anticipates large crowds, especially since Black Friday is also Record Store Day, a national recognition of independently owned record stores that occurs biannually. To combat the coronavirus, many stores like Kaiju Records will enforce social distancing guidelines and capacity limits. "Even though we want people to come out and shop, we want people to be smart," Roberts said. Supply chain issues and staffing shortages Nationwide, excitement for the holiday season has also brought concerns about supply chain issues and labor shortages. Wright said Vernon Powell has experienced these issues firsthand. CHRISTMAS SHOPPING: How supply chain issues will affect holiday season SALISBURY: Airport says big changes will take flight despite FAA funds setback The shoe store is witnessing shipment delays and operating with fewer employees than before the pandemic. "We have (products) on order, we just don't know when (they) will arrive," he said. "It's a wait-and-see situation." Story continues Wright said products could arrive on time, arrive late or never show up. Though he described this as "scary," he said the store is still carrying merchandise and is "ready to go" for the holidays. Additionally, Wright shared optimism for the future. Joe Wright, company president, poses in Vernon Powell Shoes in Salisbury, Maryland, on May 20, 2020. "Once we get the supply chain fixed, we'd love to get back to business as usual and be open the hours we are typically open and have the number of stuff we're used to," he said. Pandemic takeaways Each store experienced the pandemic differently. For Vernon Powell, the pandemic brought an "extremely challenging" year and a half. Like small businesses across the country, the shoe store struggled to pay bills, bring in customers and maintain employees, according to Wright. However, Vernon Powell is "rebounding now," in Wright's words. Kaiju Records experienced the pandemic differently perhaps due to the resurgence in popularity of vinyl records. In 2020, vinyl outsold CDs for the first time since the 1980s. Roberts speculated this could be because many people became interested in vinyl while stuck at home during the beginning months of the pandemic. Shawn "Bip" Roberts stands in his Kaiju Records store in downtown Salisbury, Maryland, on Nov. 12, 2020. Bip opened the small shop in April 2019, and remains optimistic about its future as downtown grows. "I think the pandemic did wonders for the vinyl industry," he said. Meanwhile, Barefoot Baby Boutique seemingly lucked out at the beginning of the pandemic. The boutique, which sells organic and eco-friendly clothes and toys, changed locations the week before the shutdown in March 2020. The months of lockdown allowed Ogburn to set up her new store and prepare for customers. Ogburn said she is well stocked and looking forward to the holiday season. Though the pandemic can be disheartening for businesses, she said it is important to look at the big picture. BERLIN: The Buzz Meadery finds sweet spot in Berlin with mix of mead and cider "It's the long haul that counts," Ogburn said. "You can't get caught up in the moment and get pulled down and get negative. You have to see the long haul and go for that." Maddie Aiken is the community reporter for Delmarva Now/The Daily Times. Have a story tip or idea? Send it her way at maiken@delmarvanow.com. Follow her on Twitter @madsaiken. This article originally appeared on Salisbury Daily Times: Black Friday: Shop local Salisbury businesses urge for Christmas 2021 Associated Press A former cadet who was expelled from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy after becoming a father filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday challenging the school's policy that prohibits students from being parents. Isaak Olson was two months from graduating from the academy in 2014 with a degree in mechanical engineering and a commission as an officer when he disclosed that his fiancee had given birth to their first child several months earlier, according the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Connecticut. The academy expelled Olson under a regulation that requires cadets to either resign or be disenrolled if they incur a parental obligation from a pregnancy over 14 weeks, according to the lawsuit. web_plus145_treatment_credit-shutterstock.jpg A new collaborative effort aims to cure HIV using a novel block-lock-excise approach and is backed by a $26.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health. The multidisciplinary group of researchers, known as the HIV Obstruction by Programmed Epigenetics Collaboratory, is being led by scientists at Gladstone Institutes, Scripps Research, and Weill Cornell Medicine. The biggest hurdle to curing HIV has been the viruss ability to hide a reservoir of latent copies within immune cells. Up to now most viable cure efforts have aimed at reactivating that virus reservoir in order to kill it with antiretroviral therapy an approach called shock and kill or kick and kill. Unfortunately, those approaches havent been able to wake every single copy of the latent virus (at least not without also bringing about severe side effects). The HOPE Collaboratory is taking a fundamentally different approach to targeting HIV than what everyone else has been trying, Dr. Melanie Ott, director of the Gladstone Institute of Virology and program director for the collaboratory, explained in a press statement. The new alternative tactic, block-lock-excise, targets latent HIV without reactivating it. The inspiration for this tactic arose from the fact that researchers have found ancient viruses that are integrated into the human genome but are no longer active or viable. The central concept behind [this] strategy is inspired by the way our cells naturally cope with the remnants of ancient retroviruses that have integrated into our genetic material during evolution, said Cedric Feschotte, one of the investigators and professor of molecular biology and genetics at Cornells College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Feschotte studies these so-called endogenous retroviruses, which make up about 8 percent of modern humans DNA. Identifying which proteins are used by our immune cells to lock up endogenous retroviruses opens the way to developing new repressive molecules that can target HIV and lock it permanently, Feschotte said. The concept is exciting, and it makes sense. We want to accelerate what evolution has already achieved with thousands of relatives of HIV previously defeated and buried in every human[s] cells. Story continues The researchers have also found that these ancient inactive viruses are missing several elements that HIV contains. Theyve identified two elements in particular, one a sequence of DNA and the other a protein called Tat, which are necessary for latent HIV to reactivate and begin replicating again. We have shown that blocking Tat with certain drug-like small molecules can lock HIV in its dormant stage, and this block stays in place for some time, even if antiretroviral therapy is interrupted, said Susana Valente, also a principal investigator and associate professor of immunology and microbiology at Scripps Research. With the block and lock approach, we basically want to push HIV into becoming like a harmless, ancient virus. The pharmaceutical solution would block the Tat protein and alter the structure of the virus, making it harder for other proteins to access the HIV genes and potentially turn them on. This could prevent the virus from awakening and reactivating. That would keep HIV from returning even after someone goes off antiretroviral treatment. The idea is not only to lock HIV so it cannot replicate without using drugs, but essentially to throw away the key, keeping it locked away forever, unable to do any more harm, Valente said. The excise part of the new approach uses recent advances in genome editing. By employing CRISPR/Cas9 genome-editing technology, researchers could delete the remnant HIV hiding in the DNA of immune cells. That would eliminate all traces of HIV and any chance of the virus rebounding. The collaborators are drawn from 12 institutions around the globe, three pharmaceutical companies, clinical groups in Africa and Brazil providing data and samples from people living with HIV, and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, which will bring insights and perspectives from people living with HIV. Its absolutely key that this is a multi-institutional and multidisciplinary approach, said Gladstones Danielle Lyons, program manager for the HOPE Collaboratory. Bringing together this diverse group of people with expertise across various disciplines is what will really drive the discovery of a cure for HIV. The HOPE Collaboratory is one of 10 groups awarded a five-year grant under the Martin Delaney Collaboratories program, the flagship program on HIV cure research at the NIH. BERLIN (Reuters) - Shares in Siemens Healthineers rose on Wednesday after the German health group said it expected its newly-acquired Varian business to grow faster than other divisions in the coming three years, boosting the group's revenue. Healthineers said revenue at Varian, the U.S. cancer treatment specialist it bought earlier this year in a $16.4 billion deal, should grow between 9% and 12% each year with operating return on sales rising to well over 20% until 2025. The company raised its synergy targets from the Varian takeover to more than 350 million euros ($396 million) by 2025, from a previous goal of 300 million euros. Shares in Healthineers were up 4.8% at 0822 GMT, topping the German blue-chip index. It expects annual comparable revenue growth of 6%-8% between 2023 and 2025 for the group, up from the 5%-7% forecast it expected for the fiscal year 2022, excluding COVID-19 tests. Earnings per share would rise 12%-15% each year between 2023 and 2025, it said, adding its dividend policy to distribute 50% to 60% of the net income would remain unchanged. "With fiscal year 2022 we started the next chapter of strategy 2025," Chief Executive Bernd Montag told the company's Capital Markets Day. Healthineers will focus more on fighting cancer, cardiovascular and neurovascular diseases, leveraging its market position in imaging and robotics. ($1 = 0.8842 euros) (Reporting by Riham Alkousaa; Editing by Emma Thomasson and Edmund Blair) Will Smith said that he wanted to date his "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" costar Karyn Parsons. Smith said he "tried to explain that we were not really cousins so it would be fine if we dated." The actor said that in response, Parsons was "smart enough to tell me 'hell no.'" Will Smith said he was interested in dating his "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" costar Karyn Parsons, but she turned him down. In his self-titled memoir released on November 9, Smith spoke candidly about his experience on the hit '90s sitcom, which marked his acting debut. "Fresh Prince" centered on Smith's character having a fish-out-of-water experience as he left his hometown of West Philadelphia to live with his Uncle Phil (James Avery), Aunt Viv (Janet Hubert), and three cousins named Hilary Banks (Parsons), Carlton Banks (Alfonso Ribeiro), and Ashley Banks (Tatyana Ali) in their lavish Bel-Air mansion. Smith described Parsons as "the least experienced next to me" and said that she "beat out a slew of Hollywood big hitters to win her role." The actor said that Parsons also knew that it was in their best interests to remain professional. "Was smart enough to tell me 'hell no' when I tried to explain that we were not really cousins so it would be fine if we dated. ('I swear it won't mess up our working relationship.' She knew better than that good call KP)," Smith said. Smith ended up meeting his first wife, Sheree Zampino, at a taping of "A Different World" on a nearby set and married her three months later. Their first and only child together, Trey Smith, was born in November 1992. Smith and Zampino's divorce was finalized in 1995 and the actor dated Jada Pinkett Smith, who he first saw exiting a casting office for "Fresh Prince." They got married on December 31, 1997 and welcomed two children together: son Jaden Smith (born in July 1998) and daughter Willow Smith (born in October 2000). Read the original article on Insider SEOUL, South Korea (AP) South Korea on Wednesday reported 3,187 new cases of the coronavirus, nearly matching a one-day record set in September, a worrisome development in a country that eased social distancing rules in recent weeks to lessen the pandemics economic impact. The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency said more than 2,550 of the new cases came from the greater capital area, including a record 1,436 in Seoul. The countrys death toll is now 3,137, after 21 deaths were reported on Wednesday, the 16th consecutive day of double-digit fatalities, including a record 32 on Saturday. The delta-driven spread has raised questions about whether the country was too quick to ease pandemic restrictions at the start of November in what officials described as a first step toward restoring some pre-pandemic normalcy. In allowing larger social gatherings and expanding indoor dining hours at restaurants, officials had hoped that the countrys improving vaccination rates would keep hospitalizations and deaths down even if the virus continues to spread. But there has been a rise in serious cases and fatalities among senior citizens who rejected vaccines or people in long-term care settings whose immunities have waned after being inoculated early in the vaccine rollout, which began in late February. Officials are now pushing to speed up the administration of booster shots for people who were fully vaccinated more than six months ago. Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum, the No. 2 government official behind President Moon Jae-in, said during a virus meeting Wednesday that the interval will be reduced to four months for people who are in their 60s or older, and for patients in nursing homes or long-term care hospitals. People in their 50s will be eligible for booster shots after five months, Kim said. The St. Louis couple who made headlines for pulling guns on Black Lives Matter protesters last year and spoke at the GOP convention two months later attended Kyle Rittenhouses murder trial in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Monday. They listened to closing arguments as prosecutors contended the teenager who killed two unarmed protesters and wounded a third person should be jailed. The defense argued the gunman was defending himself. Jurors deliberated Tuesday for more than eight hours without reaching a verdict. They will resume deliberation on Wednesday. Mark McCloskey said he and Patricia McCloskey were supporting Rittenhouse because they feel for the him, according to Insider. Mark McCloskey stood outside his home on June 28, 2020 holding an AR-15 as civil rights protesters passed by on June 28, 2020. Rittenhouses weapon of choice was an AR-15-style gun during his encounter with activists in August 2020. Patricia McCloskey was armed with a handgun. Mark McCloskey, a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri, and his wife Patricia McCloskey walk outside the Kenosha County Courthouse, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021 in Kenosha, Wis., during the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial. We think hes been politically prosecuted, as were we, and were hoping that the jury finds him not guilty on all counts and he can go home a free man, Mark McCloskey told Fox News. Some protesters shouted at the 64-year-old personal injury attorney, while other showed support as he tried to speak to a reporter outside the courthouse. The staunch conservative is running for a senate seat in Missouri. He blamed cancel culture for Rittenhouses predicament. Mark McCloskey pleaded guilty to fourth-degree assault and Patricia McCloskey to second-degree harassment in June. They were both later pardoned by Missouris GOP governor in August. Standing outside a St. Louis courthouse after that pardon was granted which is a roughly five-hour drive from where Rittenhouse in being tried Mark McCloskey said, Id do it again. TAVARES The 5th Judicial Circuit State Attorneys Office will not prosecute a Lake County Sheriffs Office deputy who can be seen in body cam footage shooting and wounding an unarmed man in May. The announcement by Chief Assistant State Attorney Walter Forgie came Tuesday regarding the shooting of Daniel Sayre, a 49-year-old mentally ill convicted felon, who was shot in a heavily wooded area of DeLand. In a sworn statement, the deputy who shot Sayre said he lost his balance in the pursuit and accidentally fired as he was falling. "I have no recollection of forming any intent to pull the trigger," Brian Schneider wrote in his statement. In his report, Forgie explained why the shooting did not meet the statutory requirements for prosecution, but advised that the LCSO may need to review some of its policies. Forgie made the decision after reviewing an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The first report: FDLE investigating deputy-involved shooting in Lake County More information comes out: New report, paired with footage, shed more light on Lake County Deputy-involved shooting 'Hes mentally ill': Woman wonders why brother was shot, critically injured by Lake deputy What happened on May 2 Schneider was among a handful of deputies who responded to 1:12 p.m. calls from multiple people on May 2 about an armed man spooking horses in a pasture. I saw a man holding a rifle or a shotgun, property owner Gwendolyn Granade told the Daily Commercial shortly after the incident. She said she heard a deputy shout, Show me your hands, and then a single shot. It was Schneider who was calling out the orders. After initially ignoring the commands, Sayre stopped and sat up on his knees turned away from Deputy Schneider (still ignoring the repeated commands to lie on his belly), the prosecutors report said. Approximately six seconds after sitting, Sayre swatted his hand at Deputy Schneiders firearm as if he were going to push it away or try to grab it from him. Story continues Twenty seconds later, Sayre was on his feet again, despite Schneider telling him to stop moving. The video appeared to show Sayre jerking suddenly to try and get away, and then he was shot. While officers attended to his injuries, it was determined that Sayre was not armed at the time of the incident. Sayre had dropped or discarded his gun in a wooded area across the street from the shooting scene, where it was later recovered by law enforcement, the report stated. Schneider later provided the following sworn statement to investigators: At one point he reached back with his hand and swiped and hit the barrel of my rifle. For a few seconds the suspect stopped moving. The other deputy who was approaching to back me up called out asking my location; at that moment the suspect got up in an attempt to flee. When he got up, I lost my balance when his ankle was no longer under my foot, and I attempted to regain my balance and get my rifle re-aimed at the suspect. During this split-second action, while my finger was on the trigger and I was losing my balance, a shot was fired that struck the suspect as I was falling down onto my right knee. I have no recollection of forming any intent to pull the trigger. 'Enough is enough' Sayre was airlifted to Central Florida Regional Hospital in Sanford where he underwent surgery on his stomach, colon and small intestine. His sister, Elizabeth Turner, was furious. She was on her way to pick him up after he called her. Turner told deputies that he had been in an ambulance earlier in the day, a clear indicator that something was amiss, she said. The report quoted her as saying that he was out of his mind. Turner told the Daily Commercial that he is bipolar. The report quotes her as telling deputies that he is schizophrenic. People with mental illnesses are constantly shot by police, Turner told the Daily Commercial after the shooting. Enough is enough. Sayre told rescue workers that he had taken methamphetamine before the incident, the prosecutor noted. Sayre has 12 prior criminal convictions, including multiple felonies, two prior violent crimes, and two drug-related offenses," the report stated. Its been 20 years, Turner told the Daily Commercial, referring to an aggravated battery charge that led to a one-year prison sentence. Law enforcement and the mentally ill: 911 operators need more training to handle mental health crisis calls. Here's why it matters. Ryan LeRoux: Intersection of mental health, police and race takes the life of another young Black man LCSO policy comes into question Key to the prosecutors decision not to pursue charges against the deputy is the fact that to prove aggravated battery with a firearm, the state must prove the suspect intentionally or knowingly caused bodily harm to an individual and in doing so used a firearm," the report said. "In this incident, there is no evidence to support the statutory elements" the report continues. "The video evidence and sworn statement of Deputy Schneider substantiate the fact that Deputy lost his balance at the time the single round was fired and there was no intent to discharge his weapon. Nor did his actions meet the requirements to charge him with culpable negligence, Forgie noted. That law demands proof of reckless indifference or grossly careless disregard of the safety of others. The report did add, however, there are policy matters that will need to be considered by LCSO, but did not specify what those matters are. I have not attempted to review this matter for compliance with Lake County Sheriffs Office policy or good police practices," Forgie wrote. "Such review is properly left to the sheriff. LCSO Lt. John Herrell would not go into specifics, but said the department will conduct an internal affairs investigation, including a review of training and policies. Forgie ended his findings by stating that his office will take no further action, except to prosecute Sayre for possession of a firearm by a felon, armed trespassing and resisting without violence. Were it not for Sayres unlawful actions preceding the shooting, he would not have been shot, the report said. This article originally appeared on Daily Commercial: State Attorney: Florida deputy didn't intend to shoot unarmed man, won't be prosecuted Steve Bannon, who was a top adviser to former President Donald Trump, filed a motion Wednesday pleading not guilty to charges of contempt of Congress. "I do hereby waive formal arraignment and enter my plea of NOT GUILTY to the indictment," Bannon said in the filing. The motion still has to be signed off on by the judge hearing the case. The move is unusual, because Bannon, 67, is still expected to attend a conference in the case before the judge on Thursday. In the filing, Bannon said the request obviates "the need to conduct an arraignment during the virtual status conference scheduled for November 18, 2021, which I will attend with my attorneys." Bannon's lawyer, David Schoen, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He told CNBC that the early plea would "help make the process more efficient." A federal grand jury indicted Bannon last week on two counts of contempt of Congress for defying subpoenas and refusing to answer questions from the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. One of the counts is for refusing to appear for a deposition to answer questions about what he knew about the planning for the riot, and the other is for declining to produce documents requested by the committee. Bannon's attorneys have said he did so to honor the wishes of Trump, who planned to invoke executive privilege. The committee has contended that executive privilege should not extend to Bannon, because he was not working for the White House at the time of the riot, and that he should have at least appeared for questioning and told the panel what documents are in his control. If he is convicted, Bannon could face up to a year behind bars and a fine of up to $100,000. He sounded a defiant note before he surrendered to federal authorities Monday, declaring, "We're taking down the Biden regime." "They took on the wrong guy this time," he said. Steve Bannon leaves the federal courthouse after testifying at the trial of Roger Stone in November 2019. Alex Wong/Getty Images Steve Bannon pleaded not guilty to 2 misdemeanor counts of contempt of Congress. Bannon surrendered to the FBI on Monday morning. The DOJ indicted Bannon last week after he failed to comply with a Jan. 6 select committee subpoena. Steve Bannon on Wednesday pleaded not guilty to two counts of contempt of Congress. The Justice Department charged Bannon on Friday after he refused to comply with a subpoena issued by the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot. He rejected the committee's demand that he sit for a deposition and produce relevant documents. The panel moved to pursue criminal contempt charges against him last month. The Justice Department has previously declined to enforce criminal contempt referrals, but both Democrats and Republicans on the select committee said they expected that to change under the Biden administration. Bannon surrendered himself to the FBI on Monday morning but remained defiant while speaking to reporters. "We're taking down the Biden regime," he said. Bannon is not the only associate of former President Donald Trump who's failed to comply with the January 6 select committee's investigation. On Friday, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows failed to show up for a deposition, and his lawyer said it's up to the courts to resolve issues related to Trump's assertion of executive privilege over matters related to the committee's investigation. Bannon's lawyer made a similar argument last month, telling the committee that Bannon was not required to comply with the subpoena because it was "an issue between the committee and President Trump's counsel." He added that Trump's lawyer, Justin Clark, had "directed" Bannon not to testify or turn over documents "until the issue of executive privilege is resolved." An attorney for Bannon did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment. This story is developing. Check back for updates. Read the original article on Business Insider CADIZ, Spain (AP) Metalworkers burned street barricades for a second straight day in Spain's southern city of Cadiz on Wednesday, as trade unions demanded wage increases in line with a recent spike in inflation across the European Union. Workers cut some roads leading into Cadiz for a brief period during the morning. They set alight several cars and clashed with police, who responded with rubber bullets. Two police officers suffered minor injuries. Nobody was arrested. Juan Linares, the provincial head of the industrial department of the CCOO union, one of Spain's largest, said he was not optimistic about a quick resolution to the walkout. The situation is at a standstill. There are no phone calls, no situation that would lead us to open negotiations," Linares told Spanish broadcaster RTVE. The inflation rate in Spain has risen to its highest in years, driven up by energy costs. In October, it stood at 5.5%. Nadia Calvino, a deputy prime minister and economy minister in Spain's government, asked for the violence to stop so that a deal could be struck. We have total respect for the demands of the workers and the freedom of demonstration and expression, but it is not to possible to behave violently within the framework of a negotiation of a collective or labor agreement," Calvino said. Most of the employment in the province's metal sector is in shipbuilding. Cadiz, a city of 116,000 people located on the coast near the Strait of Gibraltar, is a blue-collar city where trade unions have deep roots. Labor groups called for more demonstrations on Thursday. The high-tech riverside 'super homes' are being demolished after failing a building inspection. (SWNS) Three high-tech super homes with artificial intelligence worth 600,000 each are to be demolished after they failed a building inspection. The ultra-modern homes in Cambridge were set to feature artificial intelligence to control heating, lighting and security. But inspectors said the steel frames of the partially-built homes, part of a small development called 'Cityglade,' failed building standards and deemed them unsafe. Now the detached homes are being demolished and razed to the ground before being rebuilt by a new contractor, causing months of delays for the prospective buyers. The homes in Cambridge were set to feature artificial intelligence to control heating, lighting and security. (SWNS) The detached homes are being demolished and razed to the ground before being rebuilt by a new contractor. (SWNS) David Lewis, chief executive of county council-owned homebuilder This Land, said that buyers of the homes had been informed of the need to rebuild. Hadham Construction, who designed and built the steel frames on the three houses, has had its contract terminated and it is now the subject of legal proceedings, Lewis said. A spokesman from Hadham Construction denied any wrongdoing and claimed that the company was owed 250,000 for the work. They said that it will challenge Cambridgeshire County Council in pending legal proceedings. The spokesman added: "There have been two independent investigations into the structure and installation of these three houses and both have stated that the houses are perfectly capable of completion by HCL to the required standard to obtain full warranties. The houses were part of a 14-home county council-led development consisting of two, three and four-bed properties. (SWNS) "Various approaches have been made to This Land Ltd but no response has been received whether to company letters or solicitors letters. The houses were part of a 14-home county council-led development consisting of two, three and four-bed properties. A promotional brochure describes the Cityglades homes as "truly unique" and says they will feature artificial intelligence to control heating, lighting and security. The other 11 homes were unaffected by the steel-frame issues. Watch: How does the 95% mortgage scheme work? Dozens of cargo ships bringing goods from overseas sit stuck at anchor off the California coast, waiting for spaces at ports to become available so they can unload. Supply chain issues linked to that bottleneck have forced Jesse Borjon this fall to cancel about 60% of the orders he's made for Red Door Home Store, the Topeka business he owns with his wife, Stacie Borjon, at 2131 S.W. Fairlawn Plaza Drive. Jesse Borjon said he canceled those orders because the companies supplying the goods either were unable to provide an estimated time of arrival or gave an ETA that was unacceptably late. "In some cases, the company didn't even know where the product was," he said. Fortunately, Jesse Borjon said, Red Door Home Store is able to provide its customers "a full store" this holiday season because he saw those problems coming early this year and "overbought" on pretty much everything it sells. A 'wait and see' game Jesse Borjon, owner of Red Door Home Store, 2131 S.W. Fairlawn Plaza Drive, arranges a few holiday items for sale Tuesday morning. He said the business is able to provide its customers "a full store" this holiday season because he saw those supply chain problems coming and "overbought" on pretty much everything it sells. The Borjons are among local small business owners dealing this holiday season with global issues hampering the supply chain that provides goods to U.S. consumers. The breakdowns are making the retailers' lives more difficult. Supply chain concerns still face Absolute Design by Brenda, 629 S. Kansas Ave., said business owner Brenda Price. "My understanding is that everything I'm missing is on land now," she said. Price's store offers items including flowers, wreaths, cards, gifts, stuffed animals, women's clothing, women's jewelry, home accent, home decor and wall decor items, its website said. Price said she received an email Tuesday from the main company she's been working with. That email said the company is arranging for its employees to work double shifts. It's asking customers to be patient as it seeks to provide them their goods, Price said. "It's a 'wait and see' game," she said. Price did receive some items Tuesday from another company with which she works, she said. Story continues 'Better success' with eastern ports Jesse Borjon stands behind the Red Door Home Store sales desk Tuesday as he talks about how he spends most of his days working. Plants, furniture, mirrors, pillows, artworks, figurines and cards, many of them Christmas-themed, were among items available for purchase Tuesday at Red Door Home Store. The business relies heavily on holiday season revenues and maintains a seasonal pop-up store in Leawood, said Borjon, who is also a Kansas legislator. Some of the things Red Door Home Store sells are available only from overseas, he said. "A lot of these items come in through California ports," he said. "We've had much better success with shipments coming in through eastern ports." Some of the goods Borjon has had problems acquiring recently have included Christmas trees, Christmas ornaments and pretty much anything involving glass, he said. Furniture orders are taking 36 weeks to arrive, when it used to be about 10, Borjon said. In addition, he said, products coming from overseas cost more because virtually every company his store works with has added surcharges to offset fast-rising costs they face for the containers they use to ship their goods. Major suppliers Target and Walmart are chartering their own container ships in an effort to avoiding shipping delays. Unfortunately, small business owners can't afford to do that, Borjon said. He said scrambling to deal with inventory challenges caused this year by supply chain issues has required "three times" as much effort as his business had to put forth in past years. This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Topeka stores greet holiday season, deal with supply chain concerns The Conversation Used car and truck prices are up 31% over the previous year. AP Photo/David ZalubowskiConsumer prices jumped 6.8% in November 2021 from a year earlier the fastest rate of increase since 1982, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data published on Dec. 10, 2021. The biggest jumps during the month were in energy, used cars and clothing. The Conversation U.S. asked University of South Carolina economist William Hauk to explain whats driving the recent increase in inflation and how it affects A Nueces County district court judge has recused herself from the punishment phase of Derek Parra's trial after she and other court personnel allegedly watched the jury deliberate on camera without sound before last week's verdict. Court documents show that Nueces County First Assistant District Attorney Angelica Hernandez filed a motion for 214th District Court Judge Inna Klein's removal from Parra's case on Monday the same day Parra's punishment phase was set for. More: Corpus Christi man found not guilty of murder, aggravated assault in 2019 killing Parra, 41, pleaded guilty to a charge of felon in possession of a firearm . "Judge Inna Klein in violation of Texas Code of Criminal Procedure ... watched the jury deliberation by the use of her courtroom camera system," the motion states. "Judge Klein not only watched them, but she allowed members of her staff, defense counsel, and state prosecutors to watch the jury deliberations." Nueces County District Attorney's Office The motion says Klein was "vocal in watching the deliberations" and that the "broadcast of the jury deliberations went on for hours." Klein, who was in her courtroom preparing for the punishment phase of Parra's trial when she learned of the motion, could be heard on camera telling court personnel, "Unfortunately, some technical issues have come up where I'm going to reset this case to this Wednesday." Klein recused herself from Parra's case the same day. Court documents also show Parra's defense attorney, Victora Muniz, responded to the state's motion for Klein's recusal by saying she knew of no one who violated the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure. Additionally, Muniz claimed the Nueces County District Attorney's Office had known about the incident for six days and only chose to file the motion 40 minutes before Parra's punishment phase was set to begin calling the filing of the motion "untimely." Story continues However, Hernandez claims she only found out about the incident the day before Parra's punishment phase Sunday, Nov. 14, according to court documents. Judge Missy Medary, the presiding judge of the Fifth Administrative Judicial Region, is responsible for appointing a new judge to Parra's case. That judge will be responsible for deciding Parra's punishment, as well as holding a hearing to determine whether Klein and other court personnel accused of watching the jury deliberations should be "held in contempt and jailed, fined, or both." "It's a hard situation because we do have assistant district attorneys that were also present at the time this was happening. But, you know, there has to be accountability and equal treatment under the law," Hernandez told the Caller-Times. "That applies to a judge, to a bailiff, to an assistant district attorney, to a defense attorney to anyone who was in there. There has to be equal treatment under the law." Hernandez confirmed the Nueces County Sheriff's Office has been asked to investigate the incident for possible criminal charges. Kailey E. Hunt covers breaking news and public safety in South Texas. Help support more local coverage with a subscription at caller.com/subscribe. More: Man accused in Ayers Street killing appears in court More: Man accused of Ayers Street murder extradited to Nueces County Jail This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Nueces County judge accused of watching jury deliberate on video Cymbio, a Tel Aviv-based startup has raised $20 million in a Series B round, which saw the participation of two new backers, Chris North, an ex-Amazon executive, and Jeff Weiser, formerly of Shopify. The funding was led by Corner Ventures, with participation from Udi Angel, Vertex Ventures and Yuval Tal, founder and president of Payoneer. Cymbio, a B2B drop-ship automation platform, is planning to use the new funding to grow its global footprint by establishing an office in Europe and expanding its team in the U.S. The company was founded in 2015 by Roy Avidor, Mor Lavi and Gilad Zirke, driven by their passion for e-commerce and a realization of the challenges faced by brands and retailers in digital commerce. The platform was built to connect brands with retailers and/or marketplaces. Cymbio is laser focused on serving brands, enabling sales growth while relieving manual, error-prone and time-consuming processes, said Avidor, the startups CEO. We are humbled and excited to work with so many trailblazing operators and visionaries, and together join our mission of creating a connected commerce world. This next stage allows us to continue innovating and supporting brands growth with additional product offerings, expanding partnerships and our global footprint. Cymbio Founders Left to right: Roy Avidor, co-founder and CEO; Gilad Zirkel, co-founder and CTO; Mor Lavi, co-founder and COO. Image Credits: Cymbio Todays new funding announcement comes about seven months after the startup raised $7 million in a Series A round, which the company used to expand its sales and marketing team, and its technology. Cymbio is also planning to add new offerings to its core automation platform to expand actionable data analytics and enhance its low-code integration capabilities, which will allow brands to easily connect with hundreds of retailers and marketplaces with only a few clicks. Cymbios technology stack is paving the future for brands that sell online. The company has built the infrastructure for the next generation of e-commerce, with a platform that uniquely supports brands growth, said co-founder and general partner at Corner Ventures, Marvin Tien. Story continues The platform was built to help brands sell on any e-commerce platform, with the goal of increasing their targeted visibility and sales. For maximum benefits, before listing, brands first have to establish the cost of setting up, the ability of retailers to deliver on sales and margin projections. Cymbio does end-to-end handling, including the listing of the products, inventory integration, tracking and returns. All the brand needs to do is kick off work with any retailer and then Cymbio does the rest. In the past few months, we picked up significant tailwinds as retailers and marketplaces that we support started introducing us to brands they wanted to sell on their drop-ship programs or marketplaces, Avidor told TechCrunch. At the same time, we received many referrals from third party logistics and software vendors, which generated a network effect (where more brands brought more marketplaces, who brought more brands who brought more vendors to the Cymbio network) which helped us scale up quickly. The company said that it has so far tripled its revenues in 2021, when compared to a similar period last year, and has grown its enterprise customers fourfold. The over 400 brands it is currently supporting includes New Balance, Steve Madden and Authentic Brands Group. With the rise of marketplaces (most large retailers are operating a marketplace or a drop-ship program today) brands need to comply with every retailers requirements, some of which are very challenging to accommodate. Cymbio supports hundreds of retailers and became the go-to solution for outsourcing all marketplace and drop-ship needs for brands, said Avidor. Connecticut regulators, cracking down against another electric supplier, announced Wednesday that it has fined a Dallas company $500,000 over allegations of improper billing practices and said the supplier lacked the managerial capability to serve Connecticut customers. As part of the settlement with the state, Clearview Electric Inc. withdrew from the Connecticut marketplace for six years. Its the latest action against a third-party electric supplier that has drawn consumer complaints. The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority has documented chronic troubles with the third-party electric suppliers and run-ins with customers. Regulators said they have received complaints that Clearview charged a rate different from what was stated in the contract. Clearview blamed a processing error, PURA said. Other complaints said Clearview tried charging early termination fees, assessing incorrect re-enrollment rates and additional problems. Regulators also said they have reason to believe Clearview currently lacks the managerial capability to serve Connecticut customers. Clearview corrected complaints filed by customers but was unaware of problems until it received complained complaints or was ordered to investigate, the agency said. PURA also said Clearview customers failed to have their enrollment and renewals processed or be notified of the processing failures. A representative of the company did not respond to a request for comment. PURAs Office of Education, Outreach and Enforcement has enforced settlement payments of more than $1.7 million and about $52,000 in restitution credits to customers since July 2020, the agency said. In July, the office led negotiations for a settlement agreement between the state and Mega Energy of New England LLC to resolve claims the companys marketing included unfair or deceptive marketing practices. Mega paid a $250,000 fine and at least $47,000 in customer restitution credits. It also resolved allegations against Town Square Energy LLC after customers accused the company of various marketing violations, PURA said. It resulted in a $400,000 penalty to a nonprofit energy assistance organization. Connecticut, with many other states, allows consumers to sign up for third-party energy suppliers intended to introduce competition into the energy market and give consumers more choice. State regulators and consumer protection officials have fielded numerous complaints from consumers about deceptive and inaccurate information, prompting legislation to toughen state rules. Stephen Singer can be reached at ssinger@courant.com. A Texas woman is suing her former employer after she says the strip club stopped scheduling her when she was pregnant in 2019. Bexar County resident Sara Soto says San Antonio Mens Club violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits sex and pregnancy discrimination. The lawsuit was filed Nov. 11 in the U.S. District Court of Western Texas in San Antonio. 35 Bar & Grill, LLC, which does business as San Antonio Mens Club, could not be reached by McClatchy News. A call to the strip club went unanswered. The lawsuit says Soto was hired by the business in November 2017 as a sever before she was promoted to bartender in 2018. She typically worked five shifts a week and would sometimes be called in for extra shifts on her days off. In January 2019, she told her general manager that she was pregnant. Two months later, in March, Soto was being scheduled for fewer shifts, according to the lawsuit. First, she would be scheduled for three shifts a week, and then that dropped down to two per week. On April 2, 2019, Soto texted her scheduling manager about her reduced schedule. She told him in her text messages I cant pay my bills on 2 days a week, the lawsuit says. He responded: I am suppose to let u go till ur done with the pregnancy but was tryn to give u some shifts. The general manager also told Soto that she didnt fit into their fantasy and people dont want to see someone pregnant while at the strip club, according to the lawsuit. Sometimes its not about right and wrong its about business and its not personal, he said, according to the lawsuit. Fellow employees of Soto planned a baby shower at work for her, the lawsuit says. But as she attended the event, she saw she was no longer on the schedule for future shifts. She was never scheduled for work again, according to the lawsuit. Soto filed a Charge of Discrimination with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in July 2019 on the grounds of discrimination due to pregnancy. In June 2020, the EEOC issued a determination saying the evidence obtained during the investigation indicates that after Charging Party (Ms. Soto) notified her employer of her pregnancy, her work schedule was severely reduced until she was entirely removed from the schedule, according to the lawsuit. Story continues The document also says her pregnancy was the motivating reason for the adverse actions taken against her. Soto is suing for compensatory damages, including lost income and benefits, and for emotional pain and inconvenience. Baby Shark song was used as torture in Oklahoma County jail, inmates say in lawsuit Contaminated onions at Torchys Tacos led to childs organ failure, Texas lawsuit says Woman gets wrong drink at Starbucks then is injured returning it, Texas lawsuit says LONDON (Reuters) - Thomson Reuters Corp on Wednesday pulled out of a pledge to support members of the British armed forces in order to "preserve the safety and neutrality of our reporters" after complaints from some current and former Reuters staff that it would compromise the news agency's reputation for independence. Thomson Reuters, the Toronto-based parent of Reuters, on Aug. 31 signed the British Armed Forces Covenant, which pledges to help and support those currently serving in the British armed forces as well as veterans and their families. After Thomson Reuters' support for the covenant became public, a number of current and former Reuters journalists said the pledge called into question the impartiality of the global news agency, which is obliged by the Trust Principles to act at all times with integrity, independence and freedom from bias. They also raised concerns that the pledge could endanger reporters working in certain countries because the agency could be cast as supportive of Britain's armed forces or of its foreign policy. "We have decided we must withdraw our signature to preserve the safety and neutrality of our reporters," a Thomson Reuters spokesperson said in an emailed statement. "The covenant is not affiliated with any political party and the initiative was signed with the best intentions, but our participation led to concerns that such a public pledge could undermine the Thomson Reuters Trust Principles and compromise the newsroom's independence and safety of our journalists." The Armed Forces Covenant says it "supports serving personnel, service leavers, veterans, and their families." The British defence ministry says the covenant demonstrates an organisation's "intention to support the Armed Forces community". A spokesman for the ministry declined immediate comment on the withdrawal by Thomson Reuters. Thomson Reuters said it signed the covenant as "an extension of our longstanding support" for Britain's poppy appeal, in which tens of millions of people buy a red paper or metal poppy to remember the war dead and help armed forces families. It said the decision to withdraw did not affect its commitment to being an inclusive organisation that supports people from all backgrounds, including military veterans. (Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Nick Tattersall) Ari Brisbon, 32, of Bristol, appears in District Court in Providence on Wednesday. A 32-year-old Bristol man faces felony charges including a count of attempted murder Wednesday in the aftermath of an early-morning shooting that involved a man who had followed him to his home, according to a prosecutor. The other man told police he had followed Ari Brisbon after he saw him striking a woman in a car ahead of him, said the prosecutor, Jessica Villella, who spoke at Brisbon's appearance in District Court in Providence. After arriving at 402 High St., Brisbon retrieved a 9 mm handgun from the residence and opened fire on the witness, grazing the man's clothing, hitting a headrest in the car, and scattering at least 11 shell casings at the scene, Villella told Judge Melissa DuBose. The shooting incident generated a large police response, an hours-long standoff and the evacuation of some residents and also delayed the start of classes at three Bristol schools. A state police tactical team was deployed. It all started around 1:30 a.m. when the witness saw what he believed to be an incident of domestic violence in another vehicle, according to Burke. The witness followed the car to an apartment at 402 High St., said Bristol police Maj. Brian Burke. Earlier this year: Warren shooting suspect's death ruled suicide; Bristol police release details of firefight After the couple went inside, a man emerged from the first-floor apartment and fired multiple shots at the witness's car while the witness was talking to the Bristol police on the phone, according to Burke. One bullet smashed a window and grazed the witness's clothing near the shoulder; he was not injured, according to Burke. The police believe the man who fired the shots was the same man involved in the alleged domestic incident, Burke said earlier. (The witness initially told police it was a rifle but the police later determined it was a handgun, according to Burke.) Police seized a handgun at the home, Villella said. Survivor of Warren shootings: 'I was sitting there talking to the kid before he shot me' Story continues Responding to the call, Bristol police officers and Rhode Island State Police troopers set up a perimeter around the apartment building and told residents via Facebook to stay away. The police evacuated residents of the second and third floors of the apartment building. At about 6 a.m., a state police tactical unit approached the apartment building, "engaging" both Brisbon and the woman with a loudspeaker, according to Burke. They came out separately and were taken into custody, he said. Shortly after 6 a.m., the police posted the following message to Facebook: "The scene is now safe/secure. No longer an active situation. Please remain clear of the area for investigation that is still underway." The start of classes at the following schools was delayed two hours, according to the police: Guiteras Elementary School, Colt Andrews School and Mount Carmel School. According to the police, Brisbon faces the following charges: assault with intent to commit specified felonies; felony assault/dangerous weapon or substance; discharge of a firearm when committing a crime of violence; lacking a license or permit required to carry a pistol and firing shots in a compact area. Later, Wednesday, Brisbon appeared in court. Villella asked DuBose to set bail at $150,000. Calling the charge "very serious," DuBose set bail at $75,000, which meant he had to deposit $7,500 with the court to go free or give the court a lien on property worth $75,000. He was held immediately after his appearance. This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Bristol shooting: Witness to domestic violence grazed by gun shot The future leaders of our state are in our classrooms today. It is in our collective interest for every child to reach their full potential. Where a child lives whether it's an urban, suburban or rural community should not be what determines whether they have the resources they need to achieve their dreams and receive the kind of education that allows them to live a fulfilling life. We believe there is no better time than now to modernize the way Tennessee funds education by improving our school funding formula so every child has what they need to become the best version of themselves. Hear more Tennessee Voices: Get the weekly opinion newsletter for insightful and thought provoking columns. The current funding formula for school is not focused on student achievement The states resource-based model has forced our school leaders into equating more money with more staff and overhead rather than thinking about what students need the most and then directing the money to meet those needs in the classroom. Thats why we advocate for and support a new student-based formula that focuses on the students and their unique needs first. Parents and school faculty members attend the student-focused public education funding town hall meeting on October 27, 2021, in Hendersonville, Tenn. This is the first of eight state-led town hall meetings to discuss revising the state's education funding formula. We're focusing on asking all the right questions: Are our students learning at grade level? If not, why not? How many students come from low-income backgrounds? How many are English language learners? What special needs do our students have? What extra supports do they need to succeed? Are we adequately funding those specific needs? A formula that answers these questions is a formula for the future and one that our students deserve. Sadly, the states current formula, the Basic Education Program (BEP) forces school leaders to seek the money first before asking these critical questions. Even though education spending in Tennessee has continued to increase over the years, too many of those tax dollars are simply not making into the classrooms to directly serve our students and teachers. According to a recent analysis by the Beacon Center of Tennessee, only about 53% of our states education funding actually makes it into the classroom, while the remainder of the funds that were originally meant for students is actually being spent on administrative costs and overhead. This is bad for everyone and helps too few children across our state reach their full potential. Story continues Hear from Tennessee's Black Voices: Get the weekly newsletter for powerful and critical thinking columns. It's time to reassess the Tennessee's school funding formula Governor Lee, Commissioner Schwinn and our legislative leaders are beginning the process to reimagine state funding. I applaud them for their leadership on this issue. Victor Evans It's my honor to serve as chairman of the Economically Disadvantaged and Highly Mobile Students Subcommittee. It's my job to help lead the school funding discussion and to zero in on the needs of those students who were most at risk of falling behind academically before the pandemic began and those who need our help now more than ever. We need a bold approach for the future, and we can't pay for that approach with an outdated funding system that prioritizes where a child lives over who a child aspires to be. I am excited to be a part of this change and urge all Tennesseans to join in the once-in-a-generation effort to improve education for all of our children. Implementation will be key. Your state. Your stories. Support more reporting like this. A subscription gives you unlimited access to stories across Tennessee that make a difference in your life and the lives of those around you. Click here to become a subscriber. We must train and support school leaders to shift from compliance-based budgeting to strategy-based budgeting that is firmly focused on students. In order to make that happen, we must balance any increase in flexibility and funding with transparency and accountability. As schools and educators are given more flexibility to spend directly on student needs, parents and taxpayers must clearly know how they are spending those dollars, and easily assess whether students are learning and growing academically. Change is never easy especially when you are talking about half of the states annual budget. But the time has come for a new school spending reform and funding formula that is firmly focused on the unique needs of all students. Victor Evans is a former classroom teacher and the executive director of TennesseeCAN. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee education: Why a student-focused school funding plan is key Tom Holland has revealed that hes done secret bar work in London to prepare for his upcoming role in Unchartered. The Spider-Man star opened up about his secret job in a new interview with GQ. The interviewer and Holland meet at the Chiltern Firehouse, a luxury hotel in Marylebone, where Holland tells the interviewer that he used to come and do shifts at the bar with staff. In Unchartered, there is a scene where Hollands character Nathan Drake works behind a bar. The interviewer explains that Holland told him he would come in to do shifts with the staff, learning how to mix cocktails, practice trick pours, toss bottles around, in preparation for his role. In the same interview, Holland also opened up about working with his co-star on the film, Mark Wahlberg, who had worked out for the part. I saw him walk onto set in his costume and I was like, F***, he is twice my size, Holland joked to GQ. The first trailer forUncharted was released back in October. The film will see Holland play a younger version of video game hero, Nathan Drake, and Wahlberg as his mentor, Sully. Antonio Banderas also will play a villainous rival treasure hunter. The trailer features several nods to scenes from the popular video game series, which follows Drake and Sully as they embark on adventures to recover lost treasure. Uncharted will be released on 18 February 2022. Read More Tom Holland says he and Zendaya were robbed of privacy when photographed kissing Tom Holland brought to tears at crowds reaction to Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer New Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer teases debut of the Sinister Six Lil Nas X, Tom Holland and Giannis Antetokounmpo announced as GQs Men of the Year New Spider-Man: No Way Home poster may have just teased return of Avengers villain Fans react to first images of unrecognisable Helen Mirren as Golda Meir Tom Holland has claimed he and Zendaya were robbed of [their] privacy after being photographed kissing in a car. The Spider-Man co-stars were caught in what appeared to be an intimate embrace by a paparazzi photographer in July, though the pair had not publicly addressed a romance. In a new interview, both Holland and Zendaya expressed disappointment at the pictures, which they said were taken without their permission. One of the downsides of our fame is that privacy isnt really in our control anymore, and a moment that you think is between two people that love each other very much is now a moment that is shared with the entire world, Holland told GQ Magazine. The actor added that he would not confirm a romance with his co-star without her, explaining I respect her too much to say This isnt my story. Its our story. And well talk about what it is when were ready to talk about it together. Zendaya who contributed to the profile called the photographs strange and weird and confusing and invasive, adding: The equal sentiment [we both share] is just that when you really love and care about somebody, some moments or things, you wish were your own. The pair will next be seen in sequel Spider-Man: No Way Home. Holland shed a tear while watching the films trailer with fans yesterday (16 November). Since the trailer was released online, fans have celebrated the returns of several villains from past Spider-Man films, including Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina), Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe) and Electro (Jamie Foxx). It has also been speculated that the film could feature a major twist concerning one of the franchises beloved characters, with the new trailer dropping hints that there could be a changing of loyalties in the offing. Spider-Man: No Way Home is released in cinemas on 17 December. Read More Tom Holland brought to tears at crowds reaction to Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer New Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer teases debut of the Sinister Six Lil Nas X, Tom Holland and Giannis Antetokounmpo announced as GQs Men of the Year In just a few short years, Tom Holland has become one of Marvels breakout stars, starring as the iconic Peter Parker (aka Spider-Man) in five movies to date four of which have made more than $1 billion each. But while the world watches his heroic adventures on the big screen, Holland is the first to tell you that just because he's famous doesnt mean he's immune to the same insecurities non-famous people face. "One of my biggest faults is that I'm an impossible people pleaser," Holland told GQ in its latest cover story. I dont like the idea of people not liking me. So I will do whatever I can do to make that not the case." Standing at 5 foot 8, that feeling of wanting to be liked has bled into other aspects in his life, such as obsessing over his height, body and always wanting to "be on" for his fans. "I'd do this thing on red carpets where I would stand closer to the photographers than the people behind me [to look taller]," he explained, adding that he's learned to focus on what he can control. "I cannot do anything about my height. I can put on more muscle." And that he did. In 2016's Captain America: Civil War, the costume department put him in a muscle suit. And over the course of six movies, the suit got smaller. "Now I just have a penis cup," he said. His fitness routine extends beyond just Spider-Man. In the upcoming Uncharted, in which he stars alongside Mark Wahlberg and Antonio Banderas, Holland credits Wahlberg for inspiring him to bulk up for the role. "I saw him walk onto set in his costume and I was like, 'F***, he is twice my size,'" he said. After the [COVID] lockdown, we had five months off, and I just ate and trained and ate and trained. When I got back on set, the first thing he said to me was, 'Wow, somebody has been training.'" Story continues This kind of dedication, he said, began as a young boy after being discovered by a West End choreographer, who saw his potential and eventually cast him in the West End production of Billy Elliot. On the day of his debut, he came down with tonsillitis. Not wanting to disappoint anyone, Holland decided to push through. "I was like, 'I cant miss this, because all of these people are coming,'" he said. He delivered an epic performance but was later forced to take a week off. It was a moment that stuck him, even to this day. "I got the nickname Sick Note, which frustrates me to my core," he said. "Now as an actor I push through everything, because I'm not going to be Sick Note." As he's gotten older, however, Holland began to learn the power of saying no and embracing the responsibility that comes with fame something his girlfriend Zendaya has helped him realize. "Having her in my life was so instrumental to my sanity," he said. She is so good at being the role model for young guys and girls. When anyone comes up, like, 'Can I have a picture?' it's never a bad time. Whereas my initial reaction was: 'Why are you talking to me? Leave me alone.'" Age has also made him realize the power of realizing his own limitations, which he plans to carry with him in the years ahead. "Now as I'm getting a little bit older, I'm like, It's good to have things to work for. Just dont give 100 percent of your energy towards it. I'm trying to live my life a little bit more freely," he said. "People mistake my kindness as weakness. Sometimes I see people trying to take advantage of me because I'm a nice person. Let me tell you, when you're a 19-year-old kid, they really do take advantage of you. You dont know any better. Now I look back and go, 'Wow, I wish someone had told me that I could say no.'" Plants and lights have gone in on South Bend's Coal Line Trail at Vassar Avenue. This is looking west on Tuesday as the trail, which hasn't been finished or opened yet, goes behind Holy Cross School. If youre like me, you glance carefully each time youre on South Bends Portage Avenue crossing the bridge over the future Coal Line Trail. Contractors with Selge Construction Co. have kept busy since work began early this fall to build the first half of the 1.5-mile path, linking Lincoln Way West and the Riverside Trail. If the dump trucks and excavators dont give you a clue, the orange barrels and signs tell you that the trail isnt open or done yet. But heres what we can observe as of Tuesday: Concrete pavement has gone down for the path directly along Wilber Street for one block north of Lincoln Way. The concrete then angles onto the tree-lined corridor to Vassar Street, where several trees had been cleared out behind Holy Cross School. Lights line that section. Beyond that, though, there are just a few lights erected as contractors are still digging and hauling dirt. Nothing has been paved there. One of the tasks in this project is to install pipes that will drain the standing water to which this section is prone. Lots of the trees and growth that had made the former rail line dark and forbidding below Portage have been cleared, leaving a long slope of dirt. Watching wildlife: Trail cams spot animals on Sycamore Land Trust preserves City Planner Chris Dressel says the project team feels they can "substantially complete" the main route up to Portage in 2021, if weather cooperates. But the trail out to Riverside and amenities such as a plaza at Lawndale (the edge of Muessel Grove Park) will finish in 2022. Work on the second half of the Coal Line Trail is due to begin next year. That would turn the old rail bridge over the St. Joe River at Riverside and Angela Boulevard into a pedestrian bridge and link this trail to the East Bank Trail. Crews move dirt Tuesday on the route of South Bend's Coal Line Trail. This is looking west from the Portage Avenue bridge, which had been obscured by trees and growth before construction began. East Bank closure We expected the East Bank Trail in South Bend to fully reopen sometime this month, following a summer and fall when significant portions were closed for construction. That may still be the case, but, as of Monday, parts of the trail were still closed south and north of North Shore Drive. As you recall from my prior reporting, Indiana Michigan Power has been installing a new underground transmission line right along the trail. Story continues Now the trails bridge over Leeper Avenue is closed until spring because of a different issue. This shows damage to an iron support of the East Bank Trail over Leeper Avenue in South Bend, caused by an accident on Oct. 1. On Oct. 1, one of the Leeper bridges iron supports was bent when a hydraulic excavation truck drove along Leeper underneath the bridge, according to the police departments crash report. The driver told police he figured his vehicle, at 12 feet 4 inches tall, could make it under the bridge because a sign labeled the bridges clearance as 12 feet 9 inches. But the top of the vehicle reportedly struck the bridge, causing the truck to roll onto the drivers side. The driver suffered scratches to his eye. The city has hired a consultant to determine the full extent of the damage, Cara Grabowski, spokeswoman for South Bends Department of Public Works, says. Repairs could begin next spring. Until then, she says, the trail bridge will be closed, along with Leeper Avenue and its sidewalks near the bridge. The bridge had supported a rail line before it became a trail. This affects the trail between Michigan Street and North Shore. South Bend's Coal Line Trail heads east from the sidewalk along Van Buren Street and runs behind Holy Cross School, to the left. The trail hasn't been finished or opened yet. Lights on 933 trail A series of 30 lights went up this fall on the trail along Indiana 933 between Holy Cross College and the Inn at Saint Marys. The idea was to boost safety for the students who use the trail, which was completed a year ago by Saint Marys College, the University of Notre Dame, Holy Cross College, Holladay Properties and the Holy Cross order of brothers, sisters and priests, according to Saint Marys. The lighting project was financed with $218,000 from grants from the Indiana Regional Cities Initiative and county tourism dollars. Officials who built the trail have said they hope to see improvements to Indiana 933 to make it safer to cross, especially at three key intersections that students often use along the newly lighted section. Sadly, a 69-year-old woman was killed Saturday as she walked one of those crossings. Winifred Hale, 69, was on foot when she crossed at St. Marys Road, which links Saint Marys and Notre Dame and which has a crossing signal and stoplight. She was hit by a northbound vehicle. Police were called to the scene at 5:53 p.m. Police say impairment of the driver didnt appear to be a factor. On Nov. 10, the town of Shipshewana shared this photo on Facebook of newly installed bike racks at the new end of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail. Pumpkinvine gaps Almost all of the work was completed this fall to extend the eastern end of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail for 1.2 miles into Shipshewana. All thats missing is a flashing light at the trails critical crossing of busy Indiana 5. That equipment, Town Manager Bob Shanahan, is ordered but is delayed by supply issues. Until thats installed, he said, the trail isnt officially open for safe operation, though people have been using it. Otherwise, the trail pavement is down, along with some benches along the way and at least 32 bike racks and a bike repair station at the new terminus at Town Park, just east of the Wolfe Community Building, which contains town hall. There are also picnic tables, a pavilion and bathroom building that had previously been built in anticipation of the trail. This has been a long-awaited connection, because, until now, the trail has ended at County Road 850, leaving trail users to follow County Road 250 North to reach town. Now, the Friends of the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail are raising money to fill the final half-mile gap between Middleburys county roads 35 and 20. That would finally avoid forcing trail users onto the road for that gap. And then, this 17-mile trail between Goshen and Shipshewana would finally be complete. The Prairie Trails Club posted this photo on Facebook of the dedication in October of two miles that have been added to the Erie Trail east of North Judson. Coast-to-coast link The Erie Trail, anchored to the west by the Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum in North Judson, recently grew from nine to 11 miles. State officials gathered for the Oct. 22 dedication because this flat, straight line through Starke Countys rural landscape is pegged as a connection on a developing transcontinental paved trail. The Erie Trail, about 20-30 miles southwest of Plymouth, is paved but has an adjacent natural surface for horses. It would be a link in the Great American Rail-Trail, a route using existing and future trail connections that the advocacy group Rails-to-Trails Conservancy is promoting from Washington, D.C., to Washington state. About 55% of the routes 214 miles across Indiana have been built -- namely, the Cardinal Greenway through Muncie and Richmond, the Nickel Plate Trail through Peru and Rochester, and snippets of other trails in northwest Indiana. The Erie Trail already is part of the coast-to-coast American Discovery Trail, a mix of on- and off-road routes, and the similar U.S. Bike Route 35 that now spans from Sault Ste. Marie, Mich., to Indianas southern border. Carolla Heilstedt, president of the Prairie Trails Club that maintains the Erie Trail, quipped, We are eager to welcome visitors from across the country. The extra 2.1 miles were tacked on to the eastern end of the Erie Trail, which has now moved to County Road South 700 East. The new section is almost three miles north of Tippecanoe River State Park. And that's just north of Winamac, where volunteers are raising money and working through obstacles to extend the 22-mile Panhandle Pathway five miles north to the state park. The railroad museum is the best, easiest-to-find starting point on the Erie Trail at 507 Mulberry St., North Judson (hoosiervalley.org). The museum is open for free from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Central time each Saturday. It will offer rides on its Santa Train out to English Lake and back, with Santa on board, departing at 10 a.m. and 12:30 and 2:30 p.m. Central time on each Saturday from Nov. 27 through Dec. 18. Cost is $14 for ages 3-15, free if younger and $20 for ages 16 and older. Masks are required. Book tickets online or call 574-896-3950. Financing for the trail included a $390,750 grant from the states Next Level Trails program. Applications for the next round of Next Level grants for a total of $35 million are due Dec. 1. Follow Outdoor Adventures columnist Joseph Dits on Facebook at SBTOutdoorAdventures. Contact him at 574-235-6158 or jdits@sbtinfo.com. This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: South Bend Trails: Construction jobs continue for local neighborhoods Two lawsuits were filed against Alabama's proposed congressional and legislative maps on Monday, alleging the proposals unconstitutionally pack Black voters into districts to mute their political voices. The suits, from a coalition of groups including Greater Birmingham Ministries and Alabama State Conference of the NAACP, join two other lawsuits seeking to create a second congressional district in Alabama with a substantial Black population. A hearing on one of them, Singleton v. Merrill, has been scheduled for Jan. 4. Thomas v. Merrill alleges that nine state Senate districts and 21 House districts are drawn in ways aimed at separating white and Black voters. It alleges that both of the River Region's state Senate districts and three of its House districts 75, 76 and 78 were drawn to mute Black voices in the political process. "District 78 looks like a dinosaur," the lawsuit says. "It begins its lengthy trek along the Alabama River on the border with Lowndes County, following the river until it gets east of the city of Montgomery, where it drops down to pick up Black precincts." Milligan v. Merrill argues, like other lawsuits, that the state's proposed congressional map are racial gerrymanders that violate the Voting Rights Act (VRA) and limit Black political participation. MORE: Alabama's 2022 congressional maps are in. And so are the lawsuits "Alabamas steadfast refusal to provide Black voters with adequate representation in Congress is a product of intentional discrimination and directly linked to the states history and present conditions of discrimination against Black people," the lawsuit said. "The states intentional policy of disempowerment and discrimination has resulted in the denial of equal opportunity for Black people to participate in the political process in violation of the U.S. Constitution and the VRA." The lawsuits want the courts to declare the maps unconstitutional and direct the state to draw new ones, delaying the Jan. 28 qualifying date for primaries if necessary. Milligan v. Merrill seeks the drawing of a second majority-minority district in the state. Story continues Democrats during the redistricting process charged that the proposed maps separated more counties than necessary. Jefferson County Democrats have complained for years that the county's delegation includes representatives who live outside of it and have sway over local legislation. They also argued that a second congressional district with a substantial Black population could make the state congressional delegation 28% Black, close to the Black proportion of Alabama's population (26%). MORE: Republicans block John Lewis Voting Rights Act in Senate vote Republicans said it was impossible to draw a second majority-minority district without violating the Voting Rights Act, and said the proposed map splits fewer counties overall than the maps approved in 2010. The proposed congressional maps reduce a three-way split in Montgomery County to a two-way split. A federal judge on Tuesday sent Caster v. Merrill, a lawsuit filed against the congressional maps in U.S. Middle District of Alabama to the U.S. Northern District of Alabama. Contact Montgomery Advertiser reporter Brian Lyman at 334-240-0185 or blyman@gannett.com. This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Two more lawsuits filed against Alabama's proposed congressional, legislative maps CAIRO - (Reuters) - Two protesters were shot dead in Sudan's capital Khartoum on Wednesday, the Central Doctors Committee said in a statement. "The coup forces are using live bullets extensively in separate areas of the capital injuring dozens and some are in critical condition," the Committee added. (Reporting by Alaa Swilam; Editing by Toby Chopra) The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed a document which clarifies the meaning of communion and who can receive the sacrament, the Washington Post reports. Why it matters: The effort to produce the document was partly ignited by questions surrounding President Biden, the first Catholic president since John F. Kennedy, and whether his support for abortion rights should disqualify him from receiving communion. Stay on top of the latest market trends and economic insights with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free The vote, which did not mention any politician by name or specifically single out abortion, passed 222-8, with three abstaining, according to the Post. What they're saying: "Laypeople who exercise some form of public authority have a special responsibility to form their consciences in accord with the Churchs faith and the moral law," the document reads. Catholics also have the responsibility to "serve the human family by upholding human life and dignity," it says. The backdrop: Last month, Biden told reporters that Pope Francis believes he should continue to receive communion, adding that the pope said he was a "good Catholic." Francis has previously said that Catholic bishops should not let politics influence pastoral decisions. Most U.S. Catholics believe Biden should be allowed to take communion despite his stance on abortion, according to polling by Pew Research Center. Like this article? Get more from Axios and subscribe to Axios Markets for free. SINGAPORE (Reuters) - U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said on Wednesday that an Indo-Pacific economic framework could be launched at the start of next year, and her Asia visit was to lay the groundwork for potential partnerships. "We are likely to launch a more formal process in the beginning of next year, which will culminate in a proper economic framework in the region," Raimondo said at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore. When asked whether that would mean an actual agreement, she said: "yeah, exactly." President Joe Biden said last month that Washington would start talks with partners in the Indo-Pacific about developing a regional economic framework. Raimondo said she was in Tokyo before her trip to Singapore and would be visiting Malaysia next. Critics of U.S. strategy for the region point to its lack of an economic component after former President Donald Trump withdrew in 2017 from a U.S.-inspired trade deal, now known as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. China said in September that it had filed an application to join the CPTPP trade pact, which was signed by 11 countries including Australia, Canada, Chile, Japan and New Zealand in 2018. "This isn't about China. This is about developing robust commercial and economic relationships with our partners in the Indo Pacific where we have had a robust relationship for a long time, but for the past few years," Raimondo said. (Reporting by Aradhana Aravindan and Anshuman Daga in Singapore; Editing by Martin Petty) LONDON (AP) Britains top Brexit official lowered the temperature in the U.K.s trade feud with the European Union on Wednesday, saying he believes it is possible to reach agreement with the bloc. Chief U.K. negotiator David Frost said there were still gaps between the two sides, but added: Im glad theres ambition on the EU side...I think it can be done. Whether it will be done is a different question, Frost added during a visit to Belfast to update political leaders on U.K.-EU talks aimed at resolving differences over Northern Ireland trade. Negotiations have dragged on for a month, with Britain threatening to suspend parts of the legally binding divorce agreement between the two sides if no solution is found soon. Frost said triggering an emergency break clause known as Article 16 is a very real option for us if there is no deal. But he added that its certainly our preference to try to resolve it without using Article 16. Article 16 lets either side suspend portions of the Brexit agreement in extreme circumstances. A move by Britain to use it would trigger EU retaliation and could spiral into a trade war between the 27-nation bloc and its increasingly estranged former member. Northern Ireland is part of the U.K. and shares a border with EU member Ireland. Under the Brexit deal agreed before the U.K. left the blocs economic structures at the end of 2020, it remains inside the EUs tariff-free single market for goods, to ensure there is an open border on the island of Ireland a key pillar of Northern Irelands peace process. That has created a new customs border in the Irish Sea for goods entering Northern Ireland from the rest of the U.K., even though they are part of the same country. It has also brought red tape for businesses, and has angered Northern Irelands British Unionists, who say the checks undermine Northern Irelands place in the U.K. and destabilize the delicate political balance on which peace rests. Story continues The Democratic Unionist Party, which leads Northern Irelands power-sharing government, is demanding the agreement be scrapped, though many businesses simply want the new trade arrangements to work more smoothly. The EU has agreed to make changes to the deal, offering to reduce checks on food, plants and animals entering Northern Ireland by as much as 80% and to cut paperwork for transport companies in half. Britain is demanding the EU go farther and remove its top court from its role in resolving any disputes over the agreement an idea the bloc flatly rejects. Frost and his EU counterpart, Maros Sefcovic, are due to meet Friday to assess the state of the talks. ___ Follow all AP stories on post-Brexit developments at https://apnews.com/hub/Brexit. At least 200 University of Chicago students, many of them international, gathered at the campuss Main Quadrangle Tuesday a week after the fatal shooting in Hyde Park of Shaoxiong Dennis Zheng, a recent graduate to demand further safety measures from the university. They held handmade signs echoing their concerns: We want safety, Who is next? No longer safe under daylight, We are here to learn not to die. Following the shooting of Zheng, students quickly banded together with help from local activists and student groups to come up with a list of demands for the university and to organize the rally. Da Teng, a 23-year-old doctoral chemistry student, said that Chinese people in America are traditionally known for being more politically inactive. But we really want to be heard this time, he said. Teng said he can no longer tell students back in China that it is safe to study in Chicago. The next one to be shot could be anyone in this crowd, Teng said. We need actions right now to stop the violence. Iris Xiao, a 22-year-old masters student studying public policy, said many students who are from China came to the University of Chicago because of its academic prestige, but now she is also telling students back home applying for college to skip the University of Chicago if they have major safety concerns. My mom actually asked me to consider transferring ... because a diploma is not as important as your life, she said. Its just so devastating to see something like this. Zheng, 24, was fatally shot just before 2 p.m. Nov. 9 in the 900 block of East 54th Place while walking home from campus. Alton Spann, 18, was charged with first-degree murder, armed robbery and aggravated unlawful use of a weapon in the killing. A judge denied him bail during a hearing Saturday. Prosecutors said that Spann confronted Zheng and tried to rob him. When Zheng refused to give up his bag, Spann pulled out a gun. Witnesses said they saw Zheng fall to the ground as Spann stood over him, pointing a gun. Story continues Zheng died of a gunshot wound to the arm and was pronounced dead less than an hour after the shooting at the University of Chicago Medical Center. Two days after Zheng was killed, University of Chicago leaders held a webinar where they outlined measures being taken to increase safety around the school. This included increased police patrols, added surveillance cameras and an extension of the universitys Lyft Ride Smart program. Zheng is the third U. of C. student or recent graduate fatally shot this year in Chicago. In January, 30-year-old Yiran Fan, a graduate student, was killed during a shooting spree that ended with the gunman killed during a shootout with police in Evanston. Fan received a posthumous Ph.D. from the university. In July, 20-year-old Max Lewis died three days after he was fatally struck by a stray bullet while riding on the Green Line. Students at the rally Tuesday had a list of eight demands including further extension of the Lyft program, extended coverage of the shuttle routes, real-time alerts for any crime within the Hyde Park area, annual safety and security training for students and staff, life insurance for all university members who are not covered, options for off-campus protections and regular updates from the university police on investigation outcomes following every security alert. Students took turns speaking into a megaphone that one of the organizers bought earlier in the day at a Target. Victor Zhang, a 20-year-old economy student from China, stood on a chair as he addressed the crowd. We need all of you to voice out your concerns, Zhang said. What we need is action, and for that reason, we need to make that voice stronger. He then started a chant: What do we need? The crowd yelled back: Action! pfry@chicagotribune.com Twitter @paigexfry The self-proclaimed "shaman" whose bare chest and horned fur headgear made him the face of the January 6 assault on the US Capitol was sentenced Wednesday to 41 months in prison. Jacob Chansley, 34, had pleaded guilty to obstruction of an official proceeding after taking part in the storming of the US Senate chamber by supporters of former president Donald Trump. The court heard how, after entering the chamber, Chansley took then-vice president Mike Pence's seat on the dais, leaving behind a message saying: "It's only a matter of time. Justice is coming." "Men of honor admit when they're wrong," Chansley told the court. "I was wrong for entering the Capitol. I had no excuse." In a long, rambling statement, Chansley praised the judge and made references to Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi, Buddha and US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. "I'm not an insurrectionist. I'm certainly not a domestic terrorist," he said. The sentence matched the stiffest yet meted out to the hundreds of Trump supporters who took part in the assault. Democrats have labeled the attack an insurrection that sought to block the Congress from certifying Joe Biden's victory over Trump in the November 2020 presidential election. Federal prosecutors had sought as much as 51 months in prison for Chansley, a promoter of the QAnon conspiracy theories who had traveled the country appearing at pro-Trump rallies. - 600 people charged - Ahead of the sentencing, Assistant US Attorney Kimberly Paschall played for the court videos of Chansley in the Senate chamber, moments after Pence and senators had been evacuated due to the attack. In the video, Chansley, carrying a spear with a US flag attached and his face painted in red, white and blue, gives a long howl and shouts "time's up," adding an epithet. "If the defendant had been peaceful on that day, we would not be here... The defendant's activities were anything but peaceful," Paschall told the court. Story continues But Chansley's lawyer Albert Watkins said Chansley has long suffered from diagnosed mental illness and was genuinely remorseful. "He is accountable and wants to be held accountable," Watkins said. Chansley recounted a difficult childhood and family life and said he had been diagnosed with a personality disorder. He was one of more than 600 people charged over the January 6 attack, which succeeded in delaying for several hours the certification of Biden as the incoming president. Most of the sentences, mainly for charges of illegal entry into the Capitol, have been fairly light. But many of the more serious cases, relating to conspiracy and assault on police officers, have yet to be heard. One assailant, Scott Fairlamb of New Jersey, was sentenced in early November to 41 months in prison after pleading guilty for his part in the attack and for assaulting a police officer. Also on Wednesday, Trump advisor Steve Bannon pleaded not guilty after his arrest on charges of contempt of Congress for refusing to testify on the violence. Investigators believe Bannon and other advisors to Trump could have information on links between the White House and the mob that invaded the Capitol. pmh/bgs/dw US annual drug overdose deaths surged to more than 100,000 for the first time during the Covid-19 pandemic, a crisis driven mainly by fentanyl and exacerbated by a flood of fake online pills, officials said Wednesday. Experts say people with substance use disorders have been hit hard by daily life disruptions, while authorities are seizing record numbers of counterfeit and sometimes deadly medicines from Mexico. "As we continue to make strides to defeat the Covid-19 pandemic, we cannot overlook this epidemic of loss, which has touched families and communities across the country," President Joe Biden said in a statement. Between April 2020 and April 2021, the country saw 100,306 fatal overdoses, an increase of 28.5 percent compared to the same period the previous year -- equal to one death every five minutes. Overall, opioids accounted for 75,673 of the 100,306 fatalities, with the vast majority from synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl. "It's time to face the fact that this crisis seems to be getting worse. We need all hands on deck," health secretary Xavier Becerra said in a call with reporters. "We see it in the faces of grieving families and all those overworked caregivers. You hear it every time you get that panic 911 phone call. "You read it in obituaries of sons and daughters, who left us way too soon... and since Covid-19 hit, it's gotten worse." Deaths from psychostimulants like methamphetamine, as well as from natural and semi-synthetic opioids, such as prescription pain medication, and cocaine were also up. Covid-19 killed around 508,000 people in the same time frame, according to Our World in Data. "Many of the challenges left behind by the pandemic will actually make people more vulnerable to mental illness and substance use disorders," Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse said in the briefing. At the same time, the US Drug Enforcement Administration has warned Americans about prescription pills available online that are made to look like real Oxycontin, Vicodin, Xanax or Adderall, but contain lethal doses of fentanyl and methamphetamine. Story continues The DEA has seized more than 14 million pills this year, with the vast majority produced in Mexico from chemicals supplied by China. The fake pills are widely available on social media and e-commerce platforms. In 2019, the latest year for which national data was available, heart disease was the leading cause of death, with some 660,000 fatalities, followed by cancer, with around 600,000 deaths, and unintentional injuries, at 175,000. - Life-saving nasal spray - Biden's administration meanwhile announced the release of a "model law" it wants states to adopt that would widen access to naloxone, a life-saving nasal spray that reverses overdoses. "I believe that no one should die of an overdose simply because they didn't have access to naloxone," said Rahul Gupta, director of national drug control policy. "Sadly, today that is happening across the country." The act includes provisions that would grant immunity to individuals who administer naloxone, require physicians to co-prescribe it when prescribing opioids, ensure health insurance covers the medicine, and seek to educate more people about the benefits. Tom Wolf, the governor of Pennsylvania, said Wednesday his administration wanted ordinary citizens to carry the medicine, which is available to the public throughout the state's pharmacies. In his statement, Biden touted a stimulus package that passed in March and delivered $4 billion to expand services for substance abuse and mental health. ia/bgs Associated Press Australia's military said Friday it plans to ditch its fleet of European-designed Taipan helicopters and instead buy U.S. Black Hawks and Seahawks because the American machines are more reliable. The move comes less than three months after Australia canceled a deal to buy French submarines in favor of building nuclear-powered submarines that use U.S. and British technology in a switch that deeply angered France. Australia has 47 Taipan helicopters that were designed by Airbus and were supposed to last until 2037 but have been plagued with groundings. Police said a woman was hit by a vehicle Monday afternoon in front of Berkeley Glenn Elementary School in Waynesboro. WAYNESBORO Authorities in Waynesboro continue to investigate after a pedestrian was struck Monday and seriously injured in front of an elementary school, according to the Waynesboro Police Department. On Monday shortly after 4:30 p.m., police said the pedestrian, 51-year-old Valerie Weiss of Waynesboro, was struck by a vehicle in the 1000 block of Jefferson Avenue. Weiss was airlifted to the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville. On Tuesday afternoon, she was listed in critical condition, according to a hospital spokesperson. Police said a preliminary investigation revealed that Richard Lee Hale, 53, of Waynesboro, was driving south in the 1000 block of Jefferson Avenue in a 2014 Ford car when he struck Weiss, who was walking northbound in the same block. Hales vehicle reportedly also hit a parked 2006 Honda Accord. Police said Weiss was in the road when she was hit. The incident took place in front of Berkeley Glenn Elementary School. On Tuesday, police were seen in the area taking measurements on Jefferson Avenue. Police said the crash remains under investigation. No charges have been filed. Weiss is a veterinarian at the Animal Hospital of Waynesboro. According to her profile on the company's website, Weiss has been at the animal hospital since 2003. The profile said Weiss studied biology and also taught science. While managing the health problems of her own animals, her interest in veterinary medicine grew and she eventually applied to the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine in Blacksburg, where graduated in 2003, the profile said. More: Branch out this Thanksgiving with these alternatives to the traditional turkey dinner More: Strong initial turnout as children get COVID vaccine in Staunton, Augusta County, Waynesboro To subscribe, visit www.newsleader.com and click "subscribe" at top of page. Brad Zinn is the cops, courts and breaking news reporter at The News Leader. Have a news tip? Or something that needs investigating? You can email reporter Brad Zinn (he/him) at bzinn@newsleader.com. You can also follow him on Twitter. This article originally appeared on Staunton News Leader: Waynesboro PD: Woman hit by car in Waynesboro A week after voting 6-0 to remove all "sexually explicit" books from school libraries, Virginia's Spotsylvania County School Board voted 5-2 on Tuesday to rescind that decision. The two board members who voted to keep last week's ban on sexually explicit books, Kirk Twigg and Rabih Abuismail, raised eyebrows and hackles by suggesting the board burn those books. (They now say they were not serious about burning books, The Washington Post reports.) The short-lived ban was prompted by a mother and father who complained at a Nov. 8 meeting about two books Call Me By Your Name, about a gay relationship, and 33 Snowfish, an American Library Association 2004 Best Book for Young Adults. The mother said a search of the school system's online library catalog turned up 172 hits for "gay" and 84 for "lesbian." Dozens of students, parents, and teachers showed up at Monday's board meeting to protest the book ban. One high school student said censorship is "contagious and leads to much worse," The Free Lance-Star reports, while a county librarian said that "if you have a worldview that can be undone by a novel, let me suggest that the problem is not the novel." High school students protesting against censorship at the #Spotsylvania School Board meeting tonight. Abuismail is absent. pic.twitter.com/TrRKOwBBME Adele Uphaus-Conner (@flsadele) November 15, 2021 Board member Baron Brasswell said the school district attorney had warned the Spotsylvania board their order probably wasn't constitutional, and Brasswell also told the Post he wouldn't have voted for the ban in the first place if he had known the school district already has a mechanism for parents to complain and challenge school library books. "None of us, for certain, ever believed in censorship or burning books. That's just not who we are," Braswell insisted. "Everybody was caught off guard last week." Story continues You may also like A Harry Potter reunion is happening, reportedly without J.K. Rowling Virginia local school board reverses ban of 'sexually explicit' books after public outcry The Democrats need a unified adversary in 2022 (Bloomberg) -- Vodafone Group Plc and Orange SA are both eyeing potential deals in Spain as a way of reining in competition in one of Europes most cut-throat markets for telecommunications services. Most Read from Bloomberg We are actively thinking about the Spanish market and its structure, Orange Chief Financial Officer Ramon Fernandez said Wednesday at the Morgan Stanley TMT conference. If there is a good M&A option involving us directly, we will consider it of course. Vodafone outlined similar ambitions in a trading statement Tuesday when it said its pursuing opportunities for in-market consolidation in Spain. According to Vodafone, the number of brands in the country now stands at about 80 from about 60 in 2017. That plethora of operators explains why many struggle to record significant returns on capital in a crowded market that forces carriers to compete on price to carve out market share. Earlier this month, Angel Vila, chief operating officer of Spanish market leader Telefonica SA, said that most of the large carriers in the country are operating with low or insufficient returns of capital employed, a key financial metric. Thats not sustainable in the long-term and could lead to further consolidation, he said, adding it would be a trend that Telefonica would welcome. Orange is Spains second largest operator, followed by Vodafone in third place. The fourth is Masmovil Ibercom SA, which was delisted last year after a leveraged buyout by three private equity funds. Larger carriers have all been facing increasing pricing pressure from Romanian carrier Digi Communications NV, which is rolling out its on fiber-optic broadband network in Spain and competing aggressively in the low-end of the market. Story continues (Adds Digi in the last paragraph) Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek 2021 Bloomberg L.P. Turnout gear for a pair of fire fighters sits on the ground next to a Wabash Township Fire engine, Tuesday, June 22, 2021 in Wabash Township. WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. Optimistic Wabash Township Board members took steps Tuesday to restore full-time firefighters to the township in 2022 by approving a resolution for their salaries. There is no money set aside in the approved 2022 budget to pay for full-time firefighters positions, but there will be after an additional appropriation in January, Board President Angel Valentin said. The additional appropriation also will include money for the firefighters' salaries, benefits and pensions, Valentin said. Tuesday's resolution included pay for three full-time firefighters and a fire chief. The trustee, clerk and board members' salaries are already funded in the 2022 budget, but the board approved a salary resolution for those positions, too. Hiring full-time firefighters and a fire chief currently falls to the trustee, Valentin said. Approving the funding for the jobs is the responsibility of the board. Trustee Jennifer Teising logged onto the meeting remotely with about 10 minutes remaining in the meeting. She did not participate. If the trustee and the board reach a contract agreement with the firefighters' association, the hiring of the fire personnel, as well as management of the department, might fall to the fire department's leadership. There should be sufficient funds left over from the 2021 budget to fund the firefighters' salaries. Additionally, the board approved a one-time transfer of $500,000 from fire cumulative funds into the fire operating budget in the spring as a way to shield the former firefighters from termination. The $500,000 was sufficient to fund the fire department's personnel through the end of 2023, Valentin said in June. Teising called the transfer illegal and refused to cooperate. She recently changed her stance and will transfer the money for use beginning in 2022. She also had moved forward with negotiating a contract with the firefighters' association, which, if approved, would allow the fire department to manage itself without interference from the trustee's office. Story continues More: Wabash Township Trustee Teising reportedly calls $500K transfer illegal More: Trustee Teising agrees to transfer funds four months too late to save firefighters' jobs The board's resolution on Tuesday allotted $65,112 for a full-time fire chief, $53,040 for a senior firefighter, and $45,760 for two full-time firefighters. This is a 4% increase over the salaries budgeted for this year's wages. Additionally, the salary resolution also planned to spend $18 an hour for part-time firefighters, who will fill in for full-time firefighters who are ill or on vacation. The resolution planned for the part-timers to be used up to 66 days in 2022. The salary resolution approved Tuesday also set $35,729 for the trustee's annual wages, and $28,417 for a clerk's wages. Additionally, the resolution sets board members' annual salaries at $2,500. These amounts are identical to the 2021 salaries for these positions. The optimistic restoration of four paid-firefighter positions, including a chief, is the latest in a year-long battle over the township's fire protection. Teising, who is indicted on 21 felony charges of theft, terminated the township's three full-time firefighters at the end of June, citing a lack of funding for the positions. Teising failed to get signatures for a fire protection district in the first quarter of 2021. She intended to use that increase tax revenue from a fire district to fund full-time firefighter positions. After she failed to secure that revenue stream, she followed through on her plans to terminate the full-time firefighters at the end of June. The board adopted the one-time transfer of $500,000 in June to remove Teising's explanation for firing the full-time positions. She fired the full-time chief in December 2020, accusing him of insubordination. Ed Ward, the former fire chief, has a civil lawsuit pending against Teising and the township, alleging he was wrongfully terminated. As a way to fund full-time firefighter positions going forward, it has been proposed initially by the firefighters' association and the board, and more recently by Teising that the board approve a population adjustment. The board must file that population growth appeal for increased tax levy in the first quarter of 2022, which, if approved, the township taxpayers would begin to pay in 2023. Rough estimates are that the population adjustment might increase the tax levy for fire protection between 10 and 15 cents per $100 of assessed valuation, Valentin said Tuesday. Thats doesnt mean just to be clear that the taxes immediately go up 10 to 15 cents," Valentin said. "It just means we have the opportunity to really look at what the future of our department looks like and plan ahead and build over the coming years to meet the needs of our community. At its 6 p.m. Dec. 14 meeting, the Tippecanoe County Planning Commission will present details about the changes in the township over the last few decades and suggest what the township might want to consider going forward. Dec. 14 also is the last day of Teising's bench trial for theft. Grand jurors accused Teising of receiving her paycheck while allegedly living outside of the township, which is against Indiana law. Reach Ron Wilkins at rwilkins@jconline.com. Follow on Twitter: @RonWilkins2. This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Wabash Township Board lays plans to restore full-time firefighters Will Rowlands has withdrawn from the Wales squad with concussion (David Davies/PA) (PA Wire) WillGriff John and Will Rowlands have been ruled out of Wales match against Australia at the Principality Stadium on Saturday with concussion. Both players have been released from the squad after sustaining head injuries in last weekends win against Fiji Prop John and lock Rowlands were forced off as Wales secured a 38-23 victory. The news will come as a blow to Jonathan Humphreys and his injury-ravaged squad following a punishing Autumn Nations Series campaign. Johns fellow tighthead Tomas Francis is following return-to-play protocols after being concussed in training last week. Wing Josh Adams, who was withdrawn from the starting line-up just before kick-off against Fiji due to a calf muscle issue, is also being monitored ahead of the Wallabies clash, along with number eight Aaron Wainwright (shoulder). Read More Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonsos relationship colder than it used to be Fearless Wales ready for anyone in play-offs, says Robert Page English cricket facing the fall-out from Azeem Rafiqs racism revelations The United States and China have agreed to ease restrictions on journalist visas shortly after a long-awaited virtual summit between its two leaders, with Beijing on Wednesday calling the move a "hard-won" achievement. Washington regularly denounces the deterioration in China's treatment of US media members, and has taken measures against Chinese media on US soil that have been accused of being Beijing's propaganda organs. In 2020, Beijing expelled Americans working for several major newspapers such as the New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal as tensions soared between the two countries. But in the wake of a virtual summit between US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, officials from both countries said they had agreed to allow new journalist visas to be issued. A State Department spokesman said Tuesday that discussions in recent months had led to "some initial progress" in "a few areas" of the media environment. The official said China had "committed to issue visas for a group of US reporters, provided they are eligible under all applicable laws and regulations." Beijing also promised to "permit US journalists already in the PRC (People's Republic of China) to freely depart and return, which they had previously been unable to do," the US official said. Chinese state media said both sides had reached an agreement, including to "reciprocally approve" the visas of new journalists. Both sides agreed to extend the validity of journalist visas to one year, after both countries had largely capped permits to three months. Asked about the agreement Wednesday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters that "this hard-won achievement is in line with the interests of media on both sides, and is worth treasuring." He added that Beijing hopes "both sides will put in place the relevant policies and measures as soon as possible." Story continues The US official added that Washington would continue to push for "expanding access and improving conditions for US and other foreign media," and for broader freedom of the press in general. The State Department believes these measures will allow US media correspondents to return to China "to continue their important work." fff-bys/rox/dva The Washington State Ferry Wenatchee heads for Bainbridge Island's Eagle Harbor on Friday, Sept. 4, 2020. Washington State Ferries is moving toward bringing back sailings that were cut last month as it struggled to staff its vessels, but it appears it will take some time for the agency to get back to its previous service levels up and down Puget Sound. Speaking to the state Senates Transportation Committee Monday afternoon, WSF Assistant Secretary Patty Rubstello, the agencys head official, pointed to new agreements with employee unions that would allow the agency the flexibility to move crew members from vessels that are tied up for maintenance or because of lack of crewing to other locations where they are needed. Prior to those agreements, she said, deck crews stayed assigned to a particular route and engine room staff would stay with a particular vessel. We now have the ability to move people around where we need it the most, Rubstello said. Our strategy right now is to utilize that flexibility to return service first in Anacortes-San Juans and incrementally bring service on to these other routes. Rubstello said she hoped that the agency would be able to pilot the new staffing approach this week. Her presentation noted that service would be restored slowly, one route at a time, ensuring we can reliably do so before adding the next route. I hear from our customers frequently that they want realistic service, and so we want to make sure that were setting expectations appropriately, she said. Were going to pilot this and then as we see how things are working out then commit to that service coming back. After bringing back service in the San Juan Islands, WSF would then bring back service on the Bainbridge Island-Seattle route next, then on the Mukilteo-Clinton run, then on the Kingston-Edmonds run, then on the Fauntleroy-Southworth-Vashon Island run, then lastly on the Bremerton-Seattle run. Sen. Emily Randall, D-Bremerton, noted Bremertons spot on the list last and questioned Rubstello on the position: I understand why the San Juans, and kids getting stuck after school is a high priority, but if we look at an equity lens with working class folks who depend on the ferries to get to their jobs, I would think that Bremerton would be higher up on the list. Story continues Rubstello said island communities were prioritized and then the agency looked to traffic volume to order its list. I understand every community has its needs, and its been really hard to figure that out, just because there are a lot of needs out there, but thats the approach weve taken in prioritizing which ones comes first and which ones come later, she said. After pulling a boat from its Bremerton-Seattle run in early September, the agency announced broader service cuts to routes throughout the system in mid-October, saying that it was attempting to provide more predictable and reliable travel to customers, as sailing cancelations prompted by a staffing issues piled up. Since then, the agency has at times been able to staff vessels to bring back additional service. Numbers provided by the agency show how the staffing problems became a growing issue over the summer: in July, there were 40 canceled sailings because of crewing; in August, 130 canceled sailings; in September, 171 canceled sailings, in October, 350 canceled sailings. Rubstello on Monday pointed to the rise of the COVID-19 delta variant and the loss of 132 employees because of the states vaccination mandate as contributing factors. The agency has also noted its aging workforce and the recruiting struggles that the maritime industry has seen worldwide. Rubstello said that the agency has moved to continuous, year-round staff recruitment, rather than only recruiting in the spring ahead of the summer peak season, and is bringing on an external recruiter to help the agency reach not only our traditional-type staff, but more diverse staff as well. According to the agency, 167 new deck, engine room and terminal employees have been brought onboard in 2021. Other potential staffing options Rubstellos presentation noted include boosting wages to attract and keep employees, expanding to the ferry system a state Department of Transportation program that provides funding for support services and pre-apprenticeship training to women, minorities and disadvantaged people, increasing training options for employees, and replacing the current crew dispatch system with an automated solution. Nathan Pilling is a reporter covering Bainbridge Island, North Kitsap and Washington State Ferries for the Kitsap Sun. He can be reached at 360-792-5242, nathan.pilling@kitsapsun.com or on Twitter at @KSNatePilling. Consider supporting local journalism in Kitsap County: Sign up for a digital subscription today. This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: WSF: Service will be restored "slowly, one route at a time" National security adviser Jake Sullivan said Tuesday the future of the U.S.-China relationship can best be categorized by placing future bilateral engagement into four "buckets." Why it matters: President Biden held a 3.5-hour, late-night virtual meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday. Sullivan helped fill in the blanks with a public readout on the talks at the Brookings Institution. Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. Bucket No. 1: Working together on "urgent" issues in which U.S. and Chinese interests align, such as implementing the COP26 climate deal and vaccinating the world to end the COVID-19 pandemic. Bucket No. 2: Addressing challenges in which the U.S. and China have historically worked together and now face important tests, including Iran nuclear talks and North Korea's escalating missile tests. Bucket No. 3: Improving direct communication to effectively "manage differences," including over Taiwan. Sullivan said Biden reminded Xi he voted for the Taiwan Relations Act as a senator in 1979, and deeply understands what U.S. law says about support for the island's self-defense. Bucket No. 4: Resolving outstanding issues in the Phase One trade deal, while continuing to use "the full range of tools available to us" to confront China's unfair economic practices. Sullivan also revealed Biden asked Xi to launch talks on "strategic stability," following growing concerns about China's rapid expansion of its nuclear arsenal. "That is not the same as what we have in the Russian context with the formal strategic stability dialogue that is far more mature and has a much deeper history to it," Sullivan cautioned. "There's less maturity to that in the U.S.-China relationship. But the two leaders did discuss these issues. And it is now incumbent on us to think about the most productive way to carry it forward from here." Zoom out: Though officials stressed there were no "deliverables" from the meeting, the State Department did confirm to Axios the U.S. and China have agreed to to ease Trump-era visa restrictions for journalists on a reciprocal basis. Like this article? Get more from Axios and subscribe to Axios Markets for free. Irina Izmestieva complained of feeling unwell for days prompting speculation among neighbours in Cottesmore Gardens in Kensington that she had been poisoned The wife of a Russian tycoon jailed in Moscow for plotting a string of murders has been found dead in mysterious circumstances at her home in one of Londons most expensive streets. Friends of Irina Izmestieva, 52, also known as Irina Ford, called for MI5 to conduct an investigation after she was found dead on her sofa. She had complained of feeling unwell for days, prompting speculation among neighbours in Cottesmore Gardens in Kensington that she had been poisoned. Ms Izmestieva, a film director and producer, had moved to the UK in 2007 after her husband, Igor Izmestiev, a member of Russias parliament, was arrested and later sentenced to life imprisonment after being found guilty of leading a criminal gang and plotting several murders. The conviction came after he reportedly fell out with Murtaza Rakhimov, the long-time governor of his native Bashkiria region, and he has insisted he is innocent. Mrs Izmestieva, a mother of two 21-year-old daughters, was found dead at home after an incident was reported to emergency services. The body of Irina Izmestieva was discovered in her home on November 12 Oxana Mason, who has been Ms Izmestievas personal assistant for 12 years, told The Telegraph that she was an absolutely beautiful and healthy woman. Ms Mason said that she was the person who discovered Ms Izmestieva at her home in Kensington after becoming suspicious when she wasnt answering her phone on Friday. She let herself into Ms Izmestievas house with the spare key she owned and was the one who called police after finding her body. A tragedy and nothing to do with politics Describing herself as Ms Izmestievas closest friend in London, Ms Mason said her friends death was nothing to do with politics and was simply a tragedy that just happened. She called the rumours of poisoning absolute nonsense and said her husband being in prison had nothing to do with Irinas death. Ms Mason added: She had nothing to do with politics at all, shes living her life here in London, raising two beautiful girls and that is a tragedy and the first impression is that its likely something to do with the heart or with a blood clot. Story continues Ms Mason told The Telegraph: I spoke to her on [November 10] and she said she had a little bit of finger numbness and a little bit of heart pain so its either [a] stroke - and thats actually thats what they said from the first glance. They said, its a natural death and its either stroke or blood clot. Thats what they told me the day when they found her. But an investigation will show. Ms Izmestieva was booked to have her first coronavirus vaccine on November 20 and was not unwell with the virus at the time of her death, Ms Mason said. Suicide speculation dismissed as nonsense When asked about the suicide speculation, Ms Mason said this was absolute nonsense and that she loved her life here in London and would have no reason to do that. She had a filmmaking company, shes an absolutely beautiful and healthy woman who raised two beautiful daughters, Ms Mason added. Ms Izmestieva knew none of her neighbours in Cottesmore Gardens, according to Ms Mason, and was very much involved in Londons Russian community. I dont like that her name was mixed with Russian politics, Ms Mason said. She added that she was currently arranging Ms Izmestievas funeral. Neighbours have reported seeing police, including officers in white forensic suits, and ambulance crews at the scene on Friday night, although Scotland Yard said on Wednesday it had no record of attending. In a statement, London Ambulance Service said: We were called at 7.11pm on Friday 12 November to reports of an incident at a residential address in Cottesmore Gardens, W8. We sent an ambulance crew and two medics in cars. Sadly, a person died at the scene. The cause of death remains unknown and a post mortem is still to be carried out. Suspected foul play Yevgeny Chichvarkin, a Russian businessman who moved to London more than a decade ago and lived next to Mrs Izmestieva between 2009 and 2013, wrote on Facebook that he suspected foul play. In the past few years Irina Izmestieva has been involved in a property dispute that I have no right to elaborate on, he stated. And now they found her dead after a new development in that dispute. I very much hope that British intelligence will hold a proper investigation so that we can hopefully know one day what happened. I can say for myself that she was a very healthy person. Mr Chichvarkin has said that Mr Izmestiev had been close to Vladimir Putin up until about 2005, when the president had even presented him with a gold metronome. Igor Izmestiev was a member of Russias parliament and was arrested and later sentenced to life imprisonment after being found guilty of leading a criminal gang and plotting several murders Miranda Mirianashvili, a friend of Mrs Izmestieva, said on Instagram that the former politicians wife had recently developed a cough, was taking antibiotics, felt unwell for a few days but that it was not Covid-19. She was found sleeping on the sofa at her London home. She was already dead, Ms Mirianashvili said. She described Mrs Izmestieva as a wonderful mother, heroic wife and my brilliant friend. She had run a film production company based in London and had cemented herself in British society, attending parties and events and even being photographed with Prince Harry in 2012. Her husbands case has drawn high profile criticism in Russia and human rights activists had petitioned Mr Putin personally to have him released. The death of his wife will inevitably fuel speculation of wrongdoing after a series of mysterious deaths of Russian dissidents and exiles living in the UK, including Alexander Litvinenko, who was poisoned with polonium by assassins sent by Mr Putin. Mr Izmestiev was a member of Russias upper house of parliament between 2001 and 2006, before he reportedly fell out with Mr Rakhimov. He was found guilty of leading a criminal gang as well as plotting several murders, including an assassination on Mr Rakhimovs son. He is now serving a life sentence in Russia. The convicted murderer whose testimony helped to convict Mr Izmestiev later admitted that he gave false testimony in court. Mr Izmestiev, who pleaded not guilty, had accused Mr Rakhimov, who stood down from power in 2010, of faking the assassination in order to stay in power. Residents say police attended the scene Residents told The Telegraph they saw ambulances and a police presence outside the dead womans 10m house on Friday evening, with two describing officers in forensic suits. One said: There was an ambulance and some police presence. I saw a guy in a forensic suit. Theres a lot of speculation because its a Russian lady who lived there and her husband is in Russia in jail. Another neighbour confirmed she saw men in what appeared to be forensic suits. I saw men in the white suits, so I knew it must be something, said the neighbour. False Covid death reports, a vast gender gap, Nazi "fan fiction": These are some of the perils an international crowd of volunteers battle across Wikipedias tens of millions of online entries. The world's largest internet encyclopedia is often the first result to pop up when users ask the internet a question -- and thus a massively influential source of free information but which also reflects humanity's faults. With entries that can in theory be written by anyone with an internet connection -- in some 300 languages -- it comes down to editing by mostly anonymous volunteers to police the site. "I always carry my laptop along wherever I go, to edit Wikipedia," said Alaa Najjar, who is based in the Middle East, but asked that specific details about his identity be omitted to protect his privacy. "It is an addiction, as my friends say. I prefer to say it's my passion," he told AFP by email Najjar said he contributes to almost 500 entries a week, and as a medical doctor he has been busy fighting a flood of false information unleashed during the pandemic. Among the strains of misinformation that surfaced on Wikipedia, he has spotted false reports Covid-19 had killed notable people and inaccurate boosting of some nations' death and case numbers. "I reviewed hundreds of articles during the Covid-19 pandemic, and rejected many misleading or erroneous amendments," said Najjar, who got the platform's top honor in 2021 for his work. The 20-year-old encyclopedia -- which even has an article devoted to its own controversies -- has received positive accolades in recent years for its fact-checking capacities. Though it's a sprawling platform, the site does not seek to make money and so avoids the profit-over-safety criticism that has battered Facebook, for example. Instead, Wikipedia has volunteers who are deeply invested in the site's stated mission of providing access to a written compendium of all branches of human knowledge. Story continues Of course, it can be a thankless job to kick dubious reports off the platform. "One particular editor called me a 'vandal' for removing unsourced information," said Ksenia Coffman, who has battled what she termed "fan fiction" about World War II on Wikipedia, including how Nazis and German generals were depicted. A strand of writing that ignores historical context regarding war-time atrocities such the Holocaust, and instead romanticizes German forces, has influenced a subculture that has found its way to the platform. "Why am I getting pushback when I am trying to correct this to remove these unsourced globs of text that just glorify these supposed Nazi war heroes?" asked Coffman, who lives in California but grew up in the Soviet Union and contributes around 200 edits per month. She said the pushback from the subculture's believers as well as from editors who didn't like to be challenged was a "tactical mistake" by her detractors that in fact motivated her to stick around and take on the issue. And other dark spots in human history have a way of popping up on Wikipedia, too. Women have been less well-covered than men in published written works in general, which creates a barrier to women appearing in equal numbers to men in Wikipedia's articles. The platform requires reliable, published sources from news outlets or academia to underpin an article, noted Dublin-based volunteer editor Rebecca O'Neill. "Wikipedia is an uncomfortable mirror to show the world because it reflects back all of the systemic knowledge gaps that we have," she said, adding that she puts in about 40 minutes per day on the platform. In 2015 it became clear that only 15 percent of English language biographies on the platform were about women, sparking an effort to try to balance out the disparity. Six years later, the figure has risen to over 19 percent, said O'Neill. Last year she was writing Wikipedia articles at the clip of one per day, and in the ratio of 19 biographies on women for every one she did about a man. "I as an individual can offer something. I'm just going to set aside the time and just do it and not turn it over too much in my head," she added. "It's something I can do." jm/caw/dw Concern is growing over the welfare of Peng Shuai (Nigel French/PA) (PA Archive) The head of the WTA has expressed increased concern for the welfare of Peng Shuai after a letter purportedly from the Chinese player appeared on state media. Peng, a former world doubles number one, has not been heard from since making allegations of sexual assault against Chinas former vice-premier in a post on the social media platform Weibo two weeks ago. The post was quickly removed and there has been mounting worry for Peng, with Naomi Osaka among those taking to social media to draw attention to the situation. Statement by Steve Simon, WTA Chairman & CEO: The statement released today by Chinese state media concerning Peng Shuai only raises my concerns as to her safety and whereabouts. Peng Shuai must be allowed to speak freely, without coercion or intimidation from any source. wta (@WTA) November 17, 2021 The letter on the China Global Television Network Europes Twitter page, which the broadcaster claimed was sent from Peng to WTA chairman and CEO Steve Simon, read: Regarding the recent news released on the official website of the WTA, the content has not been confirmed or verified by myself and it was released without my consent. The news in that release, including the allegation of sexual assault, is not true. Im not missing, nor I am unsafe. Ive just been resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me. The WTA released a strong statement on Sunday, with Simon calling for an investigation into Pengs allegations, while he told the New York Times the issue could jeopardise the tours future in China despite the huge sums of money at stake. Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai has sent an email to Steve Simon, the WTA Chairman & CEO, CGTN has learned. The email reads: pic.twitter.com/jb6yXwxENA CGTN Europe (@CGTNEurope) November 17, 2021 Writing on Wednesday, Simon said: The statement released today by Chinese state media concerning Peng Shuai only raises my concerns as to her safety and whereabouts. Story continues I have a hard time believing that Peng Shuai actually wrote the email we received or believes what is being attributed to her. Peng Shuai displayed incredible courage in describing an allegation of sexual assault against a former top official in the Chinese government. The WTA and the rest of the world need independent and verifiable proof that she is safe. I have repeatedly tried to reach her via numerous forms of communications, to no avail. Peng Shuai must be allowed to speak freely, without coercion or intimidation from any source. Her allegation of sexual assault must be respected, investigated with full transparency and without censorship. The voices of women need to be heard and respected, not censored nor dictated to. Read More Giannis Antetokounmpo on song as Milwaukee Bucks beat Los Angeles Lakers Football rumours: Aaron Ramsey given options for Premier League return Garbine Muguruza takes WTA Finals title over Anett Kontaveit Azeem Rafiq hopes floodgates will open because of his experiences of racism Robert Page backs Steve Clarke call for cards to be wiped ahead of play-offs Cameron Norrie beaten on ATP Finals debut in Turin The site of the former Hutton Stone Quarry on McCrory Lane in Nashville, Tenn. is embroiled in a legislative battle over whether or not the flooded inoperable quarry can be drained and filled with natural rock and soil from construction projects. A zoning change approved by the Metro Council Tuesday blocks the owners of Bellevue's former Hutton Stone Quarry from filling the pit with any waste from construction sites. The former quarry, now a pit filled with water that residents of nearby neighborhoods call "Hutton Lake," has been at the heart of an evolving legislative battle since its purchase in 2006. Metro Council passed the bill, sponsored by Council member Dave Rosenberg, unanimously on its consent calendar. The land's owners want to drain the pit and fill it with "clean" rock and dirt from construction sites a plan adamantly opposed by nearby residents. NEW TOWNHOMES: New townhome communities popping up in south, north Nashville MORE: Metro Parks $1.9M fund request deferred; Council says funds not meant to address homelessness Crom Carmichael, a member of ownership group McCrory Lane Partners, told members of the Metro Planning Commission late last month that he views the rezoning effort as a "downzoning" that will deplete the land's value and the group will "take appropriate action if the council passes this." The group also says the unfilled quarry is a liability and "public nuisance" plagued by trespassers. A 13-year-old boy drowned in the quarry in 2008 while swimming with a group of teens. Numerous local restrictions would prevent McCrory Lane Partners from filling the quarry with rock and dirt from construction sites even under its previous zoning, but the ownership group pushed for state legislation to nullify those restrictions. The site of the former Hutton Stone Quarry on McCrory Lane in Nashville, Tenn. is embroiled in a legislative battle over whether or not the flooded inoperable quarry can be drained and filled with natural rock and soil from construction projects. Tennessee House Bill 871, sponsored by two East Tennessee legislators, would exempt former quarries from local zoning, landfill approval, traffic, noise and proximity restrictions if they agreed to receive fill from state highway construction projects. But the bill, which will go before the House's Agriculture & Natural Resources Committee in 2022, does not override the land's base zoning. The former quarry's new zoning prohibits any type of landfill at the site, even if the pending state legislation passes. Story continues RELATED: Debate over filling Bellevue's Hutton Stone Quarry sparks legislative battle Landowners first attempted to fill quarry in 2006 This is the latest chapter in the property owners' long-fought battle to fill the 12.2-acre pit. McCrory Lane Partners member Townes Duncan and Carmichael purchased the 72.24-acre parcel containing the quarry for $1.3 million in 2006, planning to use the abandoned quarry as a landfill for construction and demolition waste. That effort failed, due in part to state restrictions on construction and demolition landfill proximity to scenic rivers. The Harpeth River lies a few hundred feet away from the quarry. Soon after, McCrory Lane Partners split the land into two parcels: a 30-acre parcel and a 42.24-acre parcel containing the quarry. The owners then prepared to sell the 30-acre plot, applying for specific plan zoning in 2006 to build 180 apartment units as a condition of the sale. The Metro Planning Commission at the time stipulated that it would only approve the residential zoning with conditions: McCrory Lane Partners would need to install barriers to keep residents from accessing the quarry, and the quarry could not be filled to protect the water quality of the Harpeth River. McCrory Lane Partners maintains that the condition is not legally binding. After securing the SP zoning, the company sold the 30-acre lot for $1.89 million in 2007. Today, the company's remaining 42.24-acre lot containing the quarry is worth approximately $79,200. MORE: Metro Nashville Planning Commission votes to prevent fill of Bellevue's Hutton Stone Quarry McCrory Lane Partners secured an Aquatic Resource Alteration Permit to fill the quarry with "clean rock and soil" in September 2020. The permit lays out regulations and plans for filling the quarry but does not preclude local laws restricting the project. Metro Code considers rock and dirt from construction sites no matter how "clean" to be construction and demolition landfill. The quarry pit is too close to residentially zoned land and the nearby Harpeth River State Park to fit narrow conditions required for landfill approval under the previous zoning, Metro Planning Commission member Mina Johnson said at the commission's Oct. 28 meeting. The Metro Planning Commission unanimously recommended the zoning change's passage. "We are not taking away any land use currently allowed, Johnson said during the meeting. "Rather, we are enforcing (current ordinance)." Reach reporter Cassandra Stephenson at ckstephenson@tennessean.com or at (731) 694-7261. Follow Cassandra on Twitter at @CStephenson731. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Zoning change blocks landfill at Bellevue's former Hutton Stone Quarry Members of the media were invited to view a test run of Japan's first self-driving bullet train. The 12-car Shinkansen train operated by East Japan Railway Company is equipped with an Automatic Train Operation system. It made three round-trip runs along a 5-kilometer stretch of line in the central prefecture of Niigata on Wednesday. A driver was on hand during the tests but did not touch any of the controls. Everything from starting and stopping the train to adjusting the speed was carried out automatically. The train smoothly accelerated to about 100 kilometers per hour during the tests. The company has been developing self-driving bullet train technology out of concerns that there could be a shortage of drivers in the future due to Japan's aging population and low birthrate. In the fall of 2021, at the NBAA Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition in Las Vegas, the Honda Aircraft Company unveiled the HondaJet 2600 concept. This aircraft is Honda Aircraft's vision of how they can enter the light business jet market in a segment slightly larger than the original HondaJet. The aircraft, competing in size and weight with such planes as the PC-24, Citation CJ4 and Phenom 300, should significantly surpass them in range and become a more versatile machine, even claiming a part of the mid-sized aircraft segment. However, for now, all these possibilities are just speculation and it is not yet clear what stage Honda is currently at with their new aircraft. If they can create such an airplane, it will be cool. We have used your information to see if you have a subscription with us, but did not find one. Please use the button below to verify an existing account or to purchase a new subscription. This was one unique Airbnb. You opened the front door and were greeted by a 5-foot-tall gorilla statue sitting quietly on a bench in the entry way. Then you walked into the living room that had a tree in the corner with branches and paper leaves that stretched across the ceiling. Two giraffe Indianapolis, IN (46208) Today Showers and thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. Low near 55F. Winds S at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%.. Tonight Showers and thunderstorms. A few storms may be severe. Low near 55F. Winds S at 15 to 25 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Ranchers in British Columbia have been using Jet Skis to herd cattle. Photo: Jennifer Gauthier/Reuters In Glasgow over the past couple of weeks, we were treated to one vision of the climate future: halting, inadequate policy progress coupled with ever-rising hyperbole and rhetorical alarm. In British Columbia, Canada, right now, a different vision is unfolding: one climate emergency following in the wake of another, indeed made possible by the previous disaster, and in a prosperous, modern, well-governed corner of the global north, absolutely overwhelming local infrastructure and the capacity of public officials and local bureaucracy to manage the crisis. In June, the Pacific heat dome shattered temperature records throughout B.C., forcing climate scientists to reconsider their models and killing hundreds of humans and more than a billion marine animals, along with harvests of whole regions of farmland the cherries roasting on trees. The wildfire season overall burned more than 3,000 square miles this year, an area of land about the size of Puerto Rico, releasing probably a hundred million tons of carbon into the atmosphere and destroying the city of Lytton. And now, as happened in California with much more modest rainfall after the historic wildfire season of 2018, a storm of the century powered by an atmospheric river has hit Canadian mountains totally stripped of tree protection, producing mudslides and rockslides and landslides, trapping hundreds of cars on roads suddenly piled with debris including families in cars without food or medications. The storm closed major highways, downed power lines, forced the evacuation of thousands, shut down two of the countrys biggest railroad lines and its largest container port, and literally washed away parts of the regions chief east-west roadway, the Trans-Canada Highway. A thousand train cars carrying grain are currently idling, and its estimated that the railroads wont reopen for weeks. Some of the highways may take longer. Farmers have been trying to save their livestock by towing them in boats in water that was five feet deep. Others have been herding cattle by Jet Ski. The storm itself was historic, but the impacts would have been impossible had the prior destruction not paved the way for these climate cascades. Just look at these images. The Coquihalla highway is completely snapped in two. Surreal to see from the air. #bcstorm #bcfloods @GlobalBC pic.twitter.com/IRNUmlsoLl Kamil Karamali (@KamilKaramali) November 16, 2021 Video of some of the ongoing #Merritt flooding sent to @CFJC_Today by Cody Harris. Devastating to see. #Kamloops pic.twitter.com/2VY27AA2es Dylana (@DylanaKneeshaw) November 15, 2021 Highway 1 in #Abbotsford shut down due to rising flood waters pic.twitter.com/g9EW4Ap9F7 Harpreet Pandher (@HarpPandher) November 16, 2021 I'm told by a friend at the epicentre of the latest crisis in Canada that the terrible floods and landslides are aggravated by the fires this summer, which burnt much of the forest and baked the soil, so the water now flashes straight off. It's a classic compound climate disaster pic.twitter.com/eugNRjqaOI George Monbiot (@GeorgeMonbiot) November 16, 2021 My kids hockey team is trying to get home from Calgary. The flooding in Princeton, BC. Credit: Michael McRea - fellow hockey dad #StormBC #BCFlood #BCStorm #PrincetonBC #flooding pic.twitter.com/psoGwXazSO Matthew Campbell (@YellowJerseyAdv) November 15, 2021 A look from yesterday afternoon at #BCHwy8 Via @DriveBC - Closed due to flooding between Porcupine Ridge Rd and Petit Creek Rd for 33.5 km (east of #SpencesBridge to 17km west of #Merritt). Assessment in progress. Estimated time of opening not available. https://t.co/KlVsUcVW9g pic.twitter.com/NEbfiHRvcJ BC Transportation (@TranBC) November 17, 2021 It came down faster than the speed of sound, one local resident said of a mudslide in a vivid interview with the CBC. I just turned around, and Im just watching the whole side of the mountain coming down and taking out these cars everything just being swept away. Just complete panic. She watched with her husband and 9-year-old son as three cars were carried off by the mud. No sooner do we get back into our vehicles, the people that were in front of us are just screaming and running, she said. The look on their faces, it was like a tsunami was coming. It was the scariest thing that Ive ever seen. A water-treatment facility in Merritt was flooded, mixing the local drinking water with sewage. A floodwall in Mount Vernon completed in 2016 and designed to withstand a crest of 38 feet barely held the Skagit River reached 36.79 feet on Monday night. Incredible flooding in #MountVernon is putting the citys flood wall to the test for the first time. All day crews have been adding those silver panels along the water front hoping to keep downtown dry. #KING5 pic.twitter.com/hXiSDDOCgA Kalie Greenberg (@KalieG_KING5) November 16, 2021 There were neither road nor flood warnings, one resident of Vancouver told The Guardian. It seems nobody expected the storm to be so devastating. The rain was just incessant for 24 hours. The impacts have been significantly greater than expected, acknowledged Mike Farnworth, the deputy premier of British Columbia, echoing the language of bewilderment and disorientation that accompanied the heat dome this summer as well. This is Canada. We arent just failing to address the growing climate crisis to come; were unprepared even for the impacts already here in part because they keep surprising us with their intensity and in part because, in places across the global north, we cant seem to fathom our genuine vulnerability. iSTAR Medical receives European market approval for glaucoma implant MINIject The only commercially available, minimally invasive supraciliary device for glaucoma now approved First commercial implantations of MINIject successfully carried out by world-leading ophthalmologist Prof. Dr. Burkhard Dick at the University Eye Hospital Bochum, Germany European launch represents pivotal milestone in iSTAR Medicals commercial strategy to bring MINIject to patients globally WAVRE, Belgium 17 November 2021: iSTAR Medical, a medtech company pioneering novel minimally-invasive implants for glaucoma surgery (MIGS), today announced that its breakthrough MIGS device, MINIject, has been approved in Europe for open-angle glaucoma patients. MINIject enables more patients to be effectively treated with MIGS because of its powerful and sustained performance combined with an excellent safety profile. Glaucoma is the leading cause of irreversible blindness affecting around 100 million people worldwide.1,2 MIGS represents the most promising and fastest-growing glaucoma therapy, due to its enhanced safety profile compared to traditional surgery. Data reported to date by iSTAR Medical across four trials in over 150 patients, consistently show that MINIject demonstrates a balance of powerful and sustained intra-ocular pressure (IOP) reduction with a positive safety profile. MINIjects powerful efficacy and safety make it optimal for treatment in a broader glaucoma population, meaning flexibility for use in a greater number of procedures. iSTAR Medical is now rolling out MINIject commercially in select regions across Europe and is delighted that its first commercial implantations have already taken place in Germany. Michel Vanbrabant, CEO of iSTAR Medical, commented: With todays European approval, MINIject becomes the only commercially available MIGS device targeting the supraciliary space as a natural outflow pathway for IOP reduction. This is a major milestone for iSTAR Medical and our mission to bring truly next-generation MIGS devices to the glaucoma community. I want to thank our team, our investors, and our medical partners for their continued belief in a safer and better way to manage glaucoma by targeting the supraciliary space, with an implant powered by our proprietary STAR material. Story continues Positive two-year results from iSTAR Medicals STAR-II European trial were recently presented at the 125th American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) meeting in New Orleans, LA (USA) demonstrating a sustained powerful efficacy and safety outcome in patients with open-angle glaucoma, consistent with all MINIject trial outcomes to date. Professor Dr. Burkhard Dick, Head of the Department of Ophthalmology at University Eye Hospital Bochum, Germany, and one of the MINIject STAR-II trial investigators, treated the first patient with MINIject after European approval. He commented: Im very pleased that Im now able to offer the MINIject supraciliary device as a treatment option to my mild-to-moderate glaucoma patients, the first of which was treated successfully today, he said. Based on results so far, MINIject may open up new treatment paradigms for patients with glaucoma across Europe. David Stocker, VP Sales & Marketing at iSTAR Medical added: The launch of our first product in Europe sets iSTAR Medical on a very promising trajectory for future value generation. With its unique product characteristics, MINIject has the potential to gain a significant share of the growing wider market for glaucoma treatments and amongst its peers in the MIGS segment. Our ambition is to make this novel MIGS solution available to a broad patient community and grow the organisation, our network and our international footprint to meet the size of the opportunity. Furthermore, MINIject is currently being investigated in iSTAR Medicals pivotal STAR-V study, which was approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July 2021, the results of which will be instrumental to gain commercial access for MINIject in the US market. The study will enrol over 350 patients with primary open-angle glaucoma. - Ends - For more information Katherin Awad Head of Marketing, iSTAR Medical news@istarmed.com; +32 10 77 16 54 For media Consilium Strategic Communications Amber Fennell, Chris Welsh, Kris Lam iSTAR@consilium-comms.com About iSTAR Medical iSTAR Medical is committed to delivering breakthrough eye care solutions. Our most advanced product, MINIject, is approved in Europe for the treatment of open-angle glaucoma the leading cause of irreversible blindness2 and is progressing towards market approval in the US. MINIjects unique tissue-integrating capabilities unlock a safer, and more effective option for patients. We are building an exceptional team and pipeline of best-in-class products such as MINIject to establish new treatment paradigms in eye care conditions with the highest patient needs. For more information, please visit: www.istarmed.com About MINIject MINIject is iSTAR Medicals revolutionary MIGS device for patients with primary open-angle glaucoma. MINIject combines the unique porous structure of its proprietary STAR material with the power offered by the supraciliary space. As a result, it is designed to enhance natural fluid outflow, reducing intraocular pressure (IOP) and the need for medication, while bio-integrating with surrounding tissue, limiting inflammation, fibrosis and subsequent complications. About Glaucoma Glaucoma is a progressive disease affecting over 100 million people globally, of which primary open-angle glaucoma is the most common form.1,2 IOP reduction, through medication or surgery, helps delay disease progression.3 Medication is generally the first line treatment, but the progressive addition of multiple drops can burden patients with side effects, compliance challenges and costs.1,3 Invasive surgery can present risks with irreversible complications.1,3 MIGS is the most promising and fastest-growing glaucoma therapy due to its enhanced safety profile.1 MINIject is potentially best-in-class for its promising long-term efficacy and safety. 1 Market Scope, Glaucoma Surgical Device Market Report, August 2020. https://www.market-scope.com/pages/reports/202/2020-glaucoma-surgical-device-market-report-a-global-analysis-for-2019-to-2025-august-2020 2 Jonas JB, Aung T, Bourne RR et al. "Glaucoma". Lancet 2017; 390: 208393 3 European Glaucoma Society Terminology and Guidelines for Glaucoma, 4th Edition: British Journal of Ophthalmology. 2017;101:1-195 https://bjo.bmj.com/content/101/5/73 news Gov. Asa Hutchinson presented the Ouachita Baptist University Department of Nursing with the 2021 Governors Quality Award earlier this semester during a banquet hosted by the Arkansas Institute for Performance Excellence (AIPE), award sponsors, in the Grand Ballroom of the Marriott Hotel in Little Rock. I couldnt be more pleased with the progress our nursing program has made in such a short period of time, said Dr. Tim Knight, dean of the J.D. Patterson School of Natural Sciences at Ouachita. To be recognized in this way affirms our efforts to have a quality nursing program at Ouachita. According to its website, the AIPE works in partnership with the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce to offer training and assessment for all industries throughout the state in order to encourage excellence in performance, as well as economic growth. The Governors Quality Award honors outstanding progress in areas including strategic planning, leadership, workforce, knowledge management, operations and accomplishing results. Dr. Brenda Trigg (right), Ouachita's director of nursing, receives the Governor's Quality Award from Gov. Asa Hutchinson. One of 12 organizations from across Arkansas to be honored this year, the Ouachita Department of Nursing is the only nursing program that received the Governors Quality Award independent of its governing organization. Dr. Brenda Trigg, director of nursing at Ouachita, accepted the award from Hutchinson on behalf of the department. Trigg said that feedback from the AIPE about the selection process indicates Ouachitas nursing program received the award based on the departments overall practices and quality awarenesswhich includes support from Ouachitas administration, financial support, student and faculty resources and an effective, systematic plan for evaluation to ensure that Ouachitas nursing students meet end-of-program learning outcomes. We are excited to receive this prestigious award from Gov. Hutchinson, Trigg said. Ouachitas nursing program is fortunate to have faculty members who value and implement program assessment and evaluation, noting the work of Dr. Carol McKeever, assistant professor of nursing, and Dr. Becky Parnell, associate professor of nursing. She also credited the departments utilization of Baldridge Excellence Framework, a tool that helps organizations innovate, promote diversity and inclusion, digitize and build resilient, competitive programs. The Governors Quality Award comes as Ouachitas Department of Nursing embarks on a new phase of expansion. In Fall 2018, Ouachita launched its nursing program with a distinctive RN-to-BSN dual enrollment completion program in partnership with Baptist Health College Little Rock. The Department of Nursing has since added a fully-online RN-to-BSN degree program for students who already have a valid registered nurse license. Additionally, Ouachita has developed a third degree track, a four-year, residential pre-licensure program offering a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. The new program has been granted prerequisite approval by the Arkansas State Board of Nursing. Pending initial approval, from the ASBN, new students will be able to enter the program in the Fall 2022 semester. Currently enrolled freshmen and sophomore nursing majors, which number approximately 70, will have the option of continuing in the on-campus program without delaying their graduations. Renovations also are underway on a 6,600-square-foot Nursing Education Center at Ouachita. This simulation and teaching center will be home to a clinical skills lab, five simulated hospital patient rooms, a pharmacy and several high-fidelity mannequins that will allow students to perfect their assessment, clinical and communication skills. For more information about Ouachitas Department of Nursing, contact Dr. Brenda Trigg at triggb@obu.edu or (870) 245-5384. Lead photo: Ouachita faculty, staff and students who attended the Governor's Quality Award luncheon are (front row) Rebecca Martinez, administrative assistant in the School of Natural Sciences; President Ben Sells; Dr. Brenda Trigg, director of nursing; Dr. Carol McKeever, assistant professor of nursing; Dr. Tim Knight, dean of the School of Natural Sciences; (back row) Dr. Becky Parnell, associate professor of nursing; Department of Nursing students Jana Milam, Suzette Handwork and Jacob Moreno; and Dr. Keldon Henley, vice president for institutional advancement and chief of staff. news Three Ouachita Baptist University students received awards for their nonfiction work featured in Assayers 30, the annual publication by Ouachitas Department of Language and Literature. Cora Saddler The top three winners from this year's publication are Cora Saddler, a senior English and Spanish double major from Cabot, Ark.; Sydney Motl, a sophomore English major from Arkadelphia, Ark.; and Sabaoot Esho, a junior graphic design and psychology double major from Erbil, Iraq. Their work was chosen by a panel of faculty members led by Dr. Doug Sonheim, professor of English and holder of the Clarence and Bennie Sue Anthony Chair of Bible and Humanities at Ouachita. Other students whose submissions were included in Assayers 30 are Aubree Seibert, a senior chemistry, biology and applied physics triple major from Wylie, Texas; Lizzie Horton, a freshman from Arkadelphia, Ark.; Meredith West, a sophomore kinesiology/leisure pre-professional studies major from Sherwood, Ark.; and Elaina McKenzie, a senior English major from Gulfport, Miss. Submissions from 2021 graduates Ashley Harrison, a communications & media/film and Spanish double major from Argyle, Texas, and Russell Wallace, a biology major from Bryant, Ark., were also included. Assayers began 30 years ago as a tool to teach nonfiction writing and research skills to Composition 101 students, though submissions are not limited to this class. The collection includes both personal and research essays from students. Saddler was awarded first place for her essay, The Bartleby Dilemma, on the short story Bartleby, the Scrivener by Herman Melville. My essay is about the story of Bartleby, the Scrivener and the ways peopleboth in the book and critics of the work itselfhave, I think unfairly, interpreted Bartleby as a symbol or concept that ultimately reflects anything but Bartleby himself, Saddler said. My goal was to bring back his humanity and try to argue for an interpretation of Bartleby with more emotionality and sympathetic imagination. Saddler said she hopes readers will learn the importance of keeping an open mind and not be defined by their past selves. I hope readers are encouraged not to let other people define their sense of self, and that they keep an open mind and do the same for others, she added. We are more than the work we put out, and we don't have to be defined by the people we used to be. Bartleby defies easy categorization, and I think we do too. Sydney Motl Motl won second place for The Art of a Woman, a research essay that analyzes a painting by Italian artist Artemisia Gentileschi. The painting is called Judith Slaying Holofernes and it depicts Judith, a Jewish woman, beheading an Assyrian general who is attempting to invade her town, Motl said. What is interesting about Artemisias depiction is that Artemisia herself was raped and chose to bring that to trial; when keeping that in mind, the details that only a woman who has experienced violence herself can paint really come to life. Through her essay, Motl sought to bring awareness to victims of sexual assault or abuse through knowledge of gender. I would love for more to be aware of the new perspective that a thorough knowledge of gender can provide, she said. Having the ability to view art, literature or the world through the lens of gender can bring a whole new awareness of the issues facing those around them, especially victims of sexual assault or abuse. Sabaoot Esho Knowing My Mama, the third-place essay by Esho, tells the parallel stories of her life and the life of her mom. Knowing My Mama is a comparison between me and my mom. When COVID-19 hit, I couldn't go back home to Iraq; I was really sad, and it brought me down, reflected Esho. It got me thinking about who my mom was before she had me and how when she was in college; she was away from home and family because there was a war going on. It's basically me drawing strength from my mom and her story. Esho was inspired by a newspaper editorial by Edna Lepucki that describes the connection between mothers and their daughters.This writer had asked all different girls to send pictures of their mamas before and after they gave birth. It was talking about how those women were the same women that they were before, Esho said. The award winners and other writers featured in Assayers 30 were honored at a brief ceremony on Sept. 2. Dr. Jennifer Pittman, acting chair of the Department of Language and Literature, said she sees the value of sharing this work with the Ouachita community. I think its really important for the students who write to showcase what they have done because they all work really hard on those papers, Pittman said. I also think it is important for students in the community to see their classmates writing and see that good work can be done in all the classes. For more information about Assayers 30, contact Dr. Doug Sonheim at sonheimd@obu.edu or (870) 245-5554. I can hear the tune just by reading the name Reply Thread Link who said i was inviting you? Reply Parent Thread Link Howling! One of my all time favorite sp episodes! Reply Thread Link I fucking love this so much. Reply Thread Link Really unique place, this will be cool Reply Thread Link So awesome. And now I want sopapillas Reply Thread Link Dang this turning out to be really sweet! Reply Thread Link As long as they don't change the cafeteria line and the colored napkins and the window into the kitchen. Reply Thread Link it still blows my mind that this is an actual place lmaooooooo Reply Thread Link How do you think I feel, learning that this way? Reply Parent Thread Link i found out through here i think so thats like the circle of life, or something Reply Parent Thread Link lol i found out on ONTD too. The gift that keeps on giving.. Reply Parent Thread Link Honestly, I love this. Id love to buy and reopen some fave places I grew up with in my home town. Reply Thread Link omg saaaame. there was a cafe where I grew up called the Flight Line because of all the pilots and mechanics from the airport that would go there but it shut down :( they had the best southern food. Reply Parent Thread Link I've been there and it's such cheesy fun. It's wild that Trey and Matt are the owners now lol Reply Thread Link I still regret not going when I had the chance Reply Thread Link i've wanted to go for so long and am glad i now have even more reason to someday Reply Thread Link Thats so awesome omg Reply Thread Link I have no idea what a sopapillas is but great for Dana Rodriguez. I've never been to a Casa Bonita but this would make for a great cooking reality show. Reply Thread Link Are sopaipillas just gorditas or tortas fritas? Reply Thread Link i hope to go one day. i have my problems with south park but god it has some absolute bangers and casa bonita is one of them lmfaooo, iconic Reply Thread Link It's nice that they hired a really enthusiastic chef of Mexican heritage. I read an article about it and she seems really eager to basically take the concept but improve on it. Reply Thread Link this place was the most randomly weird sober experience i had in my early 20s, it felt like a fever dream. the food was beyond disgusting, so im glad theyre gonna change that and maybe next time im in denver ill go again. Reply Thread Link The newly resuscitated Iraq National Oil Company (INOC) has been authorised by the government in Baghdad to directly negotiate with U.S. oil giant, Chevron, for it to develop the long-delayed Nasiriyah oil field in the southern DhiQar province, according to several domestic news sources. The idea of developing the 4.36 billion-barrel Nasiriyah oilfield has been mooted by a rapid succession of governments in Iraq since it was discovered by INOC in 1975. The original plan to develop the field on a standalone basis was shelved in the lead-up to the Iran-Iraq war that began in 1980 and lasted until 1988. The field eventually came on-stream in 2009 and was listed on the 2009-2010 fast-track development plan, which aimed to raise its output to at least 50,000 bpd in the first phase. In the first half of 2009, Chevron was one of four international oil companies (IOCs), along with Italys ENI, Japans Nippon Oil, and Spains Repsol, to be invited to submit bids to develop the field on an engineering procurement construction (EPC) contract basis. The Japanese consortium led by Nippon Oil, and comprising Inpex, and JGC Corporation, then looked set to win the contract before negotiations broke down again. In 2014, a serious push was made to resuscitate the development of the Nasiriyah field within the broader scope of the Nasiriyah Integrated Project (NIP) that also included the development of adjunct lesser oil sites to the main Nassiriyah site and the construction of a 300,000 barrels per day (bpd) refinery. Bids for this wider project were encouraged by the government-ordered changes to the original Iraq technical service contract (TSC) that were aimed at addressing the concern of many IOCs that saw the contract model as falling short of the production sharing contracts model that they preferred. Unlike the previous contracts, the new TSC variant offered investors a share in project revenues, but only when production began, and the Oil Ministry would pay recovery costs from the date of commencement of work. This differed from the previous contract where the costs were only paid when the contractor raised production by 10 per cent. This said, investors would still have to pay 35 per cent taxes on the profit they made from the Nassiriya project, the same amount as in previous deals. At that point in 2014, the international engineering and construction firm Foster Wheeler had already completed a front end engineering and design study for the refinery, and 12 potential bidders were on the list. These comprised: Indias Reliance Industries, Oil and Natural Gas Corp, and Essar Oil, Russias Rosneft, Lukoil, and Zarubezhneft, Frances Total, and Maurel & Prom, Chinas CNPC, the U.S.s Brown Energy, a Japanese joint bidding team from JGC and Tonen General, and South Koreas GS Engineering & Construction. Given longstanding IOC concerns about legal, accounting, and financial transparency in Iraq, this 2014 initiative to develop the Nassiriyah oil field foundered. As summarised by the independent international non-governmental organisation, Transparency International (TI), in its Corruption Perceptions Index, Iraq demonstrates: Massive embezzlement, procurement scams, money laundering, oil smuggling and widespread bureaucratic bribery that have led the country to the bottom of international corruption rankings, fuelled political violence and hampered effective state building and service delivery. In 2017, China relaxed its directive of the previous two years to all state-owned hydrocarbons companies to cut budgets. From the Iraqi side, this coincided with a fresh impetus for expediting as much production from the south of the country ahead of the chaos in oil supplies from the north that was likely to result (and did) from Kurdistans independence referendum to be held in September. These factors then led to Chinas Sinopec and PetroChina proposing a deal that would see the NIP being rolled out as part of the broader Integrated South Project (ISP). The ISP (later rebranded as the South Iraq Integrated Project) aimed to boost output across Iraqs southern oilfields, and also to build out related infrastructure, including pipelines, transport routes, and the construction of the Common Seawater Supply Project (CSSP). The Chinese said that they would spend US$9 billion on the [NIP-related] refinery and the first phase of developing Nassiryah but as, under the terms of Iraqi oil contracts, the Iraqis would have to pay back this cost to the Chinese from the value of oil recovered, a source who works closely with Iraqs Oil Ministry told OilPrice.com. The initial reaction from the Oil Ministry was to decline the offer, and to say that the development should only cost around US$4 billion, which the Chinese in turn flatly turned down. The Chinese had other demands that grated on Iraq at that time as well. China also wanted its firms to receive their costs back in a much shorter timeframe than most other similar projects, said the source. This meant that they were effectively asking for a per barrel remuneration fee at a 15 per cent premium to the highest maximum fee being paid to any company in Iraq for a regular crude oil producing field, which was US$6 per barrel to PetroChina for al-Ahdab, he added. This would mean that the Chinese would get around US$6.90 per barrel, more than [Angolas] Sonangol for its heavy oil extraction at Najmah [US$6 per barrel] and Qairayah [US$5 per barrel] and would dwarf the US$1.49 per barrel that [Malaysias] Petronas was getting for the same type of field of Gharraf, he told OilPrice.com. China also demanded that it was given [Iraq] dinar-denominated government-backed bonds for the entire amount [US$9 billion] that could be cashed in if the development did not start to generate large amounts of oil quickly, he underlined. Given the negative history of dealing with China over the Nassiriyah project and the fact that Russia is occupied elsewhere in the country and the region, the U.S. might be in an unusually positive position to take a significant role in either the Nassiryah field development alone or in the broader NIP. This has been bolstered by the apparent willingness of Iraqs de facto leader - radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to engage with U.S. ally, Saudi Arabia, and by the shift in tone from one key player in Iraqs influential al-Hakim family. Whether this shift in attitude towards doing substantial and enduring business with the U.S. across its oil, gas, and petrochemicals sectors is genuine, or whether it is just the usual games-playing by Baghdad to keep the money flowing from Washington, remains to be seen but the slew of deals signaled recently appear propitious at this stage. By Simon Watkins for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: President Joe Biden has asked his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping to release more crude oil from its reserves in concert with the U.S., in a bid to stabilize international oil prices. Thats according to a South China Morning Post report citing an unnamed source familiar with the topics that Biden and Xi discussed during a virtual meeting this week. China released gasoline and diesel from its reserves earlier this month to halt a price rise in some parts of the country that was beginning to make people nervous. Two months earlier, Beijing held its first-ever crude oil auction, at which it offered 7.4 million barrels of crude from the strategic national reserve. The news of the auction pushed prices lower, but the effect did not last. In the United States, members of the Biden administration have mentioned the release of oil from the petroleum reserve as one possible move to arrest the climb of fuel prices. Democratic legislators have called for this, although experts warn that it will not have the desired effect. One of the pressing issues for both sides is energy supply, said the South China Morning Post source. Currently, the energy departments from both sides are negotiating the details. China, according to the source, is open to a concerted release of crude oil from the two national reserves but has not yet made a specific commitment, noting that it needed to first take care of local consumption needs. The proposal appears to be yet another tool in President Bidens box for handling gas price troublea box that has been often referred to by his administration but rarely in any detail. One other suggestion that a group of Democratic senators made earlier this month was to ban crude oil exports so there is more crude for the domestic market. The idea did not win support from the oil industry. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Demand for flights is set to soar this winter as travelers finally have a chance to get back on planes after almost two years of covid restrictions Increased fuel prices driving up flight costs doesnt seem to be deterring winter travelers who are eager to get back on the plane after almost two years of Covid restrictions curbing tourism and business travel. Airlines and travel agencies are forecasting a significant increase in the number of travelers over the Christmas period, as lockdowns continue to ease, and several international travel routes reopen. Airlines and travel companies are finally reporting profits and a more optimistic outlook for the rest of 2021 and throughout 2022, following losses of 35 billion in 2020. The International Air Transport Association (IETA)s end-of-year report suggests air cargo has recovered above 2019 levels and is expected to continue to increase. Meanwhile, the financial performance across airlines is expected to recover in all regions in 2022. But jet fuel is at its highest price since 2014 due to the elevated price of oil, with the U.S. jet fuel benchmark at $2.27 a gallon last week, a 25 percent increase from three months ago. While people are eager to book flights once again, they may be in for a shock when they see ticket prices that were significantly lower in previous years. With most airlines no longer receiving government financial support, which helped many firms keep afloat during the worst of the pandemic, companies are having to employ and pay more pilots, flight attendants, travel agents, and airport staff to meet the growing demand with their own finances, betting on the return. For flights booked before the price of jet fuel increased so much, it seems likely that airlines will take a loss, increasing the price of future flights to make back some of this money. The winter rush is bittersweet, as airlines must contend with higher flight and employment costs, betting on the stability of the international Covid situation where lockdowns are minimal and travel routes remain open - to reap the rewards. Southwest has responded to the increase in demand and difficulties in staffing by offering flight attendants, pilots, and other operations staff up to 120,000 Rapid Reward points, at a value of over $1,400, to work 36 days over the next two busy festive months. This follows an increase in the number of airline staff calling in sick. Southwest is trying to avoid a repeat of its Columbus Day weekend failings when the airline was forced to cancel over 2,000 flights, at an estimated cost of $75 million. In Europe, flight reservations are also on the up. Spains flight numbers are already edging above pre-pandemic levels. Spains ALA airline association president Javier Gandara stated last month, "There are currently 1.9% more flights programmed for this winter period - roughly from November to March - compared to 2019. Adding, "for the Canary and Balearic Islands, planned flights are over 10% higher than in 2019." AirFrance-KLM is expecting a 75 percent increase in passengers over the festive period. Reservation figures went up after the U.S. announcement that it would be permitting travel from 26 Schengen Area countries, with announcements of border openings in Canada and Singapore supporting the trend. Related: Taking A Flight Soon? Prepare To Pay More As Oil Prices Rise Benjamin Smith, CEO of Air France-KLM Group Board of Directors stated, For the first time since the beginning of this Covid-19 crisis, the Q3 results show a positive operating result which encourages us to continue our efforts. Revenue figures for quarter three total around $5.16 billion, up from $2.3 billion during the same period in 2020. But airlines are concerned with managing this dramatic increase in flight and passenger traffic after almost two years of reduced services. Increased congestion in Europes skies could lead to flight delays and cancellations if not well-managed. In addition, there is a concern around waiting times in airports as well as coordination across different countries owing to the need for more passenger documentation. Passengers now are often required to provide proof of vaccination, a negative PCR or antigen test, and in some cases the reason for essential travel, all of which vary from country to country. Airlines are now hedging the price of fuel, essentially buying it forward, to protect themselves from rising fuel prices, with experts predicting that the Brent oil benchmark could reach $90 per barrel before the end of the year, and continuing to rise. Some European budget airlines are relying on this tactic to cut costs, with 80 percent of Ryanairs fuel requirements already hedged for 2022. But higher fuel costs, meaning increased flight prices, does not appear to be dampening consumer demand for winter travel. In fact, the forecast this month from the World Tourist and Travel Council (WTTC) is predicting that U.S. travel in 2022 could surpass that of 2019 pre-pandemic levels. The WTTC also expects travel expenditure to increase over the next year. This is expected to have a knock-on effect on employment, with more job opportunities opening up. While the cost of fuel is concerning for airlines that are still trying to win back their customers after almost two years of pandemic restrictions, as well as battling against climate change concerns and a generally weakened global economy, the added expense doesnt seem to be deterring travelers, offering travel companies a reason to be optimistic. By Felicity Bradstock for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Commodity analysts have been on a forecasting binge recently as oil prices climb higher amid surprisingly strong demand and unsurprisingly short supply. Most believe oil has a lot higher to go. Others have reason to doubt that. One of the dissenters is Citis Ed Morse, who earlier this week told Bloomberg that while prices will continue to rise this quarter, next year the U.S. could surprise everyone with its production growth, suggesting that we might see an end to the oil rally as more supply comes online. Another of those not sharing the strong bullish view is Mohamed El-Erian, the chief economic adviser of Allianz and chair of Gramercy Fund Management. This week, El-Erian cautioned against too much optimism in oil prices because the higher oil prices went, the greater the pressure would be on oil demand. Speaking to CNBC, the expert noted that the current situation is a result of two unforeseen circumstances. On the one hand, El-Erian said, nobody had expected demand to rebound so quickly and so strongly. On the other, nobody had expected the energy crunch and the challenges in the energy transition. Calling these two unthinkable just a year ago, El-Erian essentially highlighted how limited the horizon of most oil price forecasters is. A limited horizon, in turn, makes for quite imperfect predictions. Indeed, 18 months ago, the very thought of oil rebounding to $80 per barrel must have seemed far-fetched even to some Big Oil CEOs. Now, theres talk about Brent hitting $100 or more. This is unlikely to happen, according to El-Erian, for a very simple reason: the higher the price, the more reluctant people will be to buy a commodity. This is perhaps one of the simplest market principles, and it is the principle that drives the cycles of commodity industries. If you were to focus only on the supply side, you could get to oil at $100, because there has been underinvestment in the industry in general, and demand will stay robust, he explained. But if you look at what is happening on the demand side, there you get some questions. Demand is robust today but will it be robust in six months time? There are some really big questions in terms of demand destruction people buying less because prices are higher and in terms of whether policy becomes contractionary or not. Related: Russia And Saudi Arabia See Oil Oversupply In 2022 Uncertainty about demand is what OPEC says makes it stick to its original production increase agreement despite increasingly frantic calls for more supply from large consumers such as the United States. The cartel made a special note of this in its latest Monthly Oil Market Report. In it, OPEC revised its oil demand growth forecast for this year down by 160,000 bpd to a total of 5.7 million bpd. For this quarter, OPEC cut its oil demand growth by a lot more330,000 bpdsaying a slowdown in the pace of recovery in 4Q21 is now assumed due to elevated energy prices. In other words, the energy crunch that first benefited oil prices is now apparently hurting demand for the commodity. Yet, the price-driven pressure on oil demand is only one side of the coin. The other is supply and energyrather than oildemand. In his interview with CNBC, El-Erian noted that the energy crunch was related to the fact that alternatives to fossil fuels were not amply available. Meanwhile, IHS Markits Daniel Yergin has warned that markets could see a series of crunches because supply will continue to fall short of demand. Yergin noted what he calls a disconnect between the dynamics of oil markets and energy policies being implemented, CNBC reported, citing the oil expert. It is perhaps this disconnect that would lend additional upward pressure to oil prices, countering the natural downward pressure that excessive prices normally have on oil demand. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: At the start of 2021, Venezuelas Oil Minister Tareck El Aissami announced that national oil company PDVSA was targeting petroleum production of 1.5 million barrels per day by the end of the year. When he made that statement in March 2021, Venezuelas national oil company was pumping, according to OPEC, an average of 525,000 barrels of crude oil per day, or a third of that target. A week ago, PDVSA gave a clear indication of just how unrealistic that target was by reducing that daily average production target by roughly a third to one million barrels per day by the end of 2021. There are signs that even the reduced output is beyond the capability of Venezuelas national oil company. If this ambitious new target were achieved, it would generate considerable income for Maduros near-bankrupt regime, as well as a capital-starved PDVSA. That cash could then be directed to urgently required maintenance and to the overhaul of Venezuelas rapidly deteriorating energy infrastructure. Despite Maduros, El Aissamis, and the PDVSAs hype, the new numbers are still unrealistic and will not be achieved until critical geopolitical dilemmas are resolved. OPECs latest Monthly Oil Market Report for November 2021 shows, from secondary sources, that during October 2021 Venezuela only pumped on average 590,000 barrels of crude oil per day. This represents an impressive 10.7% increase compared to September and is a stunning 61% greater than for the same period a year earlier, although it is still well below both the formidable production target set by El Aissami earlier this year and PDVSAs amended number. Source: OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report November 2021 and U.S. EIA. For the first nine months of 2021, Venezuela only pumped an average of 525,200 barrels of crude oil daily, compared to 500,000 barrels for 2020 and 796,000 barrels per day during 2019. Source: OPEC. This represents a steep decline from the pre-Chavez peak of 3.1 million barrels per day attained in 1998. Those numbers indicate that Venezuelas crude oil output stubbornly remains a third of El Aissamis ambitious goal and half of PDVSAs revised objective, despite Beijing bolstering investment and operations in Venezuela, indicating that PDVSA is struggling to grow its crude oil output to meet the desired target. There is a range of reasons for this, the most prominent being the severely dilapidated state of Venezuelas energy infrastructure, which will stay in that state for as long as strict U.S. sanctions remain in place. Washingtons measures aimed at triggering regime change prevent PDVSA and Maduros autocratic regime from accessing foreign energy and capital markets. This makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for PVDSA to sell the crude it produces internationally. This, in turn, prevents the oil giant from generating the capital needed to perform crucial maintenance and overhaul activities of Venezuelas severely dilapidated energy infrastructure. It is western oil majors that are essentially the only energy companies with the necessary resources and expertise to rebuild Venezuelas shattered petroleum industry. These companies, however, are unwilling to make the significant investment required to rebuild Venezuelas hydrocarbon infrastructure. Estimates regarding the amount of investment required to rebuild Venezuelas shattered petroleum industry vary wildly. PDVSA claims that $58 billion is sufficient to return production to pre-Chavez levels of around three million barrels per day, but other sources outside of Venezuela believe that is insufficient. Baker Institute for Public Policy Fellow In in Latin American Energy, Francisco J Monaldi, in a February 2021 policy brief stated it will take $10 billion to $12 billion annually over a 10-year period to lift production to 2.5 to 3 million barrels daily. Venezuelan economist Francisco Rodriguez, a key opposition figure, believes it will take as much as $15 billion to $20 billion annually for up to 10-years, meaning as much as $200 billion is required. In Guaidos plan (Spanish) to fix Venezuela, economist Jose Toro Hardy estimated it will take several years and an investment of $25 billion to $30 billion per year, a total of at least $175 billion, to restore crude oil production to 3 million barrels per day. Related: Could An Energy Crunch Lead To A Worldwide Financial Crisis? The difficult conditions associated with operating in Venezuela, a country long associated with the nationalization and state control of energy assets, are not only deterring investment but causing major energy companies to abandon the country. The latest was Japans Inpex which chose to exit Venezuela by selling its interest in two operations with PDVSA. Inpex sold a 70% stake in the Gas Guarico partnership with PDVSA to Caracas-based Sucre Energy and its 30% holding in the Petroguarico venture to PDVSA, which held the controlling 70% interest. Before that TotalEnergies and Equinor exited their operations in Venezuela abandoning their 30.32% and 9.67% respective stakes with PDVSA in the Petrocedeno heavy oil operation. That divestment saw both companies incur a loss and leaves the Petrocedeno extra-heavy crude oil operations 100% owned by PDVSA. These events bode poorly for Venezuela being able to obtain the necessary capital, parts, and skilled labor to conduct overdue critical maintenance and overhauls on industry infrastructure. Those developments are weighing heavily on Caracas fragile fiscal position, which is so dire that by March 2021 Maduros authoritarian regime had been in default for nearly three years. This was resolved by Caracas securing a restructuring deal in late March with individual creditors, which made the debt less onerous allowing Venezuela to move out of default. The financial pressure on Maduros regime because of the collapse of Venezuelas economic backbone, its oil industry, and harsh U.S. sanctions is considerable. The OPEC members economy shrank by 30% during 2020, and the IMF expects it to contract by 5% this year along with another 3% decline during 2022. PDVSAs recently revised target, along with Venezuelas crude oil output only averaging 525,200 barrels per day for the first 10 months of 2021, indicates that Caracas is incapable of lifting petroleum output to the level required to initiate an economic recovery. The looming arrival of peak oil demand and growing pressure to decarbonize the world economy means that time is fast running out for Caracas to exploit its vast petroleum reserves, which at 304 billion barrels are the worlds largest. This adds a sense of urgency to Venezuelas quest to exploit its crude oil reserves, which is the only viable means of rebuilding the petrostates shattered economy and restoring both Caracas and PDVSAs finances. That simply will not occur, despite Maduros overtures regarding reduced regulation and increased foreign control of petroleum assets, because Washingtons sanctions impact those energy companies which possess the capital and expertise required to rebuild Venezuelas petroleum industry. For those reasons, it is difficult to see how PDVSA can expand crude oil production to one million barrels let alone be pumping 1.5 million barrels per day by the end of 2021. By Matthew Smith for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Belarus is reducing the flow of oil via the Druzhba pipeline from Russia to Poland for three days due to "unplanned maintenance" while the migrant crisis on the Belarus-Poland border escalates. Belarusian operator Gomeltransneft Druzhba has limited the pumping of oil through the Druzhba pipeline from Russia to Europe, which crosses Belarus because of unscheduled repair works on one of the branches, Igor Demin, a representative of Russia's Transneft pipeline monopoly, told reporters on Wednesday, as carried by Russian news agency TASS. The Druzhba oil pipeline carries oil to Belarusian oil refineries and then via two branches to Ukraine and the EU member states of Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, and Lithuania. Polish pipeline operator PERN said on Wednesday that it had been informed by Transneft that oil flows to Poland and Germany would be "slightly reduced" and there would be no change in the monthly volume of deliveries. Poland's crude oil system is fully secured and operational, the operator added. The reduction of oil flows to Poland and Germany takes place amid rising tensions on the Belarus-Poland border, where violence erupted on Tuesday in clashes between migrants and Polish border guards. The EU said on Monday it was broadening the scope for sanctions against Belarus "to tackle hybrid attacks and instrumentalisation of migrants." "The EU will now be able to target individuals and entities organising or contributing to activities by the Lukashenko regime that facilitate illegal crossing of the EU's external borders," the EU said. Last week, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko threatened to halt natural gas supply at the key Yamal pipeline from Russia to Germany passing through Belarus if the European Union imposes additional sanctions on the country in response to the migrant crisis at the Belarus-Poland border. Russia's President Vladimir Putin, however, was quick to respond to the threat. Putin said Lukashenko had not consulted Moscow on the issue, and if he did, he risked a response from the Russian side. Despite the threats by Lukashenko, German authorities reported that gas flows via the Yamal pipeline had actually increased over the weekend. By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: A federal judge has retained jurisdiction over a lawsuit involving the Line 5 oil pipeline that Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer wanted moved to a state court. The AP reports that the case "is properly in federal court," according to the judge's opinion, which also stated that the case was "under consideration at the highest levels of this country's government." Line 5 operator Enbridge and the state of Michigan are in litigation over Michigan's withdrawal of the easement for the pipeline's operation, while Canada has officially invoked bilateral negotiations with the United States over the fate of the pipeline that brings oil and propane to the Midwest. Last year in November, the Michigan Governor and the director of the state's Department of Natural Resources revoked Enbridge's easement for the operation of the twin Line 5 pipeline, citing repeated violations of the easement and the need to protect the Great Lakes. Michigan's notice required Enbridge to cease operations of the pipelines in the Straits of Mackinac by May 12, 2021. Enbridge ignored the notice and has continued to operate the pipeline. The company says that only a court and the U.S. federal government have authority to order Line 5 shut down. This is how the case ended up in a federal court. "This is both a federal and international law issue," Enbridge spokesman Ryan Duffy said this week. "Line 5 is vital, critical infrastructure which is operating safely and is in compliance with all applicable laws." On the other hand, "Michigan's sovereign rights and duties regarding the use of our own lands and the protection of our Great Lakes are matters that belong before the state courts of Michigan," Governor spokesman Bobby Leddy said. "Regardless of today's ruling, we remain committed to getting the Line 5 dual pipelines out of the water as quickly as possible." By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: As U.S. oil companies show a new brand of fiscal discipline even as oil prices continue to climb, oil companies spent nearly $192 million on drilling rights in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, according to a press release from the U.S. Department of the Interiors Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. Wednesdays Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 257 brought in $191.7 million in high bids for 308 tracts covering 1.7 million acres in federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico. The money received for the tractsincluding high bids and rental and royalty paymentswill go to the U.S. Treasury; to the states of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama; to local governments; to the Land and Water Conservation Fund; and to the Historic Preservation Fund. Wednesdays sales saw 33 companies participate, with $198 million in bids submitted. Lease Sale 257 offered 15,148 unleased blocks up for grabs located anywhere from three to 231 miles offshore. It is the eighth offshore sale held under the 2017-2022 National OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program, according to BOEMs press release. The interest around the sale was significant in part due to the low carbon footprint of the crude extracted from these waters, compared to the higher footprint of foreign plays or U.S. onshore wells. The top high bidder, according to BOEM, was Chevron U.S.A, with more than $47 million in high bids spread across 34 tracts. Anadarko, BP, Shell, and Exxon rounded out the top five high bidders. The sale generated pushback from environmentalists who chastised the administrations foray into oil and gas lease sales despite coming fresh off the heels of COP26. But the sale comes after a U.S. District Court issued an injunction of the Biden Administrations suspension of oil and gas leases on federal lands. Meanwhile, the administration continues to review its leasing programs. By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: The Majority Leader of Parliament, Hon. Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu says the 2022 budget should be able to raise more money for the development of the country. According to him, borrowing nowadays has become difficult due to the Covid-19 as many well-to-do countries in the world are also struggling to stabilize their economies, making borrowing almost impossible. He added that the outbreak of the pandemic has compelled the government to take drastic measures against the original plan of the country; thus, the health sector has to be looked at. He maintained that the Covid-19 has hit hard at businesses as many companies had to fold up and others were unable to recover from the shock of the pandemic. He stressed that the cost of food is expensive even abroad, making such a challenge difficult to borrow money to develop the country. He admitted that the debt of the country is already high and therefore going to borrow again will shoot the country's debt higher; hence, it is important to look within for money to develop the country. Speaking on Okay FM's 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs asserted that it takes money to run the affairs of the country, hence, the Finance Minister with his 2022 budget presentation will indicate how the country will raise funds for the development of the country. But the Suame Lawmaker cautioned against overtaxing Ghanaians even though the country needs money to develop. If we are not careful and you load people with too much taxes, they will break, he cautioned. He, however, suggested that in order to raise resources from within, the tax net should be broadened to enable as many people as possible to contribute to the development of the country. He noted that it is the belief of the government to make private enterprises thrive as the development of the sector will take care of the unemployment situation in the country. "We want to promote the private enterprises so that the country can develop eventually. I am expecting that the budget will address the businesses that are down in the country. We want to hear how the businesses will be promoted to increase employment," he indicated. Watch video below Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The pan-African banking Group, the Ecobank Group, is supporting the Intra-African Trade Fair 2021 taking place from November 15-21, 2021, in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. This Trade Fair promises to help accelerate Africas commercial and economic growth and development, a core mission of the Ecobank Group. Akin Dada, Group Executive, Corporate and Investment Banking, Ecobank Group said: The Intra-African Trade Fair provides Africas businesses with unique opportunities for unrivalled networking to establish new business contacts from every country across the African continent. This is coming at a time that the African Continental Free Trade Area agreement is breaking down the historic barriers to intra-African trade and investments by creating a huge single market. At the Ecobank Group, we recognise that this will feed through to exponential growth in the demand and need for the convenience of a reliable and secure payments ecosystem and we already have the established scale to facilitate this as the payments bank of choice across Africa. IATF2021 will play a vital role in raising awareness and helping Africas businesses to leverage the benefits of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), grow and expand their international reach. In conjunction with improvements in market information about the goods and services that are available in other African countries, it will increase intra-African trade and negate the longstanding but unnecessary importation of such products from outside the African continent, while boosting sourcing from within Africa. As a key supporter determined to play a significant role in helping to achieve the objectives of the AfCFTA, the Ecobank Group is sponsoring the IATF2021 which promises to be an important vehicle in making the vision of one African market a reality. The Ecobank Group already has in place numerous solutions to facilitate the exponential growth in intra-African trade growth being created by the AfCFTA. These include its scalable digital payments ecosystem which can facilitate trade and e-commerce payments across Africa; its nurturing and supporting of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) through its provision of financial and non-financial support to help them grow and succeed; smart cash management functionalities; its Ecobank Marketplace providing a ready-made and accessible e-commerce solution for sole traders and MSMEs to grow their customer base and sales; its range of training programmes to upskill businesses management abilities; and the provision of innovative funding solutions. The Ecobank Groups intent is to be the go to bank for payments and trade finance in Africa. In addition, the Ecobank Group has a series of webinars specially designed for African entrepreneurs to help them grasp and maximise the opportunities being created by the AfCFTA. As the Best 2021 SME Bank of the Year, the Ecobank Group is continuously focusing on new solutions to meet its diverse customers needs. A recent example is its multi-award-winning Ellevate programme. Ellevate by Ecobank provides women-led/owned or focused businesses and entrepreneurs with a full suite of products, services and tools financial, educational, growth and advisory to empower them and help their businesses thrive. Source: Daniel Adu Darko/Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The eight-year-old cancer survivor, Breanna Fosua Addai, says the incorporation of childhood cancers into the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) has come as a big relief to children with cancers and their parents. Her comment followed an announcement made by the First Lady, Mrs Rebecca Akufo-Addo on Monday during the NHIS week to include childhood cancers onto the NHIS benefit package. Breanna Addai, who has been advocating for childhood cancers and hoped to become ambassador for children with cancer first made the appeal during the inauguration of the ultra-modern 54-bed hostel built by the Rebecca Foundation for children with cancer at Korle-Bu in Accra. She expressed gratitude saying "For years we have struggled, The cost of childhood cancer treatment, Far beyond our reach. For years we have hoped, For years we have prayed, For years we have pleaded Include childhood cancers on the NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE SCHEME (NHIS)! Today, what was merely a dream is becoming a reality. The hopes and dreams of the entire childhood cancer family Coming to life." Little Breanna Addai also commended Paediatric Oncology staff and associates including United Nations Children's Fund and other organisations for supporting the fight against Childhood cancer in Ghana. "Thank you, Paediatric Oncology staff and associates all around the country. Our voice has been heard! Thank you, Mama Rebecca! Our own sweet mother! We thank you for always pushing the childhood cancer agenda," she stated. She also applauded National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) for leading the role to expand the NHIS benefit package to include childhood cancers. "Thank you, NHIA. Today we can smile.Cure is finally within the reach of every precious child. God bless all of you," she said. She therefore called on authorities to pay much attention to childhood cancer issues in the country even though much is being done to reduce the canker. Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video US drug company Pfizer has penned a deal to allow its experimental Covid-19 treatment pill to be made and sold in 95 developing nations. The deal with the UN-backed Medicines Patent Pool not-for-profit could make the treatment available to 53% of the world's population. But it excludes several countries that have had large Covid-19 outbreaks, including Brazil. Pfizer says the pill lessens the risk of severe disease in vulnerable adults. In a statement on Tuesday, Pfizer said the agreement will allow local medicine manufacturers to produce the pill "with the goal of facilitating greater access to the global population". Pfizer will not receive royalties on sales in lower-income countries and said it would waive royalties in all nations included in the agreement while Covid remains a World Health Organization-designated public health emergency. In early November, Pfizer said clinical trials suggest that its Covid-19 pill, Paxlovid, cuts the risk of hospital admission or death by 89% for high-risk adult patients. Charles Gore, director of the Medicines Patent Pool, said in a statement the license was important as "this oral drug is particularly well-suited for low- and middle-income countries and could play a critical role in saving lives". Most of the countries included are in Africa or Asia. However, nations like Brazil, China, Russia, Argentina and Thailand, which have experienced major outbreaks, are not part of the deal. Some experts say this is not enough to address inequalities in access to Covid-19 treatments and vaccines. Pfizer and other pharmaceutical companies have also pushed back against calls to lift patents on their Covid jabs. Source: BBC Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Former President, John Dramani Mahama, has eulogized former Transport Minister Dzifa Attivor, who passed away on Monday, November 15, 2021, after a short illness. Mr. Mahama, in a tweet, indicated that the deceased minister was a very dedicated member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who contributed immensely to the growth of the party. He mentioned that the party, together with friends and sympathizers, were still struggling to come to terms with her departure. May the soul of our sister and mother, Dzifa Aku Attivor, rest peacefully. Dzifa was a very dedicated comrade; she was always ready and willing to get things done for our party, the NDC, and help others in need. We are struggling to come to terms with her departure. She will be sorely missed by all, especially the Volta Region NDC and the teeming number of our people operating under the Volta Caucus across the country. My deepest condolences to her family, friends and the NDC, in the wake of this painful loss, he said. Tributes have been pouring in for Dzifa Attivor since news of her demise became public. Member of Parliament (MP) for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has described her as someone who was passionate about national transformation. You were passionate about national transformation and contributed your quota with hard work and infectious zeal as epitomized by Ghanas multiple-award-winning Terminal. Your dedication to the NDC and the Volta Region was most remarkable. Rest in Glory, Mama Dzifa Attivor, he indicated in a tweet. Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video It has emerged that the Police detectives who arrested the infamous MV Benjamin vessel which was ferrying tonnes of cocaine under-declared the quantity of the illicit substance in the vessel. The police service, in 2006, based upon a tip-off arrested some persons in connection with an offshore vessel MV Benjamin believed to be carting narcotic drugs into Ghana. A member of the detectives in an interview on Angel FM Monday, October 15, 2021 said that the media at the time reported that 77 parcels of cocaine were in police custody. However, Detective Norbert Anane Dei, who partook in the arrest of the suspected cocaine smugglers, said that he together with his three colleague officers connived to retain some of the seized parcels of cocaine before submitting the remaining parcels to the police CID Headquarters. Despite not revealing the exact number of stolen parcels due to security reasons, Detective Anane Dei confessed to Kofi Adoma that the reported figure was far less than what they initially confiscated. He also alleged that the persons they arrested for possessing the drugs bribed the police for their release. When we arrested them, they gave us a 35,000-dollar bribe on the spot to let them go. We took the money and still arrested them, he said in Twi on the show. Narrating the incident further, the detective said that he ended up being a drug addict in an attempt to sell the cocaine they kept to themselves. Out of curiosity, I tasted the drugs and became hooked and since then I frequently abused it till it cost me my marriage and my job, he lamented. Narrating how the arrest happened, Detective Anane Dei explained that some disgruntled fishermen gave him a tip-off that there was a vessel loaded with cocaine docked offshore around the Kpone-Prampram beach. The fishermen noted that they have been contracted to cart the drugs ashore but their employers cheated them they were paid $20,000 instead of the agreed $50,000 thus the reason for exposing them. The then detective Anane reported the tip-off to his superiors after which an ambush was laid to arrest the people involved. Subsequently, some five persons including the vessel owner, Joseph Kojo Dawson, were tried and handed a 25-year jail term. The news media also reported that some five slabs of the 77 parcels of cocaine retrieved from MV Benjamin went missing from the Narcotics Control Board (NCB). Source: angelonline.com.gh Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Dr Wilberforce Aggrey, the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) lecturer, who is currently in police custody following a new evidence allegedly linking him to the disappearance of his wife, Rhodaline Amoah-Darko has been denied bail by the Kumasi High Court. Dr Aggrey was last Friday (November 12) remanded in police custody by the Asokwa District Court. This was after the police charged him with kidnapping. He is to re-appear on November 26, 2021 at the Asokwa District Court. The court has also granted an order for the police to submit him for psychiatric examination following some incoherent responses to police questions. Not satisfied with the decision of District Court to remand him, Dr Aggrey applied to the High Court for bail and when the case was called Tuesday, November 16, 2021, the Kumasi High Court denied the application. This followed an argument by the prosecution that, a new evidence linking Dr Aggrey to the disappearance of his wife is being investigated and that should the court grant him bail, he may interfere with the investigations. Graphic Online's Kumasi reporter, Kwadwo Baffoe Donkor who was at the Kumasi High Court Tuesday reports that the court presided over by Justice Priscilla Dikro, upheld the objection to the bail application by the Attorney General who told the court that new evidences were emerging and the accused person may interfere with the evidence when granted bail. The court therefore denied the accused person and dismissed the case. Dr Aggrey is with the Department of Petroleum Engineering at the KNUST. Substantive case Investigations by the police are still ongoing to determine the whereabouts of Rhodaline, who went missing on August 30, 2021. According to the police, their investigations have so far revealed a linkage of mobile phone communications to implicate the husband. Rhodaline Amoah-Darko, a staff of the Lands Commission in the Ashanti Region was reported missing after she allegedly left home at Gyenyase in Kumasi on August 30, 2021 and did not return. After Rhodaline allegedly went missing, the husband reported the incident to the police on September 2, 2021. Communication from her mobile phone allegedly from suspected kidnappers demanding a ransom emanated from a location (cell tower) close to her residence. A communication from the husbands phone reporting the incident to some relatives also emanated from a similar location (cell tower), according to the police per their investigations. According to the police, the husband has provided incoherent statements on the matter. The Asokwa District Court has since granted an order for the police to submit Dr Aggrey for a psychiatric examination due to the incoherent statements from him on the matter. A police prosecutor on Friday [Nov 12] told the court that the husband in reporting the case said Rhodaline had been kidnapped from their home and he could not find her. From the police, per their investigations, the messages from Rhodaline's phone to the husband's phone, and later from the husband's phone to other relatives all emanated from a location (cell tower) near their residence. Based on that, the husband was invited for interrogation. According to the prosecutor, Aggrey admitted that he sent those messages from Rhodaline's phone because he was threatened that if he did not do that, his family will be harmed. He indicated to the police, according to the prosecutor, that he had to send his wife to a place closer to the Volta Lake to ensure that she was safe. The police said he has since not been able to tell them the location of Rhodaline and that investigations are still ongoing. He has also not been able to tell where Rhodaline's phone is as of now. Related: We have no evidence linking husband to disappearance of Lands Commission staffer - Police It will be recalled that on October 27, 2021, the police in a press statement indicated that there was no evidence to link the husband to the disappearance of Rhodaline. "It must be placed on record, that as of today, Wednesday, October 27, 2021, the Police have no evidence linking Dr. Aggrey to the disappearance of Rhodaline," the police statement indicated. "Investigations are still ongoing and at this point, we are unable to disclose any information to the public on the matter". The Police statement further urged people to desist from creating and circulating unconfirmed reports on the case since their actions can impede Police investigations. "The public shall be fully updated on this issue once investigations are completed. Let us endeavour to respect the privacy of the families involved. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Residents of Akyempim in the Tarkwa Municipality of the Western region were on Monday evening horrified following the murder of Prophetess Rose Boafo of the local Word of Knowledge Church. Prophetess Mrs Rose Boafo was murdered by unknown assailants at about 4pm at the premises of her church at Akyempim near the offices of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) shortly after Monday afternoon church service. The Western Regional Police Command through the Tarkwa Police Division has taken over investigations into the murder of the prophetess. Consulting room The Western Regional Police Public Relations Officer, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Ms Olivia Ewuraabena Adiku told Graphic Online that the police are hunting for the perpetrators. She said Mrs Boafo, aged about 37-years, was murdered in a small apartment attached to the church building which she used for one-on-one consultation with members who wish to discuss issues privately. At the scene the victims body had part of her neck slashed with several cuts and stabbed multiple times in the abdomen. The body has since been deposited at the Tarkwa Government Hospital, she said. At present we are looking for the perpetrators and will also appeal to members of the general public to volunteer information to the police to help in the apprehension of the perpetrators, she said. Strange visitor A member of the community and a friend of the church said the husband of the murdered prophetess told them after the incident that the wife had received information that a visitor wanted to see her at the church and so she left the house to go to the church. The friend of the church said the husband indicated he and his wife had presumed the visitor to be a tiler they were expecting to tile the floor of the church. Phone calls The Word of Knowledge Church sits on a hill not far from the couples residential facility. A cook in the house called the prophetess several times to ask what dish to prepare for dinner but she did not answer her phone. The cook is then said to have gone to the husband to ask what to cook, after complaining that the prophetess was not answering her phone. The husband also called her phone a number of times but to no avail. The husband decided to verify from the church and to his shock, he met the lifeless body of his wife resting in a pool of her blood with her intestines gushing out. Source: graphiconline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Flyers of Joseph Yammins bid to contest the National Organizer slot for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) are currently circulating on social media. Flyers of the former Ashanti Regional Secretary of the NDC have since gone viral on social media suggests hes ready to help build Ghanas largest opposition party as they fight for power in 2021. He confirmed days ago on Accra-based Power Fm that he is coming to breathe in a new life in the party that has deviated from its radical approach in dealing with issues as a result of the timid crop of leadership. Mr. Yammin wants members of the party to apply the law of Moses of an eye for an eye in order not for the NDC to take advantage of them. On the flyer, however, Jospeh Yammin proves that hes ready to battle as he focuses on the grassroots and the need for representation in executive portfolios. His motto reads Grassroots must lead. If Joseph Yammin should take up the challenge, he will be contesting for the position of Joshua Akamba who is currently the National Organizer of the NDC. It is not certain on whether Joshua Akamba will contest for the National Organizer position when the party opens its nominations for party executive positions at the National level. Source: GNA Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Peacefmonline.com can authoritatively confirm that the Vice President, HE Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, will today not be in Parliament to observe the presentation of the 2022 Budget Statement and Government Economic Policy. Though it was often not the usual occurrence for a President or even the Vice President to be present during a budget reading, it had become a regular feature since the advent of the Fourth Republic for Ghanaians to see Dr Bawumia seated in Parliament, and somewhat providing moral support for the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, as he presents the governments economic policy. However, on Wednesday, November 17th, this spectacle which used to be as constant as the Northern Star since the Akufo-Addo led NPP administration assumed office, will be markedly missing. Why Dr Bawumia Can't Be In Parliament! The Vice President, is currently acting as president, - since President Akufo-Addo is on leave - and as such will have to be ushered in a special way done to any president who enters the chamber. Additionally, the President, by constitutional mandate allows the finance minister to read the budget on his (president's) behalf, so should Dr Bawumia (acting president) make a appearance in Parliament today, he will be required to read his own budget. It is in this regard that the Vice President will not be in parliament for the budget presentation. Previous Appearances The Veep has constantly joined Parliamentarians for the presentation of the budget in accordance with Article 111 of the 1992 constitution. Article 111 which talks about Attendance in Parliament of Vice President and Ministers states that, "The Vice-President, or a Minister or Deputy Minister who is not a member of Parliament, shall be entitled to participate in the proceedings of Parliament and shall be accorded all the privileges of a member of Parliament except that he is not entitled to vote or to hold an office in Parliament." The Vice President is the head of the Economic Management Team. Source: Peacefmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The government's decision to continue with the Nations Builders Corp (NABCO) has received major criticism from one of the pressure groups in the country- the Citizen Watch. According to Citizen Watch, the government cannot sustain the current model of NABCO hence the need to redirect the program to the private sector. With the ongoing digitalization program, we believe the government should reduce its labour strength, and redirect NABCO to the private sector. This would help ease pressure on the wage bill, which accounts for almost 60 percent of our total revenue," the Citizen Watch said in a statement issued and signed by Francis Agbenyegah, the Convener of the group. For the past three years, the government has spent over GHc 3billion as wages on 100,000 NABCO recruits. This, Citizen Watch is of the view that, the monies could have built factories across the country through the support of the private sector where the youths would be in outsourcing program and also be part of the agricultural value chain, which is more sustainable. The statement reiterates that the GHc 3billion spent on the NABCO recruits could have been channeled through the banks for the private sector to access and build factories across the country to ease the high rate of unemployment in the country, as they would have been absorbed by the private sector and also participate as forming small and medium enterprises. The GHc 3 billion could have be channeled through ADB Bank, GCB Bank, National Investment Bank among others for the incubation of SMEs to create a more sustainable income generating ventures. We need to build entrepreneurs in the country to propel growth as we keeping saying the private sector is the engine of growth, it said. "We are grateful to the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta for letting us know the true state of affairs and any further expenditure on NABCO from the government without integrating them into the private sector would be a waste of resources. The government should realign and also program the NABCO to be more private sector driven. Citizen Watch research has revealed that out of 500 NABCO recruits interviewed, 80 percent of them either sit idle at work or dont show up for work, but receive their monthly allowances due to lack of monitoring, which clearly shows that the program is a failed venture hence needs a redirection. Source: Ruth Aboagye Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video The beleaguered Member of Parliament for Madina, Mr Francis-Xavier Sosu has been seen in Parliament today, Wednesday, November 16, 2021, ahead of the 2022 Budget presentation by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta. His presence in Parliament has come as a surprise to many journalists as the Kaneshi Court was for the second time yesterday forced to adjourn the case involving the MP to November 29, as he was said to have travelled out of the country on Parliamentary duty. The Legislator has been charged for unlawfully blocking a public road and the destruction of public property. When the case was called on Tuesday (Nov 16), counsel for the legislator, Mr Victor Kwadjoga Adawudu, told the court that his client was still out of the country and was expected to return next week. He, therefore, prayed the court to adjourn the case to November 29. For his part, the prosecution, represented by Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Sylvester Asare told the presiding judge that the Police had not received any communication to indicate the inability of the accused person to attend court. Letter The judge, in his response, indicated that he had received a letter on his file signed by the Deputy Clerk to Parliament, Eric Owusu Mensah which read: Please refer to your letter No. KDC/202/22 and dated 9th November, 2021 which attached a Hearing Notice on the above matter for service on the Honourable Member for Madina Constituency, Hon. Francis-Xavier Sosu. The letter further read; I have been directed by the Rt. Hon. Speaker to bring to the attention of the Hon Court that the Hon. Member is attending at the proceedings of the 3rd Meeting of the 1st Session of the 8th Parliament which commenced on Tuesday 26th October 2021 and is also currently representing Parliament and the Country in a conference in the United States of America. Pursuant to article 117 of the 1992 Constitution of the Republic, I am unable to bring the service to the attention of the Member of Parliament as requested the letter dated the 10th of November 2021 indicated. After the court had read the letter, ASP Asare requested a certified true copy of the said letter for police records. The court subsequently adjourned sitting to 29 November 2021. Background The MP joined his constituents of Ayi-Mensah, Danfa and the Otinibi in a demonstration over poor roads on Monday, October 25, 2021. During the protest, some of the protestors allegedly blocked roads, burnt tyres and destroyed some public property. Following the demonstration, the police have been unsuccessful in their attempts to arrest Mr Sosu with Parliament upholding its privileges and requesting proper procedures for MPs who must face criminal prosecution. It is the case of the police that Mr Sosu had questions to answer in respect of the criminal act the protestors engaged in they tried to invite the MP to assist with investigations. However, the MP had been on the defence that he followed due process in organising the protest and, therefore, stated that there was no basis for his arrest. After the first attempt to arrest him, Mr Sosu filed a formal complaint in Parliament accusing the Greater Accra Regional Operations Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Mr Isaac Kojo Asante, and the Adentan Divisional Commander, ACP Mr Eric Winful, of contempt of Parliament. The Speaker of Parliament has since referred the complaint against the two police officers to the Privileges Committee of Parliament. He was first expected to appear in court on Monday, November 8, this year but was absent. The prosecution notified the court that the Police had received a letter from the Speaker of Parliament indicating that Lawyer Sosu was out of the country on Parliamentary duties, a situation which compelled the court to adjourn the case to today (Nov 16). Source: kasapafmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video " " Sen. Ed Markey speaks alongside Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other Congressional Democrats during a news conference in front of the U.S. Capitol on Feb. 7, 2019 as they unveil their Green New Deal resolution. Alex Wong/Getty Images The Green New Deal is nothing if not wildly, proudly, unapologetically ambitious. It's a bodacious cards-on-the-table challenge to everyone who doubts the seriousness of climate change and to everyone who lacks the sense of urgency or the guts to act on it. So to think, after the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate voted in late March to quash the Green New Deal (though technically was a non-binding resolution, meaning in no way would it have become law; the Senate shot down even talking about it), that this pie-in-a-clean-sky idea has gone belly-up for good is not giving it nearly enough credit. The Green New Deal, in oft-changing but always-bold forms, isn't going anywhere. "I think the Beltway mentality that, 'Well, the resolution didn't pass, so this goes away'... most people aren't necessarily following what happens in Congress," Nicole Ghio, the fossil fuels manager for the environmental group Friends of the Earth, says. "What [people] demand is not based on a vote a very cynical vote that happened in the Senate. What we're going to see is people continue to mobilize around the country for meaningful action on climate. That already has changed the debate and will continue to change the debate." Advertisement What Is the Green New Deal? The Green New Deal, as many know it today, is a resolution that was sponsored in the Senate by veteran Democrat congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts and, in the House, by freshman Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. It calls for the creation of a new federal program, a Green New Deal, that would combat climate change and do nothing less than recast the nation's economy, addressing a huge number of national ills from income inequality to social and racial injustice to health care to a living wage in doing so. It takes on more, too. Way, way more. The Green New Deal is crazy ambitious, and in that way not unlike its namesake, Franklin D. Roosevelt's "New Deal" of the 1930s, designed to lift America out of the Great Depression. "In the past, when we've confronted this type of stagnation and this type of systemic threat as a country ... the answer has been an ambitious and directed mobilization of the American economy to direct and solve our biggest problems," Ocasio-Cortez told a town hall-type meeting on MSNBC. "To get us out of this situation, to revamp our economy, to create dignified jobs for working Americans, to guarantee health care, and elevate our educational opportunities and attainment, we will have to mobilize our entire economy around saving ourselves and taking care of this planet." The Green New Deal is, to its many critics, naively impractical and prohibitively expensive. It calls for a completely clean-energy future for America, carbon-neutral, by 2030. That means goodbye coal, goodbye fossil fuels, goodbye nuclear, goodbye anything that runs on "dirty" energy (including, notably, the economy as we now know it). The devil of the Green New Deal is, of course, in the details. But the resolution, simply and admittedly, doesn't sport many of those. To be fair again, it's just a resolution, not legislation. It is considered by many to be a starting point. Still, the Green New Deal is clear in its goals, which include: Achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to global warming Creating millions of good jobs Investing in infrastructure Securing clean air, water, healthy food, a sustainable environment, access to nature and "climate and community resiliency" Promoting justice for people of "frontline and vulnerable communities" " " The Green New Deal would mean an end to all fossil fuels, including the coal mined from places like the Savage Energy Terminal in Price, Utah seen here. George Frey/Getty Images It should be pointed out that this current Green New Deal is just the latest, hottest incarnation of a Green New Deal. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman may have coined the term in 2007. President Barack Obama put the idea on his platform, without much ado, in 2008. Green Party candidate Jill Stein ran for president with a Green New Deal in the 2016 election. The Sunrise Movement pushed for a Green New Deal in a protest in the offices of Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi after the 2018 midterm election. This in-the-news version has its defining characteristics, but it's much like others, past and present, in that it would require a huge, unprecedented economic investment. Or, as Friedman put it back in 2007: "We will only green the world when we change the very nature of the electricity grid moving it away from dirty coal or oil to clean coal and renewables. And that is a huge industrial project much bigger than anyone has told you. Finally, like the New Deal, if we undertake the green version, it has the potential to create a whole new clean power industry to spur our economy into the 21st century." Advertisement What Happened with This Green New Deal? On March 26, 2019, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pushed for a vote on the Markey Green New Deal resolution, attempting to get senators on the record on a plan that some have ridiculed in outrageous fashion. (Republican Sen. Rob Bishop of Utah, ate a hamburger on camera before, as he said, the GND outlaws cows! Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, said the Green New Deal aims to end air travel! The Green New Deal says neither.) In an only-in-politics show of solidarity and with the realization that, in the Republican-majority Senate, the resolution would be defeated (again, before it was even considered or assigned to committees or debated or any of that) Democrats (most of whom backed the resolution) instead voted "present" when McConnell forced the vote. The resolution, of course, died anyway. In the House, the Ocasio-Cortez companion resolution still lives on, though its future is uncertain. For her part, Ocasio-Cortez is not backing down. She assailed lawmakers who ridiculed the Green New Deal, calling them "fools," and in floor speech warned that the costs of a Green New Deal are nothing compared to what lies ahead without one. "We're going to pay for this whether we pass a Green New Deal or not," she said on the House floor. "Because as towns and cities go underwater, as wildfires ravage our communities, we are going to pay. And we're either gonna decide if we're going to pay to react, or if we're going to pay to be proactive." Advertisement What Next, Then? "I think a lot of that is political posturing," Nathaniel Keohane, the senior vice president of climate for the Environmental Defense Fund, says in regard to the Senate vote. "What I think is most striking there is the kind of thinking behind that is already out of date, in the sense that there is overwhelming and increasing popular support for climate action." A March 2019 Gallup poll found that a majority of Americans, for the first time since 2001, are what Gallup calls "concerned believers;" that is, they are "highly worried about global warming, think it will pose a serious threat in their lifetime, believe it's the result of human activity, and think news reports about it are accurate or underestimate the problem." More than 60 percent of Americans told Gallup pollsters in 2018 that the government is doing too little to protect the environment. That's a 12-year high on that topic. That kind of grassroots sentiment, Friends of Earth's Ghio says, is beginning to trickle up. Politicians, despite what happened in the Senate, are starting to get the message. Virtually every Democrat who is running for president in 2020 has backed the idea of a Green New Deal, if not the current congressional resolution. House Republicans have introduced at least one resolution that addresses climate change. "I think what we're seeing happen is that people across the country are engaging and they're demanding action. They're demanding action because they've been fired up about the ideas represented in a Green New Deal, but they're also demanding action because Americans are seeing, first-hand, the damage in climate change, whether it's in drought or floods or increased storms," Ghio says. "They realize we need action now." Many groups are working on blueprints to provide details on a new GND, including what the latest congressional resolution did perhaps better than any previous version linking a clean-energy future to jobs and a new economy that would ease many of society's problems. The trick, now that the idea is picking up steam, is to come up with plans that are acceptable to a majority of Americans ... and then convince politicians to enact them. "Right now, we think we are at a time where getting more voices into the discussion and more ideas on the table is critical," Keohane says. "I think the Green New Deal has done an amazing job of energizing the conversation in a way that it hasn't been in a decade. I think that can only be a good thing for the cause of climate policy." For real change to be affected, though, it will take more than conversation. It will take those ideas, Keohane says, from all corners of the economy, ideas that result in designed policies that provide economic incentives for individuals and companies. Advertisement Time Is of the Essence A wrinkle: There may be little time to waste. In November 2018, a multi-agency government report that warned of the dangers of climate change included this line: "Without more significant global greenhouse gas mitigation and regional adaptation efforts, climate change is expected to cause substantial losses to infrastructure and property and impede the rate of economic growth over this century." Yet President Donald Trump reacted this way: "One of the problems that a lot of people like myself, we have very high levels of intelligence, but we're not necessarily such believers." That's the kind of thinking that those supporting a Green New Deal the one just presented in Congress or any other versions of it are still fighting. At least for the time being. "I don't want to rule out anything in terms of how fast this could move, given the trends in public opinion, given the enthusiasm behind the Green New Deal, given the fact that we're starting to get bipartisan voices," Keohane says. "But if you look at an effort like this, to pass major new legislation, it often does take presidential leadership, and I don't think that's something we're seeing with this administration. "I think that's where we need to be going, in terms of the national discussion ... what are going to be the priorities for the next president, whoever that is." NOW THAT'S SCARY The fourth National Climate Assessment, that sobering government report released in November 2018, has a wealth of information on our warming planet. One must-see highlight: an interactive chart of the "Indicators of Change," showing alarming moves in things like the Western U.S. snowpack (way down), an almost ninefold increase in U.S. ocean level in the past century and a tenfold increase over the past 10 years in acres lost to U.S. wildfires. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Scientists warn that without good biosecurity measures, 'alien organisms' on Earth may become a reality stranger than fiction. Published in international journal BioScience, a team of scientists, including Dr. Phill Cassey, Head of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Adelaide, are calling for greater recognition of the biosecurity risks ahead of the space industry. "In addition to government-led space missions, the arrival of private companies such as SpaceX has meant there are now more players in space exploration than ever before," said Associate Professor Cassey. "We need to take action now to mitigate those risks." Space biosecurity concerns itself with both the transfer of organisms from Earth to space (forward contamination) and vice-versa (backward contamination). While the research points out that at present the risk of alien organisms surviving the journey is low, it's not impossible. Dr. Cassey said: "Risks that have low probability of occurrence, but have the potential for extreme consequences, are at the heart of biosecurity management. Because when things go wrong, they go really wrong." The research provides clear evidence of how humans have spread organisms to the remotest regions of the earth and sea, and even into space. To address the risks of invasive species from space travel, the authors suggest the emerging field of 'invasion science', which deals with the causes and consequences of introducing organisms into new environments, could offer valuable learnings. This includes the fact that insular systems such as islands, lakes, and remote habitats, are most vulnerable to invasion threats. Further insights that could be applied include protocols for early detection, hazard assessment, rapid response and containment procedures currently used in response to invasive species threats. Dr. Cassey said: "It is far cheaper to prevent biological contamination by implementing protocols on Earth than it is on Mars, for example." Both Dr. Cassey and co-author Dr. Andrew Woolnough from the University of Melbourne and the University of Adelaide suggest that with some of the best biosecurity in the world Australia is well-positioned to contribute expertise in this area. "We have a fantastic opportunity to contribute to international policy and to develop biosecurity mitigation measures that can be used by the expanding private space industry. This is an untapped economic development opportunity," Dr. Woolnough said. Despite the value to space biosecurity, the authors state that invasion biologists have yet to be involved in Committee on Space Research Planetary Protection planning. In the research they argue this should change because "greater collaboration between invasion biologists and astrobiologists would enhance existing international protocols for planetary biosecurityboth for Earth and for extraterrestrial bodies that could contain life". Explore further Stowaway frogs being stopped by border security Credit: Ascannio/Shutterstock Since the end of the 20th century, daily life for most of us has increasingly moved into the digital sphere. This has led to the rise of the so-called "onlife" dimension, which represents the intimate intertwining of our online and offline lives. One day we may see the creation of the so-called metaverse, a perpetual online environment providing new digital spaces where people can interact, work and play as avatars. The result is that people's rights and freedoms are increasingly shaped by the rules set by big technology firms. Twitter's decision to silence the former US president Donald Trump in the aftermath of the violence at Capitol Hill, Facebook's banning of Australian publishers and users from sharing or viewing news content, and the decision of YouTube to block anti-vaccine content from spreading misinformation, are just some examples of how tech firms have expanded their role not only as global gatekeepers of information but also as private powers. These examples raise constitutional questions about who has legitimacy, who should have power, and how democracy can best function in the digital age. This points to the rise of digital constitutionalism, a new phase where individual rights and public powers are "relocated" among different groupssuch as technology companieson a global scale. A new power play Digital constitutionalism does not mean revolutionizing the roots of modern constitutionalism, the principles of which include responsible and accountable government, individual rights and the rule of law. Rather, it is about reframing the role of constitutional law in the digital age. Modern constitutionalism has always pursued two missions: protecting fundamental rights and limiting powers through checks and balances. In the digital age, one of the primary concerns regards the exercise of public powers which threaten rights and freedoms, such as internet blackouts or surveillance. This was underlined by the Snowden affair, where a CIA employee leaked documents revealing the extent of surveillance of the US's National Security Agency (NSA), prompting debate about national security and individual privacy. But private companies now dominate the internet and enforce terms of service or community guidelines which apply to billion of users across the globe. These rules provide alternative standards which compete with the constitutional protection of fundamental rights and democratic values. The challenge for constitutional democracies no longer comes from state authorities. Rather, the biggest concerns come from formally private entities but which control things traditionally governed by public authoritieswithout any safeguards. The capacity of tech firms to set and enforce rights and freedoms on a global scale is an expression of their growing power over the public. For example, when Facebook or Google moderate online content, they are making decisions on freedom of expression and other individual rights or public interest based on private standards that do not necessarily reflect constitutional safeguards. And these decisions are enforced directly by the company, not a court. This situation has led to calls for transparency and accountability. The Cambridge Analytica scandal, which highlighted the extensive collection of personal data for political advertising, and the recent revelations that Facebook's own research showed the potentially harmful effects of social media on young people's mental health, have increased the debate around the responsibilities of these big tech companies. Addressing big tech powers Constitutional democracies are still figuring out how to deal with tech firms' powers. And though they share the same global challenge, countries don't always react in the same way. Even if constitutional democracies generally protect rights and freedoms as part of everyday life in a democratic society, this does not mean that this protection is equal across the world. In Europe, the Digital Services Act and the General Data Protection Regulation arose from the desire to make tech firms more accountable when it comes to content moderation and data protection. But the US still sees self-regulation as the best approach to protect freedom of expression in the digital age. Even the US Supreme Court has underlined that the internetand particularly social mediaplays a critical role as a democratic forum. As a result, online platforms have lost no time in consolidating their policy. The introduction of social media councils like the Facebook Oversight Board has been welcomed as a critical step for transparency and accountability. But this could also be seen as another step towards the consolidation of powers by adopting the veneer of more institutional system such as a "supreme court," as Facebook has also done. Digital constitutionalism offers a variety of perspectives to analyze the protection of rights and the exercise of power by big tech companies. It should also prompt us to raise the debate about how individual rights and freedoms are not just subject to the powers of the state, but increasingly to big tech companies too. Explore further As a global infrastructure giant, Facebook must uphold human rights This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. White-crowned Manakin. Credit: Phillip Edwards, Macaulay Library, Cornell Lab of ornithology. Study of a perky little bird suggests there may be far more avian species in the tropics than those identified so far. After a genetic study of the White-crowned Manakin, scientists say it's not just one species and one of the main drivers of its diversity is the South American landscape and its history of change. These results are published in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. "We found that the White-crowned Manakin probably originated in the highland forests of the Andes Mountains in northern Peru," explains lead author Jacob Berv. "Today, this bird is also found across the Amazon Basin, in the lowland rainforests of Brazil, Peru, and many other countries, including parts of Central America." Berv conducted this research while a Ph.D. student at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and is currently a Life Sciences Fellow at the University of Michigan. "This study shows that there is a lot of evolutionary history embedded in what is commonly referred to as a 'single widespread' species in Amazonia," says co-author Camila Ribas at Brazil's National Institute of Amazonian Research. "The White-crowned Manakin is an example of a phenomenon that is probably more the rule than the exception in Amazoniadiversity is vastly underestimated by the current taxonomy." Around 2.5 million years ago, populations of this manakin species expanded out of the Andes, though many populations remain there today. Those that moved eventually became isolated in pockets of habitat defined by mountains, plains, rivers, and climate. Over the course of time, White-crowned Manakin populations evolved independently, accumulating differences in their songs and plumage patterns. Study authors suggest many of these pocket populations are now different enough from one another that they should be recognized as separate species. This is especially true if the variations in song make it unlikely that isolated populations would be able to recognize one another and breedthe biological definition of a species. Over a few million years, ancestors of the White-crowned Manakin expanded from the Andes Mountains into a wide variety of other habitats and became isolated by landscape features. Map markers indicate the locations and number of genetic samples used in the study. Credit: Manakin illustration reproduced with permission from the Handbook of the Birds of the World. "In order to understand evolutionary processes in Amazonia we need many more studies like this one, with dense geographical sampling," Ribas says. "For this we need to support biological collections that are able to accumulate samples through time." Study authors say underestimating the number of species in South America has important consequences for conservation, especially for endemic species threatened by ongoing loss of habitat. "We've basically just scratched the surface," notes Berv. "If what holds true for this species is indicative of what's taking place in other poorly studied species, then we have hugely underestimated the amount of biodiversity in the South American tropics." Explore further Researchers describe first-ever hybrid bird species from the Amazon More information: Jacob S. Berv et al, Genomic phylogeography of the White-crowned Manakin Pseudopipra pipra (Aves: Pipridae) illuminates a continental-scale radiation out of the Andes, Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution (2021). Journal information: Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution Jacob S. Berv et al, Genomic phylogeography of the White-crowned Manakin Pseudopipra pipra (Aves: Pipridae) illuminates a continental-scale radiation out of the Andes,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.ympev.2021.107205 Credit: CC0 Public Domain For Kent Moore, the excitement of making a discovery is often tinged with sadness. That's because Moore, a professor of atmospheric physics at the University of Toronto Mississauga, focuses on the impact of climate change. "I wish I could discover things that weren't an impact of the change in climate. But unfortunately, everywhere you look on the Earth, you're seeing these changes and most of them are happening because the climate is changing," says Moore, who is also vice-principal, research at U of T Mississauga. After the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) came to a close last week, Moore says he feels a sense of deja vuand frustration. "Countries have committed to certain levels at COP26, but the problem is, we've never been able to meet any of our commitments," he says. "It's a challenge. I don't think it's going to be easy to meet these targets, but if we don't... our children and grandchildren will have to deal with the consequences of our actions and that's what really saddens me." His research is a constant reminder of the consequences of climate change. In a study published over the summer, he and other researchers found a 3,000 square kilometer hole, or polynya, opened up for two weeks in May of 2020 in an area of the Arctic known for having the oldest and thickest ice. The findings suggest the "Last Ice Area" may be undergoing rapid changes that reduces its suitability for ice-dependent species. "When we study the Arctic sea ice we focus on the area of ice, which is decreasingbut what we don't focus on is that it's also getting thinner," Moore says. He and his co-authors suggest that a strong storm with anti-cyclonic winds (that rotate clockwise) caused the polynya to forma phenomenon that may become more common as Arctic ice gets thinner due to climate change. If nothing changes, Moore predicts that most of the ice in the Arctic will be lost in the summer by about 2050 and that the Last Ice Area will be a rare refuge for plants and animalsincluding polar bearsthat depend on the ice for their survival. "This Last Ice Area will be the last area where these ecosystems will be able to survive, and we're hoping this ice will persist through a period of time until we get our CO 2 emissions under control," Moore says. Many scientists estimate that the average global temperature has increased by more than one degree Celsius in the last 150 years, leading to more frequent extreme weather events such as wildfires, droughts and heatwaves. "Everything we're experiencing now, we will experience in the future," Moore says, "and it will be even worse than that because we aren't taking any heat out of the system now." Climate targets set out at COP26 will make it hard to stay within the global average surface temperature increase of 1.5 C, Moore says. And if the temperature jumps just half a degree to 2 C, it will have devastating consequences. "At 1.5 C, if we jump forward to the end of the century, there still will be some summers where there is ice in the Arctic. At 2 C, there won't be any. It will be ice-free during the summer," Moore explains. "We hear a lot about stresses on coral reefs, which are complex ecosystems, at 1.5 C, but the corals will survive. They'll be under a lot of pressure, but they'll survive. At 2 C, they probably won't." The difference in half a degree would also affect people. About 14 percent of the world's population will experience extreme heat in the summer with a 1.5 C increase. That number jumps to roughly 37 percent of the population at 2 C. Moore says that, while individuals are being urged to do their part by driving electric cars and using less plastic, it's ultimately up to governments to ramp up their climate commitments to make a greater difference. For now, he thinks many countries are making more modest promises with the intention of protecting their economies in the short term. "I think they understand that if they really move on this file, they'll suffer a lot of political heat and they won't get much benefit from it because the benefits will be accrued in 20 to 30 years," he says. "I don't think there's the political will to do it." He says he commends young climate activists who are pressuring their governments to make more ambitious environmental commitments. "They're the ones that understand that it's going to be them that's going to clean up this mess. They're really frustrated, and I totally understand their frustration. I feel it too," Moore says. "These changes really are significant, and they're going to be impacting the Earth for a long, long time." Explore further Scientists discover large rift in the Arctic's last bastion of thick sea ice Deforestation in regions like the Amazon has Europeans worried. The EU plans to bar food and wood imports from deforested areas, according to a proposal unveiled Wednesday aimed at using its trade power to drive sustainability. The draft law, which Brussels wants to turn into binding rules for all 27 European Union nations, would require companies show their soy, beef, palm oil, cocoa, coffee and wood products are certified "deforestation-free". It follows an international pledge made at the COP26 summit last week to end deforestation by 2030. "This proposal is a truly ground-breaking one," the EU commissioner for climate action policy, Virginijus Sinkevicius, told a media conference. "It targets not just illegal deforestation but also deforestation driven by agricultural expansion," he said. Under the EU plan, two criteria would have to be met: that the commodities are produced in accordance with the origin country's laws; and that they were not produced on land deforested or degraded since the beginning of 2021. Imports from higher-risk countries would be subject to tighter checks. The European Commission did not say when it hoped to have the new legislation adopted. The rules could impact countries such as Brazil, where European disquiet at razing of the Amazon rainforest by cattle farmers is holding up implementation of an EU-Mercosur trade deal. Clearing of the Amazon hit a new record last month, according to Brazil's National Institute for Space Research. The environmental protection group WWF says the huge EU market is responsible for 16 percent of global deforestation linked to international trade. It and other NGOs welcome the EU plan as a first step, but say it does not go far enough. Greenpeace says it does not address deforestation from other commodities such as rubber and maize, or from pig and poultry farming. Waste and soil Other sustainability proposals presented alongside the anti-deforestation rules were on waste management and improving the health of soils. "These initiatives show that the European Union is serious about the green transition and just keeps moving forward with it," said the Commission vice president in charge of overseeing the EU's Green Deal, Frans Timmermans. On waste, the Commission wants to see "circular economy" principles attached to the way it sends abroad its millions of tonnes of discarded metals, cardboard, plastic, textiles and other detritus. Waste exports to non-OECD countries would be restricted and allowed only if those destinations agree and were able to handle them sustainably. Currently the two top destinations for EU waste in that category are Turkey and India. Shipments to OECD countries would be monitored and suspended if grave environmental problems arose. Those destinations include Britain, Switzerland and Norway. The soil strategy aims for a mix of voluntary and mandatory measures to increase soil carbon in farmland and fight desertification, to get soil ecosystems healthy by 2050. Explore further Amazon deforestation hits monthly record in Brazil 2021 AFP An egg chamber expressing fluorescently tagged Pavarotti (red), which localizes to the ring canals, and Squash (cyan) which also localizes to ring canals transiently and delineates the cell boundaries in the epithelium. Credit: Imran Alsous et al. Clonal dominance is a phenomenon that occurs when descendants (i.e., clones) of one or more founder cells in an organism contribute disproportionally to the system's final structure as the tissue grows. This phenomenon is associated with numerous biological processes, including bacterial growth and the genesis of tumors. While numerous studies have investigated clonal dominance, its origin is still is poorly understood. Researchers from Princeton University, the Flatiron Institute in New York, and Jozef Stefan Institue in Slovenia have recently carried out a study investigating clonal dominance in the egg chamber of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, a biological system in which the collective growth dynamics of cells can be easily reconstructed. Their paper, published in Nature Physics, suggests that clonal dominance can emerge spontaneously in excitable cell networks. The fruit fly egg chamber is a multicellular system made up of a cluster of 16 germ cells, encased by a layer of epithelial cells. The cells in both these types of tissues are connected by ring canals, stabilized intercellular bridges that connect the two daughter cells arising from a division. Therefore, scientists can reconstruct cell lineage trees simply by tracing the ring canal connections between cells. Lineage tracing techniques, a set of tools used to identify and track cell populations in vivo, have advanced significantly over the past few years. These are particularly promising for studies examining complex, 3D and heterogeneous tissues, containing 10s or 100s of thousands of cells. The egg chamber epithelium, which has fewer cells that form a single layer, is much simpler and is therefore well suited for lineage tracing. "In the egg chamber epithelium, descendants remain, for the most part, connected to each other through ring canals, making cell lineage tracing more straightforward," Jasmin Imran Alsous and Jan Rozman, two of the researchers who carried out the study, told Phys.org. "In addition, this system has a relatively clear start and end points for cell divisions: starting with ~50 cells and ending with ~1,000." A series of past studies led by Lynn Cooley at Yale Medical School and Alan Spradling at Howard Hughes Medical Institute, identified the various ring canal proteins, as well as the number and location of founding stem cells that give rise to the epithelium, respectively. The recent work by Imran Alsous, Rozman and their colleagues built on these previous findings. "In our previous work, we focused almost exclusively on the cluster of 16 germ cells where ring canals are quite large, growing from ~1 micron to ~10 microns in the larger egg chambers, and allowing passage of most RNAs, proteins and organelles," Imran Alsous said. "Using 3D imaging, image processing and theory, we showed that as these cells grow, they do so unequally and that the resulting differential growth pattern could be rationalized by accounting for polarized transport through the ring canals." In a subsequent paper, Imran Alsous and her colleagues also investigated how these germ cells pack within an enclosure, given the topological constraints they uncovered. In the summer of 2018, they received a vial of fruit flies from another researcher, in which a protein that localizes to the ring canals was labeled, so that ring canals could be seen through fluorescence microscopy. They thus decided to investigate the extent of cell connections in the epithelium. "In the germ cells, ring canals have been shown to be important for synchronizing the divisions that give rise to the 16-cell clustergoing from 1 cell to a 2-, 4-, 8-, and eventually a -16 cell cluster," Imran Alsous explained. "Previous studies had already shown that ring canals in the epithelium are actually smaller than those connecting the germ cells, on the order of ~300 nm, but are nonetheless large enough to allow protein equilibration between connected cells through diffusion." Using the sample they received from their colleagues, the researchers decided to trace cell connections in the epithelium in egg chambers at various stages of development, where epithelia had anywhere between ~50 cells and ~1000 cells. Their study was conducted largely out of curiosity. "When we first started this project, in the summer of 2018, I was set to leave Princeton relatively soon," Imran Alsous said. "My co-author, Jan, was on a summer internship at Princeton." When they first started tracing cell connections in their sample, the researchers quickly realized that connected cells formed clusters that varied greatly in size. While some of these clusters contained a few or a dozen cells, others could contain hundreds of cells. The team expected to find a certain degree of variation in the size of cell clusters, however the differences they observed were far more pronounced than they anticipated. Their observations suggest that while some cells divided often, others rarely did. After they observed large clusters of cells, Imran Alsous, Rozman and their colleagues set out to explain the origin of these clusters. Previous studies gathered valuable insight that informed their efforts, specifically delineating two facts about the fruit fly egg chamber epithelium. Firstly, studies found that in this system, the ring canals connecting cells are large enough for proteins to move through them and cross between cells. Secondly, researchers observed cell divisions in adjacent cells more often than one would expect to observe if cell division was randomly initiated. "Combining these facts, we came upon the hypothesis that dominance could emerge because cell divisions are coupled in the epithelium (i.e., when a cell starts to divide, mitosis promoting factors could diffuse through ring canals into adjacent cells, inducing them to also divide)," Imran Alsous and Rozman said. "To test this hypothesis, we developed a mathematical model for the growing egg chamber epithelium, based on an older model that notionally represented the spread of forest fires." The original version of the 'forest fire' model adapted by Imran Alsous, Rozman and their colleagues shows spaces on a grid that can either be filled by a normal tree, a burning tree or nothing (i.e., they previously contained a tree that burned down). The trees could catch fire either spontaneously (representing, e.g., a lightning strike) or from an adjacent burning tree. Empty spaces in the grid, on the other hand, could potentially host a newly grown tree. In the adapted version of the model devised by the researchers, the tree grid was replaced by a network of cells connected by ring canals. Trees corresponded to a cell that can divide, burning trees to cells that were in the process of dividing, and empty spaces to daughter cells that resulted from a cell division, which are in turn not yet capable of dividing. "Cells could divide either spontaneously or be induced to divide by a linked dividing cell, reminiscent of a fire jumping between trees," Imran Alsous and Rozman said. "Unlike a traditional 'forest fire' model, each new division also added a new node (i.e., the new cell emerging from the division), thereby growing the network. Using this representation of the growing epithelium, we showed that coupling of cell divisions could indeed lead to the sizes of dominant clones observed in the egg chamber, capturing their statistics and dynamics of their emergence." The study offers new insight about clonal dominance in the fruit fly egg chamber epithelium. Most notably, it outlines a possible explanation for the emergence of dominant clones resulting from cell division coupling. In addition, the findings offer additional evidence for the excitable nature of cell cycle and gene regulatory processes. The excitable nature of these processes, already highlighted by past studies, was also previously confirmed by both genetic and biochemical experiments. "Our opinion is that the study almost opens as many questions as it answers," Imran Alsous and Rozman said. "For example, while it shows a possible means for the emergence of dominant clones, it is not clear if and how clonal dominance and division coupling confers an advantage to the developing system. Speculatively, it could result in faster growth or play a role in tissue scale coordination such as cell divisions stopping at ~1,000 total cells." In their next studies, the authors also plan to explore how topological links (i.e., the ring canals) affect the tiling of surfaces and tissue-scale dynamics, as they have previously done in a study focused on the packing of the 16 germ cells. "The 'forest fire' model in the paper is topological in nature and it doesn't account for the spatial constraints of the tissue and how growing clusters can interact or affect each other's' growth," Imran Alsous and Rozman added. "Therefore, a much more extensive model and experimental measurements would be required to understand this." Explore further Oocyte growth relies on physical phenomena that drive smaller cells to dump their contents into a larger cell More information: Jasmin Imran Alsous et al, Clonal Dominance in Excitable Cell Networks, Nature Physics (2021). Jasmin Imran Alsous et al, Clonal Dominance in Excitable Cell Networks,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41567-021-01383-0 Jasmin Imran Alsous et al, Collective Growth in a Small Cell Network, Current Biology (2017). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2017.07.038 Journal information: Current Biology , Nature Physics 2021 Science X Network Nina Wootton examines samples of fish to see if theyve ingested plastic. Credit: Nina Wootton More than 35 percent of fish caught in the waters off southern Australia contain microplastics, and the problem is most acute in South Australia, with plastic found in 49 percent of fish, according to research from the University of Adelaide. While Australian waters remain cleaner than many international fishing zones, lead researcher Nina Wootton found that many commercial and recreational fishers in the South Australian fishing industry weren't aware that Australia even had an ocean plastic problem, in research published in Marine Policy this month. "We wanted to find out what people knew about microplastic pollution in fish, from fishers to fishmongers to consumers," Nina said. "It varied, but about half weren't aware it was an issue because South Australian oceans had such a reputation for being clean." "We still have time to make sure Australian seafood products remain some of the cleanest in the world, but we need the seafood industry, and the general public, to recognize the problem and start taking positive actions now." The fishing industry can take a lead in solving the problem: previous studies estimate that 10% of plastic pollution in the ocean comes from fishing sources, so fishers can improve the quality of their own product by limiting their use of plastic where possible. While fishers and other stakeholders were worried about the cost and inconvenience, simple actions like replacing plastic fishing equipment with natural materials, or using biodegradable bags at fish markets, could quickly reduce the amount of plastic ending up in the ocean. The researchers suggest an education program to raise awareness of the problem and provide solutions that the industry could implement easily to maintain the quality of locally caught fish. Michael Violante, who has been part of the family-run fishmongers Seafood Works for nearly 25 years, said he was initially shocked by the findings. "Fresh local seafood is a big part of my life, and to know that South Australia is not completely exempt from the plastic problem has got me thinking," he said. "I am open to making changes to the way I use plastic and encourage others to do the same. From the fishers to the consumers, we all share this planet and can all do our small part to help lead the way to a cleaner and healthier ocean." The study shows the importance of bringing all stakeholders to the table to chart the way forward. "We know that by bringing fishers into conversations around policy, we encourage the acceptance of new management ideas within the industry," Nina said. "There is lots we can do to mitigate the problem of ocean plastic but we cannot begin unless people are aware there is a problem." This isn't just a South Australian problem, or even an Australian oneabout 75% of the fish we eat is imported from overseas. Future research could include a global audit of plastic in the fishing industry, and an evaluation of ways in which the industry can adopt new practices quickly and affordably. Explore further Banishing bandits: Other countries bear the cost More information: Nina Wootton et al, Perceptions of plastic pollution in a prominent fishery: Building strategies to inform management, Marine Policy (2021). Journal information: Marine Policy Nina Wootton et al, Perceptions of plastic pollution in a prominent fishery: Building strategies to inform management,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.marpol.2021.104846 Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Since July, every weekly update from state wildlife officials has set a new record for the most manatee deaths counted in a single year. On Wednesday, Florida crossed an especially tragic threshold: More than 1,000 manatees dead. The exact count, through Nov. 12, was 1,003 manatees, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. That is up from 637 all of last year and far above the previous record, 830, in 2013. Florida passed the previous high halfway through 2021. Manatee death reports are filed each Friday and published by the state the following Wednesday. "It makes me sad and angry," said Patrick Rose, executive director of Save the Manatee Club, a conservation nonprofit. The bad year got off to a quick start. Manatees took shelter from cold water by warm discharges from a power plant in the Indian River Lagoon off Brevard County, scientists say. The area is a typical wintering spot, but years of algal blooms there have killed tens of thousands of acres of seagrass. That destruction left manatees without enough food. Many starved. "It could've been prevented," Rose said. The algal blooms that have decimated the lagoon are fueled by human pollution, like septic and sewer overflows and fertilizer runoff during rainstorms. Starvation is not the only culprit for manatee deaths, though. Nearly 100 have been killed in collisions with boats or other watercraft, according to Conservation Commission data. Red Tide has also contributed. The Tampa Bay and Pinellas shorelines were hit hard by a toxic bloom this summer. The die-off in 2021 has left some with fears for the long-term health of one of Florida's most beloved and iconic species. Manatees are listed as a threatened animal, after federal wildlife regulators improved their status from endangered in 2017. The Conservation Commission in recent years estimated at least 7,520 were alive. U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., introduced a bill in August to return manatees to an endangered status. If passed, HR 4946 could draw more funding and attention, Buchanan said, which he hopes would help protect the creatures. "I represent Manatee County. Manatees are so beloved there, but also across Florida," Buchanan said. "People are very passionate about it." Manatees aren't only cute, Rose said. Their health is a signal for the well-being of the overall ecosystem. Many fish and turtles also eat or live in seagrass, and poor water quality affects human health. The damage that caused the die-off last winter is not easily repaired. State scientists and conservationists fear a repeat if manatees around Brevard County again struggle to find food this winter. Explore further 2021 broke the Florida record for manatee deaths in a year in just 6 months 2021 Tampa Bay Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. The empirical model built by the research team. Credit: Wei He Artificial intelligence (AI) recommender tools are widely used by industries such as e-commerce, media, banking and utilities. The tool's algorithm uses website visitors' past online activity and other data, both implicit and explicit, to predict what that visitor would like to view or buy next, and then presents those options to them. This can be highly beneficial; for example, for customers, the recommender can save them time by suggesting options tailored to their tastes and needs. While, for companies, it can encourage consumers to spend more via their website and increase customer loyalty: in the case of streaming giant Netflix, it's estimated that its recommendation engine generates $1 billion annually. A group of researchers from China, Finland and Korea set out to uncover the potential negative effects of these AI tools. As co-author Sihua Chen, from China's Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, explains that "every coin has two sides, and with the penetration of AI recommenders in our lives, the downsides are becoming more apparent." The research was first published online August 10, 2021 in the Journal of Management Science and Engineering, and is scheduled to be published in print December 2021. After reviewing previous research on the topic, the team built an empirical model, which reveals how a customer's preferences influences their purchase decisions, and the role that AI recommendation plays in that process. They were particularly interested in exploring the internet 'information cocoon' phenomenon: when facing a large volume of information online, people tend to see only what they want to see. The researchers conducted two experiments using Jingdong and Taobao, the two biggest online shopping platforms in China. According to author Jian Mou, of Korea's Pusan National University, they "found that AI recommendation augmented the information cocoon effect. In other words, people see what they want to see, and then the website's AI recommender algorithm selects content for them based on those preferences. This negatively impacts the quality of the customer's purchasing decisions." Co-author Mikko Siponen, of Finland's University of Jyvaskyla, adds that "as with many other new technologies, AI recommendation is a source of unintended consequences. Our findings have important implications for consumers, particularly in the e-commerce industryif they want to take independent purchasing decisions, they need to avoid the overwhelming influence of AI recommender tools." More information: Sihua Chen et al, When more is less: The other side of artificial intelligence recommendation, Journal of Management Science and Engineering (2021). Sihua Chen et al, When more is less: The other side of artificial intelligence recommendation,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/j.jmse.2021.08.001 Provided by KeAi Communications The fortified settlement of La Bastida (Totana, Murcia). This is one of the largest and best excavated settlements of El Argar. Credit: ASOME-UAB The third millennium BCE is a highly dynamic period in the prehistory of Europe and western Asia, characterized by large-scale social and political changes. In the Iberian Peninsula, the Copper Age was in full swing in around 2500 years BCE with substantial demographic growth, attested by a large diversity of settlements and fortifications, monumental funerary structures, as well as ditched mega-sites larger than 100 hectares. For reasons that are still unclear, the latter half of the millennium experienced depopulation and the abandonment of the mega-sites, fortified settlements and necropolis. In southeastern Iberia, one of the most outstanding archaeological entities of the European Bronze Age emerged around 2200 BCE. Known as the El Argar culture, one of the first state-level societies on the European continent, it was characterized by large, central hilltop settlements, distinct pottery, specialized weapons and bronze, silver and gold artifacts, alongside an intramural burial rite. A new study led by researchers from the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and the Max Planck Institutes for the Science of Human History (Jena) and Evolutionary Anthropology (Leipzig) and published in Science Advances, explores the relation between dynamic shifts at population scale and the major social and political changes of the third and second millennia BCE by analyzing the genomes of 136 ancient Iberians, ranging from 3000 to 1500 BCE. Genetic turnover and melting pot Including published genomes from Iberia, the new study encompasses data from nearly 300 ancient individuals and focuses specifically on the Copper to Bronze Age transition around 2200 BCE. "While we knew that the so-called 'steppe'-related ancestry, which had spread across Europe during the third millennium BCE, eventually reached the northern Iberian Peninsula around 2400 BCE, we were surprised to see that all prehistoric individuals from the El Argar period carried a portion of this ancestry, while the Chalcolithic individuals did not," says Max Planck researcher Wolfgang Haak, senior author and principal investigator of the study. Female (right) and male (left) individuals of burial 38 of the settlement of La Almoloya (Pliego, Murcia). This is one of the richest burials found in an El Argar settlement. Credit: ASOME-UAB The genomic data reveals some of the processes underlying this genetic shift. While the bulk of the genome shows that Bronze Age individuals are a mix of local Iberian Chalcolithic ancestry and a smaller part of incoming ancestry from the European mainland, the paternally inherited Y chromosome lineages show a complete turnover, linked to the movement of steppe-related ancestry that is also visible in other parts of Europe. The rich new data from the El Argar sites also show that these two components do not fully account for the genetic make-up of the early Bronze Age societies. "The causes of this disappearance of the previous diversity of the Y chromosome are still very difficult to explain," says Cristina Rihuete Herrada, UAB researcher and co-author of the study. "We also found signals of ancestry that we traced to the central and eastern Mediterranean and western Asia. We cannot say exactly whether these influences arrived at the same time as the steppe-related ancestry, but it shows that it formed an integrative part of the rising El Argar societies, attesting to continued contacts to these regions," adds Vanessa Villalba-Mouco, postdoctoral researcher and lead author of the study. UAB researchers already pointed to possible Mediterranean connections when they discovered in 2013 the monumental fortification of the Argaric settlement of La Bastida, in Murcia, to explain the originality of some architectural elements. "The genetic study argues in favor of this hypothesis: the data show that this unknown Mediterranean connection would have been sustained over time until the end of the period of El Argar, around 1500 BCE," says Rafael Mico, UAB researcher and co-author of the study. Social implications "Whether the genetic shift was brought about by migrating groups from North and Central Iberia or by climatic deteriorations that affected the eastern Mediterranean around 2200 BCE is the million-dollar question," says co-principal investigator and senior author Prof Roberto Risch from the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. "It would be foolish to think that it can all be explained by a simple, one-factor model. While the temporal coincidence is striking, it is likely that many factors played a role." Copper Age collective burial of Camino del Molino (Caravaca de la Cruz, Murcia), where a total of ~1300 individuals were buried between 2900-2300 BCE. The image shows the last burial layer, dated between 2500-2300 BCE, from which six individuals have been analysed. Credit: Universidad de Murcia. Fotografia de Francisco Ramos One of these factors could be pandemics, such as an early form of the Plague, which has been attested to in other regions of Europe around that time. While not found directly among the tested individuals in southern Iberia, it could be a cause or driver for the movement or disappearance of other groups in the region. "In any case, we can now conclude that the population movement starting in the eastern European steppe zones around 3000 BCE was not a single migratory event, but required over four centuries to reach the Iberian Peninsula and another 200 years to appear in present-day Murcia and Alicante," adds Risch. The archaeological record of the El Argar group shows a clear break with previous Chalcolithic traditions. Burial rites, for example, changed from communal to single and double burials within the building complexes. Elite burials also indicate the formation of strong social hierarchies. Testing for biological relatedness, the researchers found that males are on average more closely related to other people at the site, indicating that the group was likely patrilineally structured. Such a social organization could explain the stark reduction of the Y-lineage diversity. "We observe similar patterns of social organization and increasing stratification also in other parts of Early Bronze Age Europe, in fact broadly around the same time and with similar characteristics of early state-like formations. This suggests a structured restart or resetting following some form of crisis or unstable, highly dynamic times," summarizes Haak. In the research have participated, among others, these institutions: Adelaide University, Danube Private University, Basel University, Fundacion Vasca para la Ciencia, Universidad de Valencia, Cape Town University, Universidad de Alicante, Museo Arqueologico de Alicante, Museo Arqueologico Municipal de Lorca, Universidad de Murcia, Harvard Medical School, Harvard University, Howard Hughes Medical Institute y Universidad de Sevilla. Explore further Central European prehistory was highly dynamic More information: Vanessa Villalba-Mouco et al, Genomic transformation and social organization during the Copper Age-Bronze Age transition in southern Iberia, Science Advances (2021). www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abi7038 Journal information: Science Advances Vanessa Villalba-Mouco et al, Genomic transformation and social organization during the Copper Age-Bronze Age transition in southern Iberia,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abi7038 A baby Coquerels sifaka tries some of her first solid foods. Credit: David Haring Dr. Cathy Williams knew something wasn't right. The veterinarian had felt off for weeks after her 2014 trip to Madagascar. At first she just felt bloated and uncomfortable and wasn't interested in eating much. But eventually she developed a fever and chills that sent her to the emergency room. When tested, doctors found that what she had wasn't just a stomach bug. She was suffering from an infection of Clostridium difficile, a germ that causes severe diarrhea and abdominal pain and can quickly become life-threatening if not treated promptly. "It was horrible," Williams said. The condition is often triggered when antibiotics disrupt the normal balance of bacteria that inhabit the gut, allowing "bad" bacteria such as C. difficile to multiply unchecked and wreak havoc on the intestines. To get her infection under control, Williams asked her doctors if they could try an approach she and other veterinarians had used for decades to treat lemurs with digestive problems at the Duke Lemur Center. The procedure, known as a fecal microbiota transplant, involves taking stool from a healthy donor and administering it to the patient to add back "good" microbes and reset the gut. Lemur researchers make a case for fecal transplants to reduce the side effects of antibiotics. Credit: David Haring, Duke Lemur Center At the time it was considered too experimental for clinical use in human cases like Williams." She was prescribed the standard treatment and was sent home from the hospital, though she wouldn't feel well enough to go back to work for another month. But now new research in lemurs is confirming what Williams and others long suspected: That this ancientif gross-soundingtreatment can help an off-kilter gut microbiome get back to normal. In a recent study in the journal Animal Microbiome, a research team led by Duke professor Christine Drea, former Ph.D. student Sally Bornbusch and colleagues looked at the gut microbiomes of 11 healthy ring-tailed lemurs over a four-month period after receiving a seven-day course of the broad-spectrum antibiotic amoxicillin. The lemurs were split into two experimental groups. One was a wait-and-see group, with continued follow-up but no further treatment after the antibiotics. The other group was given a slurry of their own feces, collected prior to antibiotic treatment and then mixed with saline and fed back to the same animal after their course of antibiotics was over. "It sounds crazy," Williams said. But she has used a similar procedure since the 1990s to treat illnesses in Coquerel's sifaka lemurs, whose infants are known to eat their mother's poop during weaningpresumably to get the microbes they'll need to transition to solid food. Drea, Bornbusch and team used genetic sequencing techniques to track changes in the lemurs' gut microbiome before, during and after treatment. As expected, even a single course of antibiotics caused the numbers of microbes in their guts to plunge compared with controls, briefly wiping out species diversity in both experimental groups before returning to baseline. Ring-tailed lemurs at the Duke Lemur Center in North Carolina. Credit: David Haring, Duke Lemur Center "Antibiotics had dramatic effects, even in healthy animals," Drea said. But in terms of which types of bacteria bounced back and when, the patterns of recovery in the two groups were different. Lemurs that received the "poop soup" treatment started to stabilize and return to their pre-antibiotic microbiome within about two weeks. In contrast, the bacterial composition in the wait-and-see group continued to fluctuate, and still hadn't quite returned to normal even after four months of observation. This kind of therapy isn't new. Reports of using fecal transplants to treat people suffering from food poisoning or diarrhea date back as far as fourth century China. The evidence for its effectiveness in captive settings has Bornbusch advocating for freezing stool at Smithsonian's National Zoo, where she is now a postdoctoral fellow. "If we can bank feces from animals when they're healthy, that can be a huge benefit down the road," Bornbusch said. "It can help the animals get better, faster." And now if any of her lemur patients were to get sick with C. difficile like she did, Williams said, "I would absolutely go with a fecal microbiota transplant." "People are put off by it," Drea said, "But the disgust for this approach might actually have been holding up a fairly cheap and useful cure." Explore further Drug-resistant bacteria found in the guts of lemurs who live around humans More information: Sally L. Bornbusch et al, Antibiotics and fecal transfaunation differentially affect microbiota recovery, associations, and antibiotic resistance in lemur guts, Animal Microbiome (2021). Sally L. Bornbusch et al, Antibiotics and fecal transfaunation differentially affect microbiota recovery, associations, and antibiotic resistance in lemur guts,(2021). DOI: 10.1186/s42523-021-00126-z A setup of one of the camera prototypes in the laboratory. Credit: Florian Willomitzer/Northwestern University Northwestern University researchers have invented a new high-resolution camera that can see the unseenincluding around corners and through scattering media, such as skin, fog or potentially even the human skull. Called synthetic wavelength holography, the new method works by indirectly scattering coherent light onto hidden objects, which then scatters again and travels back to a camera. From there, an algorithm reconstructs the scattered light signal to reveal the hidden objects. Due to its high temporal resolution, the method also has potential to image fast-moving objects, such as the beating heart through the chest or speeding cars around a street corner. The study will be published on Nov. 17 in the journal Nature Communications. The relatively new research field of imaging objects behind occlusions or scattering media is called non-line-of-sight (NLoS) imaging. Compared to related NLoS imaging technologies, the Northwestern method can rapidly capture full-field images of large areas with submillimeter precision. With this level of resolution, the computational camera could potentially image through the skin to see even the tiniest capillaries at work. While the method has obvious potential for noninvasive medical imaging, early-warning navigation systems for automobiles and industrial inspection in tightly confined spaces, the researchers believe potential applications are endless. "Our technology will usher in a new wave of imaging capabilities," said Northwestern's Florian Willomitzer, first author of the study. "Our current sensor prototypes use visible or infrared light, but the principle is universal and could be extended to other wavelengths. For example, the same method could be applied to radio waves for space exploration or underwater acoustic imaging. It can be applied to many areas, and we have only scratched the surface." Willomitzer is a research assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at Northwestern's McCormick School of Engineering. Northwestern co-authors include Oliver Cossairt, associate professor of computer science and electrical and computer engineering, and former Ph.D. student Fengqiang Li. The Northwestern researchers collaborated closely with Prasanna Rangarajan, Muralidhar Balaji and Marc Christensen, all researchers at Southern Methodist University. Intercepting scattered light Seeing around a corner versus imaging an organ inside the human body might seem like very different challenges, but Willomitzer said they are actually closely related. Both deal with scattering media, in which light hits an object and scatters in a manner that a direct image of the object can no longer be seen. "If you have ever tried to shine a flashlight through your hand, then you have experienced this phenomenon," Willomitzer said. "You see a bright spot on the other side of your hand, but, theoretically, there should be a shadow cast by your bones, revealing the bones' structure. Instead, the light that passes the bones gets scattered within the tissue in all directions, completely blurring out the shadow image." The goal, then, is to intercept the scattered light in order to reconstruct the inherent information about its time of travel to reveal the hidden object. But that presents its own challenge. "Nothing is faster than the speed of light, so if you want to measure light's time of travel with high precision, then you need extremely fast detectors," Willomitzer said. "Such detectors can be terribly expensive." Tailored waves To eliminate the need for fast detectors, Willomitzer and his colleagues merged light waves from two lasers in order to generate a synthetic light wave that can be specifically tailored to holographic imaging in different scattering scenarios. "If you can capture the entire light field of an object in a hologram, then you can reconstruct the object's three-dimensional shape in its entirety," Willomitzer explained. "We do this holographic imaging around a corner or through scattererswith synthetic waves instead of normal light waves." Over the years, there have been many NLoS imaging attempts to recover images of hidden objects. But these methods typically have one or more problems. They either have low resolution, an extremely small angular field of regard, require a time-consuming raster scan or need large probing areas to measure the scattered light signal. The new technology, however, overcomes these issues and is the first method for imaging around corners and through scattering media that combines high spatial resolution, high temporal resolution, a small probing area and a large angular field of view. This means that the camera can image tiny features in tightly confined spaces as well as hidden objects in large areas with high resolutioneven when the objects are moving. Turning 'walls into mirrors' Because light only travels on straight paths, an opaque barrier (such as a wall, shrub or automobile) must be present in order for the new device to see around corners. The light is emitted from the sensor unit (which could be mounted on top of a car), bounces off the barrier, then hits the object around the corner. The light then bounces back to the barrier and ultimately back into the detector of the sensor unit. "It's like we can plant a virtual computational camera on every remote surface to see the world from the surface's perspective," Willomitzer said. For people driving roads curving through a mountain pass or snaking through a rural forest, this method could prevent accidents by revealing other cars or deer just out of sight around the bend. "This technique turns walls into mirrors," Willomitzer said. "It gets better as the technique also can work at night and in foggy weather conditions." In this manner, the high-resolution technology also could replace (or supplement) endoscopes for medical and industrial imaging. Instead of needing a flexible camera, capable of turning corners and twisting through tight spacesfor a colonoscopy, for examplesynthetic wavelength holography could use light to see around the many folds inside the intestines. Similarly, synthetic wavelength holography could image inside industrial equipment while it is still runninga feat that is impossible for current endoscopes. "If you have a running turbine and want to inspect defects inside, you would typically use an endoscope," Willomitzer said. "But some defects only show up when the device is in motion. You cannot use an endoscope and look inside the turbine from the front while it is running. Our sensor can look inside a running turbine to detect structures that are smaller than one millimeter." Although the technology is currently a prototype, Willomitzer believes it will eventually be used to help drivers avoid accidents. "It's still a long way to go before we see these kinds of imagers built in cars or approved for medical applications," he said. "Maybe 10 years or even more, but it will come." Explore further Non-line-of-sight imaging with picosecond temporal resolution More information: Fast non-line-of-sight imaging with high-resolution and wide field of view using synthetic wavelength holography, Nature Communications (2021). Journal information: Nature Communications Fast non-line-of-sight imaging with high-resolution and wide field of view using synthetic wavelength holography,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26776-w Fig. 1. Proteoforms: Distinct protein forms arising from a single gene. Credit: DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abk0734 Now that the Human Genome Project has officially wrapped, an international team of researchers will map the entire collection of proteins in the human body. Plans and goals for the Human Proteoform Project were outlined in a paper published last week (Nov. 12) in the journal Science Advances. The large undertaking will characterize known proteoforms (specific protein molecules) as well as aim to systematically discover and analyze new ones in human tissues, cells and fluids. "We are all built of proteins, and most drugs target proteins," said Northwestern University's Neil Kelleher, a world-renowned proteomics pioneer and corresponding author of the paper. "But understanding proteins is an open frontier. Like other seminal moments in science and technology, this project will serve as a major achievement that can help us more fully understand proteins' role in all types of disease, aging and new therapeutics." Kelleher is the Walter and Mary Glass Professor of Molecular Biosciences and professor of chemistry in Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a professor of medicine in Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. He also is director of the Chemistry of Life Processes Institute (CLP) and faculty director of Northwestern Proteomics, a center of excellence within CLP that develops novel platforms for drug discovery and diagnostics. Kelleher co-authored the paper with the Consortium for Top-Down Proteomics. Credit: Northwestern University The human body comprises at least 20,000 individual genesand from each gene, proteins are processed into various forms (or proteoforms). So, for the 20,300 genes, there are millions of unique proteoforms created due to genetic variation, modification or alternative splicing. "There is a proteoform family for every human gene," Kelleher said. "And proteoforms have a life of their own. They can be activated or repressed after they are produced, and their diversity varies widely in our different cell types in unknown ways. Understanding the exact proteins we are made of is complex and challenging and will require a major global effort." The Human Proteoform Project's ultimate goal is to establish a definitive and comprehensive Human Proteoform Atlas, a reference set which will be public and available to all, including the many proteomics companies recently advancing in the private sector. In order to develop this extensive, high-quality atlas, researchers must accelerate development of new, powerful, state-of-the-art technologies for deep proteoform analysis. Kelleher said he hopes researchers, physicians, clinicians, scientists and engineers will help contribute to the global effort. "With our global collaborators, we are excited to bring about the next generation of proteomics," Kelleher said. "Defining the human proteome will allow us to really accelerate the pace of biomedical research and discovery." Explore further A chemistry pioneer works to improve a flawed test for a common cancer More information: Lloyd M. Smith et al, The Human Proteoform Project: Defining the human proteome, Science Advances (2021). Journal information: Science Advances Lloyd M. Smith et al, The Human Proteoform Project: Defining the human proteome,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abk0734 Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain In an in-depth cross-country analysis considering the impacts of large-scale agriculture and industry on the human right to drinking water, Dr. Naho Mirumachi, Reader in Environmental Politics, from King's College London has called for renewed political commitment to ensure everyone can enjoy access to clean, drinkable water. There are Currently 2.2 billion people, or nearly a third of the global population, who lack safely managed drinking water. Of this figure, 450 million children face poor drinking water services and water scarcity, putting them in situations of high or extreme water vulnerability. The labor costs of water collection, including that of time spent to collect water and associated security risks, disproportionately fall on women and girls, affecting 8 out of 10 households without water. Businesses from the food, textile, energy, industry, chemicals, pharmaceutical and mining sectors contribute to the majority of water use and pollution, which are often facilitated by foreign investment. These sectors are continuing to undertake activities, such as water intensive crop production, and withdraw from fresh water sources in areas where water access is already unreliable at a human cost. Consumption of one country can have an impact on another because of the global food trade. The water embedded in that food trade or, virtual water 'trade' means that countries are interdependent and have a high water footprint. The UK is the sixth largest net importer of virtual water in the world. Over half of that water footprint comes from countries facing water scarcity. The study, commissioned by the European Parliament's Subcommittee on Human Rights, further highlights: It is estimated that global meat consumption will increase by 14% in the next decade as the population increases and income rises. Accordingly, a further 50% increase in food production is required by 2050 to feed the population. This growth in demand for agricultural products will strain the already unsustainable levels of water use. Temperature and precipitation changes resulting from climate change will contribute to the uncertainty of water availability and instances of drought and flooding. Water quality will be exacerbated by climate-induced algae blooms By 2040, water consumption in the energy sector will increase by about 60%. The demand for biofuels is underpinned by global shifts towards cleaner forms of energy. Biofuels impact other water uses, especially when these crops are irrigated for commercial production. There are concerns this will drive up prices and make food less affordable, in particular, for people below the poverty line. Whilst behavior changes such as eating less red meat would ease pressure on production elsewhere, reduce virtual water 'flows' and relieve water stress, this alone is not enough. It is necessary to strengthen corporate due diligence and corporate accounting. Voluntary mechanisms will only go so far in addressing the impact of businesses on human rights. States need to put in place mandatory measures for corporate accountability. The analysis was requested by the European Parliament's Subcommittee on Human Rights, funded by the European Parliament, and the copyright is with them. The content of study is the sole responsibility of the authors, and any opinions expressed herein do not necessarily represent the official position of the European Parliament. Explore further Regional variations in freshwater overconsumption More information: The Human Right to Drinking Water: Impact of large-scale agriculture and industry. The Human Right to Drinking Water: Impact of large-scale agriculture and industry. www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData A(2021)653649_EN.pdf A research group at the University of Gottingen has long been researching manufacturing processes for products made of popcorn that are sustainable and efficient. The University has now agreed a license agreement with the Bachl Group for the commercial use of the process and the products for building insulation. Credit: Karl Bachl GmbH & Co. KG Building insulation has become an increasingly important topic in recent years. Good exterior insulation reduces heating costs, which means lower CO 2 emissions. Nowadays, sustainable natural insulation materials are already available for the interiors of buildings. But what does sustainability really mean? It means the material should be environmentally friendly and made from renewable raw materials, it must have good thermal insulation and fire protection, and it must be easy to recycle at the end of its useful life. A research group at the University of Gottingen has long been researching manufacturing processes for products made of popcorn that are sustainable and efficient. The University has now agreed a license agreement with the Bachl Group for the commercial use of the process and the products for building insulation. The market is dominated by conventional insulation materials made of plastics or mineral fiber with about 90% of the market share. In fact, plastics derived from petroleum are used for exterior insulation. Could plastic exterior insulation also be replaced by sustainable materials? A research group at the Faculty of Forest Sciences and Forest Ecology Chemie und Verfahrenstechnik von Verbundwerkstoffen (chemistry and process engineering of composite materials) at the University of Gottingen has now succeeded in developing a novel process. Based on its many years of experience in the field of renewable raw materials, the group has managed to develop a process by which insulation boards made of "granulated" popcorn can be produced that have excellent thermal insulation properties and good protection against fire. The great advantage of this granular material is that it is a plant-based, environmentally friendly and a sustainable alternative to the products derived from petroleum currently used in the industry. "This new process, based on that of the plastics industry, enables the cost-effective production of insulation boards at an industrial scale," explains the head of the research group, Professor Alireza Kharazipour. "Especially in the field of insulation in construction, this ensures that natural insulation materials are no longer just niche products." In addition, the new popcorn products have water-repellent properties, which opens up even more opportunities for practical applications and extends their useful life. Michael Kublbeck, group Managing Director of the exclusive divisional licensing partner Bachl, adds: "We are delighted to be launching such an innovative insulation product using popcorn onto the market together with the University of Gottingen. For us, this is another important milestone in our strategic development towards becoming an integrated, multi-material insulation supplier. Popcorn insulation complements our quality range perfectly and means we can respond even more precisely to the different requirements of the market and our customers." The license agreement between the University and Bachl was brokered by MBM ScienceBridge GmbH, a wholly owned subsidiary of the University of Gottingen Public Law Foundation. The agency acts for a total of nine universities and scientific institutions in Lower Saxony: It examines scientific inventions for the possibility of a patent application and for economic potential. It then takes care of worldwide marketing and negotiates, supervises and monitors licensing agreements. The current portfolio includes projects from the fields of bio-medicine, medical technology, metrology, chemistry, physics, forestry and agricultural sciences. Explore further Wood-derived foam materials Japanese researchers have crafted a "super clone" of an Afghan mural destroyed by the Taliban, using a mix of traditional and digital techniques that they hope will salvage the work's "spirit" for future generations. Not a single fragment remains of the seventh-century cave painting demolished in 2001 along with two massive Buddha statues and other artefacts in Afghanistan's Bamiyan valley, sparking global condemnation. But a precise replica, the result of three years of state-of-the-art reproduction efforts, went on display at a museum in Tokyo in September and October, just weeks after the Taliban returned to power in Kabul. The mural on the ceiling of a cave near the famous statues depicted a blue Bodhisattvaor someone on the path to becoming a Buddha. At six metres long and three metres high (20 by 10 feet), the intricate full-size copy has been dubbed a "super clone" by the reproduction team at Tokyo University of the Arts. "We have succeeded in recreating a very precise representation in three dimensions," from its texture to the type of paint, said the team's co-leader Takashi Inoue. Japan is a major donor to Afghanistan and has long been involved in heritage protection efforts at Bamiyan, a crossroads of ancient civilisations considered to be one of the birthplaces of Japanese Buddhism. The team digitally processed more than 100 photographs taken by Japanese archaeologists of the mural before it was desecrated, to create a computerised model of its surface. They then fed this data into a machine, which carved the exact shape into a styrofoam block. To complete the replica, artists applied a traditional paint in a lapis lazuli shade similar to the one used for the original mural. Through this process, "we can reproduce designs that are very close to the real ones again and again, to hand down their spirit to future generations," said Inoue, a professor specialised in Eurasian cultural heritage. "Let's stop vandalism. Let's preserve priceless culturethe heritage of mankindtogether." 'Everything can be digitalised' Days ahead of the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan in August, the Taliban overran Kabul, sparking fears of a return to their brutal reign of 1996 to 2001. The new regime insists it wants to protect archaeological heritage from destruction. For historian Kosaku Maeda, a co-leader of the Tokyo reproduction team, the "massively shocking" images of the giant Buddhas disappearing into clouds of dust are still a vivid memory. "I was worried that such an act would be inflicted on the remains once again," said the 88-year-old, who has visited the valley repeatedly for more than half a century. But their work shows that vandalism is "meaningless" in the face of modern technology, as "everything can be digitalised", he said. On a recent visit to Bamiyan by AFP journalists, Taliban gunmen stood guarding the rock cavities that once housed the two Buddha statues. Construction work on a $20-million UNESCO-backed cultural centre and museum was still under way in Bamiyan when the AFP team visited the area in Octoberalthough its planned inauguration this year was delayed by the Taliban takeover. Maeda said his dream is to build a separate "peace museum" in the valley and, if possible, display the replica cave painting there. "We can't put it back in its original place, but I want to bring it to Bamiyan as a historical legacy that local people can inherit," said Maeda, also a member of UNESCO's committee for the safeguarding of Afghan cultural heritage. "A nation stays alive when its culture stays alive," he added, reciting the message written on a banner hung at the entrance of the National Museum of Afghanistan in Kabul. Explore further Climate change threatens Afghanistan's crumbling heritage 2021 AFP Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Back and forth transmission of SARS-CoV-2 between people and other mammals increases the risk of new variants and threatens efforts to control COVID-19. A new study, published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, used a novel modelling approach to predict the zoonotic capacity of 5,400 mammal species, extending predictive capacity by an order of magnitude. Of the high risk species flagged, many live near people and in COVID-19 hotspots. A major bottleneck to predicting high-risk mammal species is limited data on ACE2, the cell receptor that SARS-CoV-2 binds to in animals. ACE2 allows SARS-CoV-2 to enter host cells, and is found in all major vertebrate groups. It is likely that all vertebrates have ACE2 receptors, but sequences were only available for 326 species. To overcome this obstacle, the team developed a machine learning model that combined data on the biological traits of 5,400 mammal species with available data on ACE2. The goal: to identify mammal species with high 'zoonotic capacity' the ability to become infected with SARS-CoV-2 and transmit it to other animals and people. The method they developed could help extend predictive capacity for disease systems beyond COVID-19. Co-lead author Ilya Fischhoff, a postdoctoral associate at Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, comments, "SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, originated in an animal before making the jump to people. Now, people have caused spillback infections in a variety of mammals, including those kept in farms, zoos, and even our homes. Knowing which mammals are capable of re-infecting us is vital to preventing spillback infections and dangerous new variants." When a virus passes from people to animals and back to people it is called secondary spillover. This phenomenon can accelerate new variants establishing in humans that are more virulent and less responsive to vaccines. Secondary spillover of SARS-CoV-2 has already been reported among farmed mink in Denmark and the Netherlands, where it has led to at least one new SARS-CoV-2 variant. Senior author and Cary Institute disease ecologist, Barbara Han, says, "Secondary spillover allows SARS-CoV-2 established in new hosts to transmit potentially more infectious strains to people. Identifying mammal species that are efficient at transmitting SARS-CoV-2 is an important step in guiding surveillance and preventing the virus from continually circulating between people and other animals, making disease control even more costly and difficult." Binding to ACE2 receptors is not always enough to facilitate SARS-CoV-2 viral replication, shedding, and onward transmission. The team trained their models on a conservative binding strength threshold informed by published ACE2 amino acid sequences of vertebrates, analyzed using a software tool called HADDOCK (High Ambiguity Driven protein-protein DOCKing). This software scored each species on predicted binding strength; stronger binding likely promotes successful infection and viral shedding. Co-lead author and Cary Institute postdoctoral analyst, Adrian Castellanos, says, "The ACE2 receptor performs important functions and is common among vertebrates. It's likely that it evolved in animals alongside other ecological and life history traits. By comparing biological traits of species known to have the ACE2 receptor with traits of other mammal species, we can make predictions about their capacity to transmit SARS-CoV-2." This combined modeling approach predicted zoonotic capacity of mammal species known to transmit with 72% accuracy and identified numerous additional mammal species with the potential to transmit SARS-CoV-2. Predictions matched observed results for white-tailed deer, mink, raccoon dogs, snow leopard, and others. The model found that the riskiest mammal species were often those that live in disturbed landscapes and in close proximity to peopleincluding domestic animals, livestock, and animals that are traded and hunted. The top 10% of high-risk species spanned 13 orders. Primates were predicted to have the highest zoonotic capacity and strongest viral binding among mammal groups. Water buffalo, bred for dairy and farming, had the highest risk among livestock. The model also predicted high zoonotic potential among live-traded mammals, including macaques, Asiatic black bears, jaguars, and pangolinshighlighting the risks posed by live markets and wildlife trade. SARS-CoV-2 also presents challenges for wildlife conservation. Infection has already been confirmed in Western lowland gorillas. For high-risk charismatic species like mountain gorillas, spillback infection could occur through ecotourism. Grizzly bears, polar bears, and wolves, all in the 90th percentile for predicted zoonotic capacity, are frequently handled by biologists for research and management. Han explains, "Our model is the only one that has been able to make risk predictions across nearly all mammal species. Every time we hear about a new species being found SARS-CoV-2 positive, we revisit our list and find they are ranked high. Snow leopards had a risk score around the 80th percentile. We now know they are one of the wildlife species that could die from COVID-19." People working in close proximity with high-risk mammals should take extra precautions to prevent SARS-CoV-2 spread. This includes prioritizing vaccinations among veterinarians, zookeepers, livestock handlers, and other people in regular contact with animals. Findings can also guide targeted vaccination strategies for at-risk mammals. Han concludes, "We found that the riskiest mammal species are often the ones that live alongside us. Targeting these species for additional lab validation and field surveillance is critical. We should also explore underutilized data sources like natural history collections, to fill data gaps about animal and pathogen traits. More efficient iteration between computational predictions, lab analysis, and animal surveillance will help us better understand what enables spillover, spillback, and secondary transmissioninsight that is needed to guide zoonotic pandemic response now and in the future." Explore further Which animals can catch the coronavirus? Credit: ESA-P. de Maagt A specially upgraded radio-frequency chamber in ESA's technical heart is testing what is set to become the smallest radar system to be flown in space, hosted aboard a breadbox-sized spacecraft. Scheduled to fly to the Didymos binary asteroid system with ESA's Hera mission for planetary defense in 2024, the compact radar aboard the Juventas CubeSat will perform the first ever radar sounding inside an asteroid. Juventas will peer up to 100 m deep within the 160-m-diameter Dimorphos moonlet of the 780-m-diameter Didymos asteroid. CubeSats are mini-satellites built up from standardized 10-cm boxes. Juventas is a '6-unit' CubeSat, measuring 10x20x30 cm, while its quartet of radar antennas measure 1.5 m long each. So the test campaign includes a structural model of the Juventas CubeSat, to evaluate how the body of the miniature spacecraft might affect the radar signals. The test campaign is taking place inside the "Hybrid European Radio Frequency and Antenna Test Zone' or Hertz chamber at ESA's European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in the Netherlands. However testing here only became feasible after a skillful upgrade. "An essential element of anechoic test chambers like Hertz are the radio-absorbing foam spikes lining the inside walls, allowing tests to mimic the infinite void of space," explains ESA antenna engineer Paul Moseley. "But typically Hertz can only test down to 400 MHz, while Hertz's main antennas will radiate at 60 MHz. At this frequency the spikes no longer absorb signals, so instead of a dark room the chamber would be turned into a hall of mirrors, throwing out multiple radio reflections that interfere with the accuracy of our measurements." ESA's Hertz team worked with MVG in Italy to devise a new setup making lower frequency testing possible, initially as part of a general upgrade but then specially targeted to enable Juventas testing. Paul adds: "It's a combination of hardware and software that allows us to measure in this environment but still reconstruct the correct results, including fiberglass support towers that are transparent to antennas and software that combines measurements made at many different points across the room, in order to cancel out the reflection effects." Franco Perez Lissi of ESA's CubeSats Systems Unit is overseeing the Juventas testing: "We're measuring the radiation pattern in a full sphere surrounding the antennas- the results of which should also be very useful for Juventas's critical design review, taking place next monthas well as the total radiated power. This entire campaign additionally serves as a dress rehearsal of sorts for the flight model of Juventas, which is scheduled to be tested here in early 2023." The radar aboard Juventas is developed from the Rosetta spacecraft's CONSERT radar system, which peered into the interior of Comet 67P/ChuryumovGerasimenko. It is a synthetic aperture radar design, meaning it will take advantage of Juventas's orbit 3 km above the surface of Dimorphos to integrate together multiple signal reflections and resolve them into images. "We are proud to see Rosetta's legacy living on in the next generation of deep-space missions," adds Alain Herique of the University of Grenoble, Principal Investigator of Juventas's JuRa low-frequency radar. Juventas is being led for ESA by GomSpace company in Luxembourg with GMV in Romania, with its radar developed by the Planetologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble group at the University Grenoble and Technical University Dresden, with Astronika in Poland constructing the antennas and EmTroniX in Luxembourg contributing the signal generation system. Hera will also be embarking a second deep space CubeSat, the Italian-led Milani, which will employ a multispectral imager to prospect the asteroid's surface composition. Hera will be preceded to the Didymos asteroids by NASA's DART spacecraft which will perform a test deflection of the smaller body. DART is due for launch next Wednesday, 24 November. Butterflies land on branches at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury There is a ray of hope for the vanishing orange-and-black Western monarch butterflies. The number wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population, whose presence is often a good indicator of ecosystem health, reached an all-time low last year. Experts pin their decline on climate change, habitat destruction and lack of food due to drought. An annual winter count last year by the Xerces Society recorded fewer than 2,000 butterflies, a massive decline from the tens of thousands tallied in recent years and the millions that clustered in trees from Northern California's Mendocino County to Baja California, Mexico, in the south in the 1980s. Now, their roosting sites are concentrated mostly on California's central coast. This year's official count started Saturday and will last three weeks but already an unofficial count by researchers and volunteers shows there are over 50,000 monarchs at overwintering sites, said Sarina Jepsen, director of Endangered Species at Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation. "This is certainly not a recovery but we're really optimistic and just really glad that there are monarchs here and that gives us a bit of time to work toward recovery of the Western monarch migration," Jepsen said. A butterfly is illuminated by the late-morning sun at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury Western monarch butterflies head south from the Pacific Northwest to California each winter, returning to the same places and even the same trees, where they cluster. The monarchs generally arrive in California at the beginning of November and spread across the country once warmer weather arrives in March. The Western monarch butterfly population has declined by more than 99% since the 1980s. On the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains, another monarch population travels from southern Canada and the northeastern United States across thousands of miles to spend the winter in western Mexico. Scientists estimate the monarch population in the eastern U.S. has fallen about 80% since the mid-1990s. Whether the population of monarchs that fly to Mexico from the eastern side of the country has rebounded is not yet known. Results of an annual county by experts with the World Wildlife Fund in Mexico won't be released until next year. A butterfly flies near a cluster of butterflies gathered on a pine tree at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury Monarchs from across the West migrate annually to about 100 wintering sites dotting central California's Pacific coast. One of the best-known wintering places is the Monarch Grove Sanctuary, a city-owned site in the coastal city of Pacific Grove, where last year no monarch butterflies showed up. The city 70 miles (112 kilometers) south of San Francisco has worked for years to help the declining population of monarch. Known as "Butterfly Town, USA," the city celebrates the orange-and-black butterfly with windowpane patterns in its wings with a parade every October. Messing with a monarch is a crime that carries a $1,000 fine. "I don't recall having such a bad year before and I thought they were done. They were gone. They're not going to ever come back and sure enough, this year, boom, they landed," said Moe Ammar, president of Pacific Grove Chamber of Commerce. Leslee Russell of Livermore, Calif. takes a picture of her husband Dave Russell in front of a mural outside the Butterfly Grove Inn near the Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury This year a preliminary count showed more than 13,000 monarchs have arrived at the site in Monterey County, clustering together on pine, cypress and eucalyptus trees and sparking hope among the grove's volunteers and visitors that the struggling insects can bounce back. Scientists don't know why the population increased this year but Jepsen said it is likely a combination of factors, including better conditions on their breeding grounds. "Climatic factors could have influenced the population. We could have gotten an influx of monarchs from the eastern U.S., which occasionally can happen, but it's not known for sure why the population is what it is this year," Jepsen said. Scientists say the monarch population had sharply dropped because of the destruction of their milkweed habitat along their migratory route as housing expands into their territory and use of pesticides and herbicides increases. People photograph butterflies at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury A butterfly lands on a branch at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury People walk into Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury Butterflies flutter through the sky above Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury A butterfly sits on a leaf at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury A cluster of butterflies sit on a pine tree at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year. Credit: AP Photo/Nic Coury Along with farming, climate change is one of the main drivers of the monarch's threatened extinction, disrupting an annual 3,000-mile (4,828-kilometer) migration synced to springtime and the blossoming of wildflowers. "California has been in a drought for several years now, and they need nectar sources in order to be able to fill their bellies and be active and survive," said Stephanie Turcotte Edenholm, a Pacific Grove Natural History Museum docent who offers guided tours of the sanctuary. "If we don't have nectar sources and we don't have the water that's providing that, then that is an issue." Monarch butterflies lack state and federal legal protection to keep their habitat from being destroyed or degraded. Last year, they were denied federal protection but the insects are now among the candidates for listing under the federal Endangered Species Act. Explore further Monarch butterfly population moves closer to extinction 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Figure 1. Zoonotic disease emergence feedback loop. Key anthropogenic drivers of zoonotic disease emergence (eg, including land-use change, wildlife trade, intensive livestock production, and climate change) increase the likelihood of zoonotic disease emergence, which could result in public health crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Such crises could have negative effects on biodiversity and ecosystem health, as COVID-19 has had and could continue to have (appendix pp 1121). These effects can consequently exacerbate the drivers, leading to further emergence of zoonosis and potential future health crises with their own suite of effects. The continuation of this cycle would reinforce a feedback loop with substantial implications for human health, economies, society, and the environment. Credit: DOI: 10.1016/S2542-5196(21)00258-8 Scientists have investigated the links between the COVID-19 pandemic and the deterioration of the world's ecosystems and their biodiversity, discovering feedback loops that suggest a potential increase in future pandemics. University of Queensland Master of Conservation Biology graduate Odette Lawler, collaborating with a team of students and fellows contributing to the study in Professor Salit Kark's Biodiversity Research Group, said that the links between biodiversity loss, habitat degradation and zoonotic disease transfer had long been understood, but it's taken an international pandemic to bring the issue to public attention. "COVID-19 has shown the world that human health and environmental health are intricately linked," Ms Lawler said. "We've long known that issues like land-use change, intensive livestock production, wildlife trade, and climate change drive the emergence of zoonotic diseases, as they increase human-wildlife interactions. "Now we've also found that these issues are being compounded by outcomes of the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in feedback loops that are likely to promote future zoonotic disease outbreaks. "For example, research has found that rates of deforestation have substantially increased in many regions around the world over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. "This is likely due to some combination of pandemic-related factors, including decreased enforcement of forest protections, relaxation of sustainability agreements and environmental deregulation, increased pressures on low-income communities, and threats to Indigenous land managers. "This means that COVID-19a pandemic sparked by a pathogen spilling from animal to human populationshas played a part in fuelling further deforestation, which in turn increases risk of future zoonotic disease emergence by increasing human-wildlife interactions." The research team stressed that responses to COVID-19 must include actions aimed at safeguarding biodiversity and ecosystems. Senior researcher UQ's Professor Salit Kark, who led and supervised the study said that such responses would benefit from adopting what is known in public health and conservation circles as a One Health approach. "One Health is a collaborative, transdisciplinary approach that aims to optimize health outcomes for communities arising from factors operating, for example, at the intersections between people, animals and their shared environment," Professor Kark said. "It's an approach that can help holistically address outbreaks before they happen, working closely with the community and engaging people in preventative ecosystem and human health. "Here in Australia, the emphasis should be on developing close, long-term collaboration and engagement with First Nations communities and other partners to address these risks. "And, internationally, Australia has so many valuable ties, which can be strengthened through working together with other nations to address the drivers of zoonotic disease emergence. In this paper, for example, the team closely collaborated with a group based in Nepal working in the area. "It's vital we invest in protecting biodiversity and ecosystem health and address the drivers of zoonotic disease. "If we don't, we really are increasing the likelihood of future zoonotic disease emergence and further pandemics arising, and we now all know just how world-altering and high-impact they can be." Explore further Shut down 'risky' meat markets to stop disease More information: Odette K Lawler et al, The COVID-19 pandemic is intricately linked to biodiversity loss and ecosystem health, The Lancet Planetary Health (2021). Odette K Lawler et al, The COVID-19 pandemic is intricately linked to biodiversity loss and ecosystem health,(2021). DOI: 10.1016/S2542-5196(21)00258-8 Directional circulation of current around a triangle of atoms due to a synthetic magnetic field. Credit: Andy Wild A pair of theoretical physicists, from the University of Exeter (United Kingdom) and the University of Zaragoza (Spain), have developed a quantum theory explaining how to engineer non-reciprocal flows of quantum light and matter. The research may be important for the creation of quantum technologies which require the directional transfer of energy and information at small scales. Reciprocity, going the same way backward as forward, is a ubiquitous concept in physics. A famous example may be found in Newton's Law: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. The breakdown of such a powerful notion as reciprocity in any area of physics, from mechanics to optics to electromagnetism, is typically associated with surprises which can be exploited for technological application. For example, a nonreciprocal electric diode allows current to pass in forwards but not backwards and forms a building block of the microelectronics industry. In their latest research, Downing and Zueco provide a quantum theory of non-reciprocal transport around a triangular cluster of strongly interacting quantum objects. Inspired by the physics of quantum rings, they show that by engineering an artificial magnetic field one may tune the direction of the energy flow around the cluster. The theory accounts for strong particle interactions, such that directionality appears at a swathe of energies, and considers the pernicious effect of dissipation for the formation of non-reciprocal quantum currents. The research may be useful in the development of quantum devices requiring efficient, directional transportation, as well for further studies of strongly interacting quantum phases, synthetic magnetic fields and quantum simulators. Charles Downing from the University of Exeter explains: "Our calculations provide insight into how one may instigate directional transport in closed nanoscopic lattices of atoms and photons with strong interactions, which may lead to the development of novel devices of a highly directional character". "Non-reciprocal population dynamics in a quantum trimer" is published in Proceedings of the Royal Society A, a historic journal which has been publishing scientific research since 1905. Explore further The best of both worlds: Combining classical and quantum systems to meet supercomputing demands Members of the campus community help to install UC Berkeleys American Cultures exhibit displayed in Doe Library. Credit: Victoria Robinson As opponents of critical race theory continue to gather at school boards across the country protesting its use in classrooms, it has become evident that the study of racism in America continues to be seen, by some, as trivial. But UC Berkeley ethnic studies lecturer Victoria Robinson said that understanding the history of America's structurally racist roots can be just as nuanced as research done in a science lab. And more importantly, it should be celebrated as education that can help bridge communities in a country currently divided along politically racialized lines. "This history and curriculum has never been more important. It's something really worth fighting for," said Robinson, who has taught courses about the impact of race in America's carceral system for over 25 years. "It reminds us of the hard work and the possibilities that can happen when we collectively organize together and imagine together: that incredible things are possible." Since 2006, Robinson has led Berkeley's American Cultures Center, which supports the American Cultures (AC) program requirement, first instituted in 1991 to introduce students to courses rooted in examining the diversity of American experiences throughout history. The program, which offers courses in more than 50 departments and disciplines, will celebrate its 30th anniversary today (Nov. 16) at Berkeley's Doe Library. The event will include the unveiling of a new library exhibit, "Tumbling the Ivory Tower," a display that chronicles the history of the American Cultures requirement and its impact on Berkeley and beyond. Berkeley News spoke with Robinson recently about why it's important for communities to embrace education centered around structural racism, and how discussions around race can truly forge the way for a just future based on "collective care and joy." Berkeley News: When Berkeley's American Cultures requirement was first proposed in the 1980s, it got similar critiques in the public discourse that critical race theory (CRT) is currently receiving. How does American Cultures fit into this current discussion? Victoria Robinson: What we call critical race theory, a decades-long set of works, is a legal philosophy that comes out of research and expertise of folks like civil rights activist and lawyer Derrick Bell and law school professor Kimberle W. Crenshaw. It's a legal framework for understanding the structural racism driven through American policies, institutions and culture. The American Cultures requirement has never shied away from tackling the more complicated nuances of how race and racism impact our daily lives. Therefore, we have had similar pushback. But the current controversy of teaching about race in education is so prevalent now because certain people in privileged majority spaces are feeling the wearing of our social and political seams, and the unraveling of historic mythologies centered in white supremacy. They're reacting to the impact of race on history, and it being taught in their children's classrooms. The unwillingness to accept the teaching of these curriculums is an attack on the truth. Why can some of us not face the great difficulties of American history? I actually think this is a misnomer for the fact that children have always been taught about race in their communities. It's often how people in communities of color have survived. Can you expand on that? How have communities of color taught students about race in the past? Parents have had to teach their Black children what they should or shouldn't do when pulled over by a police officer or how to act or speak in predominately white spaces, and what to expect from people in places of higher education, or other institutions with white supremacist foundations. They have had no choice but to understand and analyze how race impacts their lived experiences. That education is necessary for communities of color because of the racist structures that are rooted in America's history. A history that needs to be taught without filters. How can teaching this history to those in the privileged majorities benefit them? It's not about individual benefit: This work is about the necessity of truth-telling and cultivating critical thinking skills. Understanding the histories of those communities affected the most by these racist structures can teach all of us about how we might survive this current moment we are in, a moment that has pitted us against each other along racial, political and class lines. And more than that, a lot of this history is about the politics of imagination around solidarity and coalition-making. So, why not talk about that? The freedom movements of the 1960s and 1970s, where communities came together and asked each other what it means to see our individual liberation through a collective liberationthat is a history worth teaching. What do you say to people who think that American Cultures courses and critical race theory focus too much on racial issues and make people racist? We have observed many acts that we can absolutely name as racist that occur in our society. But the foundation of what builds that behavior is where the curriculum really wants to be. What caused a group of people, who were predominately white, to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6? Why is there a call for more law enforcement amidst the increase of violence targeted at Asian and Asian American communities, versus a call to defund the police just 18 months earlier after the murder of George Floyd? We're not making racists out of the curriculum, we're providing students with the tools to understand how race is intertwined within our history and current events. I would actually ask the question, "Do we have enough time for this work, for this discussion?", not whether we are having too many discussions. But the study of race/racism is not seen as a form of research in certain academic circles. Right, and I'll always remember a moment that Berkeley sociology professor Troy Duster described to me that relates to this. He was on a panel that the American Cultures Center was hosting with a couple of his colleagues from the STEM departments. They were talking about how the study of race was structured research in STEM versus the social sciences and humanities. One of his colleagues turned to him and said, "I don't get it. Race isn't rocket science." And Troy turned to this person and said, "You're right. It's so much more complicated." That, in a nutshell, is how I feel about that criticism. As an educator, how have you seen the impact these courses have had on students? One instance I will always remember was something one of my former students, a white man from Illinois, said to me a few years back after taking my Introduction to Abolition class. He was a political science major and hadn't learned about the Attica Prison massacre of 1971 and the different histories that have contributed to the disproportionate racial demographics of America's prisons. "You know, I'm kind of angry with you," he said. "Why?" I asked. "Because I can never switch this off now," he responded. "I'm so mad that I wasn't taught this before. Why didn't I know?" He had this massive anger that he felt the history of what he called his nation, his country, was not a history that he'd actually been given a choice to fully understand. I think it's important to let people make up their minds on their own. When you choose not to share certain histories, you don't give them that opportunity to have those complicated conversations that many of us need to have with ourselves and our communities. But what about the critique that these types of curricula are more a reflection of what liberal academics find significant in history? We become irrelevant, if we are a set of elite people at some of the top universities who think we know what others need. It has to be the other way around. The American Cultures requirement was born out of the activism of Oakland's longshore workers and their fight against South African apartheid. This curriculum is based on the reality of our communities, and not some ivory academic tower. But I don't think anybody owns these histories. We're part of a genealogy of hundreds of years and multiple generations of struggle against injustice. And we have to think through how to educate each other about that historical struggle in order to bring collective joy to one anotherto flourish, together. What is the best way to bring this analysis of race in America to everyone? Does it belong in high schools? It belongs everywhereour dinner tables, our community centers, our screening rooms, our potlucks, and yes, our high schools and college classrooms. And who says it's not already there? In the classroom, what we study and how we study, puts us in a position to activate and realize the possibilities of a just future. A lot of what we're seeing right now in the backlash against CRT, ethnic studies and teaching about race in generalis fear. It's a fear from those in power, that if we had the opportunity, across divergent points of origin and racial backgrounds, to talk together and come up with ideas togetherwe'd be damned dangerous, together. How will the American Cultures exhibit and anniversary celebration help people understand the importance of teaching about race and racism in the classroom? It matters that Berkeley has a particularly powerful story in that narrative, because people do look to the strengths that we have as a big public university. And I think this exhibit and the celebration is going to give people the opportunity to look at that historical arc that Berkeley fits into. I'm really hoping that people are put into a moment of seeing themselves in those histories and wondering where they were, what they were thinking, and how they were reacting during those moments. It's really important to put these complicated narratives and historical truisms together to again remind us of the hard work and the possibilities that can happen when we collectively organize together, and imagine together. That incredible things are possible. Explore further Moving past conflation of race and genetics Harmonized carbon footprints of IT software and service (ITSS) companies. Analysis is based on CDP responses of 2019 and corporate reports of the corresponding reporting period. For each company the sum of the initial carbon footprint, as provided in the corporate report, and the omitted emissions form the harmonized carbon footprint. Omitted emissions results from sources of errors such as reporting inconsistency, boundary incompleteness, and activity exclusion. See supplementary data: sheet 2.12.3 for calculations. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standards, Integrated Reporting (IR) framework, or Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) standards are ticked in case the corporate report was prepared in accordance with them. Credit: DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26349-x Companies in the digital technology industry are significantly underreporting the greenhouse gas emissions arising along the value chain of their products. Across a sample of 56 major tech companies surveyed in a study by the Technical University of Munich (TUM), more than half of these emissions were excluded from self-reporting in 2019. At approximately 390 megatons carbon dioxide equivalents, the omitted emissions are in the same ballpark as the carbon footprint of Australia. The research team has developed a method for spotting sources of error and calculating the omitted disclosures. For policy makers and the private sector to set targets for reduced greenhouse gas emissions, it is important to know how much CO 2 companies are actually emitting. However, there are no binding requirements for comprehensive accounting and full disclosure of these emissions. The Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol is seen as a voluntary standard. It distinguishes three categories of emissions: Scope 1 refers to direct emissions from a company's own activities, scope 2 refers to emissions from the production of purchased energy, and scope 3 to emissions from activities along the value chain, in other words all emissions from raw material extraction to the use of the end product. Scope 3 emissions often represent the majority of a company's carbon footprint. Past studies have also shown that these emissions account for most reporting gaps. Until now, however, it was not possible to quantify these gaps or determine their causes. Lena Klaaen and Dr. Christian Stoll at the TUM School of Management of the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have developed a method for identifying reporting gaps for scope 3 emissions and used it in a case study to determine the carbon footprints of pre-selected digital technology companies. Their paper has now been published in the journal Nature Communications. Companies publish inconsistent figures Klaaen and Stoll determined that many companies submit different greenhouse gas emission figures depending on where they are reporting them. They focused mainly on the companies' own reports as compared with voluntary disclosures to the non-profit organization CDP. The annual survey of companies conducted by CDP is regarded as the most important collection of data based on the structure of the GHG Protocol. Most companies disclose lower emissions in their own reports than in the CDP survey. This could be partly due to the fact that the CDP report is intended mainly for investors, while corporate reports are addressed to the general public. In addition, CDP leaves it up to the reporting companies to choose which of the 15 GHG Protocol categoriesranging from business travel to waste disposalare relevant to them. The studies show that this discretionary freedom results in some companies ignoring certain categories or not fully reporting the related emissions. Most companies have reporting gaps simply because they do not receive emissions data from all suppliers and do not fill the gaps with secondary data. To close the gaps, Klaaen and Stoll calculate the emissions by applying the values of several comparable companies which report complete figures. They take into account whether these companies are from the same industry and are comparable in terms of key indicators such as sales, profits and workforce size. To apply a uniform benchmark, they assume that GHG Protocol categories are relevant to a company unless it specifically states that emissions are non-existent in this area. 751 vs. 360 megatons of carbon dioxide equivalents Klaaen and Stoll applied this method to quantify the scope 3 emissions of 56 digital technology companies. Due to its high energy consumption, this industry is seen as a major source of CO 2 emissions, but has frequently claimed that it is committed to a low-carbon business model. The case study investigates software and hardware manufacturers which were included in the 2019 Forbes Global 2000 list, ranking the world's largest public companies, and have participated in the CDP survey in the same year. The calculations show that in 2019 the analyzed tech companies did not disclose more than 50% of greenhouse gas emissions along the value chain in their own reports and/or the CDP survey. Instead of the reported 360 megatons carbon dioxide equivalents (the standardized unit for all greenhouse gases), the study arrives at a total of 751 megatons. The 391 megatons discrepancy is comparable to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of Australia. Significant differences between companies Half of the companies submitted data to the CDP that did not agree with the data disclosed in their own corporate reports. It was especially common for these reports to ignore GHG Protocol categories that contribute substantially to emissions. For example, 43 percent of the companies neglected emissions from the use of sold products and 30 percent neglected purchased goods and services. The differences in the quality of companies' disclosures was significant. Whereas some companies omitted only one GHG Protocol category, others ignored all classes of scope 3 emissions. In the biggest discrepancy found by the researchers, the publicly disclosed emissions and the figure calculated differed by a factor of 185. The closest amounts differed by just 0.06%. Hardware companies had omitted more than half of their overall emissions, and software companies somewhat less than half. Companies that have announced ambitious CO 2 reduction targets were relatively accurate in their reporting. Here the difference between the disclosed and adjusted quantities was less than 20%. 'Consider adopting binding regulations' "The often unsystematic and inaccurate reporting of companies' carbon footprints is a problem for policymakers, stakeholders and the companies themselves," says Lena Klaaen. "The lack of transparency makes it difficult to set realistic targets and develop effective strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the proper assessment of companies." In addition to further research on other branches, the authors believe, that a new regulatory framework is needed. "In light of the current underreporting we have observed, it seems unlikely that voluntary guidelines alone can bring about more accurate disclosures in the future," says Christian Stoll. "Consequently, policy makers should think about binding guidelines with clear rules on how greenhouse gas emissions are reported." Explore further Study says tech firms underreport their carbon footprint More information: Lena Klaaen et al, Harmonizing corporate carbon footprints, Nature Communications (2021). Journal information: Nature Communications Lena Klaaen et al, Harmonizing corporate carbon footprints,(2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-26349-x Credit: KMDI In a bid to shine a spotlight on their research and make it more accessible, academics around the world are following in the footsteps of their students and taking to TikTok to share videos. The trend is being highlighted by a team of researchers at the Knowledge Media Design Institute (KMDI) at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Information. The researchers looked at the different ways academics, educators and scholarly communities are using TikTok, the popular social media platform that specializes in short-form user-generated videos, to share knowledgefrom Gothic architecture explainers to weight loss tips. In particular, the researchers examined user behavior, concerns about youth engagement, data and privacy implications, the technical features of the app and the visual aspect of scholarly contribution. "If watching YouTube is like sitting in a lecture, then using TikTok is like having a conversation," says study co-lead JP King, a sessional instructor at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design who works as KMDI's data visualization and graphic designer. "TikTok provides a fun place to create new forms of accessible learning shared outside of classrooms, textbooks, and conference halls. Led by King and Associate Professor Sara Grimes, director of KMDI, four graduate students with an interest in critical media literacy reviewed TikTok videos made by academics for the study. The team also analyzed more than 100 journal articles, books and research papers focused on TikTok, social media, technology and digital rights. Their study recommends some best practices for academics using TikTok, which ranks as the fourth most popular social media platform after YouTube, Snapchat and Instagram. The researchers found that TikTok videos often tend to be "amateurish" and offer a peek behind the scenes. The estimated 20 million-plus daily users, who are mostly under 30, embrace a less professional approach and don't feel the need to make everything perfect. They may simply record themselves with their smartphones with no special lighting or makeup. While this might feel out of place on Instagram or YouTube, it is acceptable if not expected on TikTok. TikTok is also unique in how it encourages active engagement. Users can remix one another's videos or produce creative responses towards others' content. At the same time, however, users risk having their video or audio remixed or repurposed without their permission if they don't adjust their privacy settings accordingly. "You might make a sincere video explaining your research that someone else turns into a song or a joke," the study warns academics. "Decide now if you're comfortable with that possibility." The study's authors attributed the phenomenon at least partly to a generational shift around intellectual property. Without bibliographies or citations, TikTok videos can challenge the sense of ownership that academic communities have traditionally had around ideas. "It's more difficult to maintain ownership of your ideas online, and you can't control how people will use your imagery or audio. Researchers must be aware of this fact, and be thoughtful when they are publishing content," King says. The researcher say that academics also need to understand the large impact that a single video could have on their personal brand. If their personal views clash with institutional values, there could be pushback from the academic community and repercussions from administrators. Even though tenured faculty members have academic freedom, they may not get a free pass if they use TikTok in ways their colleagues consider out of line, the researchers warn. What's more, an outsized social media profile won't necessarily enhance a scholar's professional status. "In simple terms, a million followers won't guarantee you tenure or a promotion," says King. Above all, it's a way to spread the word, possibly dispelling popular myths with facts and encouraging an audience to think about a topic from a different perspective. Casey Fiesler, an assistant professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, runs a popular TikTok account that often challenges viewers to consider the problems with Facebook's domination of the online experience. It's possible to imagine a teenager finding one of Fiesler's videos tucked between dance trends and dog tricks and questioning Facebook for the first time, according to King. "TikTok offers enormous potential for the discovery of critical ideas," he says. "This is why using TikTok effectively is crucial. Sharing research with an audience outside of the academy brings together people with diverse educational backgrounds. TikTok offers an exciting new way to find like-minded thinkers, makes research accessible, and start important conversations." Here are a few of the study's recommendations for best practices on how scholarly communities can engage: Keep your videos short and simple: Less than one minute is ideal because online attention spans are shorter than in-person ones Use storytelling and humor to make your content more accessible: You are competing with all the other content online, so lighten the mood by telling a story or adding unique humor Find ways to engage people instead of speaking to them: Invite users to try out an experiment for themselves and create a video reply with their results Get your data from TikTok so you know what's being tracked. Remember social media lives forever: You might be surprised by how well TikTok knows you. Download your data and decide for yourself if you are comfortable with TikTok having this information and selling it without your knowledge Be aware that your video or audio may be remixed or repurposed without your permission, unless you change your privacy settings: You might make a sincere video explaining your research that someone else turns into a song or a joke. Decide now if you're comfortable with that possibility Explore further TikTok says it has over 1 billion users Copper-rich minerals indicating widespread volcanic activity at the end-Permian mass extinction in different regions in southern China (A: Taoshujing locality; B: Lubei locality; C: Guanbachong; D: Taoshujing locality; E: Longmendong locality). The minerals are all copper sulfides, mostly Malachite--the minerals' green patches. Credit: H. Zhang, Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology. A team of scientists has identified an additional force that likely contributed to a mass extinction event 250 million years ago. Its analysis of minerals in southern China indicate that volcano eruptions produced a "volcanic winter" that drastically lowered earth's temperaturesa change that added to the environmental effects resulting from other phenomena at the time. The research, which appears in the journal Science Advances, examined the end-Permian mass extinction (EPME), which was the most severe extinction event in the past 500 million years, wiping out 80 to 90 percent of species on land and in the sea. "As we look closer at the geologic record at the time of the great extinction, we are finding that the end-Permian global environmental disaster may have had multiple causes among marine and non-marine species," says Michael Rampino, a professor in New York University's Department of Biology and one of the authors of the paper. For decades, scientists have investigated what could have caused this global ecological catastrophe, with many pointing to the spread of vast floods of lava across what is known as the Siberian Trapsa large region of volcanic rock in the Russian province of Siberia. These eruptions caused environmental stresses, including severe global warming from volcanic releases of carbon dioxide and related reduction in oxygenation of ocean watersthe latter causing the suffocation of marine life. The team for the Science Advances work, composed of more than two dozen researchers, including scientists from China's Nanjing University and Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry as well as Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History and Montclair State University, considered other factors that may have contributed to the end of the Permian Period, which stretched from 300 million to 250 million years ago. Specifically, they found mineral and related deposits on land in the south China regionnotably copper and mercurywhose age coincided with the end-Permian mass extinction in non-marine localities. Specifically, these deposits were marked by anomalies in their composition likely due to sulfur-rich emissions from nearby volcanic eruptionsthey were covered by layers of volcanic ash. Schematic showing the formation process of copper-rich deposits within the EPME interval in South China. Credit: NIGPAS "Sulfuric acid atmospheric aerosols produced by the eruptions may have been the cause of rapid global cooling of several degrees, prior to the severe warming seen across the end-Permian mass-extinction interval," explains Rampino. The team's findings suggested that the Siberian Traps eruptions were not the sole cause of the end-Permian mass extinction, and that the environmental effects of the eruptions in South China, and elsewhere, may have played a vital role in the disappearance of dozens of species. Explore further Researchers unearth 'new' extinction More information: Hua Zhang et al, Felsic volcanism as a factor driving the end-Permian mass extinction, Science Advances (2021). www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abh1390 Journal information: Science Advances Hua Zhang et al, Felsic volcanism as a factor driving the end-Permian mass extinction,(2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abh1390 Sake bottles and mushrooms at a standing bar in Aizuwakamatsu, Fukushima prefecture, in 2018. Credit: Eric Rath. In Japan, the proverb "Sake wa honshin o arawasu" translates to "sake reveals the true heart." But that's one of the few things translated when it comes to the country's signature alcoholic beverage. "Surprisingly, despite the growing interest in sake in the U.S., there's hardly any research about the history of sake in English," said Eric C. Rath, professor of history at the University of Kansas. "So in my translation and in a book that I'm writing, I want to give readers an understanding of sake's evolution and cultural significance." His new article, "Sake Journal (Goshu no nikki): Japan's Oldest Guide to Brewing," provides the first English translation of the earliest Japanese manual for brewing sake. It appears in the winter issue of Gastronomica. "Sake is sometimes translated as 'rice wine,' and that's a mistake since it's made more like beer than wine," he said. That's not the only thing Westerners tend to misunderstand about the fermented drink. Rath said, "Sake also has a higher alcohol content than wine. Unlike most other alcoholic beverages, sake can be enjoyed at a variety of temperatures. Cooling or heating the same sake yields remarkable changes in the taste. And sake goes well with a lot more than just Asian food. It's meant to be savored, not thrown into beer to make a 'sake bomb.'" The original "Goshu no nikki" was a secret manuscript that was strictly safeguarded, its information kept primarily through oral tradition. It represented the earliest guide to brewing sake and one of the most significant sources for understanding its history in medieval Japan (11921600). Rath's article includes several translated recipes for sake, along with the directions for pasteurization. "Back in the 14th century, brewers relied on ambient yeasts, and they had not yet perfected the best ways to ferment sake and maintain the alcohol content. They also used brown rice, which with the wild yeasts would have given it a gamier taste, far from the premium sake today that uses highly polished specialty rice and tends to be lighter, finely grained and leans toward having a melon bouquet," he said. A curious amount of folklore surrounds the origins and processes around the beverage. One story asserts it began with the custom of virginal women chewing grains and using their saliva to render the sugars in the starch. Rath notes how modern sake brand names include words such as "maiden," "daughter" and "beauty," which can be construed as intentionally sexualizing the drink. "Similar types of (chewed) sake were produced in Okinawa until very recently," he said. "At some point, though, this type of sake came to be associated with young women in Japan, perhaps because when the story was retold, the idea of virgin girls chewing and spitting was more appealing to older male sake drinkers." Rath's first taste of sake came in high school, when he and some friends realized they could be served alcohol at Japanese restaurants in his hometown of Chicago. "I recall having sake one of the times we went out for sushi. I remember that the taste was like warm rubber cement, the type of clear glue that's sold with the brush inside the lid. I was never a fan until I went to Japan and discovered there was a lot more variety to sake than the two brands I was familiar with in the U.S.," he said. Rath recently published "Oishii: The History of Sushi" (Reaktion Books/University of Chicago Press, 2021), the first comprehensive chronicle of sushi written in English. He is also the author of the books "Japan's Cuisines: Food, Place and Identity," "Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan" and "Japanese Foodways, Past and Present" (with Stephanie Assmann). Explore further Mutation threatening high-quality brewing yeast identified More information: Eric C. Rath, Sake Journal (Goshu no nikki), Gastronomica (2021). Eric C. Rath, Sake Journal (Goshu no nikki),(2021). DOI: 10.1525/gfc.2021.21.4.42 Young workers have been quicker to adapt. Credit: Wayas Saeed/Unsplash, CC BY-SA 4.0 Governments had to take unprecedented measures to control the spread of the COVID pandemic, shutting down whole sectors and encouraging many people to work from home. The UK and other countries designed whole new systems of support for workers from scratch and deployed them in a matter of weeks. Economists advised governments in this task using real-time data, including from rapid online surveys, which helped to highlight which workers were worst hit in the initial lockdown. For instance, much attention was focused on younger workersthe "COVID generation"since they were more likely to be employed in shut-down sectors such as hospitality, and saw the largest initial declines in employment. However, early effects like these may have distorted our view of the pandemic's lasting consequences, and the policy challenges that governments will face in the coming months and years. To get a better impression of how different workers have fared and adapted, my colleagues and I, in work funded by the Nuffield Foundation, examined the results of a detailed survey conducted regularly throughout the pandemic (the "Understanding Society COVID study", conducted by the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex). In various ways, the findings are different to what might have been expected earlier in the pandemic. Challenges facing older workers Between February and April 2020, the proportion of 20- to 29-year-olds in employment fell five percentage points more than those aged 3049. However, what has received less attention is that these workers' employment prospects recovered much more rapidlyparticularly compared to workers over 50. By March 2021, employment of the over-50s was 5.3 percentage points below pre-pandemic levels, while the equivalent rates for 2029 and 3049 age groups were respectively 1.5 and 1.3 percentage points down. Partly this is because over-50s adapted less quickly to the changed circumstances. Under-30s who stopped working in April 2020either through losing their jobs or being furloughedwere more likely than older workers to resume paid work in a new job or industry. Nearly one third of under-30s who stopped working in the first lockdown had found work in a new industry by March 2021, compared to just 7% of over-50s. This doesn't mean we don't need to worry about scarring effects on younger workers, since career changes can be disruptive. It does however mean that older workers have been the slowest to return to the labor market, and there remains a real risk that many could drop out of it altogether. The government introduced new schemes to help younger workers back into work (including the Kickstart scheme). But older workers might need additional support and encouragement to keep working too. Men v women Another area where first impressions may be misleading is the pandemic's effects on men and women. Men's jobs tend to be more exposed to the economic cycle, but the 2020 pandemic recession was atypical in this respect. In the US, for example, it was women who were more likely to lose their jobs, and many other countries experienced something similar. This was not the case in the UK, where employment declines were comparable for men and women in the first lockdown and throughout the pandemic. Average hours worked per week also fell by less for women than for men. Women fared better in some respects than men. Credit: Jia Ye/Unsplash, CC BY-SA 4.0 Does this mean that fears the pandemic would widen gender inequalities were unfounded in the UK? Not quite. Comparing workers in similar jobs, married women with children who were working in February 2020 were more likely to have stopped doing paid work than married men with children. The unequal distribution of increased childcare responsibilities may partly account for this. So despite women not being more adversely affected in the UK in terms of overall employment or hours, the pandemic may still have unequally affected women and may have more significant implications for their future career progression. Ethnic comparisons Ethnic minorities in the UK were doubly hit in 202021, being both more seriously harmed by the health crisis, but also more likely to lose their jobs at the start of the pandemic. Yet as the pandemic went on, the employment and hours of ethnic minorities recovered faster than the white ethnic majority. By March 2021, the gap in employment rates between ethnic minorities and the white ethnic majority had fallen back to its pre-pandemic level. Part of this is again explained by the fact that ethnic minorities were more likely to switch jobs. As many as 21% of ethnic minority workers who were working in both February 2020 and March 2021 had changed jobs, compared to 11% in the white ethnic majority. And among those who stopped doing paid work in the first lockdown, members of ethnic minorities were more likely to resume working with a new employer or in a different industry. But again, individuals in these groups may have experienced greater career disruption, so they may experience lasting effects. Clearly the true effect of the pandemic on workers is more complex than a simple look at employment figures would suggest, often contradicting what happened in the initial stages. The government will need to continue to pay close attention to the experiences of different groups in the labor market as we emerge from this crisis to ensure that its unequal impacts do not become entrenched. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Presenting Orlena Nwokah Blanchard Outstanding Industrial Engineer Class of 2020 Orlena Nwokah Blanchard is an entrepreneur, marketing strategist, and innovative leader behind social impact movements and marketing programs for brands. She has more than 26 years of experience building value for Fortune 500 companies and startups. Her current venture, JOY Collective, is an award-winning cultural insights, marketing and creative agency specializing in brand building in today's complex, poly-cultural world. As JOY's President & COO, Orlena has helped reframe marketing with high cultural competency for JOY's diverse portfolio of clients including the United States Naval Academy, Dove, Dove Men+Care, OWN, WW, Tory Burch, Diageo, SheaMoisture, Google Fiber and more. She previously served in various executive positions including Executive Director of the Black Media Matters Consortium, a trade association founded by BET Networks, and as head of digital media for TV One. Orlena has also worked for world-renowned brands such as Andersen Consulting (Accenture), American Express, and the Corporate Executive Board. Orlena is an executive board member of Digital Pioneers Academy, a public charter school in Washington, DC, and a former Brand President of the Washington, DC chapter of of the Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT). Orlena received her BS in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University and earned an MBA, from the University of Pennsylvania, The Wharton School. She lives in Bethesda, Maryland with her husband and three sons. Nadia Numa Ph.D. Student School of Aeronautics and Astronautics Graduate Assistant Minority Engineering Program E-Mail: nnuma@purdue.edu Nadia Numa, born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, received her Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University with a concentration in Propulsion and a minor in International Relations in December 2015. During her undergraduate studies, Nadia participated in various organizations that afforded her the opportunity to serve the surrounding communities through programs and outreach. As the Vice-President of Society of Women Engineers, a Senator/Parliamentarian in National Society of Black Engineers, and a McNair Scholar, Nadia led and participated in education programs and outreach events to encourage women and minority students to consider a career in STEM. In May 2019, Nadia received a Master of Science in Aeronautics and Astronautics from Purdue University with a focus on experimental plasma-assisted combustion. Simultaneously, Nadia became an active member of the Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA), AAE Graduate Women Gatherings (GWG), and Women in Aerospace (WiA) where she held leadership positions and aided in planning events such as the Amelia Earhart Aerospace Summit. Nadia has also volunteered at Purdue Space Day (PSD), encouraging STEM education among students in grades 3-8. Nadia is currently a Ph.D. student in Astrodynamics and Space Applications at the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering and is a member of Kathleen Howell's Multibody Dynamics Research Group. Her current research focuses on trajectory design and optimization for cislunar missions requiring the use of propellant depots. Nadias professional experiences include internships at both General Electric and Boeing Company. Following her undergraduate studies, Nadia worked as a Propulsion Product Development engineer with a focus on engine nacelle design and engine-airplane integration at Boeing. She also worked as a mission architecture associate engineer at SpaceX in 2018 a role where she worked with the Mission Assurance Team to ensure both flight and mission reliability for five commercial space missions. Nadia hopes to continue to serve the community through teaching programs and outreach events to further MEPs vision and mission. She hopes to engage and encourage minority students to pursue their passions while leveraging the skills obtained from their STEM education. " " No telling when that grocery store apple was picked. d3sign/Getty Images There's nothing like biting into a crisp, juicy apple to evoke the spirit of autumn. Though today they're available year-round in many parts of the world, apples were once strictly a fall-time treat, and they remain one of the cornerstones of seasonal cooking in the U.S. If you live in the United States, your apples probably didn't travel too far to reach you. Only 5 percent of the apples sold in the U.S. are imported; the rest are grown domestically in temperate states like Washington, New York and Michigan. But the apples in grocery store bins are usually not sold when they're harvested. Instead, they might have been in storage for up to a year. Unless you take a trip to your local orchard, how do you know whether the apples you're buying are actually fresh? And if they're not, does that matter? Advertisement One Bad Apple Picture yourself walking down the aisle of your local grocery store, strolling past piles upon piles of shiny round apples. How do you know which ones to buy? Start by looking at the surrounding apples. "Apples are a climacteric fruit, meaning the fruits continue to develop and ripen after they are removed from the tree," says Jessica Cooperstone, a food scientist at The Ohio State University, by email. Apples and their ilk are highly sensitive to ethylene, the chemical compound that causes fruits to convert starchy cellulose into sugars (otherwise known as ripening). As they ripen, apples release more ethylene, which leads the fruit around them to ripen faster as well. In this way, one bad apple actually can spoil the whole bunch. Other climacteric fruits include bananas and avocados, while non-climacteric fruits include things like strawberries and cherries. Since ethylene is pretty much a universal chemical signal for "ripe" in climacteric plants, it will even help ripen fruit across species. (You can harness its power for yourself: Try putting a hard avocado in the same bowl as an apple and see how much quicker the avocado ripens.) Apple-harvesting season is very short (about two months in the fall), so in order to extend their lives after picking, apples are usually treated with a gaseous compound called 1-methylcyclopropene (1-MCP) that blocks ethylene. That's not all. "By modifying the environment that apples are stored in (mostly by modifying oxygen, carbon dioxide and ethylene and keeping apples cool), certain varieties of apples can be stored up to one year," says Cooperstone. "This is a really impressive feat of post-harvest storage technology, and most of this development happened in the first part of the 20th century." It's called Controlled Atmosphere storage. When apples are exposed to less oxygen and more carbon dioxide than what's found in the air, they in a sense "go to sleep" and don't finish the ripening process. So, these apples won't spoil. The exact combination of gases and temperature will vary with the type of apple. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the types of apples that can handle this process like Fuji, Gala, Granny Smith, Honeycrisp and Red Delicious are the ones you are most likely to encounter in a mass-market grocery store. But not every apple is equally storeable. Some fragile-skinned types, like Cortland, Jonagold and Crispin, should be eaten soon after they are picked. Otherwise, they might become too soft and mealy for non-cooking applications. Of course, these days science can step in to create new types of more resilient fruit. "Apple producers are always looking to develop new varieties that keep their fresh characteristics for as long as possible," Cooperstone says. For example, the RubyFrost apple, which was developed by Cornell University especially for wintertime consumption. These hybrids a cross between Braeburn and Autumn Crisp are bred to reach peak sweetness in mid to late January, months after they're harvested. While some new types of apple, like the RubyFrost, are the product of careful selective breeding, others are the result of more direct genetic engineering. Arctic Apples, which are genetically modified to resist browning, became one of the first GMO fruits to be approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2015. Advertisement How Do You Like Them Apples? There isn't a way to tell when an apple was picked just by looking at it in a grocery store. And in some ways, it doesn't matter. But you still want to make sure the apples you buy will be tasty and ripe. In general, a ripe apple is red or yellow. But some red varieties will be red even if not yet ripe. Touch might be a better bet. The apple should be firm but not hard (press it with your thumb) and not have bruises, according to the University of Wiconsin-Extension. Once you bring them home, store the apples in a cool, dry place, like your refrigerator's crisper drawer. But even non-crunchy apples have uses. "If I've kept apples for a long time and find they're shriveling enough that I don't want to eat them fresh, I will use them in a cooked application," says Cooperstone, like oatmeal or a pie. A slightly wrinkly apple may not look as pretty as a freshly picked one, but both are totally safe to eat. In the days before refrigeration, drying apples was a standard way to store up food for the winter. While wrinkled or even bruised apples can still make for good eating, you definitely want to avoid apples that have mold growing on them or that have begun to ooze liquid. Your chances of getting food poisoning from an apple are slim, but not zero, so it's important to wash your apples before you chow down as well. Once your apples are out of storage and thoroughly cleaned, it's time for some good old-fashioned fall cooking. From caramel to crumble to cider and cake, the possibilities are all delicious. Now That's Interesting Johnny Appleseed, also known as John Chapman, was an actual person who famously went around the U.S. planting apple seeds to sprout new trees. However, very few of those trees would have produced good eating apples they were extremely sour wild varieties that were mostly destined to become hard cider. Downtown Los Olivos on Saturday will be sprawling with cinephiles and festivalgoers as NatureTrack's fourth annual film festival kicks off with the screening of dozens of documentaries and short films shot from various locations around the world, in combination with the town's annual "Day in the Country" festival. CALmatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California's state Capitol works and why it matters. Dan Walters has been a journalist for nearly 60 years, spending all but a few of those years working for California newspapers. Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. " " Since 2016, U.S. government employees have complained of bizarre neurological symptoms, like headaches, ringing in the ears, vertigo and even memory loss. The government has now admitted these symptoms were likely caused by directed pulses of high-power microwaves fired at the individuals by some unknown agent. Wavebreakmedia Ltd/Getty Images/Wavebreak Media In a suburb of Washington, D.C., a woman was walking her dog. Suddenly, an intense ringing filled her ears. Her head began to ache, her face to tingle, and reportedly, her dog suffered convulsions. At the time November 2019 the woman, according to reporting by GQ, was on staff at the White House. A year later, in November 2020, another U.S. official had the same symptoms while crossing a park just outside the White House building. For the Department of State, the two cases must have felt like deja vu. Each marked a suspected instance of "Havana Syndrome," a bizarre illness that had plagued overseas U.S. government employees for half a decade. Only this time, it was happening on U.S. soil. Recently, experts have concluded that this strange condition is likely caused by directed pulses of high-power microwaves fired at a target by some unknown agent. It sounds like something out of a Dan Brown novel, but "Havana Syndrome" is terrifyingly real. Advertisement What Happened in Havana? In late 2016, around two dozen U.S. government employees stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Havana, Cuba were all struck with a variable and mysterious set of symptoms. Many reported an odd ringing in the ears; some experienced sudden headaches coupled with disorientation. In severe cases, the symptoms escalated, blossoming into memory problems and bouts of extreme vertigo. Even more worrying was the pattern that emerged as the employees came forward. "These were not random individuals," says James Giordano, a professor of neurology at Georgetown University and senior fellow in biosecurity at the Naval War College. "These were individuals with specific job descriptions and particular career history." Later, when the government personnel who were potentially exposed had their brains scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), experts found that they had significantly less white matter than expected a clinical sign usually associated with head trauma. None of their skulls, however, showed any sign of injury. It was as if they had somehow been given a contactless concussion. And their issues didn't go away. Four-and-a-half-years later, a number of the afflicted personnel still report neurological side effects, like periods of disorientation and difficulty recalling words. "Upon subsequent reevaluation, in many cases," Giordano says, "their symptoms had gotten worse." The Havana incident quickly became a medical mystery: What could have caused these symptoms to crop up, seemingly out of nowhere, in otherwise healthy individuals? In 2020, the precisely named Standing Committee to Advise DOS on Unexplained Health Effects on U.S. Government Employees and their Families at Overseas Embassies released a report assessing evidence from this case, as well as a similar one at the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou, China. It concluded that "many of the distinctive and acute signs, symptoms, and observations reported by DOS employees are consistent with the effects of directed, pulsed radio frequency (RF) energy." Those radio frequency pulses are known by another name microwaves. But instead of popping popcorn, they're being put to a much more destructive use. " " U.S. Marines stand outside the Embassy of the United States of America in Havana, in February 2018. Two years earlier, around two dozen U.S. government employees stationed there were struck with a mysterious set of symptoms, now known as 'Havana Syndrome.' ADALBERTO ROQUE/AFP via Getty Images Advertisement Micro Waves, Big Impacts High power microwave pulses have all sorts of technological applications, from returning energy collected by orbiting solar panels to jamming enemy communication in combat zones. Aimed at a human body, the effects are not pleasant. In enclosed, fluid-filled spaces the inner ear, for example microwave pulses can create an effect known as "cavitation," in which the fluid essentially bubbles. And since the blood vessels connected to the inner ear run directly to the brain, these bubbles can make their way into the brain itself. There, they can cause problems similar to the decompression sickness (the bends) divers sometimes experience after surfacing too quickly. Another issue is vibration. Microwaves cause molecules to vibrate rapidly ( this is how a microwave oven heats up your food). Inside the body's cells and tissues, this agitation can trigger a runaway inflammatory response resulting in all kinds of structural damage, including neuropathy. But wouldn't microwave activity leave burn marks? Not necessarily, according to some experts. In a livestream with the Santa Fe Council on International Relations, Edl Schamiloglu, a plasma physicist and engineer at the University of New Mexico, pointed out that short microwave pulses wouldn't singe their target. "There's hardly any energy content in them," he said, and so "you're not going to have any burns." However, repeated exposure to such pulses could culminate in severe neurologic symptoms. So it seems possible, even probable, that the so-called "Havana Syndrome" is caused by high power microwaves. But if that's the case, what kind of technology could deliver those pulses? And, more importantly, who is responsible for wielding it? " " The exterior of the White House is seen wrapped with security fencing March 7, 2021. But can President Joe Biden and other White House staff be protected from a microwave attack from an unknown source? Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images Advertisement From Russia, With Love? It's hard to say for sure. As Schamiloglu pointed out in his CIR livestream, the gear necessary to create direct high power microwaves isn't something you can pick up at your local hardware store. "This technology is not something that a tinkerer can put together in their garage," he said, "This is a nation state developed technology." The groundwork for such a device has been in development in Russia since the early 2000s, and similar technology was recently unveiled in China. But these systems are roughly the size of a lounge chair not exactly portable or discrete. The real breakthrough for a high-power microwave weapon would be in scaling it down. Assuming that is the type of device at play here, it represents a real technological leap forward. There are ways to protect against microwave attacks, but most of them involve wrapping a room (or an individual) in a continuous sheet of metal, which is not a terribly practical solution. However, new defensive technologies may be in development. Giordano is not at liberty to get into specifics, but notes that he is "very encouraged" by the Biden Administration's response to the D.C. cases. Though none of the most recent attacks are in his professional portfolio, he believes that they utilized the same mechanism as the Havana incidents, a tie that should be closely examined in order to protect U.S. officials. "The new administration certainly takes this seriously," he says, "As they should." Now That's Interesting Decompression sickness, also known as the bends, is caused when tiny nitrogen bubbles are released from bodily tissues into the blood due to extreme pressure changes. Seguin, TX (78155) Today Sun and clouds mixed. High around 85F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy this evening, then becoming cloudy after midnight. Low 56F. Winds SSW at less than 5 mph, becoming N and increasing to 15 to 25 mph. Seguin Police Officers Dustin Kincade and Sarah Wallace wave and talk to music star and television host Kelly Clarkson on her television show "The Kelly Clarkson Show." The officers and department were recognized by the music star for their kindness in the community. If you are currently a print subscriber but don't have an online account, select this option. You will need to use your 7 digit subscriber account number (with leading zeros) and your last name (in UPPERCASE). "Time For Justice The Urgent Need For Second Chances In Pennsylvanias Sentencing System" | Main | Notable Sentencing Project fact sheet on "Parents in Prison" Henry Montgomery back in 2016 won in the US Supreme Court with his claim that the landmark Eighth Amendment decision in Miller v. Alabama must be applied retroactively. But that win only garnered him a chance to be paroled after serving more than 50 years on a murder charge as a teenager in the early 1960s. Montgomery was in February 2018 denied parole as detailed in this post, and he was denied parole again in April 2019 as detailed in this post. But I am pleased to now be able to report that the third time was a charm for Montgomery as reported in this UPI piece headlined "Longtime inmate and key figure in juvenile sentence reforms finally wins parole." Here are some of the details: A Louisiana man who's spent the vast majority of his life in prison for killing a sheriff's deputy when he was a minor almost 60 years ago -- and whose case has been instrumental in freeing hundreds of inmates who were sentenced to life for crimes as juveniles -- is finally getting his chance to walk free. Henry Montgomery on Wednesday appeared at his third hearing before a Louisiana parole board. The first two turned him down. The third gave him his freedom after 57 years behind bars. For years, advocates have said Montgomery is serving an unconscionably long sentence for a crime he committed as a minor, in spite of state Supreme Court rulings that determined that life sentences for juveniles amount to "cruel and unusual punishment."... Montgomery was 17 when he shot and killed East Baton Rouge Paris Deputy Charles Hurt in 1963, after the lawman caught him skipping school. He's now 75. He was initially sentenced to death, but that sentence was overturned in 1966 when the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that he did not receive a fair trial. After a retrial, he was sentenced to life without parole. Montgomery has been locked up in the Louisiana State Penitentiary, known as "Angola" after the former plantation that occupied the area. "Through his personal growth, maturity, and maintenance of an excellent record of conduct while in prison, Henry proves daily that he is no longer the 17-year-old child he was in 1963," Marshan Allen, national policy director of Represent Justice, said in a tweet before Wednesday's decision.... Montgomery's case was at the center of a legal fight that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, and resulted in a ruling that's allowed nearly 1,000 people who were sentenced to life without parole as a juvenile to be freed.... At his first two parole hearings -- in 2018 and 2019 -- he was denied release. At both hearings, two of the three board members voted to grant him his release from prison and one voted to keep him imprisoned. At the time, parole decisions had to be unanimous. Earlier this year, however, Louisiana changed its law to require only a majority vote if an inmate meets certain conditions -- meaning Montgomery would be freed if he got another 2-1 vote in his favor. The dissenting voter who voted against releasing Montgomery in 2019 said that he hadn't presented enough programs in prison. But Andrew Hundley, one of the people who was released as a result of Montgomery vs. Louisiana and director of the Louisiana Parole Project, said that Angola did not offer such programs for decades of his sentence. "It was the most violent prison in America. There wasn't this idea of rehabilitation and that prisoners should take part in programming to rehabilitate themselves," he told The Atlantic. "That culture didn't exist and there weren't programs. You just woke up every day trying not to get killed." Hundley added that he's felt like it's his "life's work" to get Montgomery and others like him out of prison. "Henry was in prison 18 years before I was born. And I've been home five and a half years now." New OIG report assails BOP failures in implementation of FIRST STEP Act | Main | Henry Montgomery (of Montgomery v. Louisiana) finally granted parole at age 75 The title of this post is the title of this notable new report written by Emily Bloomenthal, Director of Research at FAMM. Here is part of how the report's executive summary gets started: Too many people in Pennsylvania are serving long prison terms that dont make communities safer. People who do not pose a risk to public safety languish in prison for decades because Pennsylvanias laws dont give them a second chance. This report, which focuses on people serving minimum sentences of 20 years or longer, looks at the harms and injustices of extreme sentences in Pennsylvania, as well as opportunities for reform. Key findings: Pennsylvanias prison population has been shaped by some of the harshest sentencing policies in the country. In 2019, Pennsylvania imprisoned more than seven times the number of people that it did in 1970. That growth was driven by punitive policy choices, not increases in crime, and it did not make Pennsylvanians safer. Pennsylvania is a national leader in imposing extreme sentences. This ranking is largely driven by two laws: the mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment required for first- and second-degree murder, and the denial of parole eligibility to anyone serving a life sentence. In Pennsylvania prisons, 13.4% of people are serving life without parole (LWOP), compared to only 3.6% nationally. The population serving extreme sentences in Pennsylvania has surged over the last few decades. There were more than nine times as many people serving extreme sentences in 2019 than there were in 1980. Pennsylvanias extreme sentencing practices have overwhelmingly impacted people of color, especially Black people, who make up less than 11% of Pennsylvanias population but 65% of people serving life sentences and 58% of those serving non-life sentences of 20 years or longer. Pennsylvanias extreme sentencing practices have created a large (and growing) elderly prison population, which increased thirtyfold from 1979 to 2019. Pennsylvanias extreme sentences are a high-cost, low-value proposition for taxpayers. Researchers have found no evidence that severe sentencing policies discourage people from choosing to engage in crime. Extreme sentences are not necessary for preventing recidivism, because the vast majority of people who commit crimes even very serious crimes naturally grow out of criminal behavior as they age and mature. For example, of the 174 Philadelphia juvenile lifers all originally convicted of homicide who were resentenced and released following landmark U.S. Supreme Court decisions, only two (1.1%) had been reconvicted of any offense as of 2020. Based on average incarceration costs, the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections (DOC) is spending $220 million per year to incarcerate 3,892 people who have already served at least 20 years. The true cost is undoubtedly higher, because incarceration costs increase dramatically as people age and need more medical care. The average cost for incarcerated individuals in skilled or personal care units is $500 per day (or $182,625 per year), more than three times the cost for the general population. Kala Manickam and Dr Tan Cheng Bock on a walkabout at Nee Soon GRC. PHOTO: Kala Manickam/Facebook (left) and Yahoo file photo (right). Update: Kalayarasu Manickam has responded via her lawyers on her lawsuit against PSP. SINGAPORE A former member of the Progress Singapore Party (PSP) has taken the PSP to court over what she alleges was her wrongful termination from the opposition party. Kalayarasu Manickam, who competed in PSPs Nee Soon Group Representation Constituency (GRC) slate of candidates in last years General Election (GE), is applying for a declaration that her termination was wrongful and invalid. Kala is also seeking to claw back $10,000 which she claims to have contributed as part of election expenses for the GE. PSP, founded in 2019 by veteran politician Dr Tan Cheng Bock, is challenging the application, which was filed in the High Court in July this year. When approached, Kala's lawyers from ADTLaw said, "The $10,000 referenced in the affidavits is in respect of the required contribution on account of election expenses all candidates were to have made, which our client duly paid to the party in full from her own funds. "Our client's claim for this sum is based on the party's alleged stoppage of resources to her in the course of campaigning for GE 2020, despite her aforesaid payment on account of election expenses." The lawyer added that Kala's case arose from events post-GE, in which she sought an explanation for the resources that were stopped, and was also based on the "alleged violation of her due process rights". Kala's affidavit documents, seen by Yahoo News Singapore, stated that she was terminated without regard to "the rights of due process" laid out in the party constitution. According to the party constitution, disputes between members are to be heard in a Special Party Conference. However, no such conference was convened, according to Kala. Kala also alleged that she was "kept in the dark" about charges against her by other members, and had been "suddenly suspended" from all Nee Soon-related matters from 12 September last year, while she was serving a quarantine order. Story continues While she was told that an investigation sub-committee would be formed to investigate her alleged disciplinary issues, she said that she was never told of its results. PSP's response Court documents filed on behalf of PSP, seen by Yahoo News Singapore, stated that Kala was terminated from PSP on 24 December last year after efforts to reconcile her with the party were unsuccessful, with PSP chair Dr Tan stating that her termination was a "last resort". Affidavits from at least seven party members were submitted on behalf of PSP. They include Dr Tan, current secretary-general Francis Yuen and two Nee Soon GRC candidates, Muhammad Taufik Supan and Damien Tay Chye Seng, who contested alongside Kala in 2020. In his affidavit, Yuen said that Kala's application to be compensated $10,000 has "no basis". Each candidate contributed $10,000 towards the PSP's election expenses as the party did not have enough funds to cover all such expenses. The contribution was also to underscore the candidate's serious intention in contesting, Yuen said. Kala's expenses ran up to $33,627, and the party forked out $23,637, he added. Fellow candidates: Kala conducted her own walkabouts In their affidavits, Taufik and Tay described Kala's behaviour during the GE campaign trail as "uncooperative" and "disruptive". Tay, who led the Nee Soon GRC team, said that Kalas behaviour had undermined the cohesiveness of the Nee Soon team, which comprised Tay, Kala, Taufik, S Nallakaruppan and Bradley Peter Bowyer, who has since resigned from the party. According to Tay, Kala did not join the team for morning meetings at coffeeshops and walkabouts, even though all candidates had agreed to do so. Kala also demanded that things be done her way, with no regard to anyone elses opinion. She would go for walkabouts on her own with her own volunteers rather than party volunteers, and only turned up at two team walkabouts in the nine days of campaigning, claimed Taufik. This meant that the candidates could not appear as a team in front of the media and residents, Tay added. Kala had also ranted about Tay being a lousy leader and went behind his back to arrange a walkabout with Dr Tan and PSP member Lee Hsien Yang. The purported problems with Kala culminated in a petition filed by 17 party members and a party volunteer to PSPs central executive committee on 26 August last year, calling for her removal. The petition cited Kalas alleged disrespect towards Tay and her controlling attitude, amongst other reasons. An investigation sub-committee then recommended that Kala be redeployed to "start anew" as she could still be an asset to PSP should she be persuaded to change her attitude. Dr Tan: Kala's conduct tantamount to insubordination In a separate affidavit, Dr Tan said that Kalas termination was due to her "uncompromising attitude", even though she was "resourceful, outspoken, and had strong fighting spirit". On 25 November last year, Dr Tan and three CEC members met with Kala in an attempt at reconciliation, but her conduct was far from conciliatory, said Dr Tan. I recall that when (Kala) entered the meeting room on 25 November 2020, she appeared composed but confrontational, as if she was raring for a fight. As Dr Tan started to explain the objective of the meeting, Kala allegedly cut him off and insisted she had done nothing wrong. Each time any of us tried to stop her to say something, she would shout over us and continue with an angry spiel about the wrongdoings of the other members of the Nee Soon GRC team. (Kala) then aggressively questioned if we had any proof of her wrongdoings by shouting, 'WHAT PROOF? WHAT PROOF?'" stated Dr Tan. The meeting ended with a CEC member asked to speak to Kala privately to propose a reconciliation. However, Kala allegedly proposed her own conditions, including continuing being a member of the Nee Soon GRC team. The CEC then held a meeting, during which it declined to accede to Kalas conditions. The CEC concluded that PSP was unable to work with Kala and decided to terminate her membership. It gave Kala a week to tender her resignation from 17 December last year. When Kala did not do so, the party terminated her membership on 24 December last year. Her termination letter, signed off by Dr Tan, stated that her conduct in the 25 November meeting "was disrespectful and tantamount to insubordination". Kala unsuccessfully appealed the termination on 30 December. On 19 February this year, Kala again sought to appeal, addressing an email to the party conference of cadre members. On 28 March this year, 66 out of 71 cadre members attended the PSP party conference and voted on her appeal, with the majority voting to reject her appeal. The case has been transferred from the High Court and is now pending before the State Courts. When approached by Yahoo News Singapore, PSP declined to comment on the matter. Stay in the know on-the-go: Join Yahoo Singapore's Telegram channel at http://t.me/YahooSingapore Related stories PSP unveils ex-SAF platoon commander, SIA pilot and party's assistant sec-gen among GE2020 candidates GE2020: PSP's Dr Tan Cheng Bock visited several coffeeshops in Yishun on 5 July with party candidates GE2020: NCMP a 'ploy' by PAP to entice voters not to vote for opposition Tan Cheng Bock Climate challenges mount for California agriculture Posted on 17 November 2021 by Guest Author This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jan Ellen Spiegel California agriculture has experienced just about every form of climate change-induced calamity: Heat, drought, fire, floods. None bodes well for the future of farming in this state that is the U.S. king of agriculture. But there are a couple of less headline-worthy factors that may determine what crops will survive if climate change trends dont at least slow down. One is the states winters yes, winters and the other is its management of groundwater. Challenges ahead for sure. In the end, however, there for some is optimism that the California agriculture communities ability to continue adapting gives reasons for hope. The importance of chill hours for key crops Wintertime lows have gotten warmer, says Dan Sumner, the Frank H. Buck, Jr. Distinguished Professor of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of California, Davis and a California farming region native. We all talk about it in the middle of the summertime because its hot outside, but the real news is the wintertime lows. The reason? Perennial crops, comprising the bulk of Californias top farm commodities, need off-season dormancy to regenerate, so temperatures must remain below a certain threshold for at least a minimum amount of time. That concept is called chill hours. Its crop-specific, and the fruits and nuts that are among the bedrocks of California agriculture are the ones most needing the right number of chill hours. Otherwise fewer buds, smaller fruits, lower yields. According to the most recent census data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, California still provides more agricultural product than any other state, accounting for 11% of the national total. That output includes more than two-thirds of the nations fruits and nuts and more than one-third of the nations vegetables. Californias top 10 agricultural commodities among its more than 400 in order are: dairy products, almonds, grapes, pistachios, cattle, lettuce, strawberries, tomatoes (largely for processing), floriculture, and walnuts. Those are largely perennials needing their chill hours to make them as productive as they need to be, and therefore worth growing. Crops such as nut trees and grapes are large investments, so low yields may make them money losers. Crop diversification to diffuse risks A 2018 publication Climate Change Trends and Impacts on California Agriculture: A Detailed Review provides an overview of the prevailing research around temperature, precipitation, and other factors and how they are likely to affect the states agriculture over time. The report, led by University of California Merced climate change extension specialist Tapan Pathak, indicates that higher minimum and maximum temperatures are resulting in lower numbers of chill-hours. The authors of that study say that by around 1950 growers in the Central Valley could rely on having between 700 and 1,200 chilling hours, depending on the location of their orchard. But currently, they say, for crops requiring more than 700 hours apricot, kiwifruit, peach, nectarine, plum, and walnut only between one-quarter to one-half of the valley is suitable. By 2080-2095, they project, only about 10% of the valley will remain viable for those crops. Fruits such as apples, cherries, and pears needing chill hours of at least 1,000 hours were already barely suited to Central Valley conditions 20 years ago, according to the publication. Perennial crops also make agricultural systems less flexible and therefore less able to deal with whatever climate change throws at them. Annual crops, on the other hand, can be changed year-to-year to accommodate climatic changes. You really dont want to miss a year, says Nathan Mueller, an assistant professor of ecosystems science and sustainability and soil and crop sciences at Colorado State University. Diversification in general is going to help diffuse that risk, says Mueller, who studies world-wide climate risk agricultural trends, And, he says, it all intersects with water. Not having enough makes everything worse. Striving for balance in the water/heat dance Drought and heat exacerbate themselves and each other. When its hot, whatever precipitation there is evaporates faster, often not making it into the soil to become groundwater. The warming climate also likely means precipitation will come in the form of rain rather than snow, even high up in the Sierras so crucial to Californias water supply. The result can be a smaller snowpack, which in turn means that what Mueller calls a free giant reservoir will melt earlier and at higher elevations than long has been the case. So there will be less of that gradual melting that in normal years constantly re-supplies surface and groundwater without wasting too much of those resources. Add to the equation that heat spells, now more frequent than previously in winter months, can result in more off-season melting. Furthermore, extended dry conditions may mean that when it does rain, the water may simply run off hard-packed soils without helping parched crops or soaking into groundwater supplies. So essentially, the drier it gets, the drier it continues to get. It means the waters largely are going out the Golden Gate without even doing the ecology very much good, Sumner says, referring to the situation around the San Francisco Bay area. If its warmer in the summer like it was this year, hotter and drier, then you have less water to start with for your irrigation and greater demands for irrigation in terms of the climate. In effect, it becomes a cycle, an endless loop, and that becomes quite severe, Sumner says. Another critical issue: California agriculture mainly relies on irrigation. About 80% of human water consumption in the state goes to agriculture, leaving the remaining 20% for residential, industrial, and other uses. When groundwater use is not metered or priced, guess what happens On top of that, in California most agricultural groundwater is not priced, while residential is. Agricultural operations have to pay for only the costs to extract the groundwater, not for the water itself. Groundwater also isnt metered, so its unclear how much farms are using, but its estimated that groundwater makes up about 40% of farm use in what used to be considered an average year, meaning a year with less intense drought. In a drought year, that farm use share can jump to about 80%. But the outlook now is likely on the verge of changing, as the California Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, passed in 2014, is about to go into effect. It requires the development and implementation of locally based groundwater sustainability plans to prevent overuse of groundwater. Katrina Jessoe, an associate professor in the department of agricultural and resource economics and the associate director of the Center for Watershed Sciences at UC Davis, and Ellen Bruno, an assistant cooperative extension specialist at UC Berkeley, think they know whats going to happen on the agricultural front if farmers have to start paying for groundwater. Theyve been looking at agricultural water use in some areas that had already been charging for groundwater, such as the Pajaro Valley along the central coast. There they were able to look at both changes in water use and agricultural land use. Pajaro has had pricing and metering since 1994, with a price increase in 2010 so Jessoe and Bruno could look at actual changes over 10 years. They say farmers responded immediately to the price increase by reducing production of lower value crops. In years two to five they found that farmers beginning to retire agricultural land or temporarily take it out of use. At first, the farmers actions were driven by a reduction in use of fallowed land, they say. But over time, especially after five years, they found farmers also reducing their irrigated acreage. Were going to see a contraction of agricultural land, a reduction in the acreage of agricultural land, a reduction in farm size as measured by acreage, says Jessoe. It could be a preview of how water scarcity or reduction impacts agricultural land use in California. But just what constitutes a lower value crop is a little hard to know. Bruno suggests its a combination of how much water is required and the economics of various crops. Were assuming that farmers are optimizing and that the switch were seeing due to the increase in price is a switch to the crops that give you the most bang for your buck now that waters more expensive, she says. At end of day, hope for adaptation and no nightmare California grows such a diversity of crops, its hard to even think of a staple having a huge disproportionate impact that ripples through the system, Bruno says. Were not talking about millions and millions of acres of corn and soybeans all being hit the same way. In the end, she and others dont see a nightmare scenario despite the burned and plowed-under crops from fire, heat, and drought this summer. It undersells the adaptive capacity for agriculture, she says. That might be true if we couldnt adapt to anything, but we constantly find ways to adjust both through policies and farm level changes and technological advances. One October morning in 1977, Maria Rubio was in her small green stucco house in southeastern New Mexico, preparing her husbands lunch. It was 6 a.m., and she was making burritoscooking beans, scrambling eggs, and preparing tortillas from scratch. And then she saw it, as she was putting together the second burrito: a burn mark on one of the tortillas, in the shape of a little face. Maria felt chills, and she could sense her body moving, though she wasnt sure if it was out of joy or fear. Advertisement Maria shouted at her 17-year-old daughter, Rosy, to come into the kitchen. She asked Rosy what the burn mark looked like to her. Oh, my God, Rosy recalls thinking. That looks like the face of Jesus. Maria agreed. She hadnt wanted to say it out loud, because she didnt want Rosy to think she was crazy. Marias husband, Eduardo Rubio, had slept through all of this. Now, Maria told him to get up. There was something he needed to look at. At first, when Eduardos wife and daughter explained what theyd seen, he scoffed. But when he inspected the tortilla, he saw it, too. That image was about an inch tall and an inch wide. If you look at photos from back then, the likeness is unmistakable: Its Jesus Christ in profile, complete with a beard and a crown of thorns. Maria and Rosy were overwhelmed with excitement. But Eduardo felt warier. He worried the tortilla might be a bad omen. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement When Rosy left for school that morning, the Jesus tortilla, and the debate over what it meant, was a private matter. When she got back home that afternoon, everything had changed. There were people swarming outside her parents house. And inside, visitors crowded around the tortillascrutinizing it, marveling over it, and questioning where it came from. That was only the beginning. In the years that followed, Maria Rubio would be besieged by believers and gawkers and the national press. Shed be called a visionary, and a fool. But for the Rubios, the tortilla wasnt just a public spectacle. It was the miracle that changed their family. And 44 years later, theyre still reckoning with the way it upended their lives. Advertisement This story is adapted from an episode of Slates One Year podcast. The new season of One Year launches Thursday and takes on the most interesting stories of 1995the ones youve forgotten and the ones youve never heard of. Follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts to hear a new episode each week. Maria Rubio was born in the Mexican town of Ojinaga in 1940. Her family moved across the border when she was 14 years old. Maria says that back then, the schools in New Mexico did a poor job teaching English to immigrants. To this day, shes a monolingual Spanish speaker. (I interviewed her and her husband, Eduardo, with the help of an interpreter.) We arrived here with only one suitcase, very little clothes, a couple of pillows, a couple of blankets, and a pan for food, she says. We didnt have a car. We didnt have a house or anything like that. We had a lot of problems. Advertisement Advertisement She met Eduardo in New Mexico, on a ranch where theyd both found work cleaning cotton. They got married when she was 17, and she gave birth to four children within five years. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement It was a hard life. The Rubios were very poor, often living in the houses of farmers who employed Eduardo. Maria struggled with depression and anxiety. My mother was a very timid, submissive person, remembers Rosy, the second oldest of Marias children. Her depression pretty much dictated her life. There were people swarming outside the house. And inside, visitors crowded around the tortilla. I understood what she was going through, says Rosys younger sister Corina, but there was nothing really you could do at 8 years of age. I just knew that I never wanted to be like that. Advertisement In those days, Marias relationship with Eduardo was on very shaky ground. I remember always being a little nervous during the weekends because I knew that thats when my dad was going to drink. And he was a mean drunk, Rosy says. That was just the way things were. I just figured, This is a normal life. By the fall of 1977, the Rubios had their own home in Lake Arthur, New Mexico, a remote desert town with one store and about 300 people. Maria was 37 years old. She was struggling, and she was looking for solace. And so, she prayed, and she made tortillasfor breakfast, lunch, and dinner, every day. Maria says she didnt have a specific recipeshed just use flour and salt and powder and lard. You just have to have the right mixture so that its not too hard or too sticky, Rosy says. And my mom was perfect in making the dough to perfection. Advertisement Maria prepared her tortillas in a traditional Mexican style, on a flat, cast-iron griddlea comal. She laid the first side down on the comal and flipped it over as quickly as possible, then let the second side burn a little before flipping it again. Once that initial side was burned a bit too, the tortilla was done. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The burn mark Maria saw on that Wednesday morning in 1977 had stayed dry when other parts of the tortilla got soaked with green chile. After Maria showed the tortilla to her husband, and after Rosy went to school, the Rubios carefully snipped out the face of Jesus, wrapped it in a napkin, and went to see their priest. Joyce Finnigan was skeptical. He blessed it for them, says Rosy, but he also told them it wasnt a big dealthat they shouldnt read too much into it. Maria respected Finnigan, who had been their priest at the church in Lake Arthur for many years. She thought that what he was saying must be true. But there were other people at the church, and when they saw what Maria was holding, they thought it was a big deal. The news just spread like wildfire, Rosy says. By that evening, between 75 and 100 people had converged on their small green home. Advertisement Six days later, a local reporter found cars lined up and down the Rubios block. When Rosy and her brother and sisters wanted to get inside, people pushed them back, telling them to get in line. The Rubio siblings figured out a way to bypass the crowds entirely, avoiding the front door by squirming in through a window. Maria didnt think it was her place to turn people away. If someone came to see the tortilla, she felt it was her duty to share it with them. All those visitors strengthened Marias faith. She treated the tortilla with reverence and care, displaying it in a glass and metal case atop a bunch of cotton ballslike it was floating on a cloud. That case sat on the Rubios dining room table, surrounded by flowers. Advertisement By the end of 1977, more than 6,000 visitors had signed Marias guest books. People streamed in from all over New Mexico, many of them Latino, drawn by word of mouth and local news stories. We related a lot more to the Mexican Catholic people, Rosy says. Those were the people I remember just coming in with a lot of faith, with a lot of intention. The visitors prayed for sick relatives and lit votive candles. One woman said that she was looked down upon because she [was] poor and Mexican American. She believed that Jesus had appeared in a poor persons house to show people are all the same. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Finnigan didnt appreciate all this hubbub. He worried that his flock was being led astray. The priest said to me, there are more people coming to your house than to church, Eduardo recalls. I said, And what can I do? And he said, Well, tell them not to, to come to church, that this is where God is. And I said, You know what, I cant. I cant kick out anyone from my home because they believe in that little piece of tortilla. Advertisement Eduardo and Maria kept their front door unlocked. People showed up at 6 a.m., and after midnight. Maria answered all their questions and prayed when they asked her to pray. And when reporters quizzed her on what the apparition meant, she spoke with the confidence of a true believer. Maria told the press that the burn mark was a message from God that all human beings should get together and stop fighting among themselves. She volunteered that shed been planning to separate from Eduardo, but the tortilla had brought them back together. Maria said that seeing Jesus on a tortilla had changed herthat shed been impatient but now was filled with serenity and love. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Thats what Maria Rubio was saying publicly. The truth, she says now, was a lot more complicated. Some part of her did believe that the tortilla was a godsend. But that burn mark in the shape of Jesusit had also made her life excruciating. People wouldnt stop asking me things, Maria says. And as soon as someone would come in, someone else would be there and another one and everybody wanted me to tell them what had happened. Visitors would ask her to heal them, and she would tell them that she didnt know how to heal. She struggled to eat and sleep. She didnt want to profit off the tortilla, so she agonized about how to give away the donations shed been getting. Some people even accused her of faking the whole thingof painting the image, or burning it into the tortilla herself. She started to wonder if the tortilla might be cursed, or a tool of the devil. Sometimes, she would speak directly to the tortilla, asking it if it was a good thing or a bad thing. It never answered her. She became scared of it, says Rosy. She would tell me that it was kind of taking a life of its own. Maria felt like she was going crazy. She stopped going to church or to the grocery store by herself, and she sometimes wished that the tortilla had happened to someone else. But despite the pain the tortilla caused, Maria wasnt about to get rid of it. She believed that Jesus had appeared before her, and she couldnt just reject him. Maria continued to welcome visitors into her home in Lake Arthur. And as 1977 turned into 1978, those people started coming from further and further away. The Rubios were no longer just dealing with a local sensation. The Jesus-on-a-tortilla story had gone national. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement In the summer of 1978, Cindy Tate Badger rode 500 miles from Oklahoma City to Lake Arthur, New Mexico, on the back of her boyfriends motorcycle. Badger, a 26-year-old single mother, had read about Maria Rubios tortilla in a syndicated newspaper column, and she wanted to know if it was real. When Badger and her boyfriend got to Lake Arthur, no one answered the door at the Rubios house. But there was a sign out front. Badger remembers it saying: Come on in, the tortillas on the right. Badger walked down a hallway, and there it was, sitting on a pedestal. She stared in amazement. It really does look like the face of Jesus that you see in Sunday school books and Bibles and such, she says. It truly does. She became scared of it. She would tell me that it was kind of taking a life of its own. Maria Rubios daughter Rosy After a few minutes, Maria Rubio walked into the room. She was just the most wonderful lady, Badger says. She would have talked to me a long time, but its all in Spanish and I could not follow her conversation worth a darn. And I regret that I didnt have a translator there to hear her firsthand story. I asked Badger how often shes thought about the tortilla since she took that trip. From time to time, she says. I dont talk about it very much for this reason: I will not listen to somebody scoff and make fun of it. They werent there. They didnt see it. They know nothing about it. A good number of people did see the Jesus tortilla in the 1970s and 80s. Some came from the East Coast. Others came from Europe. The first round of media coverage spawned a second round, and a third. The AP and UPI wire services both sent reporters to Lake Arthur. There were also pieces in the National Catholic Reporter, the Los Angeles Times, and Newsweek. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement As the tortilla story spread around the nation, so did a new wave of skepticism. One reporter said the burn mark looked less like Christ than like the boxer Leon Spinks. Magician Ricky Jay developed a trick in which he talked about Maria Rubios discovery, then conjured up a gift for someone in the crowd: a tortilla seared with a happy face. A television segment that aired on Showtime played up the strangeness of the Rubios tale and the oddity of their cuisine. It was a perfect story for that eras America, says Gustavo Arellano, who wrote about the Jesus tortilla in his book Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America. Mexican food is not as ubiquitous across the United States as it is today. You still have to explain to people what a tortilla is. I mean, if they know about tortillas, its in a can. From the point of view of the white news media and white consumers, the Jesus tortilla was weird news. Heres how Arellano glosses that mainstream perspective on Maria Rubios story: Dumb Mexican woman, Catholic no less, says that she saw Jesus on a flour tortilla in New Mexico, which is a weird state as it is. Oh my God. Lets laugh at her and lets put her into this carnival of freaks. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Arellano never saw it that way. Visions of Jesus and the Virgin Mary are a hallowed part of Christian tradition. And the founding myth of modern-day Mexico is one such vision: the Virgin of Guadalupe, who appeared before the Aztec Juan Diego in 1531. When he told the Catholic authorities, they didnt believe him. The archbishop was only swayed when the virgins image appeared a second time, on the inside of Juan Diegos cloak. Religious leaders in the 20th century didnt think Maria Rubios vision was a miracle on that orderor, really, a miracle at all. This image here in Lake Arthur, itsits just a little image, said a local Franciscan priest. But for Arellano, tortillas are holy objectsa humble, simple food made by one of the most fucked-over countries in the world, and thats saying somethingMexico. Of course Jesus is going to appear on a tortilla, Arellano says. Hes not going to appear on fucking caviar. In Angelica Rubios very first memory, shes watching an episode of Threes Company and eating a bowl of ramen noodles when someone knocks at the door. They would always just say, Were here to see the Jesus tortilla. And I was like, OK. I always saw it like I was some tour guide. And it was just sort of ruining my life, in the sense of it was just interfering with my TV time. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement I will not listen to somebody scoff and make fun of it. They werent there. They didnt see it. Cindy Tate Badger, who saw the tortilla in 1978 Angelica is the youngest of Maria and Eduardo Rubios six children. She was born in 1979, two years after the tortilla joined the Rubio household. Her mother believed those two events were connected. Before Angelica, Maria had been told she could never have another child. But the tortilla arrived and then came one more daughter. That made Angelica feel special. But I also know, she says, that so many of my own emotional issues have a lot to do with this huge idea of what the tortilla was. Growing up, Angelica couldnt escape the tortilla, or her connection to it. This one boy that I had the biggest crush on started calling me the tortilla kid, she says. I just remember going home and just crying, because that was the most disappointing day of my life. The tortilla loomed just as large for Angelicas older sister Rosy. But for her, the tortillas continued presence wasnt an annoyance. It was a sign. If you know anything about tortillas, if you dont eat them after three, four, five days, they start molding. And this never happened, Rosy says. To me, that was a very clear indication that this was something big and something special. Rosy was always close with her mother. She wanted to protect Maria but also help her share her story. Since her mother spoke only Spanish, Rosy became the familys media spokesperson. Maria and Rosy did a lot of interviews. But the one they taped in 1994 was their biggest yet. The Phil Donahue Show was recorded in front of a live studio audience in New York City. That trip was the first time that Maria had ever been on a plane. As they took off, Maria said, I think Im going to die now. For Rosy, it was thrilling to be in New York, but Maria was overwhelmed. When they went to a nice dinner downtown, Maria was too nervous to eat her apple pie. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Filming the show itself wasnt any easier. The studio audience started laughing less than 30 seconds in, when Donahue uttered the phrase Jesus in a tortilla. During the segment, Maria barely spoke at all. All she said was that Jesus had appeared before her to send a message. The whole time Maria was onstage, she never let go of her daughters hand. On The Phil Donahue Show, Maria and Rosy got presented as potential scammers. If you give up your caution and your common sense, one guest, a well-known debunker of phony religious miracles, said, any charlatan with a pocketful of magic tricks can come in and take your money and sometimes your life. Later in the episode, an audience member told Donahue, Although Im not much for tortillas, I am going to keep a close eye on my potato chips. On the outside, Rosy managed to keep her composure. But on the inside, she says, I remember just seething. What she wanted to do most of all was give that potato chip woman the finger. After that experience in New York, Maria told Rosy that she was done with TV interviews. The next year, when The Oprah Winfrey Show called, Rosy went to Chicago without her mother. But her second big television appearance didnt go much better than the first. I just dont know why Jesus would want to be on a tortilla, Oprah said. And the crowd roared with laughter. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement For Angelica Rubio, it was painful to watch her family get laughed at. It made her feel angry, and a little bit guilty. Ive sort of always known that people exploited my moms story, she says. And yet I did very little. I feel like I was sort of an accomplicejust not really defending her. I think it was mostly being ashamed. I mean, think about it, just saying my mom was famous for making a tortilla with the face of Jesus on it. By the 1990s, Jesus on a tortilla had become a kind of small-scale meme. Kurt Cobain wrote in his journal, I saw Jesus on a tortilla shell. The Simpsons referenced it. (Now, if youll excuse me, I have to appear on a tortilla in Mexico, God tells Homer.) Theres even a feature film, Tortilla Heaven, about Jesus image miraculously appearing on a tortilla in New Mexico. The Rubios werent consulted for that movie, which critic Justin Chang called as flat as a tortilla and considerably less nourishing. In Tortilla Heaven, everyone tries to make a buck off the holy image, charging admission fees to see it and selling tortilla merchandise. That was the popular conceptionthat anyone who saw Jesus on a tortilla surely had impure motives. But for Maria, the tortilla was always a duty. Something shed been asked to share, for reasons she didnt understand. In 1977, she opened her home to the entire world. But over many years, very gradually, that sense of obligation to the public started to go away. The first step was reclaiming the inside of her home by moving the tortilla outside. In the mid-1980s, Maria and her sister built a small chapel for the tortilla: a capilla, with glass doors, an altar, and a candle that always stayed lit. Hanging on the wall were strings adorned with small metal figurines, tiny icons left behind by visitors. Many were shaped like body partshands and feet in need of healing. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement That capilla stood on the Rubios front porch for about 10 years. In the 90s, after The Phil Donahue Show, they moved it to the back of the house. And eventually, they took the capilla down entirely. The tortilla broke sometime around 2005. My mom says she lent it out to one of my nieces, Angelica says. But she thinks nobody wants to tell the real story. Theyre afraid of what might happen, she says, which is nothing. Like, the tortillas a tortilla, it was bound to break at some point. The tortilla now sits in pieces, and the part with the actual burn mark has gone missing. Angelica Rubio is a politician now, a member of the New Mexico House of Representatives. In the past few years, shes been thinking a lot about the tortilla and what its meant for all of them. There was already suffering in our family, she says. But the tortilla is what it took to help her family to believe that things could be better. My mom back then was weak, she was sick, Angelicas sister Edubina recalls. There was times when my dad would be drinking that she, I think at times, just wanted to be done with life. And I think she would have given up hope completely. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Rosy feels similarly. At some point we believe that Jesus, God, the higher power, had to make an intervention, she says. And that was the intervention for us. That it was like, Come on, people, maybe you dont have a great life, but you have life. Back in the 1970s, Maria had told reporters that her husband, Eduardo, stopped drinking when Jesus showed his face in their home. But that didnt last. The problem was quite advanced and I couldnt just quit all at once, Eduardo says. Because how I was living, I was not happy. I thought I was, but I wasnt. It was only after Mariawith support from their childrenseriously threatened to leave him that he committed to stopping. He asked Jesus for help. If I leave this, he remembers praying, show me something that I can fill that emptiness with. He remembers Jesus telling him: Youre going to join a church choir and youre going to sing there every Sunday and you dont need to drink to sing. During our interview, I asked him to sing something that hed perform with the choir. He chose a song of love for the Virgin Mary. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Your browser doesn't support HTML5 audio. Here is a link to the audio instead. Play Pause Loading... Eduardo Rubio hasnt had a drink in more than 30 years. He and Maria have been married for 64 years. She can no longer make tortillas, because of arthritis in her hands. What makes Maria so special, Eduardo says, is that she has un buen corazona good heart. Marias children say their mother has overcome a huge number of challenges in her life. But she sometimesshe just really has a hard time, Edubina says. I think she just has a lot of anger towards having had to put up with so much for so long. Angelica says Maria has never sought out the mental health support that she, as Marias daughter, believes her mother deserves. Marias strength, Angelica says, comes from trusting in the unseen. There are moments, Maria says, where shes happy she saw Jesus on the tortilla. And then there are moments when she wonders why it happened, or whether it was true at all. One always has doubts, she says. But she wants very much to think that it was a good thing. I do believe in miracles, she says. Every day is a miracle because every day I wake up alive. And every day, Im fine. Season 2 of One Year launches on Thursday. Listen to the trailer below and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts for a new episode each week. Beto ORourke is running. Again. And this time his eyes are on the Texas governors mansion. ORourke announced his candidacy in a video on Monday, with the Texas hills in the background and a common man approach. He spoke about his mobilization efforts during the Texas power outages earlier this year, of the unprepared officials who literally left their constituents out in the cold, and of the need to build public trust. This is ORourkes third campaign for a major office after losing a Senate race to Ted Cruz in 2018 and a failed attempt at the White House in 2020. Republicans immediately responded to his candidacy by linking him to President Joe Biden, who has a 35 percent approval rating in Texas, and calling his positions reckless and dangerous. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Expect to see a lot more of that, says Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston who specializes in Texas politics and has experience working on campaigns for both major parties, Green Party candidates, and independents in the state. Our conversation about ORourkes chances has been edited and condensed for clarity. Julia Craven: So, is ORourke a viable candidate? Brandon Rottinghaus: The problem for ORourke is that hes well known in Texas, but hes not well liked in Texas, and the polling bears this out. Hes got strong name identification, but lags in approval of his political approach. Thats problematic for him, because most Democratic candidates for governor have had the opposite problem. His favorable numbers are pretty low. And Greg Abbott is a political juggernaut. He has got a turnout advantage, since midterm elections tend to favor Republicans, and hes got poll position as an incumbent whos built a tremendous ground game and has a massive war chest. Advertisement Advertisement To put it bluntly, winning as a Democrat in a midterm election with a president who is unpopular in Texas, a sour economy, and a strong incumbent is not a good recipe for Democrats. Subscribe to the Slatest Newsletter A daily email update of the stories you need to read right now. We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again. Please enable javascript to use form. Email address: Send me updates about Slate special offers. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms Sign Up Thanks for signing up! You can manage your newsletter subscriptions at any time. Theres an ad Gov. Abbott put out that morphed Beto into Joe Bidens face. This definitely telegraphs where the Abbott camp intends to go politically. Abbott doesnt need to run against ORourke when he can run against Joe Biden instead. Its an interesting dynamic. Texas politics used to be a unique entity unto itself, but as the national trends have seeped into the politics of the state, its become much more about universal issues of Republican versus Democrat. If that is the nature of the race, then its an advantage for Abbott. If this is a base versus base election, given the context of where things are, the Republicans have got a major advantage. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Democrats were hoping for a well-known, well-funded figure to run against Abbott. They got their wish, but that wish is tempered by the realization that ORourke is not the perfect candidate for them. ORourke came out the gate swinging at Abbotts record. But how does his own record play outparticularly his comments during his presidential campaign where he famously said: Hell yes, were going to take your AR-15, your AK-47, a position he has not backed down from. Advertisement Advertisement In some ways, the gun debate is more a metaphor for the cultural fights that the states been involved in over the last year, which the Republicans would like to play up in 2022. Most people dont have assault weapons. But the point that Republicans are emphasizing when they bring this up is that there are cultural differences between the Democrats and the Republicans that will connect to bigger issueslike whether or not people who are transgender should participate in certain sports, whether or not critical race theory should be taught or race in general should be identified in core curriculum. These are questions that the Republicans are going to use as a wedge against Democrats. Advertisement Advertisement How will recent gerrymandering affect ORourkes bid? The new district lines wont directly affect ORourkes bid because hes running statewide. However, if Democrats are demoralized in races down ballot because of fewer opportunities to win or have fewer incumbent Democratic candidates to vote for because of retirements, it might mute voting enthusiasm. ORourke needs all the turnout boost he can get in a rough year for Democrats nationwide. Weve seen voter groups, particularly Black voter groups, flip states like Georgia and Pennsylvania by getting more people out to the polls. Is that a possibility for ORourke, especially when you take into consideration his ground game during the power outages earlier this year? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement I think it is. Texas added 4 million new voters since Greg Abbott was first elected. There are a sizable number of new Texans who dont know who Greg Abbott is and who are unsure of who Beto ORourke is. So there are opportunities for both parties to fill in that information and to use that to their advantage. The 2020 exit polling said that more people who were first-time voters in Texas voted for Joe Biden. I guess thats what ORourke is hoping for: a whole new electorate in Texas who can be persuaded about the correctness of his policies and the problems that Republicans have faced since theyve been in office for 20-plus years. I also think he hopes to harness the tremendous amount of young energy thats emanating from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party in Texas. But it is a challenge in an off-year election when theres been a bit of an enthusiasm gap for Democrats. Advertisement ORourke can fix that problem because hes electric for so many Democrats. The problem is that as much as he elevates Democrats, he also draws the ire of Republicans. Hes a polarizing figure, and that can create opportunities for Democrats in some places, but also may close off other opportunities such as trying to pull in the rural vote. Advertisement Advertisement Why is he so polarizing? Running against Ted Cruz became a red versus blue battle. And that initially puts him into a position where it looks like hes much more aggressively partisan than he actually was in that race. By the time he ran for president, he was perceived as being pretty far to the left. The things he said during the campaign also kind of magnified that factthe way he talked about the gun issue and border security. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement These are things that made him look like he was to the left of most people in the Democratic Party. I think that narrative took root. Theres also a case to be made that hes polarizing because it looks like hes abusing his privilege. He comes from a political family. Hes married into wealth. Theres a sense, for Republicans, that hes not who he portrays himself to be, so that tends to polarize things too. Heres a good example of that: His nickname is Beto, right? His real name is Robert. Republicans still call him Robert Francis even though Beto has been his nickname from birth. What about his chances with Latino voters? Advertisement Advertisement ORourke underperformed among Latino communities in 2018, but investment since then and the fact hes kicking off his tour in South Texas shows hes serious about winning them over. The Latino community is not homogeneousRepublicans in Texas have historically gotten 30 to 35 percent of the Latino vote. But younger Latinos who typically live in urban and suburban areas are more progressive, and those are the voters ORourke needs to excite and turn out to vote. Should Bidens performance with Latino voters in 2020 change the way ORourke approaches them? Are there any lessons to learn? There are concerns that the Democrats have taken Latinos in Texas politically for granted. Long-term engagement early and often is key. This means not just running ads in Spanishit means holding events, engaging with local community leaders, being attentive to community interests. The Latino community in some parts of the state are more working-class, so left-leaning policies like guns and abortion rights and abolishing ICE wont fly. ORourke has to talk about the issues that affect people in these communities, not repeat points from a progressive party platform. Hell have to shade some of his past liberal statements. Is there a centrist Democrat in Texas who would be a better, safer bet? There are many elected, and not elected, centrist Democrats in Texas, but none are as high-profile as ORourke. A Texas Democratic candidate has to walk a fine line ideologicallythey need to be liberal enough to excite the base but centrist enough to appeal to leaning Republicans and moderate independent voters. But given the natural advantages Gov. Abbott has and the national landscape, going for a high-risk, high-reward candidate like ORourke might be the best strategy for the Democrats. Over the past year, Ive seen so many school board meetings. Angry meetings. Meetings where parents were dragged out the door. Meetings where whole contingents of observers jeered and then sang The Star-Spangled Banner. But Ive never seen a school board meeting quite like this. At a San Francisco school board meeting in January, held over Zoom, the president of the board kicked things off by saying, We want to make sure you feel welcomed and heard, especially during a time when so much pain and hurt is persisting. Advertisement The way she speaks herewith a lot of talk of holding space and lifting people upthat is the vibe the board is cultivating. There are a lot of good-natured shoutouts among this crew. But it all takes a lot of time. The school board meetings often go for seven or eight hours, well into the evening, says Jill Tucker, who writes about education for the San Francisco Chronicle. She says the problem with all this talking is that it was happening as a lot of San Francisco parents were struggling. At this point in the pandemic: Kids had been out of school buildings for almost a year. San Francisco still didnt have a firm reopening date on the schedule. But you wouldnt know any of that if you tuned in to the first few hours of this meeting, because reopening the buildings was way down the boards priority list, tucked under the 11th agenda item. They didnt even get to it until seven hours into the meeting. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement By the time they did get to it, people were mad. Listening to hours of testimony from this day, nowthe anger being lobbed at this board, it seems prescient. A few weeks after this meeting was livestreamed, a couple of parents hatched a plan to recall as many school board members as they could. Last month, they succeeded in getting this recall put on the ballot. On Wednesdays episode of What Next, I spoke with Jill Tucker about San Franciscos twist on the school board wars. It turns out the debate over how kids learn isnt just happening in swing states. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity. Mary Harris: The funny thing about this school board recall effort in San Francisco is that while it certainly heated up around the pandemic, thats not the whole story. This fight has been animated by some of the same cultural issues around race that have set off school board battles everywhere else. The groundwork was laid a few years back, when the school board weighed in on a controversial piece of art. Advertisement Jill Tucker: It goes back to when they decided to address a controversial mural in Washington High School. Its this huge mural from the depression area, a WPA work considered very historic by many, many people. And the mural has some images in there, including white settlers stepping over a dead Native American and slaves in the fields. Theres been a lot of consternation over the decades about the mural, about how kids would say something like, Oh, Ill meet you by the dead Indian for lunch. Advertisement And I guess the question is: What do you do? Because its a work of art that is, in and of itself, a historic piece. But do you want it around kids, shaping their education? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Exactly. Removing this muralits a fresco. Its not just hanging on a hook. Its painted into the wall. The issue became: Do you destroy it? Do you cover it up? Or, do you educate the kids about it? Which did the school board choose? Well, they initially chose to destroy it, to paint it over, to literally cover it with white paint. And then they realized that that was probably going to be a long legal battle, and expensive. So they then reversed that at another meeting and decided to cover it up with panels or curtains or something that would semi-permanently obscure it, so that the kids didnt have to look at it. Advertisement How did the community feel about that? A lot of people felt at the time that the school board was not doing its due diligence in terms of understanding the process of how you would need to make a decision like this about something historic. People were also frustrated by the fact that first they voted to destroy it and then they reversed that and voted to cover it up. And the artist actually painted those images in the mural to illustrate that Washington was not a saint, that he was part of slavery, that he was part of the destruction of Native American populations and culture. But that was not part of the school boards conversation. So, for a lot of people, it didnt feel like the school board was in control of the debate. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The response from the school board sounds a little herky-jerky. Theyre very into social justice, but a lot of the things theyre talking about maybe come off as performative and also expensive. And so its just touching a lot of hot buttons. Advertisement Oh, 100 percent. This board has been accused many times of being performative and paying no mind to their finances. And of course, this was happening as the district was already facing about a $60 million deficit. And the board just continued to ignore that and focused on other issues, including the mural, which was going to cost upwards of $800,000 to $1 million, depending on which option they chose. What did that incident tell you about how the school board sees its job? Advertisement It demonstrated that the school board was very committed to these types of decisions at the expense of other types of decisions that typically school boards would make. A lot of things that they have taken up have been very directed toward the superintendent and very administrative tasks. At one point, the superintendent threatened to leave and then decided to stay if they stepped back and let him do his job. Advertisement So they were making trouble for everyone. This is a board that likes to stir the pot. This well-intentioned focus by the school board on more symbolic issues continued through the pandemic. In January, as more kids around the country began returning to classrooms, the San Francisco school board made headlines againthis time for an expensive push to rename schools within the district, all while parents waited impatiently for guidance on reopening. Advertisement For a while there have been some schools that the parents and the community and the teachers wanted renamed. And so they created this task force to come up with which schools should be renamed. The idea was any schools associated with a person connected to slavery or oppression would be renamed. The task force then went through every school name and reportedly did their own research to determine whether that person had a connection to slavery or colonization or other types of things. They went down through the list, and out of about 118 schools, they pulled 44 names. Advertisement Advertisement Thats a huge percentage. And even school board members that supported the process were like, Oh my gosh, 44 school names!, including Dianne Feinstein. At least one of the board members whod been on the board years earlier had voted to name the school after Dianne Feinstein. So there was a lot of controversy about some of these name changes. The research was very questionable. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Even the mayor, London Breed, came out with a statement saying, I cant understand why the school board is advancing a plan to rename all these schools when there isnt a plan to have kids back in those physical schools. So not only was the process of renaming the schools questioned, but it was happening during the pandemic, when kids werent in school, when they were suffering, when there was a lot of issues that the district and the schools and the teachers and the families were facing. And the idea that the school board was raising this issue of renaming 44 schools, a lot of people considered it to be something akin to tone-deafness in terms of what was really mattering. Advertisement Of course, there are a lot of schools that would be widely supported in terms of renaming. But the question is: Is now the appropriate time? Ultimately, that issue gave momentum to the recall effort. When the school board was facing pressure to reopen, were they not seeing reopening as an equity issue? Thinking back to their public statements, it was hard to avoid the fact that the closure of schools was disproportionately affecting students of color, low-income students, those that didnt have the resources at home to be able to study or have parent support. But as the pandemic wore on, they were passing these resolutions symbolically addressing the needs of different demographic groups in the district, when these kids were struggling mightily during the pandemic Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement And werent in school. They were in online school and in some cases, not in school at all. There was a lot of folks at the time that were very concerned, saying, How are we going to get these kids back in school? Theyre suffering, they dont have Wi-Fi, etc. This led to a lot of angst among the community that the pandemic and reopening appeared to be something of an afterthought seven hours into meetings Around the time the board was catching so much heat for renaming schools, Tucker interviewed the president of the school board. She asked about equity issues, and whether keeping buildings closed was disproportionately affecting those on the margins. But the president seemed unmoved, insisting that children were learning more about their families and their cultures by staying home. She dismissed the idea of learning loss too, saying kids were just having different learning experiences than the ones we currently measure. Advertisement Her statements in that story definitely didnt reflect what a lot of parents were feeling. It was very stressful and the mental health of young people was really harmed for many. Over the past year, problems for the San Francisco school board began to pile up. Parents were caught off guard when the board suddenly changed admissions criteria at a selective high school, opening it up to a lottery in the interest of equity. One board member was accused of sending anti-Asian tweets. So this recall effort, it ended up being about a stew of hot-button issues. Advertisement Advertisement It caught fire because there was already so much anger brewing. What did the recall effort look like? Did it look like people on street corners with clipboards or what? Advertisement Yeah, exactly. It looked like people at farmers markets, and it looked like people literally on street corners in various parts of the city. Its a tough haul, though, to get 10 percent of registered voters to sign a petition in a city. Advertisement In San Francisco, thats like 50,000 people. Thats an awful lot of signatures, during a pandemic, when people are not outside. One thing that surprised me about this school board battle is when I saw the mayor of San Francisco say that she was supporting the recall of three school board members. Even though shes a Democrat, and theyre all Democrats. One of these people, she appointed it. It made me wonder a little bit if the school board had burned bridges with their mayor. Advertisement The mayor, London Breed, who is African American, expressed concern about the financial stability of the district, about the priorities that the school board had during the pandemic and that this was a grassroots parent-led recall. And she was behind the parents for change. Advertisement How had the boards decisions affected the finances of the school district? When people say they focused on social justice or these other issues rather than reopening or the finances, I think thats true. The question is: Could they have done all of that at the same time? I certainly think that that was possible. They just chose not to. A lot of these decisions did have price tags with them. And in a district that was struggling financially, they basically just chose not to deal with it. Instead, they passed resolutions that continued to cost money or add money to the budget expenditures. Recently, the state had to appoint a fiscal expert to come in to the district because they are facing such a massive shortfall$125 million next yearand if they dont come up with a plan in December, it triggers a process that could lead to a state takeover. Advertisement So the recall election is coming up in a couple of months. It seems somewhat likely that you might have a slew of new school board members coming in. Mayor London Breed would appoint them if any of these members did get recalled. Do you have advice for anyone who might be coming to a school board like San Franciscos fresh, after all of this? Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Oh, gosh, I dont have any advice for them, and those members would have to choose a new superintendent because the current one is retiring, and they would have to somehow figure out how to balance the budget and make cuts that are going to be incredibly difficult. It doesnt sound like a fun job. Im not sure the school board member job description ever includes fun. Thats always been the question of school boards across the country: Who wants to be on the school board? Who ends up being on the school board because of the type of job that it is? I do think across the country right now and in San Francisco, people are realizing the power of these people that are elected by often a very small percent of the voting population. People dont really know whos running necessarily. They dont pay attention. They might just check yes for the incumbent. But people are realizing that school boards have some very powerful tools to make change, whether thats banning critical race theory or banning vaccine mandates. People are waking up to the fact that the school board isnt just a bunch of boring people sitting there voting yes or no on library books or whatever, that they can play a very powerful role in the culture wars of a community. Subscribe to What Next on Apple Podcasts Get more news from Mary Harris every weekday. A pair of deeply strange articles appeared in the Washington Post this week, raising questions about whether Democracy Dies in Darkness, the papers motto, has a carveout for Gilead. Last Sunday, under the headline What Happens When People in Texas Cant Get Abortions: Diapers Save a Lot More Babies Than Ultrasounds, Casey Parks profiled Tere Haring and the anti-abortion nonprofit she runs in Texasa pregnancy center that distributes diapers and baby formula to what she calls abortion-minded women in untenable financial situations. Haring, who believed it was her Catholic duty to help women who didnt get abortions, has seen a huge uptick in the need for the services she provides after S.B. 8 became law. (God had steered these women away from abortions, Haring believed. Now, it was up to Him to give Haring the money to help them raise a child.) The second piece, published three days later, is titled, A Maternity Ranch Is Born, and offers another window into How evangelical women in Texas are mobilizing for a future without abortion. Its currently among the most read on the site. The profile, by Stephanie McCrummen, is of Aubrey Schlackman, another Texas woman who has built: Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement a place for struggling pregnant women who decide to have their babies instead of having abortions, a Christian haven where women could live stress-free during their newborns first year of life. It would have individual cottages for mothers. Host homes for couples who would model healthy marriages. A communal barn for meals. Bible study. The first story recounts how the Harings ended up in Texas in the first place: They moved in 1986 after John, Teres husband, a lawyer who defended clinic protesters, was arrested outside the Ladies Center Inc. in Pensacola, Fla. The family decided they should move to Texas to get away from the anti-abortion movement. (At least one of their children followed in their fathers footstepsthe piece notes that in 1994, after Bill Clinton signed the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, one of their kids was arrested on charges of trespassing at a clinic in Little Rock, Arkansas.) In August 1994, Tere Haring opened Allied as a nonprofit crisis pregnancy center. Advertisement Advertisement That her program involves mandatory Bible study, silver bracelets for moms that say I am free, and insistence on heterosexuality and religious primacy of males over females is elided, or maybe just downplayed. Harings work procuring food and diapers for babies and their moms in the name of God is moving. The piece also truthfully notes that critics say crisis pregnancy centers are often criticized for dishonest tactics and copying the language and signage of abortion clinics to confuse patients. It even explains that Haring refuses funding from Texas Alternatives to Abortion program, which, although set up to assist women who carry to term, spent up to 100 times as much counseling patients against abortion as on maternity clothes, as the Austin Chronicle found in 2018. But even with these additions, the bulk of the piece is framed as a redemption story, about renouncing anti-abortion violence to embrace love. It reads like an uncritical, unvarnished tribute to Harings generosity and purpose. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The Post story approaches the religious complications of Harings work respectfully. It explains why Haring rejects government money: State and federal law prohibits recipients from proselytizing or pushing religious activity on the people they serve. She prefers to be openly faithful and keeps what she calls a little chapel in the back of the center. Its a small chapel where, the Post reports, Haring sometimes prays for women in need. Hardly any of her clients go in it. But Haring doesnt want to change what she does, and she doesnt want to lie to the state. The takeaway is that having to hide or separate her faith is not worth the extra funding. The second story details the ways in which Texas passage of S.B. 8 bolstered a growing sense among evangelical Christians that the end of Roe v. Wade was no longer a dim possibility but a near certainty. Happily, it would seem, for the subject, the time had come for the next phasea new era in America when the church would establish a kind of Christian social safety net where motherhood was not only supported but exalted as part of Gods plan for the universe. Again, Aubrey Schlackmans story and charitable efforts are admirable. Hers is a deep and loving faith. But the explicit religious valence here cannot be missed. The ranch Schlackman is creating would be part of a huge cultural shift, she says: Churches helping. Christians opening their homes. Christian safe havens all over Texas. Maybe all over America. That her program involves mandatory Bible study, silver bracelets for moms that say I am free, and insistence on heterosexuality and religious primacy of males over females is elided, or maybe just downplayed. The message of both stories seems to be a kind of one-two theological neck punch: Sure, Texas has craftily ended all abortions after six weeks, but it all works out in the wash because the church is stepping into the void! Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Nowhere do these pieces mention the deep suffering of women who may become pregnant but dont want to go to ranches or wear bracelets or pose for pregnancy portraitsa professional photo shoot in which they wore flowing goddess gowns. Both seem to have been lobbed at readers with the tacit understanding that, yes, sure, Texas nullified Roe v. Wade this fall and made no exceptions for rape, incest, or maternal well-being, but hey, it sure did bring about a new spirit of charity! Seen through the lens of new reporting about the Washington Posts actions toward Felicia Sonmez, a survivor of sexual assault who was repeatedly told by the paper that she was not neutral on the subject and could therefore not report on it, it feels a bit like another example of what can go wrong when a publication apparently believes there are two sides to human rights atrocities and rape. In that light, it looks a bit like the pair of love songs to the gap-filling faithful are the deeply strange result of a commitment to both siderismas though the Post, in casting around for an upside to taking away womens life choices, has determined that the upside is More Kindness/More God. Advertisement Advertisement More Kindness/More God may well be outstanding in life, but it doesnt cancel out the need for basic health care, or for services to be delivered to the nongodly, or for pregnant people to be treated as moral agents with control over their own futures. This framing trapthat those on the abortion side are godless and those seeking to end abortion are people of faithis one of the most hackneyed political cliches of the last decades. Amy Hagstrom Miller, CEO of Whole Womans Health, an entity that offers holistic abortion care services, told me as much in an email: As a progressive Christian abortion provider I am appalled by what these organizations are doing and how they frame Christianity, and I am stunned that the Washington Post would cover these organizations as if this is normal, sensible activity. Advertisement Advertisement That there is a place in America for faith-based charitable service is uncontroversial. That has been the case since the founding. But good people who provide good service to good people who make certain choices only when their other choices are taken away is not freedom, even if it comes engraved on a silver bracelet. I keep wondering about the rest of storywhat happens AFTER the halcyon period of prayer and birth? What happens to women disinclined to sign an agreement to attend Bible study and a series of activities? Who is taking in the non-Christian mothers in a country founded on freedom from religious coercion? The words maternity ranch can sound generous and loving, but they also fundamentally distort the fact that substituting Huggies for broad freedom represents a big step backward for human agency. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Writing in Politico last year, medievalist Cord Whitaker pointed out the extent to which the idea of chivalry motivates revanchists and white supremacists. They apply it, he wrote, to multiple objects. They defend their families. They defend their neighborhoods. They defend their way of life. The flag. Western Civilization. The police. Always they use the language of honor. In their minds, they merely defend the defenseless. For years now, the charity and good works of crisis pregnancy centers and religious efforts of state legislatures have been similarly dressed as chivalric, when the story right below that layer is simply and obviously an attempt at upholding patriarchy and forced pregnancy. The pregnant in Texas must be defended not just from abortion service providers but also from their own false understanding of their own circumstances. If they can be denied access to reproductive choice, they can then be remolded. As one client explains, the Bible lessons showed me that choosing your child over whatever circumstances youre inthat God is giving you this child as a blessing. This is religious paternalism. Recall that when the Supreme Court afforded broad speech rights to both CPCs and anti-abortion counselors, it was because they were doing good work, holy work, work that is posited by its enthusiasts as curative to the sinful work of terminating pregnancies. Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Nobody should be knocked for helping the unfortunate. There is plenty of need for good and inspiring news of human kindness. But stories that are premised on the idea that taking away a womans bodily and economic choices has made more space for cute cottages and gated communities and Bible study is not both sides journalism. Faith-based charity is not a substitute for accessible and constitutionally protected freedoms. This isnt the stuff of happy endings for those who have fewer options. Everyone wants to see the upside, and everyone is tired of reading shitty news about women and their dwindling options. But feting as heroes the people who step in when all choice has been removed and replaced with Bible study and male dominated doctrine about family is not sober objectivity. Its falling prey to the oldest, most paternalistic tropes in the book, then passing it off as progress. ARCHIVED - Renfe celebrates Black Friday with bargain rail tickets throughout Spain Rail passengers can buy cheap tickets to Malaga and Alicante in addition to some destinations in France Spains state-owned rail service Renfe is offering bargain-basement tickets for travel throughout 2022 as part of its Black Friday promotion. The deal offers significant discounts on its AVE, long distance and Avlo routes in Spain and France and is valid for purchases made between November 15 and 19 this year. According to the rail company, the drive behind the promotion is to encourage Spaniards to travel more following the restrictions which accompanied the coronavirus pandemic. Special offers Renfe is offering discounts for travel to cities in Spain such as Madrid, Seville, Granada, Malaga, Valencia, Alicante, Zaragoza or Barcelona, in addition to Montpellier, Paris or Lyon from Barcelona. As an example, under the promotion, tickets for journeys between Madrid and Barcelona will start at just 10.90 euros, while a trip from Alicante to Madrid will cost 16.60 euros. Passengers travelling from Malaga to Madrid can expect to pay 20.30 euros. In all, Renfe is offering a discount on 23 routes this Black Friday. Image: Renfe ARCHIVED - Spain considers third Covid vaccine for over 60s With coronavirus cases increasing in Spain, health authorities are looking at offering a booster jab to more age groups Despite the fact that Spanish authorities decided against administering a top-up Covid jab just last week, the Ministry of Health is set to meet on Wednesday November 17 to make a decision on whether to offer a booster vaccine to people aged between 60 and 69 years, as well as healthcare workers. The ministers will come to a conclusion based on the data offered in the latest Vaccine Report, which is expected to support the additional inoculation given the recent surge in cases in Spain. If the Minister of Health, Carolina Darias, decides tomorrow that a third jab is appropriate, then the decision will go to the Public Health Commission for approval. The move to triple-jab the older population was made because research has shown that immunity against Covid depletes with age. Regarding the younger generation, most people in this age bracket were vaccinated with AstraZeneca once its use was discontinued in younger populations. In the case of those aged between 60 and 69, Spain is suggesting offering a booster of messenger RNA vaccines Pfizer or Moderna and many communities have also asked the Government to provide a top-up to health workers, something which the Vaccine Committee already supports. In fact, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDE) made this recommendation a few weeks ago, and Austria, Ireland and Romania are already administering a third dose to their medical personnel. According to data from the Ministry of Health, since May 2020, some 150,975 Covid cases have been reported in healthcare workers in Spain, with just 480 infections recorded in the last seven days. Image: Archive ARCHIVED - Weather alert for the first winter DANA in Spain Snow and heavy rain are forecast from Sunday November 21 across much of Spain Following a scorcher of a summer and a relatively mild autumn so far, the State Meteorological Agency, Aemet, has warned that some adverse weather conditions are on the horizon. From Sunday November 21, an intense influx of cold air, rainfall and snow will make its way towards Spain, leading to a dramatic change from early next week, according to the experts. Francisco Martin from Meteored predicts that the cold front would be generated by an isolated depression at high levels called DANA and driven by a maximum of winds in height of the north component that could generate a storm on the surface.'' If this weather front arrives, Mr Martin expects an early wintery period to descend on Spain, whereby heavy rainfall would enter the northern part of the country first before spreading westwards and reaching coastal areas during the second half of next week. The precipitation will likely turn to snow in the Cantabrian Sea, the Pyrenees and throughout central Spain, according to the expert, and will be accompanied by strong winds which will intensify the feeling of cold. Both the Balearic and Canary Islands have been put on alert for heavy rain also. Although a DANA is possible, the meteorologist was quick to assure that it wont be at the same level as Storm Filomena , which ravaged Spain and left a widespread trail of destruction in its wake earlier this year. Rather, the storm predicted to begin on Sunday and continue into next week is a normal situation in November while Filomena was a very exceptional, rare and extraordinary case. Likewise, Aemet has confirmed that the chances of another storm of Filomenas magnitude occurring again this year is extremely low, around 1%, as weather phenomena of this kind are usually only seen once every 100 years. In general, Aemet predicts that temperatures will be higher than normal in most of Spain between now and the end of January 2022, particularly along the Mediterranean coast. Image: Archive Opposition parties, far right and anti-vax groups held gatherings in the capital on the national holiday. News: Receive favorite authors articles by email. Try the new feature and turn on the subscription. Font size: A - | A + Comments disabled Ten protest gatherings were announced in Bratislava on November 17, the national holiday marking the 1989 Velvet Revolution under the official name the Day of Fight for Freedom and Democracy. Most of the protests were organised by the opposition, far right groups and anti-vax groups. Hundreds of protesters gathered in front of the parliament building near Bratislava Castle for a protest organised by the opposition Smer party. Robert Fico laid wreaths at the memorial of Prague Spring leader Alexander Dubcek. The LSNS renegades who founded the Republika party addressed a separate gathering at Safarikovo Square near the Comenius University main building. In the days running up to the protest, they repeatedly posted announcements on social networks that buses would be transporting people for the gathering from mostly central-Slovak towns. In both cases, the participants criticised the ruling coalition and blamed them for the bad state the country is in. They particularly objected to the anti-pandemic measures and vaccination efforts. In the evening, the protest participants moved across the centre of Bratislava to the Government's Office building at Freedom Square. They blocked the traffic on some of the main traffic routes in the area. Most tram lines running through the centre were limited. https://sputniknews.com/20211116/india-urges-action-from-australia-after-life-sized-statue-of-mahatma-gandhi-vandalised-in-melbourne-1090767365.html India Urges Action From Australia After Life-Sized Statue of Mahatma Gandhi Vandalised in Melbourne India Urges Action From Australia After Life-Sized Statue of Mahatma Gandhi Vandalised in Melbourne The bronze statue a gift from the Indian government was unveiled by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the Australian Indian Community Centre in... 16.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-16T17:50+0000 2021-11-16T17:50+0000 2021-11-17T08:58+0000 melbourne mahatma gandhi narendra modi australia scott morrison victoria india /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/10/1090779026_0:17:1124:649_1920x0_80_0_0_f64217d1469cae5f4d3bfd898fabf94e.jpg On Tuesday, Indias diplomatic office in Canberra sought action against the offenders who vandalised Mahatma Gandhis statue in Melbourne.India has raised the matter with the local authorities as well as the Foreign Ministry of Australia, a government statement read. Earlier in the day, the former state chief of Uttar Pradesh and a socialist leader, Akhilesh Yadav, demanded the culprits be caught and punished harshly. "Our country should raise its voice around the world for this. This is an attack on the father of our nation as well as the global image of India and all Indians," Yadav said, filled with indignation over the incident.The Victoria police said an unknown number of offenders tried to behead the statue some time between 5.30pm on Friday and 5.30pm on Saturday, reported ABC News.The Knox Crime Investigation Unit detectives are investigating the matter. Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison dubbed the incident "disgraceful and extremely disappointing." The Indian government donated the statue to Australia as part of its celebrations to mark the 75th anniversary of its independence. As part of its festivities India, as well as staging events all over its country, has planned events in the nations where there are large numbers of Indians living, such as Australia, the US, and China. In his address at the Australian Indian Community Centre in Victoria on Friday, Morrison had said he would participate in India's independence day celebrations and hoped to receive Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi next year. In 2018, the local population rejected a proposal to erect the statue, floated by the Federation of Indian Associations of Victoria. However, FIAV again pushed the proposal after the Liberal party won the election. Matthew Guy had promised in the election that Gandhis statue would be installed at the Indian Community Centre. https://sputniknews.com/20210609/australia-mulls-keeping-india-returnees-at-controversial-christmas-island-detention-centre-1083108154.html melbourne australia victoria Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg melbourne, mahatma gandhi, narendra modi, australia, scott morrison, victoria, india https://sputniknews.com/20211117/as-eric-zemmour-climbs-in-polls-scholar-discusses-what-it-might-mean-for-israel-and-frances-jews-1090793030.html As Eric Zemmour Climbs in Polls, Scholar Discusses What it Might Mean for Israel and France's Jews As Eric Zemmour Climbs in Polls, Scholar Discusses What it Might Mean for Israel and France's Jews France's presidential race is set for April 2022 and one leading right-wing candidate has already created a gap with Marine Le Pen, another conservative... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T08:34+0000 2021-11-17T08:34+0000 2021-11-17T08:34+0000 france israel middle east /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090793636_0:138:3077:1869_1920x0_80_0_0_4aa97307b4d9ddd1342270eee45971de.jpg Eric Zemmour, one of the right-wing contenders in the French presidential race known for his controversial comments against Muslims, keeps climbing in polls, despite the fact that he hasn't formally declared his candidacy.According to a Harris Interactive opinion poll that was conducted earlier this month, the conservative commentator is projected to win 18-19 percent of first-round votes in the race set for April 2022, thus widening the gap with Marine Le Pen, the leader of the right-wing Rassemblement National party.President Emmanuel Macron is still leading in those polls, but the chances that Zemmour will be facing him in the second round of the presidential race is no longer a far-fetched prospect.No Political CorrectnessDr. Emmanuel Navon, an Israeli expert specialising in France and Israel-French relations at Tel Aviv University, pins Zemmour's rising popularity on a number of factors."But they also love the fact that he is unapologetic, he is not politically correct. He is talking to the elites, looking them straight in the eye, and he does it in a sophisticated manner. The right-wing public has been waiting for such a person."Jews Are Divided Over ZemmourHowever, France's Jews, says Navon, are rather divided over their attitude towards Zemmour and his opinions.Some, especially those who live in blighted neighbourhoods and must suffer on an almost daily basis from the harassment of Muslim immigrants, are more prone to vote for Zemmour.Others, who belong to the religious institutions, seem to oppose the right-wing contender, primarily because they are close to the country's liberal circles, specifically Macron.However, closeness to Macron is far from being the only factor, and Navon says Zemmour's views have been a major deterrent as well.French Interests FirstIf Zemmour comes to power, he is unlikely to make any concessions to France's Jewish citizens. Nor will he make compromises when it comes to Israel, believes Navon."Zemmour is supportive of Israel and he believes that the Jewish state has the right to defend itself. But at the same time, it is not the centre of his attention. Domestic issues are. At the end of the day, he will do what's best for the French interests," summed up the scholar.Those interests often contradict Israel's, and history remembers a number of instances, when the two states didn't see eye-to-eye with each other.In 1967, during Israel's Six Day War, France imposed an arms embargo on the region that primarily hurt the Jewish state. Decades later, in 2016, Paris decided to label Israeli products manufactured in the West Bank and the Golan Heights, and more recently, it slammed officials in Jerusalem for proceeding with settlement activity in territory outside the country's pre-1967 borders.Zemmour is likely to continue this and similar policies vis-a-vis Israel. Will that harm relations between the states? It's highly improbable, not when trade between the two nations continues to be a strong pillar. Hess Another pack of lies by Blade. Zemmour is an ardent Zionist, a dirty anti-Muslim Fascist. He was found guilty of hate crimes. In fact, he has a criminal record. And has often described himself as an Israeli Jew first, a French second. France will be Europe cesspool of racism and violence if Zemmour wins. 6 Alel Europeans if they have some conscious.. things could be different..but they are like ameridiots SLEEPING.dream on suckers.. thats why you EURO stupids 5 4 france israel middle east Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Elizabeth Blade Elizabeth Blade News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Elizabeth Blade france, israel, middle east https://sputniknews.com/20211117/bolton-claims-us-should-oust-belarus-lukashenko-to-nice-villa-on-riviera---report-1090810634.html Bolton Claims US Should Oust Belarus' Lukashenko to 'Nice Villa on Riviera' - Report Bolton Claims US Should Oust Belarus' Lukashenko to 'Nice Villa on Riviera' - Report Thousands of migrants, mostly from Middle Eastern countries, have congregated at the Poland-Belarus border amid cold weather in a bid to get into the EU... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T20:57+0000 2021-11-17T20:57+0000 2021-11-17T22:49+0000 belarus us poland alexander lukashenko coup migrant camp john bolton migrant migrant crisis poland-belarus migrant crisis /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090811478_0:0:3072:1728_1920x0_80_0_0_6f232cd90246cb17e7181c6308e3dd5c.jpg John Bolton, a former national security adviser to Donald Trump, stated that the US should come up with a way to remove Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko from power in order to thwart Russia from reclaiming the neighboring former Soviet republic, CNBC reported Wednesday.The Biden administration should look into finding the authoritarian leader "a nice villa on the Riviera," Bolton is quoted in the report as saying.Thus, Bolton figures, the US must prepare a strategy on "how to get Lukashenko out of power and find him a nice villa on the Riviera or something like that."The former adviser's remarks come as the European Union intensifies its efforts to impose sanctions on Belarus in response to an escalating migrant crisis along the EU's border with Poland. In order to deter attempts by migrants to enter its territory, Poland has reinforced its border guards and deployed the military. Brussels has accused Minsk of engineering the border crisis in retribution for sanctions, while Belarus has denied the allegations.The Belarusian Foreign Ministry has rejected claims that it is behind the immigration problem as "absurd," arguing that border controls had been improved and that state-owned airline Belavia was not transporting illegal migrants into the nation. Minsk has also said that it is the Western states' military ops in the Middle East and Africa that are to blame for the refugee influx.Bolton, who served in Trump's White House for 17 months between 2018 and 2019 before departing on tumultuous grounds, has a long history of provocative statements, having advocated for increasing US pressure on such countries as Iran, Venezuela and North Korea. Trump once said that if he ever listened to what Bolton said, a third world war would be imminent.On Monday, the Russian president's spokesman Dmitry Peskov claimed that Russia could help resolve the migrant crisis on Belarus' borders with the EU as a negotiating mediator. Putin earlier stated that Russia is ready to help in every possible way to resolve the situation with migrants that has developed on the EU-Belarus border. https://sputniknews.com/20211112/scholars-eu-poland-need-to-talk-with-minsk-instead-of-fanning-enmity-against-belarus--russia-1090688744.html keyboardcosmetics Iran (Venezuela) is going to attack us even if we have t do it ourselves ~ Bolton. 12 vot tak Why hasn't war criminal/zio-asset/traitor bolton been prosecuted yet. 2 8 belarus poland Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Kirill Kurevlev Kirill Kurevlev News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Kirill Kurevlev belarus, us, poland, alexander lukashenko, coup, migrant camp, john bolton, migrant, migrant crisis https://sputniknews.com/20211117/calling-americas-bluff-xi-biden-talks-confirmed-true-extent-of-us-ambiguity-on-taiwan---analyst-1090809827.html Calling Americas Bluff: Xi-Biden Talks Confirmed True Extent of US Ambiguity on Taiwan - Analyst Calling Americas Bluff: Xi-Biden Talks Confirmed True Extent of US Ambiguity on Taiwan - Analyst Chinese President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Joe Biden spoke by video uplink on Monday in their first face-to-face talks since Bidens inauguration in... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T18:39+0000 2021-11-17T18:39+0000 2021-11-19T06:35+0000 joe biden xi jinping analysis talks /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090799736_0:0:3071:1728_1920x0_80_0_0_1f0c8f7141fbe0810f50ccc5995adc45.jpg Mondays virtual talks between Presidents Xi and Biden were successful in the sense that they allowed China and the US to signal to one another that they did not want tensions to spill into open conflict, but did not, and could not, resolve the root causes of the competition between the superpowers, political observers, academics and think tank fellows queried by Sputnik suggest.I do think it is a successful meeting in that both sides can at least use the occasion to signal to the other party that it wants to stabilize the relationship, says Dr. Zhang Baohui, director of the Centre for Asian Pacific Studies at Hong Kongs Lingnan University.Characterizing the talks as an exercise in benign signaling, Zhang said that they have the potential to ease tensions after years of escalation.In international relations, especially for countries trapped in competition, benign signaling can moderate rivalry and make cooperation more likely. In that context, the meeting was a success. However, it must be mentioned that the root cause of Sino-US strategic competition is not resolved by this meeting and nobody expected that, the academic explains.John Renie Short, a political analyst and professor of public policy at the University of Maryland, says Beijing and Washington have very different viewpoints on what these root causes are, with the US establishment fearing that China is challenging Americas global hegemony, while the Peoples Republic fears that Washington is flexing its military might to try to hem Beijing in.Ralph Cossa, president emeritus of the Pacific Forum think tank in Hawaii, also believes that Mondays meeting, could be characterized as successful, in that it demonstrated to the world and [Xi and Bidens] respective publics that the two leaders were committed to managing the relationship to ensure tensions did not spill over into conflict.Taiwan TensionsXi and Biden discussed a broad range of topics during their meeting. In a press release, the White House said the two sides brought up the need to manage strategic risks to prevent tensions from spilling out into open conflict, as well as the existential nature of the climate crisis, energy, trade, and regional challenges including Afghanistan, North Korea and Iran. Biden also also brought up Washingtons concerns about the human rights situation in China, its unfair trade practices, and the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific region, according to the readout.On Taiwan, President Biden underscored that the United States remains committed to the one China policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances, and that the United States strongly opposes unilateral efforts to change the status quo or undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, the press release indicated.Chinas Xinhua news agency quoted Xis message to Biden directly on the Taiwan issue, with the president reportedly warning the US not to cross Chinas red lines.We have patience and will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts. [But if] the separatist forces for Taiwan independence provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures, Xi warned. He added that any attempt by the US to use the island to try to contain China was just like playing with fire, and that whoever plays with fire will get burnt.The sharp comments prompted Biden to stress Tuesday to reporters that the US was not going to change our policy [on Taiwan] at all, and that they have to decide they, Taiwan, not us and we are not encouraging independence.Xi's remarks come in the wake of recent revelations that US troops have secretly been stationed on Taiwan as far back as 2008, in violation of diplomatic agreements between Washington and Beijing. Last week, Taiwan's defence ministry confirmed that over 600 US troops visited the island since 2019 alone.Calling America's Bluff?China has a clear policy goal towards Taiwan, Dr. Short says, commenting on the uncharacteristically sharp remarks by Xi. It sees it as an integral part of the PRC. What has changed is the strategies and tactics to achieve this unification, the professor suggests.CSISs Cossa has a different view, accusing Xi of saber-rattling with his comments and suggesting that Taiwan has done nothing to provoke Beijing, and has certainly not crossed any red lines.The US supports the peaceful resolution of the cross-Strait issue and has a commitment to help Taiwan defend itself. As Beijing acts more aggressively toward Taiwan, the need to increase US support to help improve Taiwans defenses increases and the US is responding accordingly, Cossa believes.Dr. Zhang disagrees, pointing to the major upgrade in US-Taiwan defence ties observed in recent years, starting with the Trump administration and continuing under Biden, and its impact on Chinas calculations.Fortunately, Zhang believes, Mondays talks may have helped to bring about a new consensus in China-US relations, which might ease tensions over the long term.Jake Sullivan, the national security advisor, just recently said that it will be a mistake for the US to try to change Chinas political system. The US just wants a stiff competition with China. This could relieve Beijings concerns and sooth their relations, Zhang summed up. https://sputniknews.com/20211117/white-house-clarifies-chinese-president-xi-absolutely-not-an-old-friend-of-bidens-1090786467.html https://sputniknews.com/20211109/us-troops-have-been-secretly-stationed-on-taiwan-since-as-far-back-as-2008-pentagon-data-shows-1090598800.html Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Ilya Tsukanov Ilya Tsukanov News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Ilya Tsukanov joe biden, xi jinping, analysis, talks https://sputniknews.com/20211117/change-of-colors-democratic-texas-state-rep-leaves-for-gop-to-oppose-liberal-agenda-1090788272.html Change of Colors: Democratic Texas State Rep. Leaves for GOP to Oppose Liberal Agenda Change of Colors: Democratic Texas State Rep. Leaves for GOP to Oppose Liberal Agenda Guillen's decision reportedly came after Republican-led redistricting in Texas turned the lawmaker's already Republican-leaning district into firmly red... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T03:02+0000 2021-11-17T03:02+0000 2021-11-17T03:02+0000 democrat us texas texas state legislature republican viral /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090788379_0:0:1687:949_1920x0_80_0_0_ea093809350791e500ca2698d3f880db.jpg Texas State Representative Ryan Guillen announced that he has left the Democratic Party to join the Republican Party.According to the Texas Tribune report, the lawmaker, who was originally elected to the Texas House in 2002, spoke in person alongside Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) and Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan on Monday morning."Everybody has known that Ryan Guillen is really a Republican who is attached to the wrong label," Abbott said at the press conference. "Ryan, we're glad you finally came out of the closet."Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee, expressed her delight at Guillen's decision to switch parties, writing on Twitter that she would "like to welcome state Representative Ryan Guillen to the Republican Party."Last month, Guillen also defied his now-former party by voting for a bill that would prevent transgender school athletes from joining teams that corresponded to their gender identity. He was the lone Democrat to vote in favor of the bill, which Abbott eventually signed into law.According to the report, Representative J.M. Lozano was the last state legislator to switch parties in 2012. He was also a South Texas Democrat who switched to the Republican Party after redistricting. DuvalKingpin63 Gerrymandering is horrible America. 3 vot tak The pork belly looks like a republican, so might as well be one. No doubt he got a pat on the back from massa netanyahoo. :-D 3 3 texas Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Kirill Kurevlev Kirill Kurevlev News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Kirill Kurevlev democrat, us, texas, texas state legislature, republican, viral https://sputniknews.com/20211117/china-builds-warships-for-fighter-jets-that-could-sink--kill-occupants-report-claims-1090787825.html China Builds Warships For Fighter Jets That Could Sink & Kill Occupants, Report Claims China Builds Warships For Fighter Jets That Could Sink & Kill Occupants, Report Claims Expert: China Builds Warships For Fighter Jets That Would Sink & Kill Occupants, Report Says 2021-11-17T02:08+0000 2021-11-17T02:08+0000 2021-11-17T02:08+0000 military & intelligence intel chinese navy chinese military us-chinese standoff in south china sea us south china sea /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/09/11/1080485060_0:264:3071:1991_1920x0_80_0_0_55620901c2d5334a6a79c90884a60ca1.jpg Sam Armstrong of the Henry Jackson Society think tank has claimed that China is secretly constructing military vessels that are capable of carrying fighter jets, the Sun reported on Tuesday.Referring to recent reports about China constructing a mock-up of a US aircraft carrier for missile attack training, Armstrong pointed out that there is no need for such efforts unless the country is planning a bombing raid on an aircraft carrier.Analysts have of late been almost unanimous in the view that the US may soon lose its naval advantage. Chinese naval modernization includes a wide range of programs for the production of new ships, aircraft and weapons, improvement of maintenance and logistics, along with the development of a naval doctrine and the improvement of naval personnel.The exact size and composition of Chinas naval force have never been revealed by Beijing. To date, it is believed that the country has at its disposal 355 warships, including large surface ships, submarines, aircraft carriers, landing and minefield ships. According to The Washington Times, China is set to acquire a total of 460 warships by the end of this decade.Apart from that, China has introduced a new naval component of its nuclear triad, nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines (SSBN) of Type 094. The warships are capable of firing ballistic missiles with a range of 7,200 kilometers, which means that they could reach the US' Hawaii and Alaska as well as the US West Coast.Reports of Chinas increasingly powerful naval forces were accompanied by news of its two alleged testings of hypersonic weapons earlier in the summer.The Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the South China Sea have been deemed the Near Seas by Beijing, an area the country considers to be a core national interest. The Near Seas are bounded to the west by an island chain that includes Okinawa, Taiwan and the Philippine, with all of them being mainly controlled by the US. A potential area of local military conflict between the US and China is believed to be in the area surrounding Taiwan and in the South China Sea. https://sputniknews.com/20211115/navigating-red-lines-on-taiwan-in-quest-for-common-ground-reportedly-key-to-biden-xi-summit-1090745128.html Holger H. The US Navy just need to F*ck off from the south China Sea and the risk of sinking that vessel and killing its occupants will be over... 9 vot tak The title is nonsensical. The article is about some propagandist making a big deal about what most country's militaries do. Training. And is worth about as much as the title. Thumbs down. 6 7 us south china sea Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Alexandra Kashirina Alexandra Kashirina News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Alexandra Kashirina military & intelligence, intel, chinese navy, chinese military, us-chinese standoff in south china sea, us, south china sea https://sputniknews.com/20211117/congress-politician-plans-to-sue-bollywood-actress-kangana-ranaut-for-insulting-mahatma-gandhi-1090802012.html Congress Politician Plans to Sue Bollywood Actress Kangana Ranaut for Insulting Mahatma Gandhi Congress Politician Plans to Sue Bollywood Actress Kangana Ranaut for Insulting Mahatma Gandhi Last week, actress Kangana Ranaut claimed that India only attained independence in 2014 when the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power. Several... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T14:37+0000 2021-11-17T14:37+0000 2021-11-17T14:37+0000 mahatma gandhi actress indian national congress congress controversy india /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/09/0a/1088949267_0:362:2048:1514_1920x0_80_0_0_d8eedbe43824648d2486c013a2e84545.jpg Legal action is being taken against Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut for making defamatory remarks against Indian freedom struggle icon Mahatma Gandhi, Maharashtra State Congress chief Nana Patole said on Wednesday, adding that the party will register an official complaint against her with the city police.Regarded as the "Father of the Nation" in the country, Mahatma Gandhi was the leader of India's non-violent independence movement against British rule.Kangana on Tuesday took a swipe at Gandhi and said freedom fighters Subhas Chandra Bose and Bhagat Singh got no support from him. She even claimed that there was evidence suggesting Gandhi wanted Singh to be hanged.She went on to poke fun at Gandhis philosophy of non-violence. Kangana also said that freedom fighters were "handed over" to the British by those "who had no courage" to fight oppression but were "power-hungry" and "cunning."She shared an old newspaper article from the 1940s with the headline, "Gandhi, others had agreed to hand over Netaji (Subhas Chandra Bose)" and wrote, "Either you are a Gandhi fan or Netaji supporter. You can't be both, choose and decide."Urging her fans to choose your heroes wisely," Kangana said it's about time people know their history and their heroes. "Because just placing them all [political leaders] in one box of your memory and every year wishing them all birth anniversaries is not enough in fact it's not just dumb but highly irresponsible and superficial," she added. During a TV interview with Times Now last week, Kangana claimed that India attained its real independence in 2014 when Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power.In 2014, the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) registered a thumping victory in the general elections throwing Congress the party of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his descendants out of office.Several politicians have called out the actress for insulting India and the freedom fighters and wrote to the Mumbai Police demanding a case be filed against her. In the past, Kangana has sparked several controversies for being outspoken on social media about a number of issues such as the sudden suicide of the late actor Sushant Singh Rajput, nepotism in the film industry, the ongoing farmer protests in India, drugs, and much more. Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sangeeta Yadav https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/1b/1080292803_0:121:960:1081_100x100_80_0_0_7490b319dab9611e309056b177265184.jpg Sangeeta Yadav https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/1b/1080292803_0:121:960:1081_100x100_80_0_0_7490b319dab9611e309056b177265184.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sangeeta Yadav https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/1b/1080292803_0:121:960:1081_100x100_80_0_0_7490b319dab9611e309056b177265184.jpg mahatma gandhi, actress, indian national congress, congress, controversy, india https://sputniknews.com/20211117/ex-daesh-financial-chief-reportedly-says-groups-income-reached-12bln-a-year-in-most-active-years-1090797452.html Ex-Daesh Financial Chief Reportedly Says Group's Income Reached $1.2Bln a Year in Most Active Years Ex-Daesh Financial Chief Reportedly Says Group's Income Reached $1.2Bln a Year in Most Active Years MOSCOW (Sputnik) The income of Daesh* during the years of its intense activity reached over $1.2 billion per year, the organisation's former deputy and... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T10:17+0000 2021-11-17T10:17+0000 2021-11-17T10:17+0000 news terrorism income daesh /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/04/0f/1082643327_0:67:1280:787_1920x0_80_0_0_26d3bc9fd06244c06a71504dc086ca31.jpg In October, the Iraqi authorities announced the arrest of Jasim, who served as a deputy of late Daesh* leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Jasim was also close to the current Daesh* leader, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi.Jasim said the terrorists received their main income from oil smuggling. Oil products were offered to owners of small refineries and plants. The group also sold part of the oil to neighbouring countries. Another part was sold on the black market at $180 per tonne, he said.Moreover, the fighters were reportedly engaged in robberies, thefts, collecting tribute from controlled territories and extortion.We took tribute from wealthy people, gas station owners, companies, traders and doctors under the pretext of helping the organization's fighters. Some wealthy people were killed for refusing to pay. We blew up the houses of others, kidnapped them or a member of their families. Tributes in Nineveh Governorate reached over 500,000 dollars per month. Half went to al-Baghdadi, and the other half was placed at the disposal of the governor of Nineveh," the newspaper quoted Jasim as saying.The terrorist said that in 2016, after his appointment as the head of the group's financial department, the treasury had $250 million and 3 tonnes of gold. According to Jasim, Daesh* issued its own currency pure gold coins. Daesh* fighters reportedly received over $30,000 for every car bomb used to attack the security forces, he added.In October 2019, then-President Donald Trump said that late Daesh* leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi killed himself during an operation by US special forces in Syria's Idlib. The American leader thanked Iraq, Russia, Syria and Turkey for assistance in this operation.In November 2020, Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said Daesh* had intensified its activities in the country, including in Al Anbar, Kirkuk, Diyala, Nineveh governorates.*Daesh (IS/ISIS/ISIL) is a terrorist organisation banned in Russia and many other countries. https://sputniknews.com/20211113/over-5000-completely-vetted-afghan-commandos-may-turn-to-daesh-if-not-evacuated-1090704487.html Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 news, terrorism, income, daesh https://sputniknews.com/20211117/goodbye-kamala-white-house-may-be-preparing-to-oust-vice-president-reports-suggest-1090788705.html Goodbye, Kamala?: White House May Be Preparing to Oust Vice President, Reports Suggest Goodbye, Kamala?: White House May Be Preparing to Oust Vice President, Reports Suggest Goodbye, Kamala?: White House May Be Preparing to Oust Vice President, Reports Suggest 2021-11-17T04:11+0000 2021-11-17T04:11+0000 2021-11-17T04:11+0000 us vice president kamala harris biden administration /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/08/19/1083712331_0:216:2082:1387_1920x0_80_0_0_2ff097b57836c41c0c2de7338e30036c.jpg The relationship between the current US president Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris may be bad enough to lead to her dismissal, despite the fact that the White House does not want to give the impression there is a split between the two, Fox News The Five suggested Tuesday.Other hosts noted that the White House has tried to tackle the rumors head on, with spokesperson Jen Psaki tweeting that the vice president is not only a vital partner to the president, but a bold leader who has taken on key, important challenges facing the country from voting rights to addressing root causes of migration to expanding broadband.A recent report by Fox News correspondent Chad Pergram was also mentioned, in which he said that theyre preparing something in Congress that they have not done in many, many years Its about the process by which you go about confirming a new vice president.Later Pergram said in a podcast that he had received a letter with a call to "start to familiarize yourself with the confirmation process not just in the Senate, but in the House, for a vice president."Taking her post in January, Harris became not only the first female vice president, but also the first non-white woman to hold the position. As a reflection of the high hopes large circles of anxious Americans had for her, she was even placed on the cover of Time magazine.Soon after the immigration crisis at the border began to take on an unprecedented urgency, Harris was designated as the presidents representative on the issue. Apart from that, she was assigned to address electoral issues, in particular, promoting controversial voting rights reform. The difficulty of these issues and measures undertaken was so unpopular among many Republicans and other parts of the political establishment that some even speculated that she purposely was being given difficult assignments to undermine her. Criticism also came after a number of Harris' foreign policy initiatives, including her recent trip to France.A poll showed last week that Harris approval ratings have hit the bottom with just 28 percent supporting the vice president, while Biden is currently at 38 percent.Following a number of setbacks, especially regarding US immigration policy, a number of former and current Harris aides along with members of the administration, Democrats and other officials in interviews with CNN have criticized the vice president, saying that she is "not prepared" for her duties. The vice president herself also reportedly complained that she felt limited in her political activities, according to some sources. https://sputniknews.com/20211116/despite-photo-ops-biden-harris-admin-clearly-experiencing-less-unity---gop-strategist-1090762107.html Hajj Qassem No, the world had turned their back on US because of him...even US military had to talk him out of war, can you imagine?! The guy was nuts, just like all of the rest. 16 iamanyam The Dimcrats had known that Harris is light-weight. They cynically got her for ideological reason: female and non-white, to appeal to the left wing, not for proven abilities or potential performances. Of course, she was meant to replace dementia-ridden Biden. Too bad, she has proven too stupid even for the Democrats. 9 19 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Alexandra Kashirina Alexandra Kashirina News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Alexandra Kashirina us, vice president, kamala harris, biden administration https://sputniknews.com/20211117/greek-protesters-burn-us-flags-at-annual-march-marking-pro-democracy-uprising-1090813494.html Greek Protesters Burn US Flags at Annual March Marking Pro-Democracy Uprising Greek Protesters Burn US Flags at Annual March Marking Pro-Democracy Uprising ATHENS (Sputnik) Greeks burned American flags on Wednesday as tens of thousands marched to the US embassy in Athens on the anniversary of a 1973 anti-junta... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T22:16+0000 2021-11-17T22:16+0000 2021-11-17T22:16+0000 greece athens us police march demonstration junta /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090813037_0:161:3069:1887_1920x0_80_0_0_ea16745feb9baeb8a69cb3b9adcecdd9.jpg The United States has been blamed for backing the far-right military regime that seized power in Greece in 1967. The junta rule culminated in a pro-democracy protest at Athens Polytechnic, in which an unknown number of people were killed when a tank was rammed into the university gate.Protesters chanted "US out, NATO out" and "Americans are murderers of peoples" as they converged on the embassy, which was cordoned off by police buses, a Sputnik correspondent said.An American flag was also set on fire outside the US consulate general in Greeces second-biggest city of Thessaloniki where a smaller demonstration was held. Public broadcaster ERT reported scuffles between protesters and police outside a trade fair center. vot tak Cool. :-D 0 1 greece athens us Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 greece, athens, us, police, march, demonstration, junta https://sputniknews.com/20211117/hackers-reportedly-go-on-global-hacking-spree-targeting-media-governments-using-israeli-spyware-1090804917.html Hackers Reportedly Go on Global Hacking Spree Targeting Media, Governments Using Israeli Spyware Hackers Reportedly Go on Global Hacking Spree Targeting Media, Governments Using Israeli Spyware Israels US ally recently slapped sanctions on NSO Group makers of the infamous spyware Pegasus, after the spyware was shown to have been used by governments... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T14:01+0000 2021-11-17T14:01+0000 2021-11-17T14:01+0000 middle east israel hacking uk /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/01/15/1081840302_90:0:561:265_1920x0_80_0_0_326d6a00e206c517c33aa577740fcd26.jpg A computer hacking tool developed by Candiru, a Tel Aviv-based surveillance and cyberespionage technology firm catering to government clients, has been used to systematically attack websites in the UK, Iran, Syria and Yemen, ESET, a Slovak internet security company has discovered.The victimized websites belong to media outlets in the UK, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia, as well as Hezbollah; to government institutions in Iran (Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Syria (including the Ministry of Electricity), and Yemen (including the Ministries of Interior and Finance); to internet service providers in Yemen and Syria; and to aerospace/military technology companies in Italy and South Africa. The attackers also created a website mimicking a medical trade fair in Germany, ESET said in a comprehensive analysis published Tuesday.The ultimate goal of the attacks were said to include collecting IP geolocation data and the targeted computers system information, and, if desired, to enable attackers to hijack the infected machines.The affected websites include the Middle East Eye a UK-based news site focused on Middle Eastern affairs, the site of Hezbollahs Al Manar television channel, and Yemens Almasirah a media outlet affiliated with the Houthis. thesaudireality.com, a Saudi dissident website critical of the monarchy, was also reportedly among those attacked.Among other targets were Piaggio Aerospace, an Italian arms maker, and Denel, a South African aerospace and military tech giant.Of the 21 websites attacked, eight are based in Yemen, three are Syrian, and three are operated by Hezbollah.The Middle East Eye announced that it was considering legal action against parties which it suspects of involvement in the attacks in the attacks, without elaborating on who it believes may be responsible.In a report in July, the University of Torontos Citizen Lab software developer reported, citing a lawsuit brought by a former Candiru employee, that the companys clients include the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, as well as Singapore and Uzbekistan.In the wake of ESETs reporting, a Candiru spokesperson assured Forbes that the company itself does not carry out attacks on clients behalf, and that it does not have any knowledge about how clients use its tools. The company is selling its products to government agencies onlythe company and its product dont hack websites, the spokesperson said.Candiru was founded in 2014, and is named after a parasitic catfish. The company is so secretive that it does not have public website, and little information exists online about its earnings, employees, and other basic information. The firm is only allowed to export its products if Israels Defence Ministry grants it an export license.The source or sources of the attacks are unclear. They reportedly ceased abruptly in mid-2021, after Citizen Lab researchers issued a report on Candirus use by governments to target journalists and activists in Armenia, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Yemen, Spain, the UK, and Turkey, and to have been operated from inside nations including Hungary, Indonesia, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.The US Commerce Department surprisingly slapped Candiru and its more famous cousin, NSO Group, with sanctions earlier this month. NSO Groups Pegasus spyware, which can infect phones using zero clicks (i.e. without any user interaction), and is impossible to remove, came into the public spotlight in July after the non-profits Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International shared a list of over 50,000 people whose phones were targeted. The software is capable of hijacking a phones camera and microphones, essentially turning it into a mobile spying device, and allows operators to access users contacts, message and call history, and more.The victims of the military-grade spyware package reportedly included over a dozen world leaders, among them French President Emmanuel Macron, Iraqi President Barham Salih, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, and others, as well as a bevy of former heads of state and government, UN and WHO officials, journalists, dissidents, and opposition politicians.NSO Group defended itself by claiming that it sells its spyware to governments only for use against terrorists and criminals, suggesting that Pegasus had saved tens of thousands of lives. Instead, it was used by governments to target foreign adversaries and domestic opponents, with Mexican drug cartels also reportedly getting their hands on the software and using it to intimidate journalists. https://sputniknews.com/20211031/iran-zionist-regime-the-americans-behind-massive-hack-attack-on-gas-station-network-1090363581.html https://sputniknews.com/20211028/hackers-breach-leak-personal-data-of-israeli-defense-ministry-servicemembers-emails-of-benny-gantz-1090265544.html https://sputniknews.com/20211103/us-slaps-israeli-pegasus-spyware-developer-with-sanctions-1090455697.html mandrake Latest revelation. The crime-group in tel aviv needs to be destroyed and the jews kicked all the way to hell out of palestine! 5 mandrake With certainty close to 100 pct, its the jewish government in tel aviv behind this 4 4 middle east israel Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Ilya Tsukanov Ilya Tsukanov News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Ilya Tsukanov middle east, israel, hacking, uk https://sputniknews.com/20211117/india-conducts-military-exercise-to-augment-winter-stocks-for-troops-along-china-border-1090798044.html India Conducts Military Exercise to Augment Winter Stocks for Troops Along China Border India Conducts Military Exercise to Augment Winter Stocks for Troops Along China Border India and China have furnished their troops with military assets and improved logistics so they can remain on duty in forward posts of the Line of Actual... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T13:28+0000 2021-11-17T13:28+0000 2021-11-17T13:28+0000 pla c-130j transport aircraft china indian army military aircraft indian air force (iaf) people's liberation army (pla) navy india /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/09/18/1089358863_0:64:1280:784_1920x0_80_0_0_982757ec25c1af8612d43d9dbd181974.jpg The Indian Air Force (IAF) and the Indian Army have carried out a joint airlift exercise, Operation Hercules in forward areas of the western sector of the Line of Actual Control (LAC). This is where Indian troop deployment is equal to that of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA).The ministry added that the aircraft used in the airlift included Boeing C-17 troop and cargo transporters, the four-engine strategic airlifter Ilyushin IL-76, and the Antonov An-32 for military transport, which took off from one of the forward bases of Western Air Command based in Leh.The effort was a real-time demonstration of the inherent heavy-lift capability of the Indian Air Force, which has played a major role in ensuring the ability to respond quickly to any contingency during the past, the statement read.In October, Indian army chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane said: "The military build-up by China in the eastern Ladakh region and new infrastructure development to sustain the large-scale deployment are matters of concern.If the PLA continues its deployment, the General emphasised that India will maintain its presence across the sectors. The army has already stockpiled vast amounts of fuel, rations, engineering and medical provisions, clothing, and climate-appropriate vehicles. It has also built several hundred camps with adequate electricity, water, heating, and other facilities in eastern Ladakh.On 9 November, Chinas Global Times released a video displaying the deployment of logistics in the forward areas to remain prepared for winter. This means that logistics is a key factor for border troops to overcome the winter, and in this area, China has big advantages over India, a Chinese military observer noted.The PLA has also equipped its frontline troops with portable oxygenators, oxygen chambers, and individual oxygen supply devices, Chinas Defence Ministry said in the first week of November. The Indian and Chinese armies clashed in June last year near the Galwan Valley resulting in the death of 20 Indian soldiers and four PLA troops. The two sides have held 13 rounds of talks to ease the tensions but have remained unsuccessful since June last year. https://sputniknews.com/20211029/india-deploys-us-weapons-including-chinook-helicopters-to-ramp-up-defence-at-disputed-china-border-1090308276.html china Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg pla, c-130j transport aircraft, china, indian army, military aircraft, indian air force (iaf), people's liberation army (pla) navy, india https://sputniknews.com/20211117/india-france-commit-to-enhance-intel-sharing-to-counter-radicalisation-extremism-in-asia-1090792480.html India, France Commit to Enhance Intel Sharing to Counter Radicalisation, Extremism in Asia India, France Commit to Enhance Intel Sharing to Counter Radicalisation, Extremism in Asia France has supported India on several multilateral platforms, including the UN Security Council, in New Delhis push to sanction organisations engaged in the... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T13:42+0000 2021-11-17T13:42+0000 2021-11-17T13:42+0000 afghanistan pakistan france narendra modi emmanuel macron us afghanistan taliban radicalization terrorism /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/106240/98/1062409896_0:238:3287:2087_1920x0_80_0_0_1f83f15a90fa473645cfd0c8c06a1b34.jpg India and France have stressed the need for all countries to take concerted action against all the terrorist networks, including Al-Qaeda*, Daesh*, and various Pakistan-based groups.The two strategic partners have also pledged to designate more entities and individuals as terrorist or extremist, and pursue various sanctions.They also focused on the growing misuse of the internet for terrorist or violent extremist purposes. High-rank officials of the two countries stressed the need for all countries to ensure those territories that are under their control cannot be used to plan, launch terrorist attack against any other country, or shelter or train terrorist fighters.The meetings took place in Paris amid increasing interactions among countries on the issue of Afghanistan. After the Delhi Regional Security Dialogue and Troika plus (US, Russia, China, and Pakistan) summits held last week, US Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West visited Moscow and New Delhi on Tuesday. West has assured India it would work together with allies to address shared interests in order to secure a stable and peaceful Afghanistan.Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi, acting Foreign Minister of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, said on Wednesday that with the elimination of the country's opposition, no threat is posed to the region or world from Afghanistan, and a pathway has been paved for positive cooperation.* terrorist group banned in Russia and many other countries pakistan france afghanistan indo-pacific Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg pakistan, france, narendra modi, emmanuel macron, us, afghanistan, taliban, radicalization, terrorism, extremism, indo-pacific, india Warsaw Will Not Recognise Any Deal on Migrants Reached Between Germany and Belarus Without Poland Poland will not recognise any agreement between Germany and Belarus on the migration crisis reached without Warsaw, Poland's President Andrzej Duda said on Wednesday, commenting on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone call with Belarusian and Russian leaders. "I told the president [of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier] that Poland will not recognize any agreements made, as the saying goes, over our heads," Duda said during the press conference in the capital city of Montenegro, Podgorica. According to Duda, Steinmeier explained to him that in conversations with Lukashenko and Putin, Merkel only expressed Germany's "firm position" on the migration crisis. "The president said that Merkel's conversations with both Putin and Lukashenko ... concerned only the presentation of Germany's firm position, which is based on the fact that they should abandon attacks on the border, stop generating this crisis, this hybrid attack," Duda said. On Monday, Merkel and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko discussed by phone the prospects for resolving the migration crisis and providing humanitarian aid to migrants at the Belarus-Poland border. On 10 November, Merkel also discussed the issue of the migration crisis with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Thousands of migrants amassed just inside Belarus along the border with Poland, near the Bruzgi checkpoint in the Grodno region, in hopes of getting onto the territory of the European Union. Poland, Latvia, and Lithuania have accused Belarus of facilitating the movement of migrants to the EU to get back at Brussels for sanctions and urged for more punitive measures against Minsk. The latter rejects the accusation and maintains that it is unable to tackle the influx of migrants under the weight of Western sanctions. https://sputniknews.com/20211117/migrant-crisis-continues-at-belarus-poland-border-1090790095.html Situation at Belarusian-Polish Border After Migrants Made Attempts to Storm It Situation at Belarusian-Polish Border After Migrants Made Attempts to Storm It Thousands of migrants have been crowding at the western border of Belarus for the past few weeks. Poland has advanced its border guard and deployed the... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T08:02+0000 2021-11-17T08:02+0000 2021-11-17T11:11+0000 belarus europe poland poland-belarus migrant crisis /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/09/1090587044_128:0:2562:1369_1920x0_80_0_0_dff5252568c2171f412f9c87488fcb8f.jpg Live from the Belarus-Poland border as migrants have set up tents near the Bruzgi crossing point.On Tuesday, Polish security forces used tear gas, stun grenades, and water cannons against migrants on the border with Belarus, who attempted to tear down fences and cross into Polish territory.The Belarusian Health Ministry has said that 21 migrants from Morocco, Turkey, Cuba, Iraq, Sri Lanka, Syria, Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, and Sudan had sought medical help since border tensions escalated last Wednesday. Four people were hospitalised, including three children.Since July, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland have reported an increase in the number of illegal migrant crossing from neighbouring Belarus. In September, Poland declared an emergency in the regions bordering Belarus, sending military personnel and additional police forces to the border and erecting barbed wire fences at various sites.Follow Sputnik's Live Feed to Find Out More! belarus poland Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 belarus, europe, poland https://sputniknews.com/20211117/negotiations-ongoing-after-armenia-azerbaijan-conflict-reignites-biden-xi-meeting-concludes-1090787514.html Negotiations Ongoing After Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Reignites; Biden-Xi Meeting Concludes Negotiations Ongoing After Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Reignites; Biden-Xi Meeting Concludes Armenia's security council secretary Armen Grigoryan has requested military assistance from Russia after border clashes resulted in casualties on its border... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T08:20+0000 2021-11-17T08:20+0000 2021-11-17T08:21+0000 nicaragua joe biden cuba armenia azerbaijan the critical hour president xijinping radio /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090787489_29:0:1273:700_1920x0_80_0_0_7b0d552c79478501a47464f3f8f60e2b.png Negotiations Ongoing After Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Reignites; Biden-Xi Meeting Concludes Armenia's security council secretary Armen Grigoryan has requested military assistance from Russia after border clashes resulted in casualties on its border with Azerbaijan. Dr. Ken Hammond, professor of East Asian and global history at New Mexico State University, joins us to discuss China. Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden seemed to work around some of the difficulties between the two world powers in a virtual meeting. Biden is reported to have reassured the Asian leader that the US would continue with the "One China" policy and not support Taiwan's independence.Professor Danny Shaw, author, activist, and professor of Latin American studies, joins us to discuss South America. The US empire and its client states have combined to levy sanctions against Nicaragua after incumbent President Daniel Ortega won another landslide victory. Also, Bolivian President Luis Arce argues that Latin America can no longer operate under the Monroe Doctrine, in which the US empire assumes administrative power over the entire continent.Mark Sleboda, Moscow-based international relations security analyst, joins us to discuss the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Armenia's security council secretary Armen Grigoryan has requested military assistance from Russia after border clashes resulted in casualties on its border with Azerbaijan. In November, the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh and border districts of the Syunik Region of Armenia worsened sharply.Dr. Linwood Tauheed, associate professor of economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, joins us to discuss the economy. The Democrats are demanding a tax cut for the rich, which will be the most costly part of President Biden's "Build Back Better" program. Economists are arguing that it is a political gift to the GOP, which will use it to increase their victories in 2022.Scott Ritter, former UN weapon inspector in Iraq, joins us to discuss foreign policy. Scott explains the reality of America's narcissistic "Rules-Based Order" campaign in which the US organizes a world order that maintains its status as the unipolar power. He argues that this system is outdated and no longer feasible as other world powers arise.Randi Nord, writer and activist, joins us to discuss the Saudi war in Yemen. There is another push in Congress and amongst international peace organizations for the US to stop supporting the brutal military campaign against the impoverished nation.Steve Poikonen, national organizer for Action4Assange, joins us to discuss Julian Assange. The recent cover-up of the US Air Force's slaughter of civilians in Syria demonstrates the danger of the Assange prosecution precedent. The US military made significant efforts to cover up and conceal the damage done at every step.Ajamu Baraka, 2016 US vice-presidential candidate for the Green Party, joins us to discuss Cuba. The Black Alliance for Peace has written a document to condemn the US empire's attempt to overtly undermine the integrity and territorial sovereignty of Cuba. They argue that the reactionary anti-government protests were funded and supported by US State Department operatives in violation of international law.We'd love to get your feedback at radio@sputniknews.com Truth 101 "International rules based order" --- Everyone striving to enrich themselves upon the misery of those with less education, less wealth or less whiteness of skin. As evidenced by the educated upper-half of society hoarding all the land, wealth and political power. 0 1 nicaragua cuba armenia azerbaijan Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Wilmer Leon https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/02/12/1082114047_0:-1:238:238_100x100_80_0_0_4e3adef3e334e381bffe19d388f4b776.jpg Wilmer Leon https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/02/12/1082114047_0:-1:238:238_100x100_80_0_0_4e3adef3e334e381bffe19d388f4b776.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Wilmer Leon https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/02/12/1082114047_0:-1:238:238_100x100_80_0_0_4e3adef3e334e381bffe19d388f4b776.jpg nicaragua, joe biden, cuba, armenia, azerbaijan, the critical hour, president xijinping, , radio https://sputniknews.com/20211117/nicaraguan-supreme-court-urges-president-to-quit-organization-of-american-states-1090811944.html Nicaraguan Supreme Court Urges President to Quit Organization of American States Nicaraguan Supreme Court Urges President to Quit Organization of American States MANAGUA (Sputnik) - Judges of the Supreme Court of Justice of Nicaragua called on the country's president on Wednesday to denounce the Charter of the... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T21:25+0000 2021-11-17T21:25+0000 2021-11-17T21:25+0000 nicaragua sovereignty general election organization of american states (oas) /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090811838_0:59:3339:1937_1920x0_80_0_0_7807e73bf2fc7a459fb3b6d36c099417.jpg On Friday, the majority of participants of the 51st assembly of the OAS adopted a controversial resolution on Nicaragua. The document condemns the recent general election in the country, calling them "neither free, nor fair," and advises the Permanent Council of the organization analyze the situation before the end of November and take countermeasures.On November 7, the president's ruling Sandinista Front gained a majority of votes in the election, where observers of the OAS were not admitted. The incumbent president and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, won the election.Nicaraguan Foreign Minister Denis Moncada told Sputnik that the OAS was an American tool of aggression and meddling in Latin American countries. NthrnNYker59 "condemns the recent general election in the country, calling them "neither free, nor fair," " ---- The same drivel regurgitated by fascist amerika and it's stooges about Equador --- see how THAT turned out. 4 Ladyshadow The entire world would be better off if the US minded its own business. 4 2 nicaragua Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 nicaragua, sovereignty, general election, organization of american states (oas) https://sputniknews.com/20211117/rittenhouse-prosecutors-case-reportedly-on-brink-of-collapse-after-they-withhold-key-evidence-1090808118.html Rittenhouse Prosecutors Case Reportedly on Brink of Collapse After They Withhold Key Evidence Rittenhouse Prosecutors Case Reportedly on Brink of Collapse After They Withhold Key Evidence Antioch, Illinois resident Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed two men and wounded a third during the August 2020 riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin sparked by the... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T16:40+0000 2021-11-17T16:40+0000 2021-11-17T16:40+0000 trial evidence mistrial kyle rittenhouse /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090808091_66:0:3707:2048_1920x0_80_0_0_181b5f3b6ec1ea50c677b24d77f9a446.jpg The prosecutions case in the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial threatens to come apart at the seams amid claims that the state willfully held back high definition drone footage of the Kenosha shootings, and provided the defence with a low quality video instead.The footage in question was turned into one of the central pillars in the prosecutions case, and features Rittenhouse, 17 at the time of the incident, pointing his assault rifle at one of his victims, giving the state grounds to say that he provoked the 25 August 2020 violence which left two people dead and a third injured.The drone video shows Rittenhouse sprinting away from Joseph Rosenbaum one of the two men he would end up fatally shooting, through a parking lot, reeling around at one point to point his semi-automatic rifle at Rosenbaum, then continuing to run, and spinning a second time and emptying several rounds into the 36-year-old as he approached within less than a meter of the teen.On November 5, the fifth day of trial on this case, the prosecution turned over the defense footage of a drone video which captured some of the incident from August 25, 2020. The problem is the prosecution gave the defense a compressed version of the video. What that means is the video provided to the defense was not clear as the video kept by the state, the motion obtained by the Mail reads, noting that the defence was not given the better quality video until two days before closing arguments, and after the deadline on the submission of evidence.The motion specified that while the file size of the defense video is 3.6 MB, the states was 11.2 MB. Further, the dimensions of our video are 480 x 212, [while] the states [are] 1920 x 844.On the basis of the new information, Rittenhouses defence called for a mistrial, and for teen to be protected from a new trial under constitutional rules prohibiting double jeopardy (being tried twice for the same alleged crimes).The failure to provide the same quality footage in this particular case is intentional and clearly prejudices the defendant, the motion alleged.The new grounds for a mistrial being cited by the defence comes following their earlier allegations of prosecutorial mistrial and over-reach over the alleged violation of Rittenhouses right to remain silent, and Assistant District Attorney Thomas Bingers attempt to enter new evidence which Judge Bruce Schroeder had explicitly excluded. Both of the earlier actions prompted Schroeder to angrily explode at Binger.America on Edge Over Rittenhouse TrialJudge Schroeder threw out the misdemeanor charge against Rittenhouse on possession of a dangerous weapon by a minor on Monday, ruling that the law on possession was unclear. Jury deliberations in the Rittenhouse case began the same day, with the teen facing life in prison on charges including intentional homicide if convicted.The Rittenhouse trial has bitterly divided Americans over whether he acted as a vigilante or a civic-minded activist, with liberal progressives also alleging that there was an element of racism involved in his suspected crimes even though all his victims were white.Along with Rosenbaum, Rittenhouse also shot and killed Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, 28, with his rifle, which he brought with him to the riot after traveling several kilometers from his home in Antioch, Illinois. All three of Rittenhouses victims have criminal records, with Rosenbaum convicted for the sexual abuse of minors, Huber having two domestic abuse convictions involving his siblings, and Grosskreutz facing charges, but not convicted of, noise violations, disobeying police and felony burglary, plus a misdemeanor for use of a firearm while intoxicated, which he was convicted on. The prosecution says the victims criminal records have nothing to do with the case.Rittenhouse's defence maintain that their client is innocent, and that he acted in self-defence. TEP Maybe there will be riots whatever the verdict ... just 'because'. 8 Dang! NOT GUILTY!! GO KYLE!! 7 10 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Ilya Tsukanov Ilya Tsukanov News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Ilya Tsukanov trial, evidence, mistrial, kyle rittenhouse https://sputniknews.com/20211117/russia-hopes-us-will-abandon-plans-to-dominate-black-sea-foreign-ministry-says-1090809413.html Russia Hopes US Will Abandon Plans to Dominate Black Sea, Foreign Ministry Says Russia Hopes US Will Abandon Plans to Dominate Black Sea, Foreign Ministry Says MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russia expects the United States to abandon plans to dominate the Black Sea, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said. 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T18:06+0000 2021-11-17T18:06+0000 2021-11-17T18:06+0000 news russia us /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/107042/65/1070426506_0:0:5320:2993_1920x0_80_0_0_029dd89d85e912e99a2c09ec625b16b7.jpg Earlier, the US Navy's 6th Fleet announced that its command flagship Mount Whitney was heading to the Black Sea for joint operations with NATO forces."This is, of course, an open attempt to test the Russian reaction, to increase tensions in the Black Sea region," Zakharova said at a briefing. "All this fits into the concept of containment, the creation of some very aggressive situations, the destabilization of the situation in general.""This all leads to a decrease in predictability, seriously increases the risk of escalation. I hope that common sense in Washington exists and that it, if available, will prevail over irresponsible plans to achieve dominance in the Black Sea," she said.On Seized Diplomatic PropertyRussia is fundamentally not going to sell the diplomatic property seized from it in the United States, a diplomatic source said on Wednesday."There was no practical conversation, there were only hints that Russia could be helped to sell this dacha. Russia, in principle, will not agree to this," the source said.He clarified that the Russians still did not have access to this property."The Russian Embassy in the United States sends notes every two weeks with a request to provide it to all selected objects, but receives a polite refusal," he added.Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that Washington continued to deny Russian diplomats access to Russian diplomatic property in the United States, and even the idea of selling it had been voiced. She noted that the Russian diplomatic property, despite its status, was subjected to searches, and was actually seized at the moment. LINDADREW i hope you can stop them russia 5 vot tak The israelis want war in order to keep the wrst under their control. That's what this boils down to. 4 6 us Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 news, russia, us https://sputniknews.com/20211117/russia-rejects-attempts-to-divide-syria-create-quasi-states-instead-special-envoy-says-1090812198.html Russia Rejects Attempts to Divide Syria, Create Quasi-States Instead, Special Envoy Says Russia Rejects Attempts to Divide Syria, Create Quasi-States Instead, Special Envoy Says DAMASCUS (Sputnik) - Russia does not accept attempts to divide the Syrian Arab Republic and create quasi-states on its territory and will continue to help... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T21:41+0000 2021-11-17T21:41+0000 2021-11-17T22:47+0000 russia syria israel bombings sovereignty settlement /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/02/05/1081984713_0:114:3054:1832_1920x0_80_0_0_2fe2b64bd7cf32f13087846115b67937.jpg "Russia is aimed at further searching for ways of the Syrian settlement in the interests of preserving the independence, unity and territorial integrity of the state. Any attempts to divide the country and create quasi-state formations, regardless of the pretexts under which such attempts are made, remain unacceptable to us," Lavrentyev said in during a roundtable, which took place in Damascus as part of the visit of the Russian interdepartmental delegation.He stressed that the internal Syrian dialogue should take place naturally and without any external pressure."The situation cannot be allowed to overcome the line after which the existence of Syria as a unified state would be impossible. We will continue to assist the Syrian leadership in achieving national and inter-religious harmony in the country," Lavrentyev concluded.Russia Opposes Israeli Bombings of Syria"As for the issue raised regarding the illegal bombings of Syrian territory by Israel: we strongly oppose these inhuman actions and call for contacts at all levels with the Israeli side on the need to respect the sovereignty, territorial integrity of Syria and stop these bombings," Lavrentyev said during a round table in Damascus as part of the visit by a Russian interdepartmental delegation."In this context, a military response would be counterproductive, because no one needs a war on the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic," he said.Lavrentyev said such actions by Israel go beyond the framework of international law. smilingjack Again - the sound voice of reason. Russia. 11 Hess Syria is a civilised nation with civilised people. By contrast, Israel is a barbaric terrorists entity with uncivilised leftover Europeans. 8 11 russia syria israel Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 russia, syria, israel, bombings, sovereignty, settlement https://sputniknews.com/20211117/russian-exporters-present-their-solutions-for-smart-cities-in-baku-1090801114.html Russian Exporters Present Their Solutions for 'Smart Cities' in Baku Russian Exporters Present Their Solutions for 'Smart Cities' in Baku Moscow (Sputnik) More than 30 Russian companies presented their products in Azerbaijan during a two-day business mission organised by the Russian Export... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T13:15+0000 2021-11-17T13:15+0000 2021-11-17T13:15+0000 baku russia azerbaijan /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/106115/84/1061158415_0:285:5472:3363_1920x0_80_0_0_13bba2b8edfe7e2225c9add3bbb14c1c.jpg Thirty-one Russian companies, as well as 36 key Azerbaijani companies and agencies, participate in the mission. Russian exporters will present their goods and services for urban planning and development in the form of a digital city," the report reads.More than 150 bilateral meetings between Russian and Azerbaijani companies are planned within the framework of the business mission. The REC group is ready to support the projects of Russian exporters in the Republic of Azerbaijan and to offer the most comfortable solutions for their realization. These include financial support measures provided by Roseximbank, such as direct loans to foreign buyers, loans to foreign buyers' banks as well as export-pledge financing of receivables," Azer Talibov, chairman of Eximbank, said during the opening ceremony.In addition, Russia and Azerbaijan agreed to support small and medium-sized enterprises in the two countries in the area of mutual trade. A memorandum of understanding was signed by REC and the Small and Medium Business Development Agency of Azerbaijan.The business mission, which started on 17 November, continues a series of activities conducted by the REC to show the potential and efficiency of Russian exporters in Azerbaijan.For example, in July 2021. the REC held a business meeting in Azerbaijan where 11 of the largest Russian companies presented their products. https://sputniknews.com/20210702/eximbank-of-russia-boosts-cooperation-with-azerbaijan-on-infrastructure-projects-1083290997.html baku azerbaijan Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 baku, russia, azerbaijan https://sputniknews.com/20211117/rzd-rec-agro-express-train-departs-russian-federation-for-uzbekistan-1090807137.html RZD-REC Agro Express Train Departs Russian Federation for Uzbekistan RZD-REC Agro Express Train Departs Russian Federation for Uzbekistan First Agro Express, an accelerated container train service for the swift shipments of agro-industrial goods between Russia and Uzbekistan, departed Russia on... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T15:44+0000 2021-11-17T15:44+0000 2021-11-17T15:44+0000 news russian railways russian export center jsc (rec) uzbekistan /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/104697/02/1046970237_93:0:3734:2048_1920x0_80_0_0_53f0b6d73b68fb1e8e68c986c83375d9.jpg On Monday, the first batch of products left for Uzbekistan; we expect a return trip with fresh fruit by the end of November, Reshetnikov said. He noted that the main task of the project is to increase rail freight turnover between the countries to 1 million tonnes by 2030. Reshetnikov recalled that the Agro Express project is implemented by the Russian Export Centre JSC jointly with JSC Russian Railways Logistics, and integrates the railways of Uzbekistan, Russia, and Kazakhstan. This project covers not only the development of agricultural enterprises in our countries but also specific territories, Reshetnikov added. According to him, a route is created at the governmental level and all the procedures are worked out. Next, regions of both countries will have opportunities to build logistics, distribution centres, to involve the maximum chain of suppliers and to build up volumes.In turn, Russian Railways said on Wednesday that JSC Russian Railways Logistics jointly with REC sent by Agro Express train from Tambov to Tashkent frozen poultry meat produced by Resource Group of Companies, one of the largest Russian exporters of the agro-industrial complex. The cargo will travel in refrigerated containers on a freight train from Tsna railway station (South Eastern Railway) to Sergeli station (JSC Uzbekistan Temir Yullari), transiting through Kazakhstan.Plans are to work out the technology and cut down on formalities during the test delivery. In the future, the participants expect to reach regular traffic on this route, the press release stated.Agro Express, a special-purpose container train service of RZD Logistics and REC for the swift delivery of agro-industrial goods to China, Turkey and CIS countries. The service is constantly being improved by expanding the list of routes and applying modern transportation solutions, using refrigerated containers and flexitanks. In June, RZD Logistics, the Russian Export Centre and Uzbekistan's agro-logistics operator Uzagrologistics Centers have signed an agreement to implement this service. Transportation of goods according to the green corridor principle ensures a maximum delivery time of no more than five days for products from Uzbekistan to the Russian Federation. uzbekistan Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 news, russian railways, russian export center jsc (rec), uzbekistan https://sputniknews.com/20211117/scott-morrison-lists-aukus-utility-in-countering-chinas-dominance-in-disruptive-technologies-1090794366.html Scott Morrison Lists AUKUS Utility in Countering China's Dominance in Disruptive Technologies Scott Morrison Lists AUKUS Utility in Countering China's Dominance in Disruptive Technologies Australia has received furious reactions from some of the ASEAN members after Canberra joined a trilateral group named AUKUS with the US and UK in... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T11:42+0000 2021-11-17T11:42+0000 2021-11-17T11:42+0000 aukus asean quantum us australia scott morrison artificial intelligence nuclear submarines quadrilateral security dialogue (quad) indo-pacific /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/0c/02/1081341494_0:17:999:579_1920x0_80_0_0_c6eae8088208abe488e89b0adbf667f6.jpg Releasing the government's Critical Technological Blueprint on Wednesday, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said that AUKUS will accelerate the country's future weapons and cyber defence technologies programme. Morrison said that these technologies are critical to the national interest and promised $111 million in funding to keep strategic rivals from controlling industries ranging from cyber security to medicine.The prime minister highlighted 63 technologies, but the government will initially focus on supporting nine. The first of these will be quantum technology. Australia is working with like-minded countries, liberal democracies in particular, to ensure global technology rules and norms reflect those values liberal democratic values, he said.Meanwhile, the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper reported that 63 rapidly developing technologies could be blocked from being shared with Chinese universities and firms as the "federal government looks to stop Beijing from gaining dominance across a range of emerging sectors."The Prime Minister also underscored that AUKUS will play critical role in achieving the goal mentioned in the strategy document.Referring to AUKUS as a pact of much more than nuclear submarines, Morrison said that three countries will prepare a working plan by 15 December that will guide them in developing common and complementary security and defence-related science and industrial bases.The work plan will involve exchanges of information, personnel, and advanced technologies and capabilities; joint planning, capability development and acquisitions, among others.In mid-September, Australia, the US, and the UK signed a trilateral security arrangement with the agreement promising Canberra nuclear reactor technology to construct nuclear submarines at any Australian shipyard. Following the announcement, the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) expressed serious concerns, fearing the programme could fuel an arms race in Southeast Asia. Australian officials have dismissed the criticism, arguing Canberra's nuclear submarines will only be conventionally armed and only help it counter a massive military build-up in the Indo-Pacific region. https://sputniknews.com/20211114/australia-vows-to-support-us-in-taiwan-in-event-of-confrontation-with-china-1090731296.html WhatTheFishIsThis Morrison Clearly Delusional .. 6 1 australia indo-pacific Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Rishikesh Kumar https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e4/08/04/1080055820_0:0:388:389_100x100_80_0_0_40018ee210946d65d49ffba4f4c008e1.jpg asean, quantum, us, australia, scott morrison, artificial intelligence, nuclear submarines, quadrilateral security dialogue (quad), indo-pacific, india, uk, aukus https://sputniknews.com/20211117/sweden-labelled-covid-exporter-in-international-study-1090791286.html Sweden Labelled COVID Exporter in International Study Sweden Labelled COVID Exporter in International Study Over the course of the pandemic, Sweden has become the focal point of international attention due to its unorthodox strategy that included no restrictions and... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T06:19+0000 2021-11-17T06:19+0000 2021-11-17T06:19+0000 news europe sweden scandinavia covid-19 /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/09/1090580512_0:512:2730:2048_1920x0_80_0_0_21b0da12734ab64c69f5b1a2c8a847c1.jpg Sweden's maverick COVID-19 strategy led to the infection being be transmitted outside of the country, an international study has concluded.The study, conducted by researchers at Uppsala University, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health and the University of Sydney in Australia and presented in the European Infection Control Agency's journal Eurosurveillance, is based on data from 71,000 patient samples. Among others, the study described how infection chains originating in Sweden subsequently spread to other countries, affecting them despite measures taken. For instance, despite severe travel restrictions in Finland, the country was particularly affected, the study said.Conversely, there was virtually no export of the virus from Finland to Sweden, according to the researchers. They concluded that it was Finns not covered by the Finnish entry ban who imported infection from Sweden when they returned to their home country.The study also indicated that infection chains in Sweden included more people than in neighbouring countries, and concluded that there is a possibility that the number of COVID cases in Sweden itself and other Nordic countries would have been lower, had Stockholm chosen a more restrictive approach.This is not unlikely, Petterson said, suggesting other factors that may have affected the outcome.At the onslaught of the pandemic, Sweden drew international attention for its standalone approach in tackling the novel coronavirus. As the Western world locked down and introduced laborious restrictions, Sweden initially continued in a business-as-usual mode, relying on recommendations with no hard restrictions at all. While stricter measures were ultimately introduced, Sweden subsequently removed them again.Worldwide, Sweden's approach was received with a mixed bag of emotions ranging from praise to harsh criticism. Despite excess morbidity and mortality, many have hailed the Swedish way as business-friendly, resilient and viable. Still, it has come under a lot of scrutiny, even internally. Earlier, a government-appointed COVID Commission, which is still in the process of evaluating the Swedish strategy, lambasted the authorities for their failure to protect the old and the frail, noting that the Swedish response was marred by lateness and a substandard preparedness level.To date, Sweden has seen 1.18 million cases of COVID, with nearly 15,100 deaths, which is more than its Scandinavian neighbours combined. https://sputniknews.com/20211029/a-breakdown-swedens-belated-covid-response-under-harsh-criticism-from-state-commission-1090312804.html https://sputniknews.com/20211115/swedish-state-epidemiologist-pins-countrys-elevated-covid-death-toll-on-immigrants-1090737411.html sweden scandinavia Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Igor Kuznetsov Igor Kuznetsov News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Igor Kuznetsov news, europe, sweden, scandinavia, covid-19 https://sputniknews.com/20211117/ted-cruz-presses-dhs-head-mayorkas-over-biden-cages-for-migrant-kids-at-southern-border-1090785429.html Ted Cruz Presses DHS Head Mayorkas Over 'Biden Cages' for Migrant Kids at Southern Border Ted Cruz Presses DHS Head Mayorkas Over 'Biden Cages' for Migrant Kids at Southern Border Earlier in the spring, Cruz shared a photograph of youngsters jammed into pens taken at the Donna migrant processing facility in Texas. Ever since, the senator... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T00:52+0000 2021-11-17T00:52+0000 2021-11-17T01:10+0000 us-mexico border us border ted cruz alejandro mayorkas cage migrant crisis migrant viral biden administration /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090787235_0:106:3072:1834_1920x0_80_0_0_cef01a6a2a95267f28518923a7802ccc.jpg Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas grilled Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Tuesday about children being held in "Biden cages" at the US-Mexico border.How many children have been in the Biden cages in calendar year 2021? Cruz asked the DHS chief during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.Cruz replied by acknowledging that Mayorkas may disagree with the term, however, he pressed the Biden administration official by asking him "How many children have been in the Biden cages?"Mayorkas insisted that he was not aware of the use of the term "cages" in regard to the migrant detention facilities at the border, and what Cruz specifically was talking about."Enclosures in which they are locked in, in which I took photographs and put them out because you blocked the press and didnt want people to see the Biden cages," Cruz explained.Cruz then displayed a photograph of kids jammed into pens taken at Donna earlier this year in the spring. He said that in the photo, children were seen "sleeping on floors, crashed in upon each other. When I took this photograph, the rate of COVID-19 positivity was over 10 percent."He asked Mayorkas what is the exact number of children in such conditions of detention, to which the head of the DHS said that he had repeatedly emphasized that the Border Patrol station was not a place for children.Mayorkas eventually admitted that the president has not yet visited the border himself, while Vice President Kamala Harris, who has been at the border, also did not visit the Donna facility, prompting renewed opposition from Mayorkas to the Texas senator's insistence on using the term "cage."Cruz then continued by stating that Democratic legislators had not visited the border at all and did not see the center for migrants at the border, to which Mayorkas objected that, according to his information, senators had visited the border and CBP facilities there. The Texas senator decided to continue grilling Mayorkas with questions about how many women and children were sexually abused en route to the US, and how many COVID-19 positive migrants or those with a criminal history were released into the country. To all these questions, an apparently confused Mayorkas replied that he did not have any such data.Prior to the exchange, Mayorkas admitted before the Senate committee that the US immigration system is "broken," and also added that not all of the 1.2 million illegal immigrants with final removal orders should be deported."We cannot remove 1.2 million individuals," the DHS head said, adding, "I would not necessarily accept the fact that all of them have received due process." https://sputniknews.com/20211019/ted-cruz-says-bidens-cages-for-migrants-bigger-more-full-than-ever-while-no-democrat-cares-1090048420.html Hess Ted Cruz should be arrested and charged. He should be put in jail for retards, homosexuals and corrupt politicians. 4 1 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Kirill Kurevlev Kirill Kurevlev News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Kirill Kurevlev us-mexico border, us, border, ted cruz, alejandro mayorkas, cage, migrant crisis, migrant, viral, biden administration https://sputniknews.com/20211117/three-photojournalists-attacked-by-polish-soldiers-near-belarus-border-polish-media-group-says-1090804724.html Three Photojournalists Attacked by Polish Soldiers Near Belarus Border, Polish Media Group Says Three Photojournalists Attacked by Polish Soldiers Near Belarus Border, Polish Media Group Says WARSAW (Sputnik) - The Polish media organization Press Club Polska said on Wednesday that people in the uniform of Polish soldiers attacked three photo... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T13:54+0000 2021-11-17T13:54+0000 2021-11-17T13:54+0000 poland-belarus migrant crisis belarus europe poland /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090804698_0:0:3079:1733_1920x0_80_0_0_7885dd56eaa33829203d87a239d20e3e.jpg "An attack on photojournalists in the village of Wiejki. On Tuesday, 16 November, at about 16:00 [13:00 GMT], a group of people in the uniform of the Polish Army attacked three photojournalists: Maciek Nabrdalik, Macieja Moskwe, and Martin Divisek while they were performing their journalistic duties," Press Club Polska said in a statement.The reporters were shooting not far from Wiejki village, which is outside the area of the state of emergency introduced in September, and then tried to return to the village of Michalow by car, but were stopped by people in Polish army uniforms. The latter pulled them out of the car while "pushing them and using profanity," according to the statement.The journalists, who were handcuffed and held for more than an hour until the police arrived, described their behavior as "exceptional aggression." As they waited for the police, the soldiers searched the car and checked the contents of the reporters' cameras, the group said.Upon the arrival of the police, the journalists were released from handcuffs, but when requested to address the situation, the law enforcement officers refused to take any other action besides informing them of the possibilty of filing a criminal complaint.The photojournalists announced their intention to do just that.The Polish Defenxe Ministry denied that any abuse of power took place. Since earlier this month, thousands of migrants have camped along the border with Poland from the Belarusian side near the Bruzgi checkpoint in the Grodno region, in hopes of getting onto the territory of the EU. Poland has boosted border security. On Tuesday, some migrants attempted to storm the border fence, which resulted in clashes with Polish security forces. https://sputniknews.com/20211116/belarus-claims-poland-used-special-means-with-toxic-chemicals-against-migrants-on-border-1090780621.html Dee Bo Clearly belarus false flag attack...lol 1 Dee Bo Looks like belarus's plan back fired. Have fun with this humanitarian nightmare. Couldn't of happened to a nicer dictator...HAHAHA 1 2 belarus poland Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 belarus, europe, poland https://sputniknews.com/20211117/us-judge-sentences-q-anon-shaman-to-41-months-in-prison-for-role-in-capitol-riot-reports-say-1090808534.html US Judge Sentences 'Q-Anon Shaman' to 41 Months in Prison for Role in Capitol Riot US Judge Sentences 'Q-Anon Shaman' to 41 Months in Prison for Role in Capitol Riot In September, the "shaman" pleaded guilty to obstructing an official proceeding when together with hundreds of other protesters stormed the building in order... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T17:02+0000 2021-11-17T17:02+0000 2021-11-17T17:40+0000 us us capitol /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090808965_0:0:3072:1728_1920x0_80_0_0_418a25d7618bb78b12e635f6ec2bdbf1.jpg The US Capitol rioter nicknamed the "QAnon Shaman" was sentenced to 41 months in prison for his role in the deadly 6 January attack by a mob of pro-Trump supporters. US District Judge Royce Lamberth also sentenced Chansley to three years probation once he's released.Jacob Chansley, a 34-year-old Arizona man, was nicknamed the "QAnon Shaman" for the horned headdress he wore during the riots. According to Reuters, while in detention, Chansley was diagnosed by prison officials with transient schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression. Back in 2006, the US Navy found Chansley suffering from a personality disorder but still declared him "fit for duty," defence lawyer Albert Watkins reportedly said.Four people died during a violent storming of the US Capitol on 6 January 2020 as Congress was about to certify Democrat Joe Biden's victory over Republican Donald Trump. About 140 police officers were injured during the clashes with protesters, and four police officers who defended the Capitol later committed suicide. Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives and acquitted by the Senate on a charge of inciting insurrection by delivering a speech before the storming began, in which he claimed his victory was stolen from him and called on his supporters to "fight like hell." https://sputniknews.com/20211110/presidents-are-not-kings-judge-oks-houses-access-to-6-january-capitol-riot-related-docs--1090615106.html Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Sofia Chegodaeva Sofia Chegodaeva News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Sofia Chegodaeva us, us capitol https://sputniknews.com/20211117/us-senators-lobby-india-on-defending-taiwan-in-case-of-possible-invasion-from-china-1090793961.html US Senators Lobby India on Defending Taiwan in Case of Possible Invasion from China US Senators Lobby India on Defending Taiwan in Case of Possible Invasion from China The fate of the self-governed Chinese province of Taiwan figured prominently in the virtual summit between US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T14:57+0000 2021-11-17T14:57+0000 2021-11-17T14:57+0000 joe biden xi jinping china india taiwan national defense authorization act (ndaa) quadrilateral security dialogue (quad) /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/11/1090805149_0:127:3072:1855_1920x0_80_0_0_11dc1c21e1107ac80ae606d2d372cfa5.jpg A US Congressional delegation led by Senator John Cornyn, the co-chair of the Senates India Caucus, disclosed on Tuesday that Congress members engaged in extensive discussions on the "Taiwan question" when they travelled to the Philippines, Taiwan, and India last week.In other words, whats at stake here is much larger than the future of one nation, Cornyn, a Republican senator from Texas, also remarked.An official press release from the Indian government about the meeting between the US Congress delegation and Indian leadership, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, makes no mention of Taiwan-related topics.India doesnt officially recognise Taiwan and adheres to the One-China Policy. Cornyn reckoned that if China was able to capture Taiwan there wasnt a reason to believe that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will stop there.China also has territorial claims against the Philippines, Japan, Vietnam, and India, he noted.Passage of the NDAA, which is an annual affair, in the US Congress is instrumental in sanctioning Americas defence spending. The Joe Biden administrations initial estimate of $753 billion in federal defence spending has already shot up to $778 billion. While the US House of Representatives has cleared the NDAA, the Bill is yet to be cleared in the Senate.Cornyn said that NDAA was critical in the US-led goal in defending Taiwan from a possible Chinese "invasion," as he echoed fears that such a scenario could take place by 2027, or even earlier.Former US Indo-Pacific Commander Philip Davidson said in September that Beijing could "invade" Taiwan by 2027.The Taiwan Partnership Act would establish a partnership between the US National Guard and Taiwanese defence forces just to strengthen Taiwans preparedness, he said.Should troops need to be deployed quickly in case of a crisis, they would be armed with the same knowledge and skills as the dedicated US guardsmen. The NDAA also proposes other provisions to increase cooperation with Taiwan and equip the US Indo-Pacific command with more resources, added Cornyn.Cornyn further urged the countries of the "Quad" grouping, which comprises Australia, India, and Japan (besides the US) to stand up to defend Taiwan in the future.Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton said last week that it wasnt inconceivable that his government would join the US in defending Taiwan if the self-governed province is invaded by China.Xi Warns Biden Against Crossing 'Red Line' on TaiwanChina has consistently maintained that it's not open to granting any concessions on the Taiwan question and seeks "reunification" with the renegade province."Achieving China's complete reunification is an aspiration shared by all sons and daughters of the Chinese nation. We will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts," Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian said at a press conference on 16 November. He was spelling out Beijing's position on the Taiwan question, as specified by President Xi Jinping during his virtual summit with Biden earlier in the day."That said, should the separatist forces for Taiwan independence provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures," Zhao further said.While it has regularly called for "peaceful reunification" with Taiwan, Beijing hasn't ruled out the use of force should American or any other country support Taiwan's "independence."According to a White House readout of the meeting, Biden re-affirmed America's commitment to the "One China policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances."The Joint Communiques, signed between 1971 and 1982, are considered by Beijing as the "political foundation" of relations between itself and the US. Among other things, the agreements stipulate that the US doesn't recognise any other Chinese nation but the People's Republic of China, which translates into US' respect for the "One China" policy. https://sputniknews.com/20211116/biden-reportedly-told-xi-jinping-us-doesnt-support-taiwans-independence-1090764601.html https://sputniknews.com/20210925/china-warns-us-will-dump-india-australia-and-japan-as-four-nations-convene-for-quad-summit-1089391336.html https://sputniknews.com/20211117/xi-warns-biden-supporting-taiwan-is-playing-with-fire-1090779857.html WhatTheFishIsThis All those Delusional Western Supporters of Taiwan, and Rhetoric for Cannon Fodder .. Truly Insane !! 1 1 china india Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Dhairya Maheshwari Dhairya Maheshwari News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Dhairya Maheshwari joe biden, xi jinping, china, india, taiwan, national defense authorization act (ndaa), quadrilateral security dialogue (quad) https://sputniknews.com/20211117/white-house-clarifies-chinese-president-xi-absolutely-not-an-old-friend-of-bidens-1090786467.html White House Clarifies Chinese President Xi Absolutely Not An Old Friend of Bidens White House Clarifies Chinese President Xi Absolutely Not An Old Friend of Bidens When US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping held a video chat on Monday night, Xi opened by calling Biden his old friend. However, the White... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T00:16+0000 2021-11-17T00:16+0000 2021-11-17T00:17+0000 joe biden xi jinping us china friends /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/0b/10/1090769248_0:198:3072:1926_1920x0_80_0_0_fc595d07098c4cca0f09aa2bd4fe790f.jpg "Although it's not as good as a face-to-face meeting," Xi said as part of the opening pleasantries on Monday, "I'm very happy to see my old friend."While the 3.5-hour conversation was only the third time theyd spoken since Biden took office in January, the two met several times previously when Biden was vice president under Barack Obama, including once in 2011 in Sichuan before Xi had become Chinas head of state. The following year, just before Xi was chosen as President Hu Jintaos replacement, he also toured the United States with Biden, during which time they had more than 20 hours of private conversations, the New York Times reported at the time.However, a decade later and with both men now heading nuclear superpowers on opposite sides of an increasingly polarized strategic competition, that relationship has changed. Earlier this year, Biden explicitly rejected the notion he had some friendly connection with his communist counterpart, telling a reporter that we know each other well. Were not old friends. Its just pure business.He also referred to Xi during an April address to Congress as an autocrat who is deadly earnest on [China] becoming the most significant, consequential nation in the world.Thats why on Tuesday, a Bloomberg correspondent asked White House spokesperson Andrew Bates what Xi meant by the comment.However, it seems thats something the two sides actually agree on."When we Chinese call someone an old friend, we mean we've known him for a long time, Shi Yinhong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University of China in Beijing, told Reuters. But an 'old friend' doesn't necessarily mean he is still a real friend. Barros Sure. No country can be a US "friend". 9 Nonyank XI takes the high road and the US stays in the cesspool. 4 2 us china Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Morgan Artyukhina https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/04/17/1082703728_0:0:800:800_100x100_80_0_0_0b6ce8daa7411284d60c8a0b6d84186d.jpg Morgan Artyukhina https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/04/17/1082703728_0:0:800:800_100x100_80_0_0_0b6ce8daa7411284d60c8a0b6d84186d.jpg News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Morgan Artyukhina https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/07e5/04/17/1082703728_0:0:800:800_100x100_80_0_0_0b6ce8daa7411284d60c8a0b6d84186d.jpg joe biden, xi jinping, us, china, friends https://sputniknews.com/20211117/whoever-gives-birth-to-a-child-swedish-tax-agency-switches-to-gender-neutral-language-1090789485.html 'Whoever Gives Birth to a Child': Swedish Tax Agency Switches to Gender-Neutral Language 'Whoever Gives Birth to a Child': Swedish Tax Agency Switches to Gender-Neutral Language Sweden's push toward gender neutrality, which includes ways to facilitate gender change notwithstanding the biological body, has spurred criticism from the... 17.11.2021, Sputnik International 2021-11-17T05:51+0000 2021-11-17T05:51+0000 2021-11-17T05:51+0000 news society europe sweden women men scandinavia gender neutrality /html/head/meta[@name='og:title']/@content /html/head/meta[@name='og:description']/@content https://cdnn1.img.sputniknews.com/img/103592/36/1035923692_0:0:4368:2458_1920x0_80_0_0_744d9c3bc5cd59499cc58f596875858b.jpg The Swedish Tax Agency has switched to a more gender-inclusive language in a bid to become more accommodating, in effect abandoning the notions of motherhood and fatherhood.We are not talking about mothers and fathers, but we are talking about the one who gives birth to the child, Swedish Tax Agency business developer Ingegerd Widell told national broadcaster SVT.As an example, she cited the authority's legal guidance on births.Whoever gives birth to a child automatically becomes the child's guardian. This applies regardless of whether the person giving birth to the child is a woman or a man, the guidance said.Asked whether this change is easy to implement, Ingegerd Widell admitted obstacles along the way.On social media, this approach raised eyebrows.The Swedish Tax Agency will now become more 'inclusive', among other things by talking about 'the one who gives birth to the child', 'regardless of whether it is a man or a woman'. Why would the Swedish Tax Agency avoid facts? Only women can give birth, Sweden Democrat MEP Jessica Stengrud tweeted.Weird. Even the virgin birth featured a woman, another one mused.Earlier this month, the Swedish government presented a bill to make it easier for citizens to change their legal gender. If the bill gets hammered out, changing one's registered gender will be done largely based one's preference instead of medical assessment, and will become about as easy as changing one's name.However, the Swedish Women's Lobby suggested that the bill would undermine decades of gender equality work.Former Social Minister Annika Strandhall, the chair of Social Democrat Women, by contrast, called the bill extremely important and well-balanced, pledging to vote yes. Still, even she agreed that there are clouds of unrest and ventured that the perspective of completely removing men and women would subvert gender equality work.The bill, presented by the Swedish Ministry for Social Affairs, will also allow children starting from the age of twelve to apply for a new legal gender in the national population register. To change the legal gender for a pre-teen, just the consent of the guardian will suffice, with no medical examination or approval from healthcare authorities required. Today, a doctor's statement is needed to change one's legal gender, which can be done starting from the age of 18.So far, the national-conservative Sweden Democrats are the only party that voiced clear opposition toward the proposal. https://sputniknews.com/20211110/sweden-to-lower-threshold-for-legal-gender-change-to-twelve-1090612961.html anne00marie I remember the feminist movement, who made the males redundant. No complaints, from the masses. Now a minority has decided to make the females redundant and still no complaints from the masses. Personally, I enjoy being a female and have no desire to have my gender erased, and no doubt many males felt the same, when the feminists were making males gender neutral. 1 anne00marie For some reason have had my comment erased. Must not mention anything that upsets the minorities, now must we? It wasn't even offensive, by any stretch of the imagination. 1 2 sweden scandinavia Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 2021 Igor Kuznetsov Igor Kuznetsov News en_EN Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 1920 1080 true 1920 1440 true 1920 1920 true Sputnik International feedback@sputniknews.com +74956456601 MIA Rosiya Segodnya 252 60 Igor Kuznetsov news, society, europe, sweden, women, men, scandinavia, gender neutrality Caribbean A ntigua and Barbudas Prime Minister Gaston Browne has described the ongoing United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 26) in Glasgow as a public relations exercise, even as he acknowledged that there had been some benefits to the event. Browne said that the establishment of the Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law is likely to be one of the most significant outcomes of the November 1-12 conference. The commission creates an avenue through which larger countries can be held accountable for their role in global warming and its impact on the most vulnerable states. We will be writing to the international tribunal on the Law of the Sea to get a final determination on the liability and I am pretty sure by the next Cop for sure we would have made a lot of progress and this matter will become far more significant, said Browne, who chairs the Alliance of Small Island States, (AOSIS). Browne said that AOSIS had detailed a number of issues it wanted debated ahead of the meeting, including compensation for loss and damage due to climate change from the worlds major polluters. The Prime Minister, who is also chairman of the 15-member regional integration grouping, CARICOM, shared the recent views echoed by the executive director of the Belize-based Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCC), Dr Colin Young, who said that the larger countries were basically kicking the can down the road when it comes to meeting their commitments on climate change. Browne said that among the matters not considered at the meeting were increased subsidies to green energy, reducing fossil fuels and an increased scale for funding for small islands. We want to see subsidies going to renewables to reduce the price. Electric vehicles (EV) for example . . . we need to see subsidies going . . . to reduce the price of electric vehicles so that we can transit from these fossil vehicles into EVs. We also wanted to see increased scale of funding so that more monies would be made available to small island states and other developing countries to adapt and mitigate against the effects of climate change and even to have some form of mechanism for compensation for loss and damage. Those are among the objectives we had established going into the COP 26, but unfortunately if you look beyond the incremental gains COP 26 was merely a PR exercise, a great PR platform, Browne said. But he did acknowledge that some benefits had been attained. He said it is now left to the SIDS and other developing countries that have to deal with the actions of the developed countries. If we dont increase our climate ambitions to reduce emissions, to keep global temperatures below 1.5 degrees Celsius then obviously there will be catastrophic consequences and the irony about it is that it is the small island states in the Caribbean, in the Pacific and in the Indian ocean, they are the ones that are in the front line and they are the ones that will suffer disproportionately. We have to continue to fight strenuously to advocate in a most vociferous way to get these large emitters to reduce their emission, Browne added. Google recently rolled out Android 12 mobile operating system. Soon after, Oppo announced the rollout of Android 12-based ColorOS 12 OS. At the time, Oppo had said that it will start rolling out ColorOS 12 public beta to its global users with the Oppo Find X3 Pro in Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia to be the first one to get the update. In addition to that, Oppo had also shared a timeline for the rollout of ColorOS 12 public beta to its smartphone users across the globe. As a part of this, the company had said that the ColorOS 12 public beta update will first arrive on the Oppo Find X3 Pro 5G smartphone in October 2021. The company had also announced that the ColorOS 12 public beta update will arrive on the Oppo Find X2 series and Oppo Reno 6 series smartphones in November 2021 and on select Reno 6 series models, Reno 5 series, A 73 5G, A74 5G and F19 Pro+ in December 2021 with the rest of the phones getting the update throughout the course of 2022. Today, Oppo announced the rollout of ColorOS 12 public beta update to select smartphones in India. The Chinese smartphone maker today announced the schedule for the rollout of ColorOS 12 public beta update on its Find X2 series smartphones. As a part of this update, the company said that the Oppo Find X2 smartphone will get the ColorOS 12 public beta update starting November 17, while the Reno 6 Pro 5G and the Reno 6 Pro 5G Diwali Edition smartphones will get the update starting November 22. On the other hand, the Oppo Reno 6 5G smartphone will get the update starting November 25. In addition to this, Oppo clarified that the ColorOS 12 public beta update to the eligible users on a batch-by-batch basis. This means that not all Oppo smartphone users will get the update starting the mentioned rollout date. So, dont worry if you see the update on your Oppo Find X2 or the Reno 6 series smartphone just yet. It is likely to arrive on your smartphone in a couple of days. President Joe Biden gets into a Hummer to drive it at the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021, in Detroit. Credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci President Joe Biden punched the accelerator on a battery-powered Hummer on Wednesday, causing the wheels to squeal and the truck to jet forward as he tried in his own way to drive the country toward an electric vehicle future. The engine was quiet as the president pulled up to a waiting delegation of reporters and officials. "Anyone wanna jump in the back?" Biden asked. The president had just toured a General Motors plant in Detroit to showcase how his newly signed $1 trillion infrastructure law could transform the auto industry. He is highlighting billions of dollars in his giant bipartisan infrastructure deal to pay for the installation of electric vehicle chargers across the country, an investment he says will go a long way to curbing planet-warming carbon emissions while creating good-paying jobs. It's also an attempt to leapfrog China in the plug-in EV market. Currently, the U.S. market share of plug-in electric vehicle sales is one-third the size of the Chinese EV market. The president noted that the U.S. was not yet leading with electric vehicles, something he believes his infrastructure package can change with plans to build 500,000 charging stations. The Hummer he drove has a starting price of $108,700, as the electric market seems designed so far to serve luxury buyers instead of a mass audience. President Joe Biden participates in a tour of the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021, in Detroit. Credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci "Up until now, China has been leading in this racethat's about to change," he said. "We're going to make sure that the jobs of the future end up here in Michigan, not halfway around the world." Two top White House advisers, writing in the Detroit Free Press, said the legislation will help America regain its global competitiveness, which has waned, they contend, "after decades of delay and decay." "Nobody knows this better than Detroit, which has been at the heart of American industrial strategy in the past and now can again, which is why President Biden is coming today," wrote Brian Deese, director of the National Economic Council, and national security adviser Jake Sullivan in an opinion column published Wednesday. Republicans, even some of those who voted in favor of the infrastructure package, are criticizing Biden for being preoccupied with electric vehicle technology at a time when Americans are contending with a spike in gasoline and natural gas prices. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell took the Senate floor Tuesday to make the case that "the Biden administration doesn't have any strategic plan to snap its fingers and turn our massive country into some green utopia overnight." "They just want to throw boatloads of government money at things like solar panels and electric vehicles and hope it all works out," said McConnell, one of 19 GOP senators who voted in favor of the infrastructure bill. He added, "American families are staring down the barrel of skyrocketing heating bills, and the Democrats' response is to go to war against affordable American energy." President Joe Biden participates in a tour of the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021, in Detroit. Credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci White House press secretary Jen Psaki has stressed that the administration is looking at "every tool in our arsenal" to combat high gasoline prices, saying that Biden and his economic team are "quite focused" on the issue. Biden has asked the Federal Trade Commission to monitor gasoline prices and address any illegal conduct being observed and is engaging with countries and entities abroad like OPEC on increasing supply. Biden went a step further Wednesday, sending a letter asking the FTC chair to consider investigating "whether illegal conduct is costing families at the pump." The letter noted an "unexplained" gap in the price of unfinished gasoline and prices for consumers at the pump. The GM plant Biden visited was slated to be closed in 2018 as the automaker tried to shed excess factory capacity to build sedans as buyers shifted toward SUVs and trucks. But the plant, which built cars with internal combustion engines since it opened in 1985, was rescued a year later and designated Factory Zero to build zero-emissions electric vehicles. Currently, the 4.1 million-square-foot plant, which straddles the border between Detroit and the enclave of Hamtramck, is making pre-production versions of the electric GMC Hummer pickup truck. Next year it will start making a Hummer electric SUV. The plant will start cranking out the Origin, an electric vehicle for GM's Cruise autonomous vehicle subsidiary, in 2023, and an electric Chevrolet Silverado pickup at an unspecified date. President Joe Biden participates in a tour of the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant with General Motors CEO Mary Barra, left, and United Auto Workers President Ray Curry on Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021, in Detroit. Credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci The plant won't see much direct impact from the infrastructure spending, but it will benefit from $7.5 billion designated to help build an electric vehicle charging network. Biden wanted $15 billion to build 500,000 chargers and hasn't given a number for how many could be constructed for half that amount. It's likely $7.5 billion won't be enough. The International Council on Clean Transportation says the U.S. will need 2.4 million charging stations by 2030 if 36% of new vehicle sales are electric. Currently there are about 45,500 charging stations nationwide with about 112,000 plugs. Biden is hoping to do even more to promote electric vehicles, including a provision for a $7,500 tax credit for consumers who buy electric vehicles through 2026 that's been floated as part of his proposed $1.85 trillion social services and climate bill. The following year, only purchases of electric vehicles made in the U.S. would qualify for the credit. The base credit would go up by $4,500 if the vehicle is made at a U.S. plant that operates under a union-negotiated collective bargaining agreement. Only auto plants owned by GM, Ford Motor Co. and Stellantis NV qualify. Explore further Biden to spotlight electric vehicle future he sees for US 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain According to the Overseas Security Advisory Council (OSAC) Malaysia 2020 Crime and Safety Report, common crimes in Malaysia include snatch thefts and residential or commercial robberies. More than 2000 snatch thefts or robberies were reported in Malaysia in 2019. The global pandemic and subsequent movement control orders across the country may have reduced street crimes, but they're anticipated to increase again as the nation progresses towards a post-pandemic era. In an attempt to curb these crimes, city councilors, retailers, commercial and residential management have ramped up the deployment of closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras across urban areas. Kuala Lumpur has about 1900 CCTVs for traffic management, 100 at flash-flood hotspots, 270 at public parks,130 at rivers, and 309 for security surveillance. Netizens have regularly witnessed the horrors of snatch thefts or robberies captured by CCTVs, which frequently go viral on social media. The perpetrators are often able to evade apprehension due to the delayed response in alerting authorities. Researchers at Monash University Malaysia's School of Information Technology embarked on a research and development initiative to transform conventional CCTVs into an autonomously intelligent system to detect street crimes in real time. The project is led by Dr. Vishnu Monn Baskaran and Ph.D. student Marcus Lim Jun Yi, and funded by the Ministry of Higher Education's Fundamental Research Grant Scheme. The research is motivated by the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence and, in particular, deep neural network algorithms. "There is a new opportunity to realize a reliable smart video surveillance framework, coupled with significant advancements in high-performance computing technology," says Dr. Baskaran. A three-stage process Typically, there are three stages in a smart video surveillance platform. Stage one involves having AI-based software to process live video surveillance images to detect weapons. In most cases, urban robberies would involve weapons such as guns. Automatically identifying the presence of a weapon from a surveillance camera in real time would increase the software's reliability in assessing a threat within a surveilled area. Stage two involves formulating a relation between the person wielding the weapon and the weapon itself for aggressive action recognition. Most importantly, the first and second stages are executed autonomously using AI-developed software with minimal manual intervention. Stage three generates an alert that's relayed to medical crews and law enforcement officers to dispatch them quickly to provide aid to the victim and apprehend the perpetrator. Credit: Monash University The significance of a real-time alert and response mechanism could re-envision how AI is used to strengthen law enforcement and to further deter criminal activities. The Monash University Malaysia team has completed stage one in developing a smart surveillance system that can accurately detect handguns from surveillance cameras in real time. The team initially focused on automated handgun detection, given that crimes using firearms are more prevalent globally, especially in the Americas and in parts of Southeast Asia. The outcomes of the research were published in the Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence journal. The team also won a gold medal for the project, named the Monash Automatic Gun Detection System (MAGTS), at the 31st International Invention, Innovation and Technology Exhibition 2020 (ITEX 2020). The researchers are now formulating an accurate human-to-weapon model for classifying aggressive human actions, which represents the second stage in realizing a smart video surveillance platform. They're also fine-tuning the outcomes from stage one of the research to detect knives and machetes, which are more prevalent in robberies carried out in Malaysia. This research could also be extended to include person re-identification (that is, spotting or tracking a person from one camera to another). Through person re-identification, the location or movement of a perpetrator can be translated into geographical coordinates. These are then relayed to multiple notification modules and plotted on a map, representing a unified urban/city alarm notification system. This, in turn, could further complement efforts in apprehending the law offender. The research is driven by the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) 1.0 report, which states: "Despite the improvements in the country's crime rate and its continued downward trajectory, public perception of safety is still a challenge as 52.8% of the rakyat [citizens] say they still do not feel safe." The government recognizes that safety is paramount in sustaining robust economic growth. As such, the proposed outcomes of this research establish the fundamental components of an autonomous surveillance platform. The platform potentially expands law enforcement's omnipresence program by substantially reducing response time at the point of theft identification. These improvements align with version 2.0 of the GTP to reduce the crime index, which is expected to improve public perception of urban safety. In addition, it's envisaged that machine-assisted analysis of human actions in real time will provide additional support for social and scientific domains such as forensic science, criminal deterrence, criminal investigation, medical aid, and psychotherapy. These solutions can transform the nation's capital into a smart and safe city in line with Transformasi Nasional (TN50), thus paving the way for vibrant economic and societal development. Explore further Study estimates the prevalence of CCTV cameras in large cities worldwide Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain Chinese police said Wednesday they have arrested a suspect in a digital currency scam who allegedly swindled thousands of dollars in one of the first such cases involving the central bank's new e-wallets. China has been carrying out pilot schemes for its digital yuan since late 2019, rolling out tests in 10 cities including the capital Beijing. Authorities in the eastern city of Gaoyou in Jiangsu province said they arrested a suspect who allegedly impersonated someone else to create an e-wallet under her name. The suspect first claimed to be a police officer to obtain the victim's personal information including her name, identification number and bank card number, said Gaoyou authorities in a statement. Without her knowledge, this information was used to set up a digital yuan e-wallet, into which more than 300,000 yuan ($47,000) was transferred from her bank account. The money was later channelled into the suspect's own e-wallet, before police caught on. There are currently 140 million personal digital yuan wallets in use in China, according to state media, with total transactions amounting to 34.5 billion yuan ($5.4 billion) as at the end of June. With the central bank developing its digital yuan, all financial transactions involving cryptocurrencies that might pose competition have been deemed illegal. The new electronic payment method mainly aims to meet demand from domestic retailers, according to state media reports. Explore further China's central bank rules all crypto transactions are illegal 2021 AFP Inventors hope the DogPhone device could ease separation anxiety suffered by 'pandemic puppies' who became used to human contact during lockdowns. Does your chihuahua crave a chinwag or the Yorkie want to yak, the greyhound needs to gossip and the corgi loves a chat? Lonely dogs could soon be able to call their absent owners using a new device invented by animal-tech scientists in Britain and Finland, they said Wednesday. The DogPhone works when the pet shakes a ball fitted with an accelerometer, which triggers a nearby laptop to make a video call to the owner's device. It was invented by the University of Glasgow's Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas, with help from her labrador Zack, and colleagues from Aalto University in Finland. After Hirskyj-Douglas showed "lab assistant" Zack how to make a call using the ball, he was given the toy to play with for 16 days. Despite being hounded with some accidental calls, Zack used the prototype device to contact his owner and show off his toys. Hirskyj-Douglas, a specialist in animal-computer interaction, responded by showing the pet her office, a restaurant and a street busker, causing Zack to approach the screen. "Of course, we can't know for sure that Zack was aware of the causal link between picking up the ball and making a call, or even that some of the interactions which seemed accidental were actually unintended on his part," she said. "However, it's clear that on some occasions he was definitely interested in what he was seeing, and that he displayed some of the same behaviours he shows when we are physically together." The team hopes the DogPhone, which is undergoing further testing, could help ease separation anxiety suffered by "pandemic puppies" who became used to constant human contact during lockdowns. More information: Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas et al, Forming the Dog Internet, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction (2021). Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas et al, Forming the Dog Internet,(2021). DOI: 10.1145/3488539 2021 AFP Under the agreement with Google, AFP will also offer fact-checking training on several continents. Google and Agence France-Presse on Wednesday said they had signed a "pioneering" five-year deal under which the world's biggest internet search company will pay an undisclosed sum for content in Europe. The agreement, following 18 months of negotiations, is the first by a news agency under the 2019 European directive on so-called neighbouring rights, at the heart of multiple disputes between web giants and the media over payment for use of online news and other content. "This is an agreement that covers the whole of the EU, in all of AFP's languages, including in countries that have not enacted the directive," said AFP CEO Fabrice Fries, describing the deal as "pioneering" and the "culmination of a long struggle". AFP produces and distributes multimedia content to its clients in six languages around the world. After initially being reluctant to pay French newspapers for the use of their content, Google finally signed a three-year framework agreement with some of the nation's press in early 2021, but was fined 500 million euros ($566 million) by the competition authority in mid-July for having failed to negotiate "in good faith". Google has appealed, and is continuing talks to reach a new agreement. 'Common ground' Google's Sebastien Missoffe (left) and Fabrice Fries reach what the AFP CEO described as a 'pioneering' agreement for the search giant to pay for the news agency's content. AFP has fought for news agencies to be fully eligible to benefit from neighbouring rights agreements, Fries said. Wednesday's deal "will contribute to the production of quality information and the development of innovation within the agency", he added. "This agreement with Agence France-Presse demonstrates our willingness to find common ground with publishers and press agencies in France on the topic of neighbouring rights," said Sebastien Missoffe, Google's general manager in France. The pact "paves the way for even closer collaboration", he added. Under the agreement AFP will also offer fact-checking training on several continents, details of which will be announced soon, the companies said in a statement. Global tech giantsmostly Americanhave run into a wide range of disputes with Brussels and EU member states, over taxation, abuse of their dominant market power, privacy issues and of making money from journalistic content without sharing the revenue. To tackle this the EU directive created the form of copyright called neighbouring rights that would allow outlets to demand compensation for use of their content. Facebook announced several agreements in October, including one that provides for two years' remuneration to French news media for the use of their content, as well as for their participation in Facebook News, which Facebook will deploy in France in January 2022. In France and Denmark, media groups joined forces to negotiate with tech giants, while in Spain Google announced on November 3 that it would reopen its Google News service in early 2022. In Australia, a law has been passed to oblige tech giants to pay the media for using their content. Explore further Facebook says will pay French press for news 2021 AFP CEO Elon Musk departs from the justice center in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, July 13, 2021. Musk is selling more Tesla shares than he needs to pay current tax obligations, and experts say he's either converting part of his fortune from stock to cash, or he's saving for bigger tax bills that will come due next year. As of early Wednesday, Nov. 17, Musk had sold roughly 8.2 million shares in the electric car and solar panel maker in the past nine days, worth a total of just over $8.8 billion. Credit: AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File Elon Musk is selling more Tesla shares than he needs to pay current tax obligations, and experts say he's either converting part of his fortune from stock to cash, or he's saving for bigger tax bills that will come due next year. As of early Wednesday, Musk had sold roughly 8.2 million shares in the electric car and solar panel maker in the past nine days, worth a total of just over $8.8 billion. Of those, Musk sold 2.8 million shares worth about $3 billion specifically to pay taxes on three tranches of stock options that he exercised this week, according to filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. That means he has sold roughly $5 billion more in shares than he needs at present. Under a compensation plan from 2012, Musk has options to buy 26.4 million shares. The options expire next year, and the tax bill will come due. Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives estimates the bill to be $10 billion to $15 billion, depending on the stock price. Musk's options so far allowed him to buy shares at $6.24 each, and the stock is selling for around $1,080. Erik Gordon, a University of Michigan business and law professor, questioned why Musk would sell that many shares now to pay obligations that come due next year. He said accruing for future tax liabilities makes sense only if Musk expects the stock price to drop. "If you think the stock is going to go up, or if you think the stock is going to stay the same, you wouldn't be selling extra shares," he said. On Nov. 6, Musk asked his 60 million Twitter followers if he should sell some of his Tesla stock. "Much is made lately of unrealized gains being a means of tax avoidance, so I propose selling 10% of my stock," he wrote. According to Musk, 58% of those who responded said yes. Musk also conceded his wealth is tied up in stock, tweeting that he doesn't get a cash salary or bonus from anywhere. "I have only stock, thus the only way for me to pay taxes personally is to sell stock," he wrote. Musk started selling on Monday, and as of Wednesday, he had liquidated about 5% of his holdings. His federal tax obligations could be as high as 40% on proceeds from some of the sales, said Brad Badertscher, an accounting professor at the University of Notre Dame. Musk could have cut his tax bill on the options in half if he had exercised the options and waited a year to sell the shares, Badertscher said. That's because with an immediate sale, the gain is taxed as ordinary income. In a year, Musk would pay the much lower capital gains rate, he said. Wedbush's Ives said that while the Twitter poll is unorthodox, it telegraphed the sale to investors, preventing a huge selloff in Tesla stock. "If he didn't do the Twitter poll and just started selling stock, the stock is probably 15% lower than it is today," Ives said. As of Tuesday, Tesla's stock had fallen nearly 14% since Musk agreed to abide by the poll. On Wednesday, the stock rose more than 3%. Ives is confident that investors will see the stock's value as the sales start to wane. Musk historically has been adept at moving the price of Tesla stock through tweets, said Michigan's Gordon. "He's shown himself to be a master of influencing the price of Tesla stock," Gordon said. "That's the story over and over again." Messages were left seeking comment from Musk and Tesla, which has disbanded its media relations department. 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain The next time you are outside, look up. You might see houses, buildings, a few trees. Higher you may see some clouds, a commercial airplane, a military airplane. Maybe there's a helicopter. In other words, not much. That's changing. Aerospace engineers and entrepreneurs across the world are in a race to fundamentally change how we see the sky. They are working on new air vehiclesin an industry called advanced air mobilitythat will be used to drop packages on your doorstep, transport people and cargo over shorter distances and could even give people the ability to call air-taxis. "It's not an if, it's a when," said Davis Hackenberg, the Advanced Air Mobility project manager for NASA. "Electric aviation is going to happen." Earlier this month, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill sponsored by Kansas Rep. Sharice Davids that would create a working group to study what the federal government needs to do in regards to the fledgling industry. It now heads to the U.S. Senate, where it's being shepherded by Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran. The bill is an attempt to get the government prepared for what will likely change the future of transportation. It will mean everything from new safety regulations, to infrastructure in the form of "vertiports," to getting the public onboard with the concept of drone-like planes flying around their neighborhoods. It's also an attempt to keep Kansaswith its well-established aeronautics industryat the forefront of the next generation in flight. "I think we're well positioned to not only be able to be the air capital of the world for all the general aviation and commercial aircraft that we have been historically but we can be the air capital of the world for advanced air mobility too," said Pierre Harter, the Director of Research and Development for National Institute for Aviation Research at Wichita State University For nearly a century, air travel has largely been limited to airplanes and helicopters. For the average passenger during much of that period, it's meant going to an airport, sitting for an hour and getting herded into a seat that seems to get smaller every year. But technology may soon change the way we think about flying. Batteries keep getting smaller. Materials to build the aircraft are lighter than ever. Software is getting more sophisticated. A modern cockpit from 20 years ago can't do half as much as the phone in your pocket, according to Harter. It has enabled an even greater focus on electric technology in aviation over the past 15 years. That's allowed for new aircraft designs. It's changed the way they fly. It's changed how aircraft can be used. It has made them quieter, so they can get closer to people's homes. "It's a big, wide-open, wild west," Harter said. "There's a lot of people out there, a lot of dreamers trying to crack this nut. You have a lot of folks who are not traditionally aerospace who think they can crack this nut as well." An end to 'transportation deserts?' Already, companies like Joby Aviation, which has investments from Uber, are testing passenger vehicles in the hopes of getting them certified with the FAA. Amazon and Wing, which is owned by Google's parent company Alphabet, already have permission to use drones to deliver packages in some places. Hyundai has an advanced air mobility group and traditional aviation companies like Boeing have invested in start-ups. So what, exactly, would this future look like? Maybe you're walking down the street to the vertiport, where you'll catch an air taxi because you're a little late to work. Something flies overhead, just above the houses. It may hover over its destination and send a string down to drop a package. Maybe, higher in the sky, there's a vehicle carrying cargo from a business to the airport, but you don't really notice because it's so quiet, unlike a helicopter. "I think over the next 10ish years ... it's realistic to say that you're going to see some on the way to work in the morning," Hackenberg said. It won't all happen at once. First, Harter said, we're likely to see some of these planes, with a pilot, carrying boxes from one place to another. Those trips would enable companies to get comfortable with the technology and meet safety requirements so they can start flying with passengers. Then it will start to become autonomous. "It won't be autonomous to begin with," Harter said. "There's just a lot of development that has to be done, a lot of infrastructure that has to be built, a lot of public confidence that has to be built, not to mention the regulators have to approve it all first." As the new aircraft become more common, the result could be something as simple as cutting down travel time within urban and suburban areas, making it slightly easier to get to the airport or from the suburbs to downtown. But they could also be used to help get rid of "transportation deserts," making it easier for a doctor to reach a patient in a rural area who has limited access to a hospital. "I think part of the challenge is it's going to depend a lot on the community's priorities," said Nancy Mendonca, the community integration lead for NASA's AAM Mission. "And then understanding what the local community wants." There are a lot of outstanding questions before advanced air mobility becomes commonplace. There are safety precautions and regulations that need to be developed. There is pilot training and workforce development. There's the cost. There's figuring out who would use this type of transportation. There's figuring out whether people want to have these aircraft near there homes, no matter how quiet companies say they are. There are still more advances in technology that need to happen if you want them to go farther than 150 miles and to be unmanned. There's infrastructure that cities and towns will need to create. There will be arguments over where to put vertiports. There will be questions of access, whether they will just be toys for the bourgeoisie or available to the hoi polloi. The working group that would be formed if the bill passes Congress would be tasked to answer some of those questions. "When drones were first being discussed, we kind of got behind the curve on that," Davids said. "And I want to make sure that doesn't happen with this emerging technology." Davids said she was "excited" about the industry, which is projected to grow significantly over the next 15 years. A report produced by Deloitte this January projected that the market around advanced air mobility could pull in an estimated $115 billion by 2035 and employ more than 280,000 people. Hackenberg, from NASA, said there is going to be intense competition around the world and said, in his opinion, America "must win." "Aviation is the future," Hackenberg said. "There's a ton of competition. It's like automotive, it's gonna be distributed ... there's going to be vehicles and such built everywhere. But we need to own. We need to have the General Motors and the Fords. And hopefully, the Toyotas and the Tesla's and everything else." Explore further NASA begins air taxi flight testing with Joby Aviation 2021 The Kansas City Star. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Transportation Security Administration administrator (TSA) David Pekoske listens during an event to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Sept. 11, 2021, in Springfield, Va. The number of people traveling for Thanksgiving this year is expected to rebound to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels, but the Transportation Security Administration say it is ready to handle the surge. Credit: AP Photo/Luis M. Alvarez, File The number of airline passengers traveling for Thanksgiving this year is expected to rebound to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels, but the Transportation Security Administration says it is ready to handle the surge. Administrator David Pekoske said Wednesday he expects agency staffing to be sufficient for what's traditionally TSA's busiest travel period. "We are prepared," Pekoske told ABC's "Good Morning America." He said travelers should expect long lines at airports and plan to spend a little more time getting through security. In 2019, a record 26 million passengers and crew passed through U.S. airport screening in the 11-day period around Thanksgiving. But that plummeted in 2020 as the pandemic kept people at home. Pekoske said he didn't think a vaccine mandate going into effect for TSA agents Monday would have any effect on staffing for Thanksgiving next week. "In fact, implementation of the mandate will make travel safer and healthier for everyone," he said. "So, we see quite a significant increase in the number of our officers that are vaccinated, and I'm very confident that there will be no impact for Thanksgiving." Pekoske told NBC's "Today" on Wednesday he remains "very concerned" about the issue of unruly passengers as incidents on airplanes have continued. Two airplane pilots pass by a line of passengers while waiting at a security check-in line at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, ahead of Fourth of July weekend, July 1, 2021. The number of people traveling for Thanksgiving this year is expected to rebound to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels, but the Transportation Security Administration say it is ready to handle the surge. Credit: AP Photo/Shafkat Anowar, File "The level of unruly behavior is much higher than I've ever seen it," he said. The Federal Aviation Administration says it has referred 37 cases involving unruly airline passengers to the FBI for possible criminal prosecution since the number of disruptions on flights began to spike in January. Explore further TSA extends into January mask rule for airline passengers 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, announced Tuesday that it took action against four separate malicious cyber groups from Pakistan and Syria who were found targeting people in Afghanistan, as well as journalists, humanitarian organizations, and anti-regime military forces in the West Asian country. The Pakistani threat actor, dubbed SideCopy, is said to have used the platform to single out people with ties to the Afghan government, military and law enforcement in Kabul. The campaign, which Meta dubbed as a "well-resourced and persistent operation," involved sending malicious links, often shortened using URL shortener services, to websites hosting malware between April and August of 2021, what with the operators posing as young women and tricking the recipients with romantic lures in a bid to make them click on phishing links or download trojanized chat applications. Meta's threat intelligence analysts said these apps were a front for two distinct malware strains, a remote access trojan named PJobRAT, which was previously found targeting the Indian military forces, and a hitherto undocumented implant dubbed Mayhem that's capable of retrieving contact lists, text messages, call logs, location information, media files, device metadata, and even scrape content on the device's screen by abusing accessibility services. Among other SideCopy's tactics, the hacker group engaged in a number of nefarious activities, including operating rogue app stores, compromising legitimate websites to host malicious phishing pages that were designed to manipulate people into giving up their Facebook credentials. The group was purged from Facebook in August. Furthermore, Meta also said it disrupted three hacking networks linked to the Syrian government and specifically Syria's Air Force Intelligence Syrian Electronic Army aka APT-C-27, which targeted humanitarian organizations, journalists and activists in Southern Syria, critics of the government, and individuals associated with the anti-regime Free Syrian Army with phishing links to deliver a mix of commercially available and custom malware such as njRAT and HmzaRat that are engineered to harvest sensitive user information. APT-C-37, which targeted people linked to the Free Syrian Army and military personnel affiliated with opposition forces with a commodity backdoor known as SandroRAT and an in-house developed malware family called SSLove via social engineering schemes that duped victims into visiting websites masquerading as Telegram, Facebook, YouTube, and WhatsApp as well as content focussed on Islam. A government-linked unnamed hacking group that targeted minority groups, activists, opposition in Southern Syria, Kurdish journalists, and members of the People's Protection Units and Syria Civil Defense, with the operation manifesting in the form of social engineering attacks that entailed sharing links to websites hosting malware-laced apps mimicking WhatsApp and YouTube that installed SpyNote and Spymax remote administration tools on the devices. "To disrupt these malicious groups, we disabled their accounts, blocked their domains from being posted on our platform, shared information with our industry peers, security researchers and law enforcement, and alerted the people who we believe were targeted by these hackers," the social technology firm's Mike Dvilyanski, head of cyber espionage investigations, and David Agranovich, director of threat disruption, said. Israeli spyware vendor Candiru, which was added to an economic blocklist by the U.S. government this month, is said to have reportedly waged "watering hole" attacks against high-profile entities in the U.K. and the Middle East, new findings reveal. "The victimized websites belong to media outlets in the U.K., Yemen, and Saudi Arabia, as well as to Hezbollah; to government institutions in Iran (Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Syria (including the Ministry of Electricity), and Yemen (including the Ministries of Interior and Finance); to internet service providers in Yemen and Syria; and to aerospace/military technology companies in Italy and South Africa," ESET said in a new report. "The attackers also created a website mimicking a medical trade fair in Germany." The strategic web compromises are believed to have occurred in two waves, the first commencing as early as March 2020 before ending in August 2020, and the second string of attacks beginning in January 2021 and lasting until early August 2021, when the targeted websites were stripped clean off the malicious scripts. Watering hole attacks are a form of highly targeted intrusions in that they tend to infect a specific group of end-users by backdooring websites that members of the group are known to frequent with the goal of opening a gateway into their machines for follow-on exploitation activities. "The compromised websites are only used as a jumping-off point to reach the final targets," the Slovak cybersecurity firm said, linking the second wave to a threat actor tracked by Kaspersky as Karkadann citing overlaps in the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). The Russian company described the group as targeting government bodies and news outlets in the Middle East since at least October 2020. The original attack chains involved injecting JavaScript code into the websites from a remote attacker-controlled domain that's designed to collect and exfiltrated I.P. geolocation and system information about the victim machine, opting to proceed further only if the operating system in question is either Windows or macOS, suggesting the campaign was orchestrated to target computers and not mobile devices. The final step led to a likely browser remote code execution exploit that enabled the attackers to hijack control of the machines. The second wave observed in January 2021 was characterized by more stealth, as the JavaScript modifications were made to legitimate WordPress scripts ("wp-embed.min.js") used by the websites instead of adding the malicious code straight to the main HTML page, using the method to load a script from a server under the attacker's control. What's more, the fingerprinting script also went beyond harvesting system metadata to capture the default language, the list of fonts supported by the browser, the time zone, and the list of browser plugins. The exact exploit and the final payload delivered remain unknown as yet. "This shows that the operators choose to narrow the focus of their operations and that they don't want to burn their zero-day exploits," ESET malware researcher Matthieu Faou said. The campaign's links to Candiru stems from the fact that some of the command-and-control servers utilized by the attackers are similar to domains previously identified as belonging to the Israeli company, not to mention feature browser-based remote code execution exploits in its arsenal, raising the possibility that "the operators of the watering holes are customers of Candiru." ESET also noted that the attackers ceased operations at the end of July 2021, coinciding with public disclosures about Candiru related to the use of multiple zero-day vulnerabilities in Chrome web browser to target victims located in Armenia. "It seems that the operators are taking a pause, probably in order to retool and make their campaign stealthier," Faou said. "We expect to see them back in the ensuing months." The best bang for your buck! This option enables you to purchase online 24/7 access and receive the Sunday, Tuesday & Thursday print edition at no additional cost * Print edition only available in our carrier delivery area. Allow up to 72 hours for delivery of your print edition to begin. Print edition not available for Day Pass option. (TBTCO) - Ngay 11/12/2021, So Giao dich Chung khoan Viet Nam se chinh thuc ra mat anh dau mot cot moc phat trien moi cua thi truong chung khoan Viet Nam. Voi triet ly ve 2 ban sac, 3 phuong cham, 4 tru cot, ky vong So se co nhieu buoc tien moi mang tinh ot pha, gop phan tich cuc hon nua trong viec nang tam chat luong phat trien cua thi truong chung khoan trong giai oan moi. MOSCOW Russia's space agency Roscosmos will send Lebanon the satellite images it has for Beirut's port before and after a huge explosion rocked it last year, its head Dmitry Rogozin told reporters Wednesday. In October, Lebanese President Michel Aoun asked Russia for the satellite images from Aug. 4, 2020, when the blast killed more than 218 people, injured thousands and destroyed swathes of the Lebanese capital. The probe into the cause of the explosion still continues. "I signed a paper today enclosing quite detailed imagery in response to a request from the Lebanese leadership," Rogozin said. The blast was one of the world's largest non-nuclear explosions and the country's worst peace-time disaster as it slips into political and economic meltdown. Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will discuss the mutual relationship between the two countries with his Lebanese counterpart, Abdallah Bou Habib in Moscow on Nov. 22, the Russian ministry said Wednesday. BEIRUT Lebanon said Wednesday that only foreigners with Belarusian residency permits would be allowed to fly from Beirut to the ex-Soviet country, amid a migrant crisis on its border with Poland. "Many Arab and foreign travelers have recently arrived in Belarus from Beirut via flights of various airlines," including Belarus's state-run Belavia airline, the Transport Ministry's directorate general of civil aviation said. "It was later discovered that the purpose of their travel was to move to the border with Poland" and enter European Union territories, "in cooperation with smuggling networks," it said in a statement. All airlines operating from Beirut must limit passengers departing on direct or indirect flights to Belarus to Belarusian citizens, Lebanese citizens holding visas or residency permits for Belarus, and "Arabs and foreigners having residency permits in Belarus." It said the measures were effective immediately until further notice. Thousands of migrants, mainly from the Middle East, are staying on the Belarus-Poland border in what the West says is a crisis engineered by Minsk to try to divide the EU and hit back against sanctions. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and his main ally, Russian President Vladimir Putin, have rejected the accusations and criticized the EU for not taking in the migrants. Turkish Airlines has banned Iraqis, Syrians and Yemenis from flying to Belarus via Turkey, while private Syrian carrier Cham Wings Airlines said it was halting flights to Minsk. Belarus's Belavia airline has also said that Syrians, Iraqis, Yemenis and Afghans are banned from flights from the United Arab Emirates, while Iraq is planning a repatriation flight from Belarus on Thursday for at least 200 of its nationals stuck on the border. An official from Beirut airport had previously told AFP that authorities started preventing Iraqis departing en route to Belarus "around a month ago." The number of flights between Beirut home to Lebanon's only international airport for commercial flights and Minsk has also been cut back recently. ITS another bleak Christmas for some store owners in Downtown Port of Spain. This is the second year store owners are saying things are very slow, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The Express visited Excellent City Centre at Frederick Street, Port of Spain, yesterday afternoon, and there was not much foot traffic, as has been in previous years, during the Christmas season. THERE was a year in the history of the British West Indies1943when every fourth person on TAKING OVER: Members of the Police Service Commission (PolSC) pose in a group photo yesterday after receiving their instruments of appointment from President Paula-Mae Weekes at The Office of the President, St Anns. They are, from left, Rajiv Persad, Maxine Attong, Ian Kevin Ramdhanie, PolSC chairman Justice Judith Jones and Maxine King. Photo: Office of the President It is your duty as Prime Minister and Minister of Health to provide whats best for your citizens. The jabs have been provided and are still available to all who want it. But what about those who do not want it? Vietnam Airlines on Tuesday received a foreign air operator certificate issued by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), thanks to which the national flag carrier will become the first Vietnamese airline to run regular direct flights to the States. The first direct flight is scheduled to depart from Ho Chi Minh City on the evening of November 28 and arrive in San Francisco 13 hours and 50 minutes later, said Vietnam Airlines CEO Le Hong Ha. The return flight will leave San Francisco on the evening of November 29 and reach Ho Chi Minh City on December 1, with a flight time of 16 hours and 40 minutes. Starting December this year, there will be two flights per week and the frequency could be increased to seven on the condition that the COVID-19 pandemic is put under control and the Vietnamese government allows resumption of regular international air routes. The wide-body aircraft Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner will be used for the direct flights. On November 4, the FAA announced the granting of a certificate, which is a legal prerequisite, for Vietnam Airlines to regularly operate direct passenger and cargo flights between Vietnam and the U.S. in an unlimited period. The route between Vietnam and the U.S. is one of the 10 longest air routes in the world. The U.S. is also Vietnams largest air transport market, with more than 2.2 million Vietnamese living there. U.S. authorities had previously granted licenses to Vietnamese airlines to operate charter flights between the Southeast Asian country and the States with limited frequency in a fixed period. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Domestic borders around New Zealand's largest city Auckland will reopen from Dec. 15 for fully vaccinated people and those with negative COVID-19 test results, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Wednesday. Auckland is the epicentre of an outbreak of the infectious Delta variant of the COVID-19 and been locked off from the rest of the country for over 90 days now. But with more than 80% of Auckland and the rest of country fully vaccinated it was time to open up the ability to travel again, Ardern said at a news conference. "Aucklanders can now book summer travel and accommodation with confidence and businesses inside Auckland and around the rest of the country can plan for summer travellers, Ardern said. Travellers will have to either be fully vaccinated or present a negative COVID-19 test result within 72 hours of departure. People breaking the rules will face an infringement fine of NZ$1,000 ($698.60). Details about easing international border restrictions will be released before the end of the year, Ardern said. New Zealand only allows its citizens or permanent residents to enter the country, but the returnee numbers are controlled by limiting the spaces available in state quarantine facilities each week, making it hard for many to travel home. New Zealand had largely successfully pursued an elimination strategy until the persistent Delta outbreak forced Ardern to shift to a focus of living with the virus with higher vaccinations. She said the cabinet would confirm on Nov. 29 its decision to move Auckland and the rest of the country into the new traffic-light system, which will end lockdowns and use social distancing and other measures to limit the spread of the virus. ($1 = 1.4314 New Zealand dollars) Vietnams first sapper unit for United Nations peacekeeping operations, along with level-2 field hospital No. 4, made its debut during a ceremony in Hanoi on Wednesday morning. The countrys sapper unit No. 1 was established in 2014 and charged with a suitable peacekeeping mission at the request of the UN. The unit will be sent to the UN Interim Security Force for Abyei, Major General Hoang Kim Phung, director of the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations, said at the ceremony. It originally had 268 members, but the number has been reduced to 203, including 21 female sappers. Along with level-2 field hospital No. 4, the unit will play a role in providing humanitarian aid, helping UN peacekeeping missions complete their tasks, contributing to peacekeeping and national reconstruction, and bringing a peaceful and stable life to host countries. Seventy-one members of the field hospital have been focusing on English and professional training this year. They will participate in training courses on healthcare, peacekeeping, and other military aspects in the coming time. At the event, Deputy Minister of National Defense Hoang Xuan Chien, head of the ministrys steering committee for participation in UN peacekeeping operations, urged relevant units to make all-round preparations and organize more training courses before deployment. Chien urged the expedition of legal preparedness and signing of a memorandum of understanding with the UN on the deployment of the sapper unit in Abyei. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The Hanoi administration has required all arrivals from Ho Chi Minh City and other localities at high risk of COVID-19 transmission to self-quarantine for seven days amid rising cases in the Vietnamese capital. Chairman of the municipal Peoples Committee Chu Ngoc Anh has signed a document on tightened measures to prevent and control the pandemic. The document stated that more stringent measures would be taken from Wednesday to manage people coming from other provinces and cities. Arrivals from localities at high and very high risk, which are classified as 'orange' and 'red zones,' as well as places with a high number of infections such as Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong, Long An, and Dong Nai must be quarantined at home or accommodation establishments for seven days, even when they have been fully vaccinated or recovered from COVID-19. They will be tested for the novel coronavirus on the first and seventh days of quarantine. If these arrivals are unvaccinated or have received only one vaccine shot, they are to undergo home quarantine for seven days and have their health monitored for another seven days. Meanwhile, fully-vaccinated arrivals from localities at medium risk, or 'yellow zones,' need to monitor their health for seven days and get tested for COVID-19 on the first day of their stay. If they are unvaccinated or have received only one shot, they need to monitor their health for 14 days and undergo testing on the first and seventh days. Everyone who comes to the capital must file health declarations and promptly report to local authorities if they have a fever, coughing, sore throat, or loss of smell or taste. According to the document, Hanoi will pilot the treatment of COVID-19 patients with mild symptoms at concentrated facilities managed by district-level authorities. The capital city will also quarantine direct contacts of coronavirus patients at their homes on a trial basis. Hanoi has documented more than 6,600 local COVID-19 cases since the fourth outbreak hit Vietnam on April 27. The capital has seen a surge in community-based infections over the past days. On Monday, health authorities logged 289 new cases, the citys highest daily jump since the beginning of the fourth flare-up. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Authorities in Ho Chi Minh City have allowed local cinemas, karaoke parlors, discos, and bike-hailing service to resume operations under various conditions depending on the coronavirus risk level of each area. Chairman of the municipal People's Committee Phan Van Mai signed a decision on temporary measures to safely and flexibly adapt to the COVID-19 pandemic on Tuesday evening. Generally, residents have to be vaccinated with at least one shot or have recovered from the disease in order to participate in various activities in the city. Those unable to receive the vaccination due to health problems must present a certificate from health authorities. Unvaccinated children are allowed to take part in activities if they are accompanied by vaccinated adults. The decision also highlighted the conditions for the reopening of cinemas, karaoke parlors, bars and discos, massage parlors, and bike-hailing service. The conditions are different depending on the coronavirus risk level of each area. There are currently four risk levels, namely low (a.k.a. green zone or level 1), medium (yellow zone or level 2), high (orange zone or level 3), and very high (red or level 4). As of Wednesday morning, only Can Gio District was classified as level 3, while the remaining districts and Thu Duc City were at levels 1 or 2. Residents can check the corresponding risk level of each ward and district using the interactive map operated by the municipal Department of Information and Communications via https://bando.tphcm.gov.vn/ogis/thongke?Province=79. According to the latest decision, massage parlors, spas, beauty salons, bars, discos, and karaoke shops are permitted to operate in green, yellow, and orange zones. All employees and customers must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or have recovered from the disease. Customers who do not meet these conditions must have a negative test within 72 hours. These establishments must operate at 50 percent of capacity in yellow zones and 25 percent in orange zones. Cinemas are allowed to operate in green, yellow, and orange zones if they meet all safety criteria promulgated by municipal authorities. These facilities are requireed to operate at 50 and 25 percent of capacity in yellow and orange zones, respectively. Street vendors and lottery sellers can resume their job in green and yellow zones. Those in yellow zones must be fully inoculated or have recovered from COVID-19. Bike-hailing service is permitted to re-operate if the overall risk of the city is at level 1, and must reduce to 50 percent of capacity if the city is at risk level 2. Ho Chi Minh City is currently at level 2. Traditional motorbike taxi service, or xe om, is only restored when the city is at risk level 1. Ho Chi Minh City has been the hardest-hit locality in Vietnam since the fourth virus wave began on April 27, with nearly 450,000 infections. The city has imposed various levels of social distancing since May 31 before loosening restrictions in October thanks to a high vaccination rate. Authorities had previously closed bars, discos, and karaoke shops from April 30, and cinemas and massage parlors from May 3, while ride-hailing service was suspended from July 9. As of Monday, health authorities had administered more than 13.8 million vaccine doses, with nearly six million out of nine million people in the city fully inoculated. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Ho Chi Minh City will reopen all schools in the coming time following a pilot offline schooling plan executed in its coastal Can Gio District, chairman of the municipal administration Phan Van Mai has said. Schools are now open for in-person classes for grades 1, 2, 6, 9 and 12 in Can Gio, a COVID-19 low risk area with almost all children aged 12 to 17 having received their first vaccine doses, will form a foundation for the resumption of all schools, chairman Mai said at a meeting with voters on Tuesday morning. As the southern city has basically completed first-dose vaccination for children in that age range and is preparing to give them their second shots, it is at an advantage to bring all students back to schools, Mai said. Reopening schools is a significant issue for a city of 1.7 million students like Ho Chi Minh City as the epidemic situation has improved, with many locales becoming green zones, or areas at low risk of COVID-19 transmission, the chairman told the meeting. After Can Gio, green zones in Cu Chi and Hoc Mon Districts should follow suit, he recommended. The chairman emphasized that virtual classes have caused many difficulties for students since many of them have no computers or laptops for remote learning. Students cannot fully apprehend knowledge in online classes compared to learning directly at schools. The city has put in place the rules for school safety and procedures for handling COVID-19 cases in the classroom. The municipal administration will work with local educational and health authorities this week to finalize the plan for reopening all schools, Mai said. By Monday, the city of nine million people had administered 7.86 million first COVID-19 vaccine doses and 5.95 million second jabs to adults, according to the national COVID-19 vaccination portal. Since the pandemic hit Vietnam in early 2020, Ho Chi Minh City has documented over 445,000 COVID-19 cases and more than 17,000 deaths, the Ministry of Health reported. Nationwide, a total of 1,045,397 infections, including 870,997 recoveries and 23,270 fatalities, have been recorded. Recently, daily infections of both Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh City have gradually increased again after a month of sharp decline, but their mortalities keep dropping remarkably, to 101 on Monday from 250 two months earlier for the country, and to 45 from 189 for the city. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! An estimated 17,000 children die within their first four weeks and more than 100,000 babies are born preterm in Vietnam annually, UNICEF said in a press release on Tuesday. The statistics were provided to observe World Prematurity Day (November 17), which aims to raise awareness of the challenges of preterm birth and shine a light on the risks and consequences faced by premature births and their families worldwide. Preterm birth is the leading cause of death in children under the age of five, UNICEF said, adding that each year roughly 15 million babies worldwide are born prematurely, or about one in 10 children. In Vietnam, it is estimated that 17,000 children die within their first 28 days and 103,500 babies are born prematurely per annum. The global COVID-19 pandemic has forced neonatal units around the world to adopt strict safety measures that often separate parents from their preterm babies, leading to detrimental consequences for both sides. Separation of parents from their babies contributes to severe and long-term health and developmental issues in the newborns while also affecting the parents mental health in lasting ways. Centered around the Zero Separation. Act now! Keep Parents and Babies Born Too Soon Together theme, this years World Prematurity Day is an opportunity to advocate for every parents right to have unrestricted access to their babies in hospital, no matter where and when. Even without the additional risks of a global pandemic, preterm babies are among the most vulnerable patients worldwide and, as studies have shown time and again, they need their parents by their side. Healthcare systems are encouraged to balance the needs of babies born too soon, too small, or too sick and their families with the requirements to keep hospitals running and the staff safe during the pandemic. In Vietnam, UNICEF continues to work with the Ministry of Health to support and scale up newborn lifesaving interventions throughout the country. This work focuses in particular on the rural and mountainous provinces in the northern and Central Highlands regions, where a number of ethnic populations live and where worryingly high neonatal mortality rates persist. Cost-effective interventions to save newborns include immediate skin-to-skin contact and early initiation of breastfeeding for newborns, said Maharajan Muthu, chief of the Child Survival and Development Program of UNICEF Vietnam. Skin-to-skin contact as early after birth and as continuously as possible has positive and protective effects, such as the regulation of cardiac and respiratory rates, the prevention of sepsis (severe infection), hypothermia (low body temperature) and hypoglycaemia (low blood sugar), and reduced hospital readmission. Meanwhile, early and exclusive breastfeeding and providing mothers own milk have a positive impact on the babys short- and long-term physiological and neurodevelopmental outcomes. It is equally important to ensure that babies born too soon, too small or too sick, if needed, have equitable and quick access to higher levels of hospital care, irrespective of where they are born. As in previous years, World Prematurity Day activities are being carried out in about 100 countries this week to raise awareness and spur action to prevent preterm birth wherever possible, improve healthcare systems, and save babies lives. In Vietnam, a special event will be organized in Da Nang to mark World Prematurity Day by the Department of Maternal and Child Health under the Ministry of Health, UNICEF, and the Da Nang Hospital for Women and Children in order to honor and recognize the contributions of health workers in newborn care. The event is also meant to raise awareness of the challenges surrounding preterm birth and ensure that people are informed of the risks and consequences. It is a part of UNICEF and its partners project to support the Ministry of Health in newborn care interventions in order to save the lives of many more infants in Vietnam. Newborn care and neonatal mortality reduction are among the important goals not only for the health sector but also for Vietnam as the country has been committed to achieving the UNs Sustainable Development Goals, according to the Department of Maternal and Child Health. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Eighteen children under seven months old who were jabbed with COVID-19 vaccine by mistake in Hanoi earlier this month are in stable health conditions, Suc Khoe & Doi Song (Health & Life), which is the mouthpiece of the Ministry of Health, cited health experts as saying at a meeting on Tuesday evening. Doctors from Saint Paul General Hospital in Ba Dinh District and the Vietnam National Childrens Hospital in Dong Da District have closely monitored the health condition of the 18 babies in question at the neonatology department at Saint Paul General Hospital over the past two weeks. During the health monitoring process, the 18 were tested three times on the third, seventh, and 10th days since the detection of their COVID-19 injection on November 4. Results showed that the babies current health status is stable, according to the experts. They eat, enjoy milk feeding, sleep, and play well. Their inflammatory reactions and swellings at the injection site have been gone. Only some of them still have digestive disorders, a mild runny nose, atopic dermatitis, and eczema. At Tuesdays meeting, after reviewing and discussing the babies clinical status, the experts agreed that it is necessary to continue monitoring their health at Saint Paul General Hospital. On the 21st-day milestone, doctors will retest and specifically evaluate the health status of each baby. After that, they will seek consultation from a professional council set up by the Hanoi Department of Health for next steps. At a previous meeting, medical staff planned to discharge the 18 infants once their health conditions become stable. The babies would have their health checked once a month afterward until the end of 12 months since the wrong injection. Health workers at a medical station in Quoc Oai District, Hanoi made a serious mistake by giving the 18 babies Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine doses, instead of a vaccine designed for a routine inoculation program for children between two and six months old, on November 3. The case was discovered the following day and reported to the municipal Department of Health and the Ministry of Health, which looked for consultation from leading professors in the country and medical experts from the World Health Organization and the United Nations Childrens Fund. In Vietnam, the countrys health ministry has only issued guidelines on COVID-19 vaccination for children aged 12 to 17. Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long requested authorities and related units to strictly deal with the medical staff involved in the said vaccination incident but there has been no further news of it ever since. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The awards ceremony of the Ho Chi Minh City Goes Global contest was organized in Ho Chi Minh City on Tuesday afternoon, during which several of the prize winners had a brief presentation about their proposals. Taking place at Liberty Central Saigon Riverside Hotel in District 1, the event saw the attendance of vice-chairman of the municipal Peoples Committee Duong Anh Duc, city officials, and representatives of consulate generals in the city. The contest was co-organized by Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper and the Ho Chi Minh City Department of External Relations, along with Global Embassy and Vietnam Signature. The organizing board received entries from June 16 to August 16 and announced ten prize winners in late August. The competition was intended as an open forum, Le The Chu, Tuoi Tres editor-in-chief, said at the ceremony. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the organizing board had received over 420 entries including articles, PowerPoint files, graphics, and video clips presented in both Vietnamese and English, from which 55 finalists were selected, Chu stated. Through this contest, we hope to create a program for local residents to propose plans and join hands with local authorities to boost the citys development and international integration, said Tran Phuoc Anh, director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of External Relations. Vice-chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Peoples Committee Duong Anh Duc (C) receives the compilation of winning entries of the Ho Chi Minh City Goes Global contest from Tuoi Tre editor-in-chief Le The Chu (R) and director of the municipal Department of External Relations Tran Phuoc Anh, November 16, 2021. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Participants ranged from university students to senior citizens, from individuals to organizations and businesses, and from Vietnamese to foreigners, Anh continued, adding that the entries included topics in such fields as culture, education, economic matters, diplomacy, urban development, and environmental issues. Elevating the citys standing is not only the target set by the local government, but also the aspiration of residents and everyone who loves this city, he said. Local authorities plan to turn Ho Chi Minh City into an economic and cultural center of Southeast Asia by 2030 and of Asia by 2045, the official remarked. Le The Chu, editor-in-chief of Tuoi Tre newspaper, speaks at the awards ceremony in Ho Chi Minh City, November 16, 2021. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre At the ceremony, several of the prize winners were invited to give a brief presentation on their ideas. Phan Khuong, who won the first individual prize with his City of Unity in Diversity entry, stated that his dream, which is also the dream of other residents, is that Ho Chi Minh will soon become similar to other developed cities in the world. My plan focuses on three main factors the Saigonese, an open economy, and modern infrastructures, Khuong elaborated. A livable city is where no one is left behind or forgotten, he said. Tran Phuoc Anh, director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Foreign Affairs. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Vu Nguyen, representative of SPG Industrial Development Co. Ltd., winner of the second collective prize, said that their proposal highlights how Ho Chi Minh City can find its own story in the Industry 4.0 era the sustainable way. We hope that the city will be able to promote itself to the international community so that many people across the world will find it an interesting destination, Nguyen said. Nguyen Thien, who won the consolation prize, shared his ideas about the twinning relationship between Ho Chi Minh City and other cities in the world, while French businessman Guillaume Rondan, another consolation prize winner, stressed that the metropolis needs to establish more favorable visa, tax, and investment policies. Phan Khuong, winner of the first individual prize, presents his ideas at the ceremony in Ho Chi Minh City, November 16, 2021. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre At the event, several delegates also joined a panel to discuss ways to elevate Ho Chi Minh Citys international position. According to Ton Nu Thi Ninh, former Vietnamese Ambassador to the EU and Belgium, the city needs to identify the values that it is targeting, as well as what it currently has and lacks. This contest is only the first step," Ninh remarked. "We need to further discuss and select the core values of the proposed plans before realizing them." French businessman Guillaume Rondan delivers a presentation at the awards ceremony in Ho Chi Minh City, November 16, 2021. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre The human factor plays an important role, and Ho Chi Minh City is a melting pot that attracts diverse groups of people, said Dominic Scriven co-founder and executive chairman of Dragon Capital Group. We must also take into consideration other aspects including infrastructure, environmental issues, and the legal system, he added. Tim Evans, CEO of HSBC Bank Vietnam Ltd., stated that Vietnamese people are full of energy, passion, drive, and incredible resilience, and Ho Chi Minh City needs to capture that in order to go global. A representative of SPG Industrial Development Company receives the award for the second collective prize in Ho Chi Minh City, November 16, 2021. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre In his closing speech, Ho Chi Minh City vice-chairman Duc thanked the participants for submitting the entries which clearly showed their love for the southern metropolis. The city leaders will take note of these ideas and add them to the development plan so that Ho Chi Minh City will always be a livable place and a center of creativity that plays an important role in Vietnams economic, cultural, and technological development, Duc elaborated. The vice-chairman later received the compilation of winning entries of the Ho Chi Minh City Goes Global contest presented by Tuoi Tre editor-in-chief Chu and director of the Department of External Relations Anh. Kieu Minh Trang, winner of the second individual prize. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Guillaume Rondan (L, 2nd) and Nguyen Thien (R, 2nd) receive awards for the consolation prizes. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Delegates join a panel discussion at the awards ceremony. Photo: Duy Khang / Tuoi Tre Ton Nu Thi Ninh, former Vietnamese Ambassador to the EU and Belgium, shares her thoughts during the panel discussion. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Dominic Scriven co-founder and executive chairman of Dragon Capital Group speaks during the panel discussion. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Wee Joon Seok, Deputy Consul General of the Republic of Korea in Ho Chi Minh City, is pictured during the panel discussion. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Tim Evans, CEO of HSBC Bank Vietnam Ltd., is pictured during the panel discussion. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy, deputy director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Culture and Sports, shares her ideas during the panel discussion. Photo: Quang Dinh / Tuoi Tre Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! Your browser does not support the audio element. A student from Ho Chi Minh City was named among the top 10 finalists of ASEAN Photo Competition (APC) 2021 in a ceremony that took place earlier this month. Vo Minh Thang, a student majoring in urban studies at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities under the Vietnam National University-Ho Chi Minh City, scored an honorable mention with 'Greenting from Vietnam,' a photography project that aims to promote solidarity and harmony between ASEAN countries in terms of renewable energy. Youths responsibility In his submission to APC 2021, Thang pointed out the urgency of renewable energy development in Southeast Asia. Many countries in the region have already seen the potential of renewable power sources, including Vietnam with its favorable policies for solar energy projects. It is estimated that Vietnams renewable energy sector can contribute 23 percent to ASEANs renewable energy makeup by 2025. However, he believes that the deployment of renewable energy requires a large amount of land and forest resources, affecting peoples lives and disrupting biodiversity. In addition, countries have not removed regional barriers and not liberalized trade, making technology transfer difficult. That is not to mention other issues, including disparities of qualifications, costs, and techniques between countries, and a lack of coordination between the government and the private sector. In order to demonstrate his point, Thang took pictures of several energy projects in Vietnam, namely Binh Thanh Wind Power Plant in Binh Thuan Province, Dray Hlinh Hydroelectric Plant in Dak Lak and Dak Nong Provinces, and street lights powered by solar cells at the Binh Duong Province campus of his university. From there, he put forward two questions: can these photos attest to the competence of renewable energy sources, compared to the great economic efficiency of fossil fuel sources? How will these projects fare when climate change worsens? According to Thang, young people in Vietnam in particular and ASEAN in general should take it upon themselves to promote renewable energy, pushing the public and businesses to join hands with the government to achieve the goal. We dont lack manpower, we just need to spread awareness about renewable energy, Thang said. For young people, it is an honorable and noble task. Street lights powered by solar batteries at Dormitory Zone B, Vietnam National University-Ho Chi Minh City in Binh Duong Province, Vietnam. Photo: Vo Minh Thang Out of the comfort zone According to Thang, he applied for the competition in a rush, as he only knew about it in early May -- two weeks prior to the deadline. After reading the prompt, he kept pondering over keywords such as 'renewable energy,' 'youth,' 'concept shaping,' and 'Vietnam,' striving to find a good way to reflect them in his work. After scrapping three presentations and a photo collection, he decided to shoot images of three different types of renewable energy in three different locations. That was my first time traveling alone, so it was difficult, he told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper. Three months later, Thang was taken back when he found out his work was the only Vietnamese representative in the top 10 finalists of APC 2021. Though he did not enter the top 3, Thang received positive comments from the panel of judges for his presentation in the final round. His work stands out in terms of concept and layout, with strong messages about renewable energy, said Frederic Lezmi, a judge at APC 2021. Despite not being in the top three overall, ASEAN Photo Competition 2021 has brought valuable experiences and given me more motivation to spread the message that I stated in my project, Thang affirmed. He also calls on young people to step out of their comfort zone and participate in big competitions and organizations to seek valuable learning opportunities, while also contributing to the good of society. The ASEAN Photo Competition, which is one of a competition series under ASEAN Youth Energy Awards (AYEA 2021), aims to contribute to the awareness of the benefits of sustainable energy, paving the way for ASEANs cleaner and greener future, according to the website of the ASEAN Foundation, which organized it. In 2021, the contest returned with the theme of ASEAN Youth Shaping the Vision of Sustainable Energy as the New Normal. After multiple evaluation rounds from March to November, APC 2021 selected its top three finalists, who will participate in the Ministerial Summit on Environmental Issues in 2021. Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam! The Organization of American States elected University of Dayton School of Law Professor Carlos Bernal to its Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. As part of the seven-member body, Bernal, a native of Colombia, will help members of the Organization of American States promote the protection of human rights, investigate alleged human rights violations by nations in the Americas, and present cases to the Inter-American Court. The commission also publishes reports on issues and meets with government representatives, academic institutions, nongovernmental organizations and others to promote an understanding of the inter-American human rights system. "I appreciate the Colombian government's nomination and the vote of confidence by the Organization of American States," Bernal said. "As a commissioner of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, I will work with determination and total commitment for the satisfaction of human rights in the Americas." Bernal's appointment comes with high praise from Colombian President Ivan Duque Marquez. "Not only is he one of the most outstanding jurists of his generation, but he also has an academic career in the main universities of the world. We are happy that a Colombian arrives at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and arrives on behalf of our country," Duque said, as reported by Colombian news outlet El Pais. Bernal, who stepped down as a sitting justice on the Colombian Constitutional Court to join the University of Dayton School of Law in August of 2020, has held visiting professorships in Colombia, Australia, France, Denmark, Israel, Spain and Germany. His area of research is the interpretation of constitutional rights and comparative constitutional change, and he teaches courses in Constitutional law and torts. "In electing him to the commission, the Organization of American States has recognized Carlos' deep experience as a judge and as a scholar," said UD School of Law Dean Andrew Strauss. "In his new role as a commissioner, it is clear to me that Carlos will make a major contribution to international human rights law." In addition to being a highly accomplished legal scholar, he's highly decorated in Colombia. Bernal has been awarded Colombia's Order of Boyaca and the Medal Jose Maria Cordova. The Order of Boyaca is Colombia's highest honorary distinction for eminent citizens and for nationals of friendly countries of Colombia; Queen Elizabeth II of England and U.S. President Joe Biden are recipients. The Medal Jose Maria Cordova goes to members of the Colombian army who have excelled in discipline and military virtue, provided eminent services and fellowship, or for acts of courage. For interviews, contact Shawn Robinson, associate director of news and communications, at srobinson1@udayton.edu. The Prince of Wales has pledged to send a jar of his honey to a fellow beekeeper after he saw first hand Jordans efforts to support refugees. Charles was also taken with a little four-year-old girl at ease in front of the medias cameras and he joked he could take lessons from her. The heir to the throne toured the International Rescue Centre (IRC) at the Al Nuzha Community Centre in Amman which provides a safe space for refugees, from a range of nations, to meet and undertake activities as part of the UNHCRs One-Refugee Approach. The Prince of Wales comes across four-year-old Salsapela during a visit to the Al Nuzha Community Centre in Jordan (Arthur Edwards/The Sun/PA) When the prince met Hudaifa, 30, a passionate Jordanian beekeeper, the pair struck up a conversation and Charles quizzed him on where he keeps his bees and what kind of trees or plants they feed from. The prince produces his own honey at his Highgrove home, while Hudaifa hopes to turn his hobby into a career after receiving a business grant through the IRC, which the prince supports as patron, and joining its business training programme. Charles, who likes to sweeten his tea with honey, said he loved the Syrian version after being given a jar: Im thrilled with the honey. Id like to send back one of mine. Well attempt it! Whether it reaches you As the prince was shown around a small playground where primary school-aged children were using swings and slides, he swapped English lessons with young learners and admired their skills. And he saw the work of children in a computer lab, where they were brushing up on their skills. The Prince of Wales admires his portrait given to him by the Syrian refugee artist Faihaa (Arthur Edwards/The Sun/PA) As he spoke to staff, little four-year-old Salsapela, originally from Sudan, sidled up to the group and began to pose for the watching media. Catching sight of her, the delighted Prince beamed and leaned over to tell her: I saw you playing with all the cameras. I could pick up a thing or two! The prince then met refugee families receiving UK assistance through the UNHCR (UN High Commission for Refugees). Unable to work in Jordan, they receive basic financial help and support to help them rebuild their lives. Story continues They included Louai, a nurse, and Rana, a Christian family with three children who had to flee Mosul, Iraq in 2015, when Islamic State or Daesh took over their city. In a group meeting volunteers, the prince shook his head sorrowfully as he heard their stories. I so feel for you, he said. You are marvellous for volunteering. Fantastic. Im so impressed by how you are managing these challenges. Before leaving the prince was given a pencil sketch of himself by Faihaa, 38, who fled Damascus with her husband and three children after the city was bombed and now runs an art workshop in Amman. Wow, the prince said as he saw her work, before posing for a photograph with her. England and South Africa will meet for the first time since the 2019 World Cup final at Twickenham on Saturday. Here, the PA news agency examines the fly-half duel between Marcus Smith and Handre Pollard that will help shape the contest. Marcus Smith England Marcus Smith has made a promising start to his England career but South Africa are the toughest opponents he will have faced (Adam Davy/PA) Club: Harlequins Position: Fly-half Age: 22 Caps: 4 Debut: v USA, 2021 Height: 5ft 7in Weight: 12st 13lbs Points: 51 (Tries 2, Conversions 19, Penalty 1) The rising star of English rugby has barely put a foot wrong in his young Test career but against South Africa he faces his greatest challenge yet. Smith has made his name through the attacking flourishes that swept Harlequins to the Gallagher Premiership title last season, but on Saturday he will need to demonstrate the strides taken in his game management. The Springboks will unleash a barrage of kicks and Smith must orchestrate the response, while also operating in the teeth of their blitz defence. There will be no Owen Farrell to assist with the generalship, but Smith has shown previously that he has the steel to match his genius. Handre Pollard South Africa Handre Pollard is a physical presence who can carry into the heart of the opposition midfield (Steve Haag/PA) Club: Montpellier Position: Fly-half Age: 27 Caps: 59 Debut: v Scotland, 2014 Height: 6ft 2in Weight: 15st 4lbs Points: 586 (Tries 6, conversions 83, penalties 126, drop-goals 4) A very different fly-half to Smith and one ideally suited to South Africas forward-orientated, smothering gameplan that was enough to topple the Lions during the summer. Cobus Reinach will provide imagination at scrum-half, while Pollard directs the world champions around the field with a siege-gun boot. Unlike Smith, the France-based playmaker is also a physical presence who can carry into the heart of the opposition midfield, offering a gainline threat. Defensively he is very solid and, while armed with a a range of passing, it is his game management that stands out. (Bloomberg) -- Germanys likely next ruling coalition is pushing ahead with tougher measures to tackle record increases in coronavirus cases, including requiring companies to let employees work from home where possible. Most Read from Bloomberg The proposed law also in some cases limits access to the workplace to people who are vaccinated, recovered or provide a negative test, according to parliamentary documents published Wednesday. The Social Democrats, Greens and Free Democrats aim to use their Bundestag majority to get it through the lower house of parliament on Thursday. The current pandemic situation in Germany is dramatic, Chancellor Angela Merkel told a conference of municipal leaders on Wednesday. The fourth wave is hitting our country with full force. The new legislation, which replaces existing emergency powers that will expire on Nov. 25, is designed to provide a nationwide framework while giving regions room to tighten restrictions in coronavirus hot spots where needed. Olaf Scholz, who aims to be sworn in to replace Merkel as chancellor early next month, has described it as an effort to winter proof Germany against the disease and prevent hospitals becoming overloaded. Many German states, particularly in the worst-affected regions like Bavaria, Saxony and Thuringia, have already taken steps to keep people who arent vaccinated or recovered out of shops and restaurants and away from public gatherings. We urgently need to make progress on vaccinations, Merkel said. Its not at all too late to make a decision for the first vaccination. Everybody who is vaccinated protects themselves and others. The battle to keep a fourth wave of the virus in check and encourage more people to get immunized is being fought across Europe. Austria already introduced curbs for the unvaccinated, and the Netherlands implemented a partial lockdown. Story continues Ireland has reintroduced some Covid-19 restrictions as it grapples with surging infections and a rising number of hospitalizations. Starting Thursday, people should work from home where possible, while bars and restaurants must close by midnight. Cinemas and theaters will now require proof of vaccination. In Italy, tighter restrictions are set to kick in automatically as infections near a six-month high. Some regional leaders want to replicate the Austrian model and have asked that any new curbs apply only to the unvaccinated. Belgium is considering new steps to stem a sharp rise in cases. The government in Brussels is considering new curbs, including mandatory working from home several days a week and requiring kids to wear masks in school from nine years old. While the measures represent a downside risk for the regions recovery, it looks to me that the economies have learned to live with the pandemic or the lockdowns a little bit better than initially, said Erik Nielsen, chief economist at UniCredit SpA. Eastern Europe, where many states are grappling with low vaccination rates, is one of the worst-hit regions in the world. Slovenia has the highest infection rate in the world, while Bulgaria, the blocs least-vaccinated and poorest nation, leads the world in the number of fatalities per capita. Hungary is suffering the highest infection levels since March, but President Viktor Orban is resisting restrictive measures ahead of parliamentary elections next year. Germanys RKI public-health institute reported another record number of daily cases on Wednesday, and the seven-day incidence rate per 100,000 people hit a new high of 319.5. The number of deaths from Covid increased by 294, the most in more than six months and taking the total above 98,000. Merkel and Scholz will hold a video conference with the leaders of Germanys 16 states on Thursday. Merkel said state leaders must focus on setting a threshold for hospitalization rates that would trigger stricter measures. Regional officials must also make an urgent push for inoculating Germanys population. We still have too large a group of people who arent vaccinated and theyre making life more uncertain for those who are, Stephan Weil, the premier of the state of Lower Saxony, said Wednesday in an interview with ZDF television. We unfortunately have to put people who are not vaccinated in a situation in which they have to prove everywhere and all the time that they dont pose a danger, he added. Germanys vaccination campaign stuttered in recent months, though it has picked up pace again in recent weeks, pushing the share of fully inoculated citizens up to about 68%, according to health ministry data. That compares with almost 78% in France and nearly 75% in Italy. (Updates with comments from Merkel beginning in the third paragraph) Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek 2021 Bloomberg L.P. Photo - IMCD Indonesia strengthens its life science portfolio with the acquisition of PT Megasetia Agung Kimia In the picture, Adelia Sia, Managing Director of IMCD Indonesia (left), and Suryani Hartoyo, President Director of Megasetia (right). In the picture, Adelia Sia, Managing Director of IMCD Indonesia (left), and Suryani Hartoyo, President Director of Megasetia (right). ROTTERDAM, The Netherlands (17 November 2021) IMCD N.V. (IMCD or Company), a leading distributor of speciality chemicals and ingredients, today announces that IMCD Indonesia has signed an agreement to acquire 100% of the shares of PT Megasetia Agung Kimia (Megasetia) in Indonesia. Megasetia is an excellent fit with IMCDs life science strategy and provides a significant platform for further growth in the life science segments in Indonesia. The transaction will take place in two tranches, with IMCD now acquiring 70% of Megasetias share capital and the remaining 30% in 2025. The management of Megasetia will continue to lead the company post completion of the first tranche. Founded in 1995, Megasetia is the leading distributor of speciality ingredients for the pharmaceuticals industry in Indonesia. In addition, it covers the personal care, home care, animal health, and industrial markets, offering end-to-end solutions to its customers and partners with 3 laboratories, 6 offices, and 6 warehouses across Indonesia. Megasetia generated a revenue of approximately IDR 974 billion (ca. EUR 60 million) in 2020 with around 160 employees. It currently serves more than 1,000 customers and represents over 50 of the worlds leading ingredients producers. Indonesia is South East Asias largest economy and this acquisition provides excellent growth opportunities to strengthen IMCDs positioning in the life science segments. In addition, it enables us to enhance our offering to local customers and partners, said Haiko Zuidhoff, Vice President of IMCD APAC. We are delighted to be part of IMCDs global network. We are confident that our life science portfolio will complement their offering to customers and suppliers, commented Suryani Hartoyo, President Director of Megasetia. Our culture of growth through market knowledge, technical innovation, and high level of services, is very well aligned with IMCDs strategy, concluded Hartoyo. Story continues The closing of the transaction is expected to take place in December 2021. Attached, please find a pdf format of the press release, the main picture, and its caption. Attachments Koray Aldemir Retains Massive Lead With Three Remaining in 2021 WSOP Main Event November 17 2021 Yori Epskamp After nearly seven hours of play, a final table of nine in the 2021 WSOP Main Event has been whittled down to its last three hopefuls in search of becoming poker's next world champion and $8,000,000 richer. Koray Aldemir, who came in hot as the overwhelming chip leader and odds-on favorite, kept his distance from the pack and ended a fantastic day with 264,600,000 in chips. Only two people are standing between Aldemir and poker's most coveted title: UK's Jack Oliver will return second in chips with 77,300,000 after a late-night surge vaulted him up the leaderboard, while the last remaining American, Atlanta, Georgia's George Holmes, rounds out the final three with 57,400,000 in chips, still a cushiony 36 big blinds to work with in the current level. For Joshua Remitio (4th - $2,300,000), Ozgur Secilmis (5th - $1,800,000), Hye Park (6th - $1,400,000), Alejandro Lococo (7th - $1,225,000), Jareth East (8th - $1,100,000), and Chase Bianchi (9th - $1,000,000), their dream of winning the Main Event came to an end on Day 8. 2021 WSOP Main Event Chip Counts Seat Player Chip Count Country Big Blinds 1 Koray Aldemir 264,600,000 Austria 165 2 Jack Oliver 77,300,000 United Kingdom 48 3 George Holmes 57,400,000 United States 36 Final Table Results and Remaining Payouts Place Winner Country Prize (in USD) 1 $8,000,000 2 $4,300,000 3 $3,000,000 4 Joshua Remitio United States $2,300,000 5 Ozgur Secilmis Turkey $1,800,000 6 Hye Park United States $1,400,000 7 Alejandro Lococo Argentina $1,225,000 8 Jareth East United Kingdom $1,100,000 9 Chase Bianchi United States $1,000,000 Final table players While play was originally scheduled to be hard-stopped with four players remaining, a late-night decision by the staff saw play briefly continue. Shortly after that decision, a big three-way all in at the end of the night nearly resulted in a double knockout and almost left the field with just two for the final day. Holding pocket queens, Aldemir over-called after Oliver originally shoved and Remitio three-bet jammed. just setting up my twttr Biz Stone (@biz) Oliver held the jack-nine of diamonds, while Remitio brought ace-jack to the table. Oliver ultimately rivered a backdoor flush for a massive triple up and spun it up even further by delivering the knockout blow to Remitio shortly after. The end result is three-handed play tomorrow with plenty of pepper left in every player's stack. Jack Oliver returns second in chips for the final day. Explosive End Proves Fitting Conclusion The explosive end proved a fitting conclusion of a night full of thrills and frills that kicked off in high gear right off the bat. Just five hands in, Bianchi was forced to tap out after running his king-queen straight into Oliver's Big Slick. In the subsequent hand, East saw his Main Event run come to a screeching halt after his ace-jack failed to improve against Holmes' queens. Left with just seven after a mere six hands, Aldemir grabbed the reigns and started controlling the pace of play from his lofty spot. For 60 hands, the final table remained more or less the same, but Hand #61 changed everything. It's one of those hands that will no doubt be remembered in poker history for years to come. Holding pocket tens, Lococo, second in chips at the time, called a three-bet from Aldemir, who held pocket nines. The jack-jack-nine flop gave Aldemir a boat and the German fired all streets, including a pot-sized shove on the river. Lococo made a very daring call with pocket tens in rather rapid fashion, but received the bad news that forced the popular rapper off the stage in seventh place. Viewers of the PokerGO live broadcast couldn't believe what they were seeing, and the clip was later uploaded to the PokerGO YouTube channel to be enjoyed in its entirety. If youre not currently subscribed to PokerGo, you can get a monthly subscription for $14.99, a three-month plan for $29.99, and an annual subscription for $99.99. You can also save $10 off an annual subscription by using promo code PokerNews at checkout. Click here to subscribe. "I decided to three-bet, I can't call with nines," Aldemir said afterwards. "When it came jack-jack-nine, that's just great and I was going for value basically and hope that he has something, a jack or that he doesn't believe me and calls me down." That's exactly what ended up happening, and with an even bigger lead, it was smooth sailing for Aldemir from there on onwards. "I hit a lot of hands again and raised a lot, they couldn't do much about it," he said. With Lococo out of the way, Aldemir turned it up a notch and started opening every other hand. Twenty hands after Lococo's bust, Aldemir took care of Park in a blind-on-blind confrontation with ace-queen versus pocket sevens. On Hand #113 of the night, he also sent Secilmis home after the latter's shove with king-five suited got picked off by Aldemir's nines. Home Game Hero Holmes "Feels Awesome" Recreational player George Holmes is on the ride of his life Four-handed play started with Aldemir sporting a four-to-one lead to his nearest challenger Holmes, and if it wasn't for the aforementioned escape by Oliver with the jack-nine, it would've been just Aldemir vs. Holmes on the final day. Holmes, the home game hero and the proverbial David to high roller Aldemir's Goliath, kept his stack afloat throughout the day and will be back on the final day. "I feel awesome. I just want to go get some sleep so I can start off fresh tomorrow and be in good spirits," he said directly after bagging. Holmes, who may not have the poker resume of his fellow two adversaries, had a plan coming into the day. "Just kind of survive. See if we can get to three or four handed. Thats all it was about," he explained. "Tomorrow is going to be a little bit different from today. Theyre good, theyre aggressive. Thats the secret sauce," he added. Aldemir could become the third German within ten years to win the WSOP Main Event in Las Vegas and the reality of that hasn't fully sunk in yet. He was supported by a boisterous rail, which he was part of back in 2019 when Hossein Ensan won and he praised the support by the fellow German poker players. Aldemir, Oliver, and Holmes will be back in the air at 2 p.m. local time in the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino to contest for poker's most coveted prize. There's 1:45:04 left in level 39 with blinds at 800,000/1,600,000 and a big blind ante of 1,600,000. 2021 WSOP Main Event Bracelet Russia's Denis Strebkov defeated Jerry Wong in heads-up play to win his second World Series of Poker title in Event #74: $2,500 Big Bet Mix at the 2021 WSOP. Strebkov outlasted a field of 212 entries to win $117,898 and the gold bracelet. This is Strebkovs second WSOP title, the first coming in 2019 in the $3,000 H.O.R.S.E. event. Strebkov found a great deal of success in 2019, making three final tables in mixed formats and winning one. I like the mixed format because I play a lot of games, Strebkov told PokerNews after the win. I play a lot of mixed. I dont like to play holdem but I like some other games where you can play a lot of hands and have more fun. Strebkov was eager to build on his 2019 success, but travel restrictions related to COVID-19 made the 2021 WSOP a complicated trip that required a stop in Croatia to get the necessary vaccines. This is fantastic. I am glad I can play. I had a problem because the Russian vaccine is not approved here. Strebkov is taking a moment to celebrate, but after going through the trouble to get to the United States, he plans to make more noise at the 2021 WSOP. I am just speechless right now. The second bracelet is very good! I am going to go to the Razz event right now. I am already thinking about the next one. I might play another Omaha tournament, but we will see how its going. 2021 WSOP Event #74 Final Table Results Place Name Country Prize (USD) 1 Denis Strebkov Russia $117,898 2 Jerry Wong United States $72,868 3 Pearce Arnold United States $48,864 4 Richard Bai United States $33,583 5 Shanmukha Meruga United States $23,670 6 Patrik Ciklamini Slovakia $17,119 7 Hooman Nizad United States $12,715 Day 3 Action Noah Boeken was the first to hit the rail on Day 3 when Strebkov drew the fourth ten in Five Card Draw High to send him home in 14th place. Amnon Filippi followed right behind in a Pot-Limit Omaha hand where Strebkov made two-pair to beat Filippis pocket aces. Shortly after the re-draw to two tables, Asher Lower hit the rail in 12th place in a hand of Pot-Limit 2-7 Triple Draw when he caught a pair of fives on the last draw to lose to the ten-nine of Anthony Ribeiro. Jordan Siegel was next to go after he got it in with pocket nines against the ace-king of Richard Bai. Bai flopped a straight and Siegel was out in 11th place. Jon Turner went home with a 10th-place finish after he got it in with ace-jack but Patrik Ciklamini looked him up with pocket aces. Ciklamini went on to bust Scott Bohlman in ninth place when he called Bohlmans shove and caught a pair of twos score the elimination. Riberio was close behind in eighth after running into Wongs two-pair in Five Card Draw. After the final table re-draw, Hooman Nizad fell in seventh place in a Big O hand when Bai made a pair of aces to beat his pocket kings. Cinkamini was out in sixth after shoving with ace-eight against Strebkovs ace-queen. Shanmukha Meruga managed to ladder up in the process, but he ran out of time after being forced all-in on his big blind, and Bai stepped in to finish the job with tens full of nines in a hand of Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better. Bai was the next out after tangling with Wong in a hand of Pot-Limit 2-7 Triple Draw. The fourth-place finisher got it in and drew to a seven, but a queen on the third draw lost to Wongs eight-seven. Pearce Arnold finished third after running into Strebkovs nut flush in a hand of Big O. Heads-up play started with both players close to even, but Wong took a big hit early when he made a failed attempt to bet Strebkov off of a flush. The big moment came just a short time later when Strebkov made three eights in Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better and Wong missed his last chance at a low draw. Denis Strebkov on Day 3 of the 2021 Big Bet Mix Event. Congratulations to Denis Strebkov for winning his second bracelet in Event #74: $2,500 Big Bet Mix. Be sure to keep it here throughout the rest of the series for updates on all of your favorite events from the PokerNews live reporting team. Check out our 2021 WSOP Hub here! After nearly seven hours of play, a final table of nine in the 2021 WSOP Main Event has been whittled down to its last three hopefuls in search of becoming poker's next world champion and $8,000,000 richer. Koray Aldemir, who came in hot as the overwhelming chip leader and odds-on favorite, kept his distance from the pack and ended a fantastic day with 264,600,000 in chips. Only two people are standing between Aldemir and poker's most coveted title: UK's Jack Oliver will return second in chips with 77,300,000 after a late-night surge vaulted him up the leaderboard, while the last remaining American, Atlanta, Georgia's George Holmes, rounds out the final three with 57,400,000 in chips, still a cushiony 36 big blinds to work with in the current level. For Joshua Remitio (4th - $2,300,000), Ozgur Secilmis (5th - $1,800,000), Hye Park (6th - $1,400,000), Alejandro Lococo (7th - $1,225,000), Jareth East (8th - $1,100,000), and Chase Bianchi (9th - $1,000,000), their dream of winning the Main Event came to an end on Day 8. 2021 WSOP Main Event Chip Counts Seat Player Chip Count Country Big Blinds 1 Koray Aldemir 264,600,000 Austria 165 2 Jack Oliver 77,300,000 United Kingdom 48 3 George Holmes 57,400,000 United States 36 just setting up my twttr Biz Stone (@biz) Final Table Results and Remaining Payouts Place Winner Country Prize (in USD) 1 $8,000,000 2 $4,300,000 3 $3,000,000 4 Joshua Remitio United States $2,300,000 5 Ozgur Secilmis Turkey $1,800,000 6 Hye Park United States $1,400,000 7 Alejandro Lococo Argentina $1,225,000 8 Jareth East United Kingdom $1,100,000 9 Chase Bianchi United States $1,000,000 Final table players While play was originally scheduled to be hard-stopped with four players remaining, a late-night decision by the staff saw play briefly continue. Shortly after that decision, a big three-way all in at the end of the night nearly resulted in a double knockout and almost left the field with just two for the final day. Holding pocket queens, Aldemir over-called after Oliver originally shoved and Remitio three-bet jammed. Oliver held the jack-nine of diamonds, while Remitio brought ace-jack to the table. Oliver ultimately rivered a backdoor flush for a massive triple up and spun it up even further by delivering the knockout blow to Remitio shortly after. The end result is three-handed play tomorrow with plenty of pepper left in every player's stack. Jack Oliver returns second in chips for the final day. Explosive End Proves Fitting Conclusion The explosive end proved a fitting conclusion of a night full of thrills and frills that kicked off in high gear right off the bat. Just five hands in, Bianchi was forced to tap out after running his king-queen straight into Oliver's Big Slick. In the subsequent hand, East saw his Main Event run come to a screeching halt after his ace-jack failed to improve against Holmes' queens. Left with just seven after a mere six hands, Aldemir grabbed the reigns and started controlling the pace of play from his lofty spot. In the first 60 hands, despite plenty of action to enjoy for the live crowd and audience of home, the final table order wasn't changed all that much. However, hand #61 changed everything. It's one of those hands that will no doubt be remembered in poker history for years to come. Holding pocket tens, Lococo, second in chips at the time, called a three-bet from Aldemir, who held pocket nines. The jack-jack-nine flop gave Aldemir a boat and the German fired all streets, including a pot-sized shove on the river. Lococo made a very daring call with pocket tens in rather rapid fashion, but received the bad news that forced the popular rapper off the stage in seventh place. Viewers of the PokerGO live broadcast couldn't believe what they were seeing, and the clip was later uploaded to the PokerGO YouTube channel to be enjoyed in its entirety. If youre not currently subscribed to PokerGo, you can get a monthly subscription for $14.99, a three-month plan for $29.99, and an annual subscription for $99.99. You can also save $10 off an annual subscription by using promo code PokerNews at checkout. Click here to subscribe. "I decided to three-bet, I can't call with nines," Aldemir said afterwards. "When it came jack-jack-nine, that's just great and I was going for value basically and hope that he has something, a jack or that he doesn't believe me and calls me down." That's exactly what ended up happening, and with an even bigger lead, it was smooth sailing for Aldemir from there on onwards. "I hit a lot of hands again and raised a lot, they couldn't do much about it," he said. With Lococo out of the way, Aldemir turned it up a notch and started opening every other hand. Twenty hands after Lococo's bust, Aldemir took care of Park in a blind-on-blind confrontation with ace-queen versus pocket sevens. On Hand #113 of the night, he also sent Secilmis home after the latter's shove with king-five suited got picked off by Aldemir's nines. Home Game Hero Holmes "Feels Awesome" Recreational player George Holmes is on the ride of his life Four-handed play started with Aldemir sporting a four-to-one lead to his nearest challenger Holmes, and if it wasn't for the aforementioned escape by Oliver with the jack-nine, it would've been just Aldemir vs. Holmes on the final day. Holmes, the home game hero and the proverbial David to high roller Aldemir's Goliath, kept his stack afloat throughout the day and will be back on the final day. "I feel awesome. I just want to go get some sleep so I can start off fresh tomorrow and be in good spirits," he said directly after bagging. Holmes, who may not have the poker resume of his fellow two adversaries, had a plan coming into the day. "Just kind of survive. See if we can get to three or four handed. Thats all it was about," he explained. "Tomorrow is going to be a little bit different from today. Theyre good, theyre aggressive. Thats the secret sauce," he added. Aldemir could become the third German within ten years to win the WSOP Main Event in Las Vegas and the reality of that hasn't fully sunk in yet. He was supported by a boisterous rail, which he was part of back in 2019 when Hossein Ensan won and he praised the support by the fellow German poker players. Aldemir, Oliver, and Holmes will be back in the air at 2 p.m. local time in the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino to contest for poker's most coveted prize. There's 1:45:04 left in level 39 with blinds at 800,000/1,600,000 and a big blind ante of 1,600,000. Main Event Bracelet Natural gas prices have been ceding ground with the selling pressure primarily driven by the delayed onset of winter and weak cash pricing. Natural gas prices were quoted at a seven-week low of $4.77/MMBtu on Monday's intraday session, 23% below the 13-year high they attained a month ago. Oil Price reports that Russia, one of Europe's biggest natural gas providers, has been accused of intentionally withholding supplies, comments that Putin quickly rubbished, saying Europe's energy woes are self-inflicted. Gas traders contend that one of the drivers of the rally is that Russia has been limiting its European gas supplies to the levels in long-term contracts and has allowed Gazprom's storage facilities in the continent to fall to very low levels. But people expecting Russia to become the new 'Gas-OPEC' could be in for a major disappointment. Gas prices in Europe have started surging again as traders see little evidence that Russia is capable of making good on Putin's promise of increased exports. According to the Financial Times, whereas Gazprom started adding some gas to its largest storage sites in Germany and Austria over the weekend, Russia has failed to book additional pipeline capacity, suggesting that any storage fill would come from existing flows. "Russia has done what it said it was going to do, but in a very narrow way. What would get a bigger reaction from the market would be if Gazprom went back to auctioning short-term gas supplies, as they have done in previous years," Laurent Ruseckas at IHS Markit tells FT. European benchmark futures jumped as much as 10% to above 80/MWh while the U.K. benchmark climbed 6% to ~2/therm. Swing producer The natural gas sector finds itself in a tenuous position mainly because it lacks a strong organization like OPEC to try and maintain some semblance of order with the natural gas equivalent--the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF)--usually preferring to take a hands-off approach. Here, gas producers usually dance to their own tunes, adjusting production according to the prevailing market dynamics, but none of the members have the flexibility to act as swing producers. Sure, Norway's Equinor (NYSE:EQNR) is able to optimize its domestic gas output by deferring production when prices dip too low. Meanwhile, producers who do not use long-term futures contracts, such as Egypt, are forced to halt production when it stops making economic sense while Russia's Gazprom is mainly limited by how much their transport infrastructure can handle. Russia's ability to regulate the natural gas markets appears quite limited. Last year, Russia completely turned off flows from the 2,607-mile-long Yamal-Europe pipeline that runs across Belarus, Poland, and Germany with a capacity of 33 bln cubic meters of gas per year, yet the markets hardly took notice with prices remaining severely depressed. Prices at the Dutch Title Transfer Facility, a virtual trading point for natural gas in the Netherlands, plunged to ~$40 per 1,000 cubic meters in May. That's considerably lower than the $47 on average per 1,000 cubic meters that Gazprom forks over as transit costs for the pipeline. The litmus test of Gazprom's capacity to act as a swing supplier was its ability to drop production dramatically in 2020 and then to bring it back up again quickly in 2021. Yet, Gazprom has failed to bring any more spare production capacity online when needed mostbecause it has none left. According to Vitaly Yermakov, expert with the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Gazprom has really been "firing on all cylinders", pushing its gas output to maximum levels at all of its key fields for most of 2021 so far. In fact, there was no sharp cyclical decline in output over the summer months. Yermakov points to several reasons why Gazprom has been unable to cover the call for increased gas production or to fully refill gas storage in Russia and in Europe. First off, very low gas prices in 2020 forced extremely high withdrawals of gas from storage by producers in a bid to minimize transportation costs and reduce losses. Second, the combined effects of robust gas demand, extreme weather patterns, and limited LNG availability in Europe have resulted in extreme market tightness and high prices. Gazprom has actually done well by managing to meet all its contractual obligations and increased deliveries to Europe, but could not single-handedly address Europe's energy insecurity. Yermakov says Russia is not about to run out of natural gas, and its prolific reserves allow the country to meet much higher overall demand. However, bringing additional production online is something that cannot be done at the push of a button. Russia is fully capable of producing much more gas in the long term but needs to secure this output by signing new supply contracts with buyers. In other words, Russia is not ready to spend billions of dollars just to maintain spare productive capacity and meet demand spikes in Europe and elsewhere. Further, Russian natural gas fields have been evolving, making this task even more challenging. There are few physical links between the Central corridor that connects the country's old and declining gas fields in Nadym-Pur-Taz with consumers in Central Russia, and the Northern corridor that connects growing new production in Yamal with northwest Russia making it hard for Gazprom to swing flows between the Northern and Central corridors, especially during the winter. In the final analysis, Yermakov concludes by saying that Russia could develop the necessary infrastructure and improve its supply flexibility if the offtake is guaranteed by new contracts. The Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over the formerly occupied territories of Azerbaijan was a byproduct of the collapse of the Soviet Union, although it had roots from before then. Seizing the opportunity created by the political turbulence in and around the South Caucasus in the early 1990s, Armenia occupied up to twenty percent of Azerbaijans internationally recognized territories and succeeded in keeping them under its control until last years forty-four-day Karabakh War, The National Interest reports. The conflict was a source of frequent armed escalations and constant tension between the two countries; it hampered the economic progress of the entire South Caucasus region and shaped the foreign policies of both countries. While Armenia eagerly joined the Russia-led regional political and military structures in hopes of counterbalancing Azerbaijan and its strategic ally Turkey, Azerbaijan succeeded in pursuing a more independent foreign policy. Notwithstanding the threats from and pressure by parts of its territories that remained under Armenian control, Azerbaijan initiated or participated in various Western economic and geopolitical projects, proving to be a reliable ally. Given that the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict is relegated to history, and Azerbaijan has restored its territorial integrity, Baku has gained more strategic autonomy and could play a crucial role in U.S. policy toward Eurasia. The emergence of new security threats in the region, like the recent tensions between Baku and Tehran, necessitates the quick and substantial engagement of the United States. The lack of such engagement risks undesired consequences not only for AzerbaijanU.S. relations but also for U.S. policy toward the entire region. The post-Soviet foreign policies of the Republic of Azerbaijan have mostly belonged to a balanced approach, denoting the countrys cordial relations with all major geopolitical forces. For the Azerbaijani government, this policy, which it presents as multilateralism, allows it to effectively pursue national interests and act as a bridge between rival great powers. The Azerbaijani presidential aide on foreign policy Hikmet Hajiyev has aptly characterized this approach as the 4 Ms, which stands for multi-vectorism, multilateralism, multi-regionalism, and multiculturalism. According to Hajiyev, the geopolitical realities of the region where Azerbaijan is located give Baku no choice but to develop partnerships with various regional and global players, rather than allying with a geopolitical pole at the expense of relations with other actors. This political course of action has been made possible thanks to the policies of Azerbaijans leaders and the support of its Western partnersprimarily the United States. Relations between Azerbaijan and the United States developed through bilateral and multilateral cooperation in energy security; counter-terrorism; joint economic projects; and trade, political, and humanitarian initiatives. Azerbaijan was one of the first countries to declare unwavering support to the United States after 9/11 and sent troops to Afghanistan and, later, Iraq. While other countries reduced their troop presence in Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, as the only Muslim-majority partner of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in the mission, increased boots on the ground from ninety-four to 120 in early 2018, reaffirming its support of its Western allies. Azerbaijan has also provided critical transportation passage for NATO; approximately forty percent of cargo destined for NATO troops in Afghanistan passed through the country. Azerbaijans support for the Afghanistan mission continued even after the Taliban announced it would take full control of the country. A 120-man peacekeeping unit from the Azerbaijan Army, together with Turkish troops, ensured the security of Kabul International Airport until the end of August, providing the necessary security for the safe evacuation of civilians and troops. Azerbaijan has been also a reliable U.S. partner in critical geopolitical issues, including the energy security of the European Union (EU) and the national security of Israel. Azerbaijani oil and gas exports provide the EU with an important alternative for reducing its energy dependency on Russia. The inauguration of the 3,500-kilometer-long Southern Gas Corridor with an investment volume of about $40 billion created the necessary infrastructure to carry Caspian gas reserves to the European market for the first time. Against the background of Europes recent energy crisis due to skyrocketing gas prices, Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev rightly said at the VIII Global Baku Forum from November 4 to 6: In those countries where Azerbaijans gas is delivered, there is no gas crisis, there is no price crisis, and there is no freezing. So, this demonstrates that the Southern Gas Corridor is a project of energy security of Europe. In fact, this pipeline provides more than just European energy securityit is also of great importance for the Western geopolitical agenda. For example, the Southern Gas Corridor will provide a window of opportunity for Turkmenistan to reduce its dependency on China after it starts to export its natural gas to Europe via the pipeline. Azerbaijans close relations with Israel have proved to be critically important for the national security of both countries. As a Muslim-majority country that is a secular state, Azerbaijan has prioritized these relations despite all the challenges and threats posed by the countrys southern neighbor Iran. The Azerbaijani city of Qirmizi Qasaba is thought to be the worlds only all-Jewish city outside of Israel. During a recent visit to Qirmizi Qasaba, the U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan, celebrating the coexistence of synagogues and mosques in the city, called Azerbaijan a special place. Azerbaijan has also been one of the top buyers of Israeli military technology, which has empowered the country against regional security threats. Azerbaijan also provides Israel with forty percent of its oil requirements. The multilayered relations between Azerbaijan and the United States have persisted despite opposition inside and outside the United States. Pro-Armenian legislators like Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) and Congressman Adam Schiff (D-CA) consistently promote anti-Azerbaijani views within the United States and call upon the countrys leaders to oppose Azerbaijans policies that concern its conflict with Armenia. Media campaigns also do not shy away from calling Azerbaijan a strategic liability for the United States, thereby disregarding all the contributions that Azerbaijan has made to the national security of the United States and its allies. But American administrations rarely buy into the propaganda. Despite efforts by the pro-Armenian lobby and Armenian diaspora organizations, the Joe Biden administration waived the provisions of Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act in April and enabled U.S. assistance to Azerbaijan. This action took place during a critical period for Azerbaijan-U.S. relations as it happened less than six months after the end Second Karabakh War that reclaimed Azerbaijans territorial integrity. The post-war period necessitates more robust support for Azerbaijan, as the country faces new security threats. The recent tensions in Baku-Tehran relations taken alongside Armenias alignment with Iran challenge Azerbaijans national security. Both Yerevan and Tehran are concerned about Azerbaijans deep relations with Israel and the strategic autonomy that the country regained after its occupied territories were liberated. Both are interested in disrupting the post-war regional status quo as well as Bakus ties with its Western partners. At a meeting with Azerbaijans new ambassador amid strained tensions on September 30, Irans foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said, We do not tolerate the presence and activity against our national security of the Zionist regime next to our borders and will take any necessary action in this regard. Against this backdrop, U.S. support for Azerbaijan is beneficial for both parties. Azerbaijans thirty years of post-Soviet era contributions toamong other things, counterterrorism efforts, European energy security, and Middle Eastern peace and stabilitydemonstrate that Azerbaijan is a reliable partner of the United States. Eastern commander Khalifa Haftar says he will run for president in elections to be held in Libya on 24 December that are also set to be contested by a son of former leader Muammar Gaddafi. Middle East Eye reports that Haftar said: "I declare my candidacy for the presidential election, not because I am chasing power but because I want to lead our people towards glory, progress and prosperity." His announcement comes two days after Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, who has been accused of war crimes by the International Criminal Court, announced his candidacy. Haftar, who is backed by Russia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, has been accused of seeking to establish a military dictatorship in the country. In April 2019, his self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) launched a year-long offensive on the capital Tripoli under the pretext of rooting out militant groups. Haftar was eventually pushed back after Turkey intervened, with Ankara deploying Syrian fighters, combat drones and military equipment to support the internationally recognised government in Tripoli. In his speech on Tuesday, Haftar said that the December election was "the only way to pull Libya out of chaos". On 22 September, he provisionally retired from his role as head of the LNA in line with electoral law to allow him to run for president. Last week, his forces said 300 mercenaries fighting on his side would leave Libya at the request of France in a "unilateral gesture," expecting nothing in return from the government in Tripoli. Following his announcement, he is expected to head to the electoral authority to formalise his candidacy. Israel visit Earlier this month, Haftar's son Saddam landed in Israel on a private jet amid reports about the possibility of the commander promising an agreement to recognise Israel after the December election. A report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz said that Saddam was on the plane, which landed in Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv for 90 minutes before lifting off again. Though it is unknown who he met while on the ground in Israel, Haftar has in the past reportedly met with members of Israeli intelligence. Libya and Israel currently have no diplomatic relations, but, according to Haaretz, Haftar has promised that he would launch a recognition process akin to that carried out by the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco last year, in exchange for "military and diplomatic assistance" from Israel. Next month's election is seen by the international community as a key step in restoring stability to Libya after a decade of conflict since the overthrow of Gaddafi in a Nato-backed uprising. The attitude of Armenians towards Russia has seriously deteriorated over the past year, and the main reason was Moscow's reluctance to side with Yerevan in its conflict with Baku, Armenian political observer and journalist Hayk Khalatyan said. "The Armenian man has two versions of what is happening: either Russia is in collusion with Azerbaijan, or Russia is not as strong as they say on TV: it could simply be afraid of Turkey's might and Azerbaijan's might. So, they conclude that it is necessary to look for either a more reliable ally, or a stronger one," MK cited Khalatyan as saying. Yesterday, during the Soloviev LIVE show, discussing the Armenian-Azerbaijani border situation, Khalatyan said: to be a friend of Russia means to be a looser. "Being a friend of Russia has become synonymous with the word 'loser'. As in foreign policy, you are a 'loser' if you are with Russia, because Russia will not help you, so in domestic policy, being friends with Russia means losing forever. This is what Russian foreign policy means," the Armenian political scientist said. However, it's not just the war - early parliamentary elections were held in Armenia, and despite the fact that the opposition made a lot of efforts to take power from Nikol Pashinyan, "Russia took an equidistant position in this issue as well. Because of this, the pro-Russian electorate in Armenia was dealt another morale blow," Khalatyan said. Today Azerbaijan is marking the National Revival Day. Azerbaijani people started indefinite rally on Azadlig Square against the anti-Azerbaijani policy of the USSR on November 17, 1988. It was a real national liberation movement. The Soviet troops dispersed the nationwide rally in early December. These events are regarded in Azerbaijan as the start of the national liberation movement and the main factor in gaining independence. On the first days of 1988, Armenia started its evident aggression against Azerbaijan. Seeing Moscow and particularly the head of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev's indifferent attitude towards these events, the Armenians started mass deportation of the Azerbaijanis from their native lands in Armenia under the instructions of the Armenian government. More than 200,000 Azerbaijanis were deported from their homes, killed by the Armenians. Gorbachev and the rest of the USSR leadership had no reaction to the Armenian vandalism. In early February 1988, Armenians carried out revolts in Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan and even raised the issue of joining those lands with Armenia. Azerbaijani people expressed protest to the government. Slogans, portraits and flags carried by the Azerbaijani citizens proved their belief to Moscow and local authorities at that time. But getting no serious answer from Moscow and the then government, people from every corner of the republic moved to Baku and gathered on Azadlig Square (Lenin Square at that time), held meetings and evidently expressed their protest. November 17 has been marked as the Day of National Revival since 1992. Azerbaijan produced 704,400 barrels of oil per day, including condensate in October 2021, of which 585,900 barrels accounted for crude oil and 118,500 barrels were condensate, according to the country's Energy Ministry. In accordance with the decision taken at the 20th meeting of the ministers of the OPEC + countries, Azerbaijan committed itself to cut oil production by 78,000 barrels in October. The country's oil production quota in October was 640,000 barrels.As such, Azerbaijan fulfilled its obligations under the OPEC + agreement by 109.2%. According to the agreement reached at the 21st meeting of ministers, Azerbaijan pledged to reduce production by 71,000 barrels per day in November and thereby produce 64,000 barrels of crude oil more than in the previous month. A telephone conversation took place between the of Turkey's Minister of National Defense Hulusi Akar and Azerbaijan's Minister of Defense, Colonel General Zakir Hasanov on November 16, according to Azerbaijans defense ministry. Colonel General Hasanov informed his counterpart on the provocations committed by the Armenian side and the situation on the state border, as well as noted that these steps of the opposing side were resolutely suppressed. In turn, Akar noted that today Turkey supports Azerbaijan as it always does. An adequate response will continue to be given to any military provocations against the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, according to the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry. "The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry strongly condemns the military provocations of the Armenian side, which acts from a position of revanchism. Responsibility for aggravating the situation in the region and creating obstacles to the implementation of the trilateral statement lies directly with the military-political leadership of Armenia. An adequate response will continue to be given to any threats and military provocations directed against the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan within its internationally recognized borders," the statement says. As a result of the military provocation committed by Armenia on November 16 on the state border with Azerbaijan, seven servicemen of the Azerbaijani army were killed and 10 were wounded. Baku believes that there is no alternative to normalization of relations with Yerevan, Permanent Representative of Azerbaijan to the UN Yasar Aliyev told the Security Council, stating Bakus readiness to sign a peace treaty with Armenia. "Azerbaijan states its readiness to normalize relations with Armenia, including by signing a peace treaty that would ensure a sustainable peace, development, progress," the diplomat said, assessing the situation at the border as a result of Armenias "dangerous revanchist ideas." "Azerbaijan is certain that there is no alternative to normalization of relations between the two countries, based on mutual recognition, respect of each others sovereignty and territorial integrity within internationally recognized borders," he said, adding that such normalization aims for reconciliation and peaceful coexistence of Azerbaijan and Armenia. The issues of expanding cooperation were discussed in a telephone conversation by the presidents of Ukraine and Turkey, Volodymyr Zelensky and Recep Tayyip Erdogan on November 16. Edogan and Zelensky spoke by phone and discussed ways to improve relations, according to a statement from Turkey's Directorate of Communications. The presidents agreed to hold the 10th anniversary meeting of the High-level Strategic Council in Kiev in February 2022. EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell said on Tuesday he spoke over the phone with Belarusian Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei and urged for restoring order at the border with Poland. "Spoke to Foreign Minister Makei as a follow up to FAC (Foreign Affairs Council) discussion on Belarus. I called for urgent action to restore security at Belarus border areas with EU and address humanitarian plight of stranded persons there," he wrote on his Twitter account. The EU foreign ministers on Monday passed a decision on imposing the fifth portion of anti-Belarusian sanctions and agreed to establish a new sanctions mechanism for air companies, travel agencies and individuals responsible for airlifting migrants to Belarus. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said earlier the countrys Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei had held a telephone conversation with German acting Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday and they had agreed that the Belarusian foreign minister would maintain contact with EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell in a bid to settle the crisis. Makei and Borrell discussed the migration situation at Belarus border with the European Union. The migration crisis at Belarus border with Poland, Lithuania and Latvia deteriorated dramatically on November 8, when several thousand migrants approached the Polish border and set up camp there. From time to time they try to break through the fences and cross into Poland, but are stopped by Polish law enforcers. The Cooperation Council between the European Union and Uzbekistan held its sixteenth meeting on November 16 in Brussels. The meeting was chaired by Mr Augusto Santos Silva, Portugals Minister of Foreign Affairs, on behalf of Josep Borrell, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. The delegation of Uzbekistan was led by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Abdulaziz Kamilov. The Cooperation Council took stock of developments in relations between the EU and the Republic of Uzbekistan over the past two years, noting with satisfaction the intensity of contacts at all levels despite the disruption to regular scheduled face-to-face meetings as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The two sides agreed on the importance of pursuing a green, sustainable economic recovery from the pandemic. The Cooperation Council discussed Uzbekistan's reform programme, and issues relating to the rule of law, trade, investment and energy relations, and international issues. The Cooperation Council also discussed questions of good governance and the role of civil society, as well as measures to improve the business climate in Uzbekistan. The Cooperation Council took note of the progress in negotiations for a new Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement between the EU and Uzbekistan. This new agreement will further deepen bilateral relations and support the ongoing ambitious reform programme in Uzbekistan. Nine formal negotiating rounds have taken place to date, with both sides meeting also remotely during the pandemic to achieve steady progress towards finalising a text. The Cooperation Council welcomed Uzbekistan's role in advancing regional cooperation in Central Asia, including through the promotion of sustainable connectivity. The Cooperation Council also exchanged views on Afghanistan and other current political and security issues. European Council President Charles Michel urged the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan on Tuesday to call a full ceasefire after new border clashes erupted between the old foes. Michel said he had spoken to President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan of Armenia. Michel did not apportion blame for the challenging situation in the region but demanded an urgent de-escalation and full ceasefire. The EU is committed to work with partners to overcome tensions for a prosperous and stable South Caucasus, he tweeted. Hundreds of migrants amassed on the Belarus-Poland border on Tuesday night, tried to force their way onto European Union territory, clashing with Polish security forces. The migrant crisis on the Belarusian-Polish border has been brewing since spring, as thousands of people from the Middle East have tried to transit into the EU member country through the territory of Belarus. Poland, as well as Latvia and Lithuania, have accused Belarus of sponsoring the illegal migration, an accusation the Belarusian government has denied. On Tuesday, the Belarusian-Polish border witnessed attempts by migrants to enter the European Union, trying to tearing down fences on the Polish-Belarus borders, and throwing sticks and rocks at Polish security forces who used tear gas, stun grenades, and water cannons in response. The Belarusian Health Ministry said that 21 migrants from Morocco, Turkey, Cuba, Iraq, Sri Lanka, Syria, Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, and Sudan had sought medical help since border tensions escalated. Four people were hospitalized, including three children. The consent and readiness of all sides are needed for a trilateral contact of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Azerbaijans leader Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Wednesday. "Undoubtedly, at some stage such contacts will be necessary but in order to make them possible, the consent and readiness for it of the three sides are needed," the Kremlin official said in response to a corresponding question. The spokesman added that Moscow calls the sides for restraint and stands for compliance with the trilateral agreements. Peskov stressed that the resumption of military activities on the border caused serious concern yesterday but Russia's mediation efforts made it possible to urge the parties to exercise restraint. Preclinical trials of two more coronavirus vaccines are currently underway in Russia, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said at Wednesday's meeting on the development of genetic technologies chaired by President Vladimir Putin. "We have simultaneously developed several breakthrough things of this sort. First and foremost, the Sputnik V vaccine that involves genetic technologies is already in use. We have also created two more vaccines that are currently going through preclinical trials. They are made on different platforms but work on a similar principle," he pointed out. Russia has so far registered five coronavirus vaccines, including Sputnik V, EpiVacCorona, CoviVac, Sputnik Light and EpiVacCorona-N. A Covid-19 vaccine for teenagers, developed by the Gamaleya Center, is in the registration phase. Seven servicemen of the Azerbaijani army were killed during the military operations conducted on November 16 on the state border due to the provocations of Armenia, according to the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry. Their names are Umid Niftaliyev (lieutenant), Orkhan Jabbarov (warrant officer), Natig Aliyev (super-conscript junior sergeant), Elchin Aghayev, Elmin Alizade, Elchin Aliyev and Murad Khalilov (soldiers). Besides, according to the ministry, 10 Azerbaijani servicemen were wounded in the battles. The situation on the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border has stabilized since the evening of Nov. 16. The provocation committed by Armenia on the state border failed, the ministry said. The operational situation is controlled by the units of the Azerbaijani army. The Armed Forces of Azerbaijan continue to serve in the sovereign territories of the country. The responsibility for the tension and confrontation that arose as a result of the Armenian provocation rests entirely with the military-political leadership of Armenia, added the ministry. The Taliban (movement banned in Russia) called Wednesday on U.S. Congress members to release Afghan assets frozen after their takeover of the country, warning economic turmoil at home could lead to trouble abroad. In an open letter, Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said the biggest challenge facing Afghanistan was financial insecurity, "and the roots of this concern lead back to the freezing of assets of our people by the American government". "I present to you our compliments and would like to share a few thoughts on our bilateral relations," Muttaqi wrote, noting that 2021 was the centenary of Washington recognising Afghanistan's sovereignty. In measured understatement, he added: "Akin to other world countries, our bilateral relations have also experienced ups and downs." Muttaqi said Afghanistan was enjoying stable government for the first time in over 40 years. "Practical steps have been taken towards good governance, security and transparency," Muttaqi wrote. "No threat is posed to the region or world from Afghanistan and a pathway has been paved for positive cooperation." Muttaqi said Afghans "understand the concerns of the international community", but that it was necessary for all sides to take positive steps to build trust. He warned, however, that the economic situation could spark a mass exodus. "If the current situation prevails, the Afghan government and people will face problems and will become a cause for mass migration in the region and world which will consequently create further humanitarian and economic issues," AFP cited him as saying. Washington has seized nearly $9.5 billion in assets belonging to the Afghan central bank, and the aid-dependent economy has effectively collapsed - with civil servants unpaid for months and the treasury unable to pay for imports. The United Nations calls on Azerbaijan and Armenia to demonstrate restraint and use peaceful means to settle problems between themselves, Deputy Spokesperson for the Secretary-General Farhan Haq said on Tuesday. "We are following with concern the reports of this latest violence. And we'll need to verify those reports. And at this point we urge all sides to exercise restraint, to act in accordance with the ninth of November and 11th of January trilateral statements and address any related concerns peacefully through dialogue," he stressed. "We want to avoid any return to the sort of escalation we had earlier," Haq added. White House officials insisted that U.S. President Joe Biden does not consider China's President Xi Jinping a "friend" after Xi, speaking through an interpreter in a virtual meeting with Biden Monday night, referred to his American counterpart as "my old friend." Asked what Xi was getting at - and if Xi was trying to undermine the U.S. - White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates didn't answer directly, but reiterated that Biden doesn't see Xi as an "old friend." "I'm not going to speak for President Xi," Bates told a reporter on Air Force One as Biden headed to New Hampshire. "But like you just mentioned," Bates continued, "you've heard explicitly from the president himself, that he has a longstanding relationship with President Xi. They've spent a great deal of time together. They are able to have candid discussions, be direct with each other, which helps them be productive. But he does not consider President Xi an old friend." Biden has often spoken of his long-term relationship with Xi and the time they spent together in person when they were both served as vice presidents, ABC News reported. But this June, Biden made clear he didn't think of Xi as an "old friend," saying in response to a question at a news conference in Geneva: "Let's get something straight. We know each other well; we're not old friends. It's just pure business." The two world leaders spoke for about three and a half hours via videoconference on Monday evening. Millions of overseas Vietnamese want to fly to Vietnam to celebrate Tet but international commercial flights have not resumed and few rescue flights exist. Millions of Viet Kieu want to fly to Vietnam to celebrate Tet T.T.D. has been stuck in Canada for two years and cannot return to Vietnam though he is fully vaccinated. He learned that there are rescue flights provided occasionally, but the airfare is too high, about VND50 million and passengers have to pay for quarantine. He has decided to wait for international commercial flights. I heard that Vietnam has temporarily recognized the vaccination certificates/vaccine passports of 72 countries/territories. When will Vietnamese people with vaccine passports be able to return? he said. At a recent webinar about the resumption of international air routes, a man said he and other Viet Kieu in Australia wanted to fly to Vietnam. When will airlines be allowed to sell tickets? Is it true that we have to wait until April 2022? he asked. In reply, an official said the plans to provide specific flights to help Vietnamese citizens return home are still being made, and depend on pandemic developments and domestic quarantine capacity. Regarding April 2022, he said airlines are still waiting for the decision by the Government on the Ministry of Transports proposal. As routine commercial flights have not resumed, Vietnamese citizens overseas have to wait to book rescue flights, which are rare and unscheduled. Meanwhile, air tickets are priced quite high. Its estimated that the total cost for flying from Japan or South Korea to Vietnam is VND50-60 million, while the figure is VND80 million from Europe. Explaining this, Nguyen Quang Trung from Vietnam Airlines, the national flag air carrier, said aircraft have to land at airports with quarantine facilities such as Nha Trang, Van Don and Da Nang. Besides, the cost per seat on these flights is twice as much as usual, because airlines fly only one way. Once routine commercial flights resume, airlines will have passengers for both ways, and airfares will be lower. Millions of overseas Vietnamese wait The demand from overseas Vietnamese to take flights to Vietnam is very high. Vo Huy Cuong, Deputy Head of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV), cited a report by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) as estimating that in the first two quarters of 2022 (Tet holiday), about half million Vietnamese, Viet Kieu and foreigners have demand to fly to Vietnam. Millions of Viet Kieu (overseas Vietnamese) want to fly to Vietnam to celebrate Tet but international commercial flights have not resumed and few rescue flights exist. However, since the number of rescue flights is limited, many of them would have to take chartered flights for tourists and have a 7-day quarantine before getting home. Luong Hoai Nam, a respected aviation and tourism expert, said demand is very high, because many Viet Kieu missed 2021 Tet in the country because of Covid-19 and they want to return this year. The problem is that people will have to have a 7-day quarantine. Meanwhile, Cambodia removed the quarantine requirement on all fully vaccinated passengers on November 15. Its unreasonable to require fully vaccinated people to quarantine, he said. He said that more than 1.5 years have elapsed and its necessary to restore routine international flights for fully vaccinated people. Bui Doan Ne, Deputy Chair of the Vietnam Aviation Business Association, said overseas Vietnamese and Vietnamese people should be treated equally. That is, Vietnamese citizens overseas who have been fully vaccinated and have negative test results should be allowed to fly to Vietnam without concentrated quarantine. Localities dont have the right to restrict the number of Vietnamese citizens returning to their homeland. Millions of overseas Vietnamese want to fly. Tet holiday is nearing. And in order to avoid congestion, itd be better to allow Viet Kieu to fly to Vietnam now, Ne said. Overseas Vietnamese could register for tours under a new pilot program on receiving foreign tourists. This means that they need to book packaged tours and fly to five localities Phu Quoc (Kien Giang), Nha Trang (Khanh Hoa), Quang Nam, Da Nang or Quang Ninh. People will have to follow 7-day tours and fulfill procedures to be able to visit relatives. However, they can only stay in Vietnam for a maximum of 90 days. The Ministry of Transport has proposed reopening international routine flights, commencing from Q1 2022 under a 3-phase program. Phase 1, from the first quarter of 2022, the major markets are China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, France, Germany, Russia, the UK, Australia, with 4 flights/week/way (about 12,000 passengers would enter Vietnam a week). Phase 2, from the second quarter of 2022, routine flights carrying passengers with vaccine passports to Vietnam with no requirement on concentrated quarantine. The flight frequency is 7 flights/week/way for each airline. Phase 3, from the third quarter of 2022. Routine flights will be provided depending on travel demand, pandemic developments and vaccination coverage. The markets and flight frequencies will be determined by airlines. Ngoc Ha International flights welcome foreign travelers back A number of chartered flights carrying foreign travelers with vaccine passports are coming to Vietnam this week under closed tourism programs. Five localities have prepared to serve international arrivals. Many shop owners have had to suspend their business and give back their premises to landlords because of the impact of Covid-19. But, surprisingly, despite low demand, many landlords have still raised rental prices. Retail premises have been left idle At one company, a receptionist still has to be present at her old address every morning to wait for clients and guide them to the new address. The clinics owner said moving to another location was a last resort. The clinic had been operating for five years and had become well known among locals. When Hanoi imposed social distancing, the number of clients fell sharply and the clinic decided to suspend operation. While the revenue was zero during lockdown days, the clinic still had to pay rent, electricity and water bills, and pay the security guards. In late October, when the lease contract expired, the owner asked the landlord to cut the rent by 30 percent, but the proposal was rejected. As the negotiation failed, he decided move the clinic to a location nearby. He is satisfied with the new location. The street-front five-storey villa has very reasonable rent. We feel better operating here, he said. While the rent in an apartment building ground floor is VND50 million a month, not including service fees, the rent is just VND45 million a month at villas. The owner of the former space has not found a renter and the space has been vacant for many months. Other rentals are available at more attractive prices. Hong Minh, the owner of a dental clinic in Ha Dong, complained that she failed to negotiate with the landlord on rental cuts, so she is considering moving to another location. The landlord said clinics still could make big money despite the pandemic, so no reason for him to cut the rent, she told reporters. Minh leases two stories with total usable area of 100 square meters at rent of VND35 million a month. I have poured billions of dong into the clinic, so I really dont want to move. I am wavering between moving away or staying on, she said. Leasing a semi-detached house in My Dinh at VND35 million a month to sell medicine, functional food and cosmetics, Nguyen Thi Hai was shocked when she was informed about the rent increase, commencing in January 2022. Hai complained that the rent increase will be a burden. Though drugstores still opened during the pandemic, revenue was very low. She was thinking of asking the landlord to reduce the rent when the landlord unexpectedly informed her of the rental increase. After Hanoi authorities allowed eateries to resume operation, Nguyen Thi Thuy, the owner of a restaurant in Hai Ba Trung district, quickly prepared for reopening. However, she recently got a notice that she would have to pay 100 percent of rent. Prior to that, she had enjoyed a 50 percent rent reduction. She said that revenue may be unsatisfactory because people are still hesitating to eat out. She will take a loss if she has to pay 100 percent of rent. I think I will negotiate with the landlord about the rent. If he says no, I will leave, she said. The Covid-19 pandemic has caused retail revenue to drop sharply, impacting the domestic retail property market. The income of the owners of villas and street-front houses has dropped dramatically recently because of low demand. Predictions about the future of the retail rental market vary. Some believe that once businesses bounce back, retail premises will become more expensive. Meanwhile, others are not optimistic about pandemic developments. The number of Covid cases has increased day after day so they are worried if they will be asked to close their doors again. The owner of a four-storey house on Cau Giay street said a usable area of 160 square meters has been left idle since the beginning of the year, though he has offered a rent reduction from VND50 million to VND30 million. Nguyen The Vinh, a real estate broker, said its difficult to lease street-front houses now. If landlords cannot retain their existing clients, they will find it difficult to find new tenants. Many places in advantageous positions have been vacant for two years despite 50 percent rent reductions. Local newspapers report that The Gioi Di Dong, a large mobile phone distribution chain with presence all over the country, has terminated a leasing contract at a premise in An Nhon Town in Binh Dinh after failing to negotiate for rent decreases. Soon after The Gioi Di Dong left, another retailer leased the premise at a rent that is 20 percent higher than that once paid by The Gioi Di Dong. Duy Anh Foreign retailers make quiet landing as domestic counterparts shut down Many shops hit hard by Covid-19 have had to close, but some foreign retailers have taken advantage of the opportunity to scale up their business in Vietnam. Most recently, Vietnam's e-government development strategy towards digital government for the period 2021-2025 with a vision to 2030 has clearly identified that data is a new type of resource. On November 16, the Vietnam Digital Communications Association hosted the Asia Open Data Partnership Conference 2021 in Hanoi, an annual conference that has been organized by the Asia Open Data Partnership (AODP) and its partners since 2015. This is the first time Vietnam has hosted the conference. Data economy to contribute 5% to GDP According to a report from the European Data Portal, an initiative of the European Commission, the open data market was valued at 184.45 billion Euros in 2019 and is expected to reach about 199.51 - 334.20 billion euros by 2025. Most governments around the world use open data to deploy solutions to improve their operations and citizens' rights, create development opportunities, foster innovation, and solve social problems. There are three trends of using open data in the world today, including: commercializing open data and developing the data service industry; open data for digital development; and cooperation in comprehensive digital economy agreement. Nguyen Minh Hong, Chairman of the Vietnam Digital Communications Association, said the data economy in general and open data in particular is the heart of the digital economy, bringing economic and social benefits to countries, people and businesses around the world. For Vietnam, the economic value that data flows create through the use of digital technologies in commerce reached 81 trillion VND in 2017 and it can reach 953 trillion VND by 2030. According to the draft national data strategy for the period 2021 - 2025, with a vision to 2030, Vietnam's goal is that the data economy will contribute 5% of GDP. Le Quang Huy, Chairman of the National Assembly's Committee on Science, Technology and Environment, said that in the open trend, open data has important characteristics - publicly used, reused, and non-exclusive. That means the community can exploit and use open data based on open licenses. It is also can continue to share that data with the community to promote its value. Huy said that Asia with the largest population in the world, with a young, dynamic and creative workforce, needs to be a pioneer in the field of digital technology development, effective use, sharing of data to develop more prosperous. For Vietnam, this will also help the country join the global flow, solving the challenges and difficulties that it is facing. Data is new kind of national resource At one of the Uptime Tier 3 standard data storage centers in Vietnam. Photo: Trong Dat Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Huy Dung said that the Covid-19 pandemic showed valuable lessons about the importance of open data and data sharing in planning the epidemic prevention strategy of each country. Vietnam recognized early on the importance of data and open data. Most recently, Vietnam's e-government development strategy towards digital government for the period 2021-2025 with a vision to 2030 has clearly identified that data is a new type of resource. State agencies provide open data for the development of digital government, digital economy and digital society. The Ministry of Information and Communications, with the role of coordinating the national digital transformation program, has been developing a roadmap to establish data standards, to ensure data of ministries, branches and authorities from central to local levels to be classified and shared scientifically, and ensure network security. Internationally, open data development also requires cross-country cooperation. Because the digital economy is a global issue, if data is considered the lifeblood of the global economy, this data lifeblood must be established based on a widely accepted framework of standards and technical regulations. Data is a special resource that is created in the process of using technology of the people. Unlike resources in nature, the more data resources are used, the more they are generated, and the more they create great value. However, according to Mr. Dung, data sharing needs to be done appropriately, ensuring harmonization of cross-border data flows, network safety, and privacy of each individual in accordance with the laws of each country. Through regional cooperation, Vietnam can move towards a comprehensive open data ecosystem, promoting regional and global digital economic integration. The Ministry of Information and Communications is committed to accompanying the technology community and open data community at home and abroad, to jointly establish global data standards and regulations, thereby discovering and creating values from open data. Trong Dat Data sharing among state agencies yet to meet actual needs One of the problems in building e-Government is the lack of data connection and sharing among state agencies, according to the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC). Wind and solar power has been developing at lightening speed in Vietnam recently. Now is the time to think about dealing with the equipment when its life cycle ends. A workshop on the development of green and new energy was held a few days ago by the Central Economics Committee as a part of Industry 4.0 Summit 2021. Nguyen Duc Hieu, Deputy Head of the committee, affirmed that countries all are striving for production and use of green clean energy, and the eighth national power development plan calls for Vietnam to prioritize renewable and new energy resources. Its expected that solar power will account for 5.4-5.9 percent of total electricity generation output by 2030 and 8.4 percent by 2045. Meanwhile, onshore and near-shore wind power would account for 6.5 percent. As for offshore wind power, the capacity would be 2,000MW or higher by 2030. Vietnam would also generate electricity from solid waste, biomass and other types of renewable energy, which is expected to account for 0.9-1 percent by 2030 and 2.2-2.5 percent by 2045. If the plan is implemented, the generation capacity and the proportion of electricity from renewable energy sources will increase rapidly in the time to come, especially in 2030-2045, when technological advances will help reduce investment rates and electricity generation production costs. Commenting about offshore wind power, Mark Hutchinson from GWEC said Vietnam could not only create a new industry but also generate hundreds of thousands of jobs and a new offshore wind power center in Asia if it is ahead of other countries, including South Korea, Japan and the Philippines. Dao Xuan Lai from UNDP expressed his concern about how to treat the waste from wind and solar power plants after the equipment ends its life cycle. Lai warned that the waste of wind and solar power plants is part of the industrial waste stream. The volume of waste could be up to hundreds of thousands of tons in the next 10 years. Photovoltaic panels and end-of-life wind turbines contain valuable materials which, if recycled, could help save natural resources. Discarded photovoltaic panels are considered hazardous waste unless components containing hazardous materials are properly removed and disposed of. In Vietnam, there is still no legal basis for the classification of waste from wind and solar power plants, and the waste collection and treatment is rudimentary. The representative from UNDP suggested classifying waste and compiling detailed guidance on how to uninstall photovoltaic panels. Wind and solar power developers need to observe the extended producer responsibility (EPR). Luong Bang Vietnam sees big opportunities in wind energy Vietnams commitment to increasing its energy capacity using renewable sources and favourable macroeconomic conditions may create valuable opportunities for wind investors and developers. Hu tieu (noodle soup), milk tea, broken rice, snails and fried fish balls the common dishes of Vietnamese are being sold at shops on HCM Citys Bui Vien Street. Hu tieu (noodle soup), milk tea, broken rice, snails and fried fish balls the common dishes of Vietnamese are being sold at shops on HCM Citys Bui Vien Street, which is called western street, backpackers street or street of bars as its a famous attraction for foreign travelers. The appearance of common dishes, or mon an via he (street food) is quite a surprise for many people, because they were not on the menus at the bars there in the past. However, bar owners now have to sell anything that can to earn them a living. Luong Truong Vu in district 3 lost his job as a chef at a large hotel in HCM City because of Covid-19. Now he has to sell seafood at a corner of Bui Vien instead of staying at home and using his savings. Vu, who has 31 years experience and once served high-ranking delegations during the APEC Summit, now has to glean every small change every day to feed himself and his family. I have been working here for half a month, he said. I got the job after reading an ad by a bar owner which said he was seeking an experienced cook. This is just a sidewalk processed snail stall and it receives few clients, but brings enough income to cover his basic needs. The snail shop managed by Vu is a new model applied at Corner Sky Bar Bui Vien. Besides the snail shop, the bar is also selling green bean juice with centella, vegetables and broken rice. The manager of Corner Sky Bar said he had been doing this business for too long to give it up. Selling street food is just a temporary solution while waiting for the municipal authorities to allow bars to reopen. He said the money from the sale of street food is just enough to pay workers and maintain the bar, and he doesnt expect to make profit from this. Meanwhile, Bar 86 Pho Tay is now selling bubble tea and fried fish balls from 4pm to 9pm daily for indoor dining. Last month, the bar sold take-away hu tieu. Le Thi Huong, the bar manager, said the bar sells a wide range of food, but the revenue is modest. About 10-20 customers come to the bar each day. She said bars and discotheque halls have been seriously affected by the pandemic over the last two years. Workers have left HCM City for their hometowns. Meanwhile, a representative of the municipal authorities affirmed that the current pandemic situation is still not good enough to allow the reopening of bars and karaoke parlours. Tran Chung Bars on Bui Vien Street turned into mini-marts Bui Vien Street, dubbed Western Street in downtown HCM City, used to be the place where most foreign tourists came to experience the nightlife. A number of charter flights carrying international passengers with vaccine passports will arrive this week as part of a closed travel programme. Northeast Asia is an important tourism market for Vietnam. Photo courtesy of vietnamnet.vn The first five localities participating in the tourism pilot programme are ready to welcome guests, according to vietnamnet.vn Le Van Nghia, director of the Nhat Binh Tourism Joint Stock Company, said the company has welcomed a charter flight carrying 222 Korean passengers from Incheon Airport to Khanh Hoa. They were safely brought to an accommodation facility where the provincial Centre for Disease Control gave COVID-19 tests to all visitors, he said, adding that another flight with 207 passengers from Tokyo has arrived as well. More international flights will be arriving in Phu Quoc, Da Nang and Nha Trang. Vo Huy Cuong, deputy director of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam, said that Vietnam Airlines will transport South Korean passengers to Hoiana tourist resort in Quang Nam tomorrow, while two flights from Vietjet Air on will carry 250 tourists from Tokyo to Nha Trang and 250 from South Korea to Phu Quoc on November 20. About 24 other flights have been scheduled for Korean, Japanese and Taiwanese travellers to Kien Giang, Khanh Hoa and Da Nang. This will be an important basis for authorities possibly re-establishing more international routes in the future, Cuong said. Nguyen Minh Tam, deputy head of the Marketing and Sales Department of Vietnam Airlines, said the airline has worked with a number of key markets to open 15 to 20 charter flights from now until the end of January. Nghia added that unlike travellers from Japan and Taiwan, Russian tourists returning from other countries are not required to be quarantined. The Nhat Minh Tourism Company plans to coordinate with S7 Airlines and schedule four flights in December to bring Russian guests to Cam Ranh. No restrictions Cuong explained that restrictions would limit the effectiveness of the pilot programme. Now that China has pursued a policy restricting people from going abroad, for example, the country is no longer a stable source of visitors for Vietnam. In addition, many travellers have chosen Vietnam as one of their final destinations after visiting Europe, Thailand, Singapore or Malaysia. He said Vietnam should have a one-month visa exemption policy for foreign visitors to ASEAN member countries as it had before to make it easier to attract visitors. The General Director of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, Nguyen Trung Khanh, emphasised the importance of adding new markets with a high safety level in terms of epidemic prevention, such as Northeast Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Australia. However, as long as tourists meet medical and immigration requirements, there should be no reason to limit any of them, Khanh said. Ready to welcome guests The first five localities participating in the pilot programme have prepared plans to welcome international guests. Bui Quoc Thai, director of Kien Giang Department of Tourism, affirmed that all tasks for foreign travellers arrival have been completed. On November 20, Phu Quoc will host the first batch of international visitors for the first time in two years. Around 250 guests will be staying in 13 accommodation establishments of Vingroup, Sungroup and Movenpick, among others. They will spend time in nine designated locations. More will be added to the list of locations later. Meanwhile, in Quang Nam, three tourism complexes, including Hoiana, Vinpearl Nam Hoi An and TUI BLUE Nam Hoi An, will be open for international tourists during the first phase. Tourists can visit Hoi An and My Son sanctuary during their stay. We have worked with all participating hotels and they will not have other guests while hosting these international visitors. Hoi An and My Son will have separate lanes for them, Tuong said. In the second phase, Quang Nam will extend the list of hotels allowed to host foreign tourists. Source: Vietnam News The satellite explosion caused at least 1,500 trackable bits of space debris and hundreds of thousands of smaller fragments. United States officials and politicians are alarmed by Russia's missile test that hit a decommissioned space satellite. It is raising concerns that Moscow is attempting to militarize space even more. They have called for the Kremlin to be held responsible. After the satellite explosion, at least 1,500 pieces of trackable space debris were formed, along with thousands of smaller fragments, according to authorities, which might pose a hazard to astronauts and other satellites in orbit. This comes on the heels of an aggressive Russian military buildup along its border with Ukraine, exacerbating tensions. As a result of Russia's confirmation of the test on Tuesday but dismissive of American concerns, legislators have called on the Biden administration and allies to take immediate action. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith said in a statement Tuesday that the Russian military's anti-satellite test "makes it clear that Moscow is willing to threaten the peaceful use of outer space, to further militarize this domain, and to disregard any consequences for all nations." "With the cooperation of our friends and partners, we must hold Russia accountable for this incident," Smith said. Officials and legislators in the United States are concerned that the ground-fired missile, which struck a Soviet satellite launched in 1982, is symptomatic of increased Russian attempts to build and test space-based systems and weapons in recent years. As part of its effort to outperform the United States in the intensely disputed space realm which has been described as the "new Wild West," Russia has tested a number of anti-satellite missiles, lasers, and other weaponry that might prohibit the effective use of U.S. and partner satellites. Russia is "strongly motivated to continue development efforts" on its anti-satellite weapons program, according to a study issued earlier this year by the nonprofit Secure World Foundation, which is dedicated to promoting international security. This was on full show in July 2020, when the United States Space Command accused Russia of conducting a "non-destructive test of a space-based anti-satellite weapon." As noted at the time, Gen. John Raymond, commander of the United States Space Command, stated the test was "more proof of Russia's continuous attempts to develop and test space-based weapons" and an "example that the risks to U.S. and Allied space systems are genuine, serious, and escalating." Russia's "dangerous and reckless activity jeopardizes the long-term sustainability of our outer space," according to State Department spokesman Ned Price, who told reporters after Monday's test that "our outer space is at risk." According to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby, the United States is carefully monitoring Russia's capabilities because they might "pose a danger not just to our national security interests but also to the security interests of other space-faring states." On the other side of the Atlantic, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg described the test as a "reckless conduct" that may endanger the International Space Station, which was constructed mainly by NASA and the Russian space agency Roscosmos. However, although the United States and its allies have criticized the missile launch, it is unclear what further action they may take in response to the event. The danger of nation-states to the space systems of others is not governed by global norms, rules, or principles of responsible conduct, and no such laws, regulations, or codes exist. Russia expressed opposition to a United Nations resolution that would have moved the establishment of such standards earlier this month. The proposal, which would create a working group to offer recommendations, was passed by the United Nations' First Committee by a vote of 163-8. Still, it was opposed by Russia, China, Cuba, Iran, Nicaragua, North Korea, Syria, and Venezuela, among other countries. In a statement released on Tuesday, Russia's defense ministry justified its military actions, claiming that the founding of the United States Space Force last year and the United States' own weapons tests had prompted the country to beef up its defensive capabilities. The United States conducted its last significant anti-satellite missile test in 2008. However, it was conducted at a far lower altitude than the one conducted by Russia. Senator James Inhofe (R-OK), the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has called on the Biden administration to "make it plain to [Russian President Vladimir Putin] in no uncertain terms that this is unacceptable." The Biden administration has yet to respond. The State Department's top spokesperson said the administration would cooperate with friends and partners to react. Still, it was unclear if the administration had spoken out to other nations about the incident as of Tuesday. Prices said he did not want to "get ahead of where we are" and that he did not want to "telegraph particular steps" when asked what choices the United States had. Upon being questioned whether the CIA had sought out Russia or other nations, a State Department spokesman told The Hill that "we do not comment on private diplomatic discussions or communications." In addition, Kirby said on Tuesday that he had "no communications to speak of and no new context to share" regarding the Russian nuclear test. PRESS RELEASE President and CEO John Lites Leenhouts has been at the helm of SUN n FUN for over a decade and has worked in the industry for 48 years. During his tenure, the organization has transformed not only the operating state and organizational culture but also the perspective from which it operates. Tracy Neal, Chief Financial Officer, attests, He was the perfect addition to our team. I dont think we could have found anyone with more experience or excitement about aviation. He jumped right in and helped us transform from a Not-For-Profit living on a line of credit to a Not-For-Profit able to survive the COVID pandemic. He has guided the team through major improvements across the entire campus, including our latest addition to the Ramus SkyLab Innovation Center. He has forged bonds with volunteers, donors, and students that will be remembered for years to come. After ten incredible years of resurrection, realignment, rebuilding, and expansion, the leadership of the Aerospace Center for Excellence and the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo, is about to change. At the completion of SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo 2022, John Lites Leenhouts will retire from the President/CEO role but will continue to be an active advocate for both ACE and SNF. ACE Board Chairman Rick Garcia ascertains, Lites has done so much for ACE & SUN n FUN the list is too long, it has been an honor to work with Lites for the past 11 years. Since arriving in August 2011, Lites led the ACE/SUN n FUN team from an extremely challenging fiscal situation into a position of financial strength for the first time in over 30 years. Lites has continued to pour millions into capital improvements on the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo Campus, created a world-class event venue attracting dozens of multiday events annually, built the worlds largest high school flying club, and consistently increased attendance at the annual SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo. Fittingly SUN n FUN 2021 became the biggest and best in its 47-year history. Additionally, he conceptualized and established the Aerospace Center for Excellence, home of the Ramus SkyLab Innovation Center, as the premier Aerospace-based, hands-on STEM education ecosystem in the nation. Board Member, Gene Strickland, recognizes, Johns leadership during the past ten years has enabled SUN n FUN to achieve remarkable success. More importantly, Johns influence has resulted in SUN n FUN being recognized for its education of our next generation of aviation professionals. A big thank you from Lakelands new young pilots and its aviation technicians. The new workplace ambiance took time, but the change nourished a shift that has sustained a space where employees can be successful, transparent, and empowered. Executive Events Director Laura Vaughn maintains, Although the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo began many years before Lites tenure at the helm, his focused efforts provided a purpose and relevancy for the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo to continue and to give the gift of flight to future generations. A legacy to be proud of! From his 27 years as a US Naval Aviator to 11 years at Northrop Grumman Corporation, all the way through his tenure at SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo and the Aerospace Center for Excellence, and the Florida Air Museum; Lites has consistently delivered high-quality performance, solid dynamic leadership, and a value-driven work ethic. From SUN n Fun Board Chair, Dr. Harley Richardss perspective, We are grateful for the dedication that John Lites Leenhouts has given to SUN n FUN, the community, and the Aerospace industry. His knowledge of general aviation as well as his organizational and communication skills have enabled him to take SUN n FUN and ACE to a level we could have never imagined. We are anxious to begin our new relationship with Lites as he becomes an Ambassador to ACE and SUN n FUN helping us grow and expand our Aerospace Education footprint. Lites has been a driving force and a tremendous advocate for the significant growth of the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo, and the development of ACE along with the youth aviation education programs produced by ACE, said Gene Conrad, Lakeland Airport Director. We will miss Lites passion and energy here at the airport, but we know he will continue to be a staunch advocate and cheerleader for all things Lakeland Linder International Airport and ACE. We wish him all the best and much success in his next chapter. After serving with Lites from the very beginning, Marketing Director, Melissa Goodson, states, The strength of his leadership is inspiring trust, proving to be challenging at times; this led staff, volunteers, and Board to follow his lead. Also, returning confidence to us empowered us to take responsibility for our decisions from an organizational standpoint. When we followed his lead and stuck with him, he instilled in us the belief that we did this together. Remaining as a unit for many years now, we have developed the strong communication necessary for where we are today. Being a part of the Aerospace Center for Excellence process has allowed me to fully appreciate and remain blown away with what we have accomplished with him at the helm. The imprint he has left is embedded in our history now. When asked what do you attribute to all these many successes, Lites quickly stated, Can-do spirit and total team effort on the part of Board, Staff, and Volunteersit has truly been an honor to serve alongside them in our adventurous journey for this noble cause. He went on to say, Of all the wonderful accomplishments that I have been privileged to be a part of while here, the most rewarding experience has been observing average kids populating our ACE/SNF campus and over a very short period of time-evolving into competent, capable, and focused young men and women who have become good citizens with bright futures. ABOUT SUN N FUN FLY-IN. INC SUN n FUN Fly-In, Inc. is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit whose mission is to preserve and enhance the future of flight through world-class events, inspiring and educating people of all ages. Year-round events, including the SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo, which is one of the worlds largest aviation events, raise funds for the Aerospace Center for Excellence (ACE). The SUN n FUN Aerospace Expo annually raises funds for ACE enabling the delivery of STEM-related and aerospace education programs engaging over 50,000 local youth each year. Additionally, ACE manages and allocates local aerospace scholarships. For more information: www.flysnf.org. Before Colleen Smyth graduated with her Masters of Science in Data Science in August, the program helped her discover a novel approach to a persistent question at work. For her capstone project, the Portland high school math teacher wanted to discover what features were most predictive of an on-time graduation, such as course history or GPA. Smyth BA 15, MS 21 created a classification model that examined three years worth of past graduates, and once she discovered the predictions were pretty accurate, she felt confident the results identified what her school could focus on. She shared her findings with the principal this fall. It was really cool to do a class project then return to school and present practical ideas that can be applied now, she said. Among the first to pursue the universitys new data science program, Smyth figured the degree would open the door to future jobs and complement her current one at Portland Public Schools. Shes now incorporating tips on public presentations, how to understand social justice through data and statistics and career suggestions for students into class, she said. Its not something most of them have learned before, and its relatively new in the workforce, so I feel like Im able to provide them with a unique perspective after taking the masters program, she said. Smyth wasnt an obvious advocate for data science. A history major at Willamette, she didnt view herself as a math person or even someone who excelled in the subject, but after she graduated in 2015 and applied for Teach for America, her feelings changed. Offered preferences in subject matter, she said she was open to teaching middle school math. The quantitative courses shed taken at Willamette helped her realize her high school background in math was stronger than she thought, and she also enjoyed tutoring students on the subject through college prep program Willamette Academy, she said. A few years later, when she was teaching high school algebra in Chicago, the course included some statistics topics that Smyth found as interesting as her students. When she returned to her hometown and found a job at PPS a longtime goal as a fourth-generation district educator she began to push for a stronger focus in statistics instead of calculus to better engage students interested in pursuing non-STEM fields in college. Data science is definitely the future of math education, she said. During her second year, Smyth pushed her school to add a financial algebra and statistics elective already offered by the district that aims to keep students in math throughout their academic career. The next year, she proposed and was granted the opportunity to teach an AP statistics course, the first time in school memory such a course was offered. Oregon education standards are leaning toward including more data science, too. Last month, the State Board of Education adopted a new model for high school that focuses more on statistics in required courses and offers students more options for their third required credit, such as data science, statistics and the traditional advanced algebra course. Smyth is working with the district to pilot its first data science course next year. Eventually, shed like to integrate more data science applications in her own AP class and provide students with other opportunities shed never had as a student. Being able to teach data science to students and develop courses for the school has been really rewarding and meaningful to me, she said. With the state as a whole pushing for a more data science-oriented framework, I want my school to be at the forefront of that movement. When it comes to weeknight drinks, nothing gets us like the dilapidated charm of cheap neighborhood watering holes. For no-frills drinks, greasy bar bites, quirky decor, graffiti-scribbled bathrooms, analog photo booths, and jukeboxes, these are San Francisco's most beloved dive bars. Cheers, gang. Li Po Cocktail Lounge See on Instagram Nestled on the edge of Chinatown, Li Po Cocktail Lounge exists as a dimly lit former opium den, where, instead of illicit drugs, now live bands and potent drinks fill the halls and basement. Their signature Chinese mai tais are the go-to libations here, which you can sip seated alongside the wraparound bar or atop a "well-loved" red leather booth. Ubiquitous, traditional Chinese lanterns hang from the celings for decoration and practicality. On your way out, feel free to send a silent offering to the gold-plated Buddha statue near the door. // 916 Grant Ave. (Chinatown), lipolounge.com The Knockout See on Instagram Akin to Beauty Bar's SF installment, sans the obvious nightclub chain normalities, the Knockout houses DJ dance parties, live punk band playings, bingo nights, and an all around no-frill dive bar experience. Knockout's weekly Sweater Funk Superfly dance party is reason enough to bob and weave to Motown and Soul anthems after downing a bit of liquid courage. A word to the wise: Don't leave without signing a pose in the photo booth. // 3223 Mission St. (Bernal Heights), theknockoutsf.com Kozy Kar Bar See on Instagram One of our favorite NSFW-skewed watering holesporn, straight and gay, plays on the wall-mounted televisions when the sun goes downKozy Kar harkens back to the care-free 70s. The drinks are, as you'd expect, remarkably cheap for SF, and the ambiance is, say, That-70s-Show-meets-the-HGTV's-roster-of-home-decorating-shows. (Custom vans, eight track players, CB radios, waterbeds, chain steering wheels, shag carpets, oh my!) Leave any semblance of prudence at home, please. // 1548 Polk St. (Polk Gulch), kozykar.com Zeitgeist See on Instagram The award for the diviest and most beloved of San Francisco bars probably has to go to Zeitgeistbecause let's be honest, this is where you go for cheap drinks (preferably bloody marys) once you're already drunk enough to eat one of their greasy-ass burgers. And there's just nothing better, especially when you and your gang can crowd in at a picnic table on a sunny day to get sloshed. // 199 Valencia St. (Mission), instagram.com/zeitgeist_sf The Cinch Saloon See on Instagram A haven for button-up gays in flannel and billiards enthusiasts, The Cinch exudes old-school dive bar vibes from everyone of its weathered corners, albeit with a hella homo twist. The drinks are effusively slung and quite strong; the outside patio is intimate, and also smoke-friendly; pool and pinball machines fill the narrow lounge. Keep an eye out on their Facebook page for updates on drag shows, community potlucks, and more. // 1723 Polk St. (Polk Gulch) Aces Bar See on Instagram Sports fans know Aces as home base for NY Giants and Wisconsin Badgers game. Everyone else comes to the no-frills Polk Gulch hub for the friendly bartenders and the slurpee machine that stirs a frappuccino-like Irish Coffee available from 6am to noon, making for a potentially left-of-center morning coffee run. Inexpensive, straightforward cocktails fill the menu, as well as a Keg Table, which can be reserved in advance. Jukebox playings revibrate off the red-painted walls, essentially all hours they're open. // 998 Sutter St., (Polk Gulch) acesbarsf.com Hi Dive Bar See on Instagram Waterfront views and pier-inspired decor serve as the diving platforms for bar bites and cheap(ish) libations. Brunch at Hi Dive (10am to 2pm Saturday and Sunday) centers around their famous spicy Bloody Mary, served saddle-side with such staples lake Mission Huevos, chorizo scramble, and more. Take your shot at the pool table in between drinks. And don't worry, you're not going crazy: There really is a bike hanging from above the bartop. // 28 Pier (Embarcadero), hidivesf.com Zam Zam See on Instagram One of the oldest, most beloved bars in San Francisco, Zam Zam has been Haight-Ashbury fulcrum for quenching a thirst since 1941. A Persian barwith like-culture interior paraphernalia, including a drop-dead gorgeous back bar muralspecializes in the martinis of yesteryear. Suffice to say that this cash-only (and prior Anthony Bourdain approved watering hole) is a must for locals and tourists, alike. // Open daily; 1633 Haight St. (Haight-Ashbury), facebook.com Louie's Bar See on Instagram Louie's Bar is a bit more unassuming than its sister Pour Guys-owned watering hole, Tempest...to say the least. But it's this bar's bashful, brick-faced facade that makes is all the more worthwhile to checkout. A former whalers drinking establishment, with roots back to the 1930s, Louie's Bar splays its daily round of cocktails, mocktails, and other drinks across chalkboards. Upscale pub grub include such morsels like pork belly tacos, vegan cauliflower burger, you name it. // Open daily; 55 Stevenson St. (SoMa), pourguys.com Tempest Bar & Box See on Instagram The long-standing and undoubtedly most popular dive bar in San Francisco, Tempest is the brick-exposed, rustic mecca for frugal drinks and live music (though shows remain on hold due to Covid). The bar, itself, maintains some of its old vintage 50's-era fixtures, mixed in with modern-day technologies and convienes (free WiFi!) The Tempest, too, doubles as a culinary playground for Box Kitchen; the chicken karaage nuggets are, alone, worth the after-work-day wait. // Open for outdoor seating and takeout 11:30am to midnight weekdays, 3:30pm to midnight Saturday and Sunday; 431 Natoma St. (FiDi), pourguys.com/tempest-bar The Saloon See on Instagram Set in a late-1800s atmosphere, The Saloon presents itself as a window into a simpler, less high-strung way of drinking in the city. Live music is a daily calendar event, where relaxed vibes and a diverse crowds intersect across the bartop; The Saloon, above all else, is an ode to an SF of past, one you can see, hear, and even smell when walking through their single narrow entryway. Cash is the preferred payment method here, so make sure you've got some bills on you, beforehand. Please note that, as of press time, The Saloon remains temporarily closed due to Covid-19 but is expected to reopen in Summer 2021. // 1232 Grant Ave. (Jackson Square), sfblues.net/saloon Its hard, she said. There are risks both ways. As they did at Christian Living Communities facilities, vaccine mandates at nursing homes around the country appear to be pushing vaccinations up. The national vaccination rate for nursing home staff jumped from 67 to 74 percent between mid-September and mid-October, according to an AARP analysis of government data, as a wave of nursing home chains, individual facilities and states activated the requirements for workers. Thats the largest monthly increase since AARP began tracking COVID-19 vaccination data in June. A federal mandate for most staff in health care facilities that receive Medicare or Medicaid dollars, which includes nursing homes, will also take effect in early January. But even as the mandates appear to be working, many long-term care operators say they are intensifying staffing shortages. Thats especially true in pockets of the country where vaccine hesitancy is high. While shortages and high turnover have long plagued the long-term care workforce, the pandemic has exacerbated them, raising more concerns about inadequate care for residents. The pandemic has killed more than 186,000 residents and staff of long-term care facilities, including nursing homes, assisted living facilities and other settings, representing more than a quarter of all U.S. coronavirus deaths. Almost a third of the nations 15,000-plus nursing homes recently reported a shortage of nurses or aides, according to AARPs analysis, representing the worst monthly shortfall since the government began collecting COVID-19 data from nursing homes in May 2020. In Maine, Washington and Minnesota, more than 60 percent of facilities reported shortages. In Alaska, 81 percent did. A recent survey of 1,200 senior care providers by the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living (AHCA/NCAL), which lobbies on behalf of more than 14,000 nursing homes and long-term care facilities nationwide, paints an even bleaker picture: 99 percent of nursing homes and 96 percent of assisted living facilities said they didnt have enough workers. And more than a third of nursing homes said they were very concerned that the issue might force them to close. While we support the overall intent of this [federal] policy, we are concerned that the execution will exacerbate an already dire workforce crisis in long-term care, Mark Parkinson, president and chief executive officer of AHCA/NCAL, said of the federal mandate. A building wave of vaccine mandates Requirements that long-term care staffers get inoculated have been scattered. A few private companies acted early, handing them down to employees as soon as residents and staff were prioritized for COVID-19 vaccines at the end of last year. When vaccine availability increased and more data emerged on the safety and efficacy of shots, more companies followed suit. After California introduced the first statewide vaccine mandate for health care workers, including those in nursing homes, in early August, more states jumped on board. Now around half of all states have active mandates of some kind, though many offer regular testing and masking as an alternative to full vaccination. President Biden announced in mid-August that all U.S. nursing homes that receive federal Medicare and Medicaid funding the vast majority of facilities must require their workers to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. The move followed AARP calls for requiring nursing home staff and residents to be vaccinated. More recently, the Biden administration announced a Jan. 4 deadline for worker compliance, with no option to test out. Assisted living, memory care and other long-term care facilities are regulated by the states and are not subject to the federal mandate. The mandates have clearly prompted more vaccinations. As of mid-October, staff vaccination rates exceeded 90 percent in Connecticut, Washington, D.C., Massachusetts, Maine and Rhode Island, where vaccinate-or-terminate policies have been adopted. Rates also exceeded 90 percent in California and Hawaii, which have a regular test-out alternatives to full vaccination. Still, more than a quarter of nursing home workers nationwide were not vaccinated as of mid-October, according to AARPs analysis. And recently, even as many mandates took effect, COVID-19 cases and deaths in nursing homes rose to their highest levels nationally since last winters peaks. While the death rate was only around one-tenth of what it was last winter, the 2,000 COVID-19 deaths that occurred between mid-September and mid-October represent a sixfold increase since early summer. It may seem low compared to the course of the pandemic says AARPs Ari Houser, a senior methods adviser and coauthor of AARPs analysis, but more than 2,000 [residents] dying from COVID in just one month is not a small number. More ways to avoid heartburn Sometimes it not just what you eat, but how you eat. Check out these tips for taming those searing symptoms. Dont slouch when eating. It may be tempting to settle into the cushions and watch TV while inhaling that plate of Buffalo wings. But sitting less than straight while you chow down can encourage gastric juices to head in the wrong direction. Doctors say its also important stay upright for 45 to 60 minutes after eating. If stomach acid does escape, gravity will send that noxious stuff back to where it belongs: your stomach. Liquid and gas want to go to the path of least resistance, Pichetshote says. If youre laying down it can easily go up toward your head. If youre a little more upright, it has to fight gravity to move upward. The same goes for sleeping: Wait at least two to three hours after eating before hitting the sack. Find your sweet spot. Overeating is never a good idea. When your stomach is distended and bloated, acid can rise back into the esophagus, triggering symptoms. But an empty stomach can cause problems, too. Go more than three to four hours without a meal or snack, and stomach acid which would usually be used in the digestive process to break down food collects. The best approach? Eat smaller meals and eat slowly. And choose water to wash things down. Loosen the waistband. Clothes that are snug around midsection can constrict the belly area, squeezing your stomach and pushing acid up into the esophagus, says Gulchin Ergun, M.D., a gastroenterology specialist in Houston and professor of medicine and digestive disorders at Houston Methodist Hospital. Know the 8 worst foods for acid reflux or heartburn Experts say you can uncover your specific triggers by paying close attention to how your body reacts to what youre eating. (Keeping a food diary can help.) But you may well find one of the following eight foods pops up as a problem. 1. Fried, fatty foods. Talk about a triple whammy. First, foods that are high in fat and drenched in oil (bacon and sausage, French fries, potato chips and doughnuts, to name a few) cause the lower esophageal sphincter the ring of muscle connecting the esophagus and stomach to relax, allowing acid to leak out and up into the esophagus. Also, they are digested slowly and sit in your stomach longer, giving gastric acid more time to work its way up into your esophagus, increasing your risk of heartburn. And high-fat food can cause weight gain. That extra poundage increases pressure on your abdomen, making it easier for fluid to travel upward, into the esophagus. Tip: Opt instead for lean cuts of meat, chicken and fish, cooked on the grill or in the oven. 2. Citrus fruits. Their vitamin C may be the draw, but these fruits high acid content makes them risky for reflux. (Our stomachs naturally produce a lot of acid; why make things worse?) Lemons and limes are the biggest culprits, but oranges, grapefruit, grapes and blueberries make the list, too. Tip: Offset their acidity by buffering them with more alkaline (less acidic) foods, such as low-fat yogurt. 3. Tomatoes. Also highly acidic, this common base for many meals is also a culprit in causing gastric acid to back up into the esophagus and no, cooking tomatoes wont help. Tip: If you cant resist the robust flavor of marinara sauce, neutralize the acid by adding one-quarter teaspoon of baking soda to your recipe. 4. Chocolate. Where to begin? Its high fat content, caffeine and theobromine, a compound found in the cacao bean, can all trigger acid reflux. More bad news: Chocolate causes the intestines to release serotonin, which causes the lower esophageal sphincter to relax and open, allowing that unwanted flow back up the esophagus. Tip: Dark chocolate, which contains less fat than milk chocolate, can be less likely to cause acid reflux. 5. Peppermint. A cup of refreshing, mint-infused tea can calm a turbulent tummy. But peppermint, in any form, can also cause gastric reflux and heartburn. Tip: Savor a cup of soothing chamomile tea or suck on licorice-flavored hard candy to soothe your stomach. 6. Carbonated beverages. The bubbles in carbonated beverages are like air pockets, expanding in your belly. This increases pressure on the esophageal sphincter, increasing the risk for acid to reflux into the esophagus. Tip: Try decaf iced tea or dress up tap water with slices of cucumber. 7. Coffee. While studies on the subject are mixed, some have shown that caffeinated beverages may impair the function of the muscles that separate the esophagus and stomach. Whats more, drinking caffeinated coffee may also increase the amount of acid that your stomach produces. Tip: If a decaf brew isnt for you, try a dark roast coffee (it tends to have less caffeine per bean that lighter roasts). Or cozy up to a cup of herbal tea. 8. Alcohol. More reasons to drink in moderation: Alcohol can irritate the esophagus and make the stomach produce more acid. It also relaxes that gateway of the lower esophageal sphincter muscle. Tip: When it comes to wine, white is more acidic than red and may cause more heartburn. Beer is acidic, and its carbonated both bad news. But it has a lower alcohol content compared to other alcoholic beverages, and may be better for heartburn. Prefer the stronger stuff? Know this: Darker drinks (brandy, whisky and dark rum) contain compounds called congeners, which can increase stomach irritation and heartburn symptoms. Courtesy U.S. Attorney's Office As puppy buying rises, so do scams, according to the American Kennel Club (AKC), which says red flags can help spot bad actors online. Its guidance, which also applies to purchasing a cat or another kind of pet online, urges consumers to be dogged about due diligence and to know the four red flags. Scammers post fake litters online or pretend to be someone theyre not, usually an existing breeder, AKC officials say. If you arent careful, you could send a breeder money and never receive a puppy or follow-up communication. Fake listings appear on bogus websites as well as on legitimate sites like Craigslist. Some scammers pose as reputable breeders by stealing their personal information. Here are four red flags of puppy scams: 1. No phone calls. Fraudulent sellers, often in foreign countries, prefer to communicate by email, not by phone. (In the highlighted case, the defendant and a victim trying to buy a miniature dachshund exchanged more than 100 text messages in a week during March 2020. The dog never arrived, and the victim lost $1,840. That month, another victim traded 900 texts with him over nine days.) A reputable breeder will communicate by phone, video chat or in person. 2. Copycat or stock photos. Photos of the dog or the text of the ad may be found on multiple websites. Search for the text in an ad listing to see if the seller copied and pasted it from another site. Or do a reverse image search of a photo on a site such as images.google.com. 3. A sketchy payment method. Avoid wiring money or paying with gift cards or a payment app such as Venmo. (An FBI agent in the accompanying case said criminals prefer that customers pay through means that can obscure the recipients identity to avoid law enforcement detection. The agent also cited cryptocurrency and money transfers such as Western Union or MoneyGram.) 4. A price too good to be true. If a purebred dog is being offered at a deeply discounted price, thats typically a fraud. And if a seller says he or she register the dog, call the organization to confirm that. BPH Investment in Advent Energy Perth, Nov 17, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - BPH Energy Limited ( ASX:BPH ) is pleased to advise that it has completed an investment of $2,271,450 in investee Advent Energy Pty Ltd's under Advent's Offer Information Statement that takes BPH's direct shareholding in Advent to 36.1%.About BPH Energy Limited BPH Energy Limited (ASX:BPH) is an Australian Securities Exchange listed company developing biomedical research and technologies within Australian Universities and Hospital Institutes. The company provides early stage funding, project management and commercialisation strategies for a direct collaboration, a spin out company or to secure a license. BPH provides funding for commercial strategies for proof of concept, research and product development, whilst the institutional partner provides infrastructure and the core scientific expertise. BPH currently partners with several academic institutions including The Harry Perkins Institute for Medical Research and Swinburne University of Technology (SUT). Mineral Resource Update Perth, Nov 17, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Over the past 18 months, Wiluna Mining Corporation Limited ( ASX:WMC ) ( FRA:NZ3 ) ( OTCMKTS:WMXCF ) drilled over 175,000 metres de-risking and advancing the new Wiluna gold mine towards production which will commence in December 2021.The Wiluna Mining Operation is a large, long-life open pit and underground mining operation located in Western Australia with production of 52koz in FY 2021 expanding to circa 120,000oz per year by June 2022, and further expansion to greater than 250,000oz envisaged in FY 2024.The significant 28% increase in Indicated Resources affirms the Company's strategy over the past 18 months of drilling to upgrade Resources and Reserves through systematic infill drilling at high-grade (>5 g/t) initial mining areas to support near-term production.Stockpiles of approximately 100,000 tonnes of development ore are already on surface ready for processing through the new concentrator (Figure 1*) in December 2021 with gold concentrate expected from January 2022 ramping to commercial production of 120,000 ounces per year by June 2022.Wiluna has a growing high-grade gold endowment of 15,000 ounces per vertical metre over three main gold structures with a combined strike length of approximately 10km, and further drilling is expected to increase this in the top 600 metres of the Wiluna Mining Centre. Historical mining extended to 1,000m and drilling to 1,200m below surface, indicating that the highly continuous gold structures remain open and provide considerable opportunities for growth (Figure 2*).SUMMARY OF RESOURCES STATEMENT 2021The Company's Annual Mineral Resource Estimate has been compiled in accordance with the Australian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves (JORC Code 2012 Edition), Chapter 5 of the ASX Listing Rules and ASX Guidance Note 31. Full details in relation to this estimate are provided in the Appendix to this announcement titled 'JORC (2012) Table 1'.- The Mineral Resource update for 2021 includes the Wiluna deposits (Wiluna Mining Centre), as well as the Matilda, Lake Way and Galaxy deposits, stockpiles, and tailings available for retreatment.- Wiluna Mining Centre total open pit and underground Mineral Resource is 36.0Mt @ 3.90 g/t for 4.51Moz (60% Measured & Indicated), Table 1*.- Large-scale inventory at higher cut-offs, including 3.11Moz @ 5.81 g/t above a 3.5 g/t cut-off, and 2.02Moz @ 7.37 g/t above a 5g/t cut-off (Table 2*).- The Matilda, Lake Way, and Galaxy Mineral Resources, which are located within a 20km radius of the Wiluna Mining Centre, contribute a combined 332koz @ 1.93 g/t to the Company's total MRE (Figure 3*).- Stockpiles and tailings available for retreatment located adjacent to the Wiluna processing plant contribute a combined 685koz @ 0.58 g/t to the Company's total MRE.The Company has achieved its goal to build at least a 2.5Moz total Measured & Indicated Resource by the end of FY 2022. The high-quality, higher-confidence Resource will underpin an Ore Reserve update that is currently underway as part of the Stage 2 Feasibility Study and due for completion in the March quarter of 2022.The Company has invested over $35 million since February 2020 to drill over 175,000m of RC and diamond core utilising up to 8 rigs, in a major program supporting the Company's total MRE.The focus of this drilling has been to:i) Increase the level of geological confidence in the Mineral Resource at the Wiluna Mining Centre.ii) Increase the confidence in high-grade, high-priority mining areas in the 1 to 5 year mine planning window, particularly in the North Mine area at Bulletin- Lennon, Happy Jack and Essex (Table 3*).iii) Grow the Ore Reserve.The updated Mineral Resource at these priority target areas is shown in Table 3, with substantial >3.5 g/t zones that may be brought into the mine plan during the in-progress Feasibility Study and Ore Reserves update. Further targets for Indicated Resource conversion and mine plan extensions include the South Mine area and the West Mine area (Figure 4 & 5*).Significant high-grade and higher confidence Indicated Resources have been defined outside of the current Ore Reserves, in adjacent areas, which shows the potential for additional Ore Reserves to be defined based on the latest resource models (Figure 4 & 5*).*To view the full release including tables and figures, please visit:About Wiluna Mining Corporation Ltd Wiluna Mining Corporation (ASX:WMC) (OTCMKTS:WMXCF) is a Perth based, ASX listed gold mining company that controls over 1,600 square kilometres of the Yilgarn Craton in the Northern Goldfields of WA. The Yilgarn Craton has a historic and current gold endowment of over 380 million ounces, making it one of most prolific gold regions in the world. The Company owns 100% of the Wiluna Gold Operation which has a defined resource of 8.04M oz at 1.67 g/t au. In May 2019, a new highly skilled management team took control of the Company with a clear plan to leverage the Wiluna Gold Operation's multi-million-ounce potential. Commences Blasting at Anthill Mine Brisbane, Nov 17, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Copper producer Austral Resources Australia Ltd ( ASX:AR1 ) is pleased to announce that the first blast at Anthill Mine has been fired on 16 November 2021.Highlights:- First blast fired on 16 November 2021, a key development milestone- 110,000 cubic meters (BCM) of ironstone cover broken over Anthill east pit- Anthill Mine site facilities and haul roads are under construction- Austral is on track to be producing 10,000tpa of copper cathode for four years from mid 2022The first production blast is designed to establish initial mining benches at Anthill East pit - in preparation for bulk earthmoving in January 2022. First ore mining is expected to commence in March/April 2022. Austral is focussed on developing its new Anthill Mine and ramping production to 10,000t of copper cathode by mid 2022 at Mt Kelly, which is scheduled to process 5,000t/day of oxide ore at full production.Anthill Mine DevelopmentThe inaugural blast at the Anthill Mine is a key milestone for Austral's development plans. It is the result of several years of careful planning and design by the Austral team and is a crucial first step towards progressing to 10,000tpa cathode production by mid 2022.The maiden blast was attended by Austral Executive Director, Dan Jauncey, site management, Thiess Mining Services, Orica and Roc-Drill, with all parties pleased to witness this key event. Additional blasting is planned through to mid-December 2021, with the aim of having significant overburden material prepared for the commencement of bulk mining in January 2022.Approval to commence mining at Anthill was received on 25 October 2021 with the first blast achieved within three weeks. The pit areas are being cleared with vegetation and topsoil stockpiled for future mine rehabilitation. Thiess is currently mobilising its fleet whilst clearing continues and site infrastructure is installed.Steve Tambanis, Austral's Chief Executive Officer commented:"We're delighted to break ground within three weeks of obtaining approval to commence mine development. Employees and contractors have worked tirelessly to achieve this key development milestone - both safely and cost effectively.Site works are proceeding as scheduled with bulk earthmoving planned to commence in January 2022 and first ore deliveries expected in April 2022, weather permitting. Both Anthill Mine development and Mt Kelly plant refurbishment are in full swing.Our goal is to achieve planned copper production of 10,000tpa commencing mid 2022 for a four year period.Exploration and development activities are underway with a further update planned over the next month. Historic geological, geochemical and geophysical data is currently being evaluated with several new prospects identified adjacent to the Anthill mine and exploration recruitment being finalised.We look forward to updating shareholders as we prepare to commence maiden production. On behalf of the Board, I would like to thank our employees and contractors for their collective efforts to develop Anthill and Mt Kelly in a safe and timely manner. We look forward to delivering shareholder value over the coming period."*To view tables and figures, please visit:About Austral Resources Australia Ltd Austral Resources Australia Ltd (ASX:AR1) is a copper cathode producer operating in the Mt Isa region, Queensland, Australia. Its Mt Kelly copper oxide heap leach and solvent extraction/electrowinning (SXEW) plant has a nameplate capacity of 30,000tpa of copper cathode. Austral is developing its Anthill oxide copper mine which has an Ore Reserve of 5.06Mt at 0.94% Cu. The Company expects to produce 40,000t of copper cathode over a four-year period from mid-2022. Austral owns a significant copper inventory with a JORC compliant Mineral Resource Estimate of 60Mt at 0.7% Cu and 1,940km2 of highly prospective exploration tenure in the heart of the Mt Isa district, a world class copper and base metals province. The Company is implementing an intensive exploration and development programme designed to extend the life of mine and increase then review options to commercialise its copper resources. High Priority Gold Targets at Woods Point Gold Project Ballarat, Nov 17, 2021 AEST (ABN Newswire) - White Rock Minerals Limited ( ASX:WRM ) ( OTCMKTS:WRMCF ) is pleased to provide an update on the regional exploration review and the strategy being developed to advance multiple targets towards a significant gold discovery within the Company's large 660km2 tenement holding at the Woods Point Gold Project.Following completion of the merger of White Rock and Austar Gold in August 2021, a review of the Company's commanding 660km2 Victorian tenement package in the Walhalla Synclinorium, encompassing the Woods Point goldfield, has highlighted several key factors confirming White Rock's view of the gold exploration prospectivity of the Woods Point Gold Project. White Rock is now progressing plans to formalise its regional exploration program going into 2022.Key Highlights- The Woods Point Gold Project contains:o 197 or 60% of the 320 known historic primary gold mineral occurrences within the Walhalla Synclinorium.o 95% of all historic gold production outside of the 3 major deposits (Walhalla, Morning Star & A1).o 73 mineral occurrences with recorded production grades >10g/t gold,Including 34 mineral occurrences >30g/t gold, andIncluding 22 mineral occurrences >60g/t gold.o Only 8 gold prospects have public records of previous drilling.o Multiple historic mines with significant production have never been drilled.o The majority of historic gold mining was restricted to levels above the water table, usually less than 100 metres vertically (except for the 3 major deposits: Walhalla, Morning Star & A1).- White Rock has identified the Wallaby-Eldorado-Shakespeare trend as a high priority target with Wallaby ready for drill testing, subject to an approved Work Plan.- Wallaby is a dyke bulge with similar width and quartz reef development to Morning Star and has never been drilled.- The overall Wallaby-Eldorado-Shakespeare trend extends for over 2,000 metres with the potential for a large dyke host to be defined in multiple dyke bulge positions or as a continuous structure.- Historic production records indicate 24,000 ounces of gold was produced from the three mines with Eldorado recording production at a grade of 75g/t gold.Matt Gill, MD&CEO of White Rock Minerals commented:-"The Walhalla Synclinorium is host to an estimated 6Moz of gold production, and White Rock controls a 660km2 tenement covering the core area. We are committed to systematically assessing our significant tenement package using modern exploration methods to identify targets with the potential to host million-ounce gold quartz reef deposits.Our land package contains 197 of the 320 gold mineral occurrences recorded in the Synclinorium, with 73 gold deposits recording production at >10g/t gold, of which 34 are >30g/t. The majority of these have never been drilled with only 8 gold prospects in White Rock's exploration tenements having records of drilling.As the first modern explorers on historically proven ground, we see great potential upside from this exploration program and look forward to progressing our plans during 2022, starting with the Wallaby-Eldorado-Shakespeare trend."The Company controls a 660km2 tenement land package that covers the core area of the Walhalla Synclinorium, host to an estimated 6Moz of gold production (Figures 1 and 2*). The land package contains 197 of the 320 primary gold mineral occurrences recorded in the Synclinorium, with 73 gold deposits recording production at >10g/t gold of which 34 are >30g/t. (Figure 3*). The majority of these have never been drilled with only 8 gold prospects in White Rock's exploration tenements having records of drilling (Figure 4*). White Rock plans to begin drill testing the highest priority historic prospects during 2022, with the Wallaby-Eldorado-Shakespeare trend the first to be drilled once permitting is completed.Wallaby-Eldorardo-Shakespeare have combined production of 24,000 ounces gold with Eldorado recording production at 75g/t gold. The Wallaby prospect is the most advanced and is drill ready with the mapped dyke having similar width and quart reef distribution characteristics to Morning Star, as well as a dyke margin vertical quartz reef that could be analogous to the Cohens Reef at Walhalla, which yielded 1.5 Million ounces at 32g/t gold. Surface mapping and prospecting along strike to the south over the Eldorado and Shakespeare mines will proceed while drilling at Wallaby to better understand the overall strike extent and size potential of this area.Work has also commenced planning orientation surface geochemistry and geophysics across known dyke bulges hosting gold mineralisation. Orientation data will then be used to design a systematic surface geochemistry and airborne geophysics program aimed at identifying new priority targets.White Rock is committed to assessing the Walhalla Synclinorium using modern exploration methods not used at the Woods Point Gold Project previously, and to apply this disciplined approach systematically to identify targets that have the potential to host million-ounce gold quartz reef deposits. This is likely to include:- Detailed airborne magnetics/electromagnetics (for direct dyke detection and detailed structural interpretation);- Airborne LiDAR (Digital laser topographic mapping capable of identifying unknown historic workings);- Stream geochemistry (sensitive precious metal analysis and dyke pathfinder elements); and- Soil and rock geochemistry (sensitive precious metal analysis and dyke pathfinder elements).Understanding the structural architecture with respect to the controls on mineralisation has been identified as a critical layer of knowledge to assist in identifying the highest priority targets with the potential to host the largest deposits in the Walhalla Synclinorium.White Rock sees enormous potential for the discovery of a significant high-grade gold discovery based on:- The proven existence of million-ounce gold deposits at Walhalla and Morning Star;- The extensive distribution of high-grade gold mineral occurrences throughout White Rock's tenement land holding;- The lack of historic exploitation below the water table; and- The lack of exploration, historic and modern.*To view tables and figures, please visit:About White Rock Minerals Ltd White Rock Minerals Ltd (ASX:WRM) (OTCMKTS:WRMCF) is a diversified explorer and near-stage producer, headquartered in Ballarat, Victoria. The Company's flagship exploration project is Red Mountain in central Alaska. At Red Mountain, there are already two high grade zinc - silver - gold - lead VMS deposits, with an Inferred Mineral Resource of 9.1 million tonnes @ 609g/t AgEq / 13% ZnEq. The Company is also exploring its recently discovered large intrusion related gold anomaly at Last Chance, also located in the Tintina gold belt of Alaska, home to multi-million gold ounce deposits like Pogo, Fort Knox and the Donlin Project. The Company also has the Mt Carrington project, located near Drake, in Northern NSW, which is a near-production precious metals asset with a resource of 341,000 ounces of gold and 23.2 million ounces of silver on an approved mining lease, and with a Gold First PFS and JORC Reserve. NEW YORK An influential U.S. advisory panel will discuss expanding eligibility for COVID-19 vaccine booster shots to all adults Friday, a move that could make the shots available nationwide as early as this weekend. Some cities and states already allow all adults to get boosters of Pfizers vaccine, but it is not yet official U.S. policy. In the last week, California, New Mexico, Arkansas, West Virginia and Colorado expanded the shots to all adults. New York City made a similar move. Pfizer asked U.S. regulators last week to allow boosters of its COVID-19 vaccine for anyone 18 or older. The Food and Drug Administration is expected to sign off on Pfizers application before the advisory panel meets Friday. The final step CDCs official recommendation could come soon after the meeting. The move would greatly expand who is eligible. Boosters are now recommended for people who initially received their second Pfizer or Moderna shots at least six months ago if theyre 65 or older or are at high risk of COVID-19 because of health problems or their job or living conditions. Boosters are also recommended for people who received the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine at least two months ago. Nearly 31 million Americans have already received a dose beyond their original vaccination, including those with weakened immune systems, such as cancer patients and organ transplant recipients who need an extra dose to be fully vaccinated. While all three vaccines used in the U.S. continue to offer strong protection against severe COVID-19 illness and death, the shots effectiveness against milder infection can wane over time. Pfizer has submitted early results of a booster study in 10,000 people to make its case that its time to further expand the booster campaign. The study found that a booster could restore protection against symptomatic infection to about 95%, even as the extra-contagious delta variant was surging. Side effects were similar to those seen with the companys first two shots. Members of the panel, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, have debated in prior meetings whether there is sufficient evidence that boosters are currently needed for all adults. ___ Associated Press writer Matthew Perrone contributed to this story from Washington. ___ The Associated Press Health & Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Prev 1 of 7 Next Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal The Las Vegas, New Mexico, police detective was familiar with Eric Vigil from prior run-ins. But when the detective was called to investigate Vigils homicide at the San Miguel County jail, he said the 40-year-old was unrecognizable, according to court records. The detective said Vigils lips were sunken in from having no teeth left, his face was purple and his nose almost completely flat. The blood was spattered around the cell with so much energy that pieces of flesh stuck to the walls. Seven fellow inmates were charged Monday in a two-minute beating that left Vigil dead on Nov. 1 at the San Miguel County Detention Center. Conrad Atencio, 25, Dathian Lucero, 24, Daniel Magallanes, 22, Nathan Pacheco, 25, Devin Morales, 21, Pierre Lovato, 44, and Joaquin Richardson, 19, are each charged with an open count of murder and tampering with evidence. Some of the inmates told authorities Vigil feared for his reputation as a cage fighter was a bully who would always start fights in the jail. One inmate said they jumped Vigil, killing him, after he challenged them to a fight. The warden of the jail did not respond to questions from the Journal. Vigil had been held at the jail since June 7 and was awaiting trial on charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He was accused of having a pistol and a sawn-off shotgun. In 2013, Vigil was acquitted in the 2007 fatal shooting of two New Mexico Highlands University students, while his older brother was sentenced to 30 years in the case. According to a criminal complaint filed in Magistrate Court: Jail officials were alerted around 5:30 p.m. by an inmate in the Echo pod who said another inmate had slipped and fallen. They found Vigil on the floor in a large cell on the top floor. He was pronounced dead at Alta Vista Regional Hospital in Las Vegas. Surveillance video showed that the inmates surrounded Vigil and followed him to the cell after the staff left the pod. Vigil tried to close the cell door behind him, but Lovato caught the door and the men got inside. The video showed Magallanes hit Vigil and the other inmates drag him to the middle of the cell, and attack him as other inmates watched from the doorway. The inmates leave the cell, and shake hands and hug each other in a celebratory fashion before going to the showers. Ten minutes later, guards were made aware and locked down the pod. By the time a Las Vegas police detective arrived, the men had washed up and changed clothes, but many of them had swollen knuckles and no defensive injuries. Atencio, Magallanes, Morales and Lucero all refused to speak with police, and began crying when told Vigil had died. Pacheco told police Vigil was a bully who was feared in the pod and everyone was getting tired of him. He said the only way for any of the inmates to come out alive was to attack Vigil at once comparing the incident to the biblical story of David and Goliath. Another inmate, who watched the beating, told police Vigil challenged everyone to a fight before going into the cell. He said that, after Vigil fell down, everyone attacked him. The inmate told police he was grossed out and there were teeth everywhere. An autopsy found Vigil had no defensive wounds indicating he never fought back and his skull was filled with blood. He had multiple facial fractures and, due to the blood spatter, the pathologist found Vigil was jumped on, and stomped on, and beaten. Through my past experiences and encounters I could no longer recognize (Vigil), the detective wrote in the complaint. Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal SANTA FE A Taos Pueblo woman found dead outside a residence there Saturday has been identified by her family as 29-year-old DeAnna Autumn Leaf Suazo, a well-known New Mexico artist. A family member confirmed her death to the Journal, and noted she was the daughter of Taos Pueblo artist David Gary Suazo, but would not discuss any circumstances of her death. The death is being investigated by the FBI and the Taos Pueblo Department of Public Safety, an FBI spokesman said in an email Monday. The agency did not release a name. Pueblo police referred inquiries to the Taos Pueblo Governors Office, which did not return a call for comment Tuesday. The pueblo has been closed to nontribal members due to the pandemic. Steven McFarland, owner of the Revolt Gallery in Taos, knew Suazo for several years and exhibited her work in several shows. He said he last spoke with her Thursday night at the gallery. She was totally in good spirits, said McFarland in a Tuesday phone interview. She was one of the purest, sweetest souls I have met in my life. She was the epitome of her corn maidens (depicted in her art). My friends and me, we are all shocked, we are just devastated. A tragic loss. Suazo divided her time between Taos, where she was born and raised, and Santa Fe, where she received a bachelors degree in studio arts in May from the Institute of American Indian Arts, according to her website. Her work has been on display in numerous shows and galleries, and she participated in the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts (SWAIA) Santa Fe Indian Market for almost 10 years, and in the Artist Market at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian in 2016 and 2018. Her art also included a painted room in the Nativo Lodge in Albuquerque and shows at La Fonda Hotel in Santa Fe and the Millicent Rogers Museum in Taos. Suazo described herself as a Taos Pueblo and Dine contemporary 2D artist, on her website. The Institute of American Indian Arts noted her passing on its website Tuesday evening: We are deeply saddened to acknowledge the loss of DeAnna Autumn Leaf Suazo (Dine, Taos Pueblo), who tragically passed away last weekend. DeAnna loved celebrating her Dine and Taos Pueblo heritage, and creating art that reflected Pueblo cultural significance and aesthetics, the tribute said. She will be remembered as a dedicated student, a devoted friend, a kind person and a passionate artist whose creativity knew no bounds. Anime influence Her art grew out of a collaboration of different styles, Suazo said in a radio interview with KCEI, Taos-Red River, last month. Her parents, both painters, focused on pueblo architecture and Southwest landscapes, but she was inspired by anime, a style of Japanese television and film animation. Growing up, I watched anime with my older brother and older sister, and cousins, Suazo said in the interview. So that really, really plays on to memory and bringing memory into my art for a while, I was painting just like them (her parents), and I wanted to separate my style and my image from theirs. I really wanted to represent pueblo people today, whereas a lot of representation I see is from the past or its from such outside perspectives as the Taos Society of Artists and bringing anime into it makes it new, makes it fresh, it makes it recognizable as a modern thing of today, Suazo said during the 30-minute interview. She also described the influence of Sailor Moon, an animated series and books depicting the adventures of a Japanese schoolgirl whose author focused on the strength of femininity and the power of the moon. That reminded Suazo of pueblo stories handed down from her great-grandmother to her mother to her. I was always drawn to women empowering women; even though they are little girls, they are still able to help each other in a strong way, and help the world with the power of the moon, she said. What reminds me of Sailor Moon in my pieces is her hair. She is recognizable for these two buns on her head and, in a way, they reminded me of Taos Pueblo stylized buns and thats what I incorporated into my pieces.. I really emphasize the hair in my work, and then that emphasizes the strength in their culture. A lot of us have long hair and we keep it that way to participate in our religious doings. SANTA FE The New Mexico Public Education Department is asking state lawmakers for a $6.7 million budget increase, citing the need to address an ongoing lawsuit that centers on accusations the state is failing to meet constitutional obligations to provide essential educational opportunities to all students. State Education Secretary Kurt Steinhaus is expected to release an action plan next month that would address parts of the legal challenge. Nearly $5 million of the budget increase would fund compliance with state court orders related to the lawsuit. Most legislative funding for education, around $3 billion each year, goes directly to school districts. Additional funding comes from the states large endowment fund, which has grown in recent decades thanks to oil royalties and market investments. The Public Education Department also oversees the distribution of federal funds, including $1 billion this year in pandemic relief. Steinhaus told members of the Legislative Finance Committee that the biggest need is staff to help with management of the funds. His request to boost the agencys budget from $14.5 million to $21 million would include the hiring of at least 33 employees. I realize thats a large request, he told legislators, adding he believes its the bare minimum. Legislators asked Steinhaus why the department wants money for more positions when around a quarter of the funded positions in the department are unfilled. You have 59 positions that youre funding for that are not filled and now youre wanting 33 more and I just guess my question is why? said Rep. Candie Sweetser, D-Deming. Steinhaus said he had the same question when he became education secretary three months ago. He said he has filled staffing roles in the hiring department of his agency and has dozens of interviews being set up. He insisted that he needs the staff to monitor a growing set of state and federal programs and funds. And so I am confident that I can build a team of people with that extra funding that can meet those requirements, he said. One member of the Legislature questioned the need for a $102,000-per year position listed in the budget as an equity specialist. Whats a priority in my district is less administrative overhead and more certified personnel in the classroom, said Rep. Phelps Anderson of Roswell, a former Republican who became an independent in February. Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal As Use of Force investigations continue to be a sore spot at the Albuquerque Police Department, there are now about 553 cases 83% of a burgeoning backlog where even if an officer is found to have used force improperly he or she cannot be disciplined. In his latest report covering February through the end of July, the independent monitor overseeing the APD reform effort roasted investigators, supervisors and leadership for the backlog, saying that for the past two reporting periods there has been a virtual shut down of use of force investigations in the Internal Affairs Force Division. Out of 216 level 2 use of force cases those resulting in injury or expected to cause injury opened during the reporting period, only seven had been closed as of when the report was written and only one was closed within 90 days as is required by the settlement agreement. For the 91 level 3 cases resulting in serious injury or death only two were closed. Given the amount of focus on the problems related to IAFD (Internal Affairs Force Division) investigations in previous monitors reports, and the exceptional amounts of technical assistance provided by the monitoring team relating to IAFD processes, we can only conclude that this new backlog was intentional, and yet another canard designed to ensure that officers are not disciplined for known policy violations, James Ginger wrote in the report. We consider this another example of deliberate non-compliance exhibited by APD. By and large, city and APD officials including Police Chief Harold Medina and superintendent of police reform Sylvester Stanley dont dispute the data, but they do take issue with the way its presented. The police department has been in the midst of reforms since 2014 when a Department of Justice investigation found officers had a practice of using excessive force against residents. Using that inflammatory hyperbolic language is improper editorializing in a whole lot of areas, said City Attorney Esteban Aguilar. It improperly ascribes intent to the work of our officers, the women and men who are on the ground, trying to not only keep us safe, but trying to implement all of the provisions of constitutional community based policing. Aguilar also pointed out that many of the fixes APD is trying had not yet taken effect when the reporting period ended. For instance, the city and the DOJ agreed that APD should bring in an outside team of investigators to oversee force investigations. The idea was launched as a way for the city to stave off being put in receivership for non-compliance with the Court Approved Settlement Agreement laying out the reforms. A stipulated order establishing the team was filed in February and then it took a number of months to request proposals and choose a contractor, Aguilar said. He said he does not anticipate the backlog continuing to grow now that the team is in place. We have failures, you know, we still have 37% operational compliance to attain, so we do have a long way to go, Aguilar said. But were not at the beginning of this process. And, I think it does a disservice to the work of the department, but also the work of the community members who have been engaged in this process, and who have been actually asking for meaningful change as well, because weve been walking with them step by step throughout this process. Last fall, APD Forward a coalition of police reform advocacy groups including the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico was one of the stakeholders to ask for the city to be held in contempt of court and to be put under a receivership. Barron Jones, a senior policy strategist with the ACLU, said after reading the report, its clear that APD still has a lot of work to do. Unfortunately its more of the same, Jones said. While we recognize the departments efforts to improve training and that the performance metric unit is up and helping folks analyze trends we believe that the crux of the reform lies in the departments ability to address bad behavior, or out of policy violations. That doesnt seem to be happening yet during another monitor report. Jones said right now its unclear what APD Forward will do in response to the report. Although Ginger was incensed by the use of force investigation backlog which he pointed out at 667 was more than double a previous backlog APD worked through from 2018 to 2020 Medina said it was expected since the solutions, namely the External Force Investigative Team, werent yet in place. Medina said its easy for someone who is thousands of miles away to point at APDs problems and say its intentional, but in fact everyone is working to comply in the best way they can. Its a matter that we dont know how to do stuff to their liking, or to their standards, Medina said. I think thats been a problem from the very beginning is that instantly when APD fails, theyre tagged by the monitoring team, DOJ, as Oh, APD is resisting this. No, you guys are all here because APD sometimes doesnt know how to do this stuff. And thats what we should be doing is if were doing it wrong, correct us more quickly, and give us the lag time to put the fixes in place. Other things of note in the Monitors Fourteenth Report: After backsliding during the previous monitoring period, APD has regained compliance in a handful of paragraphs, for a slight overall increase. APD stayed static in primary compliance regarding the development of policies and secondary compliance regarding training of officers on those policies with 100% and 82% respectively. In operational compliance whether officers are following policies and being corrected when they dont the department reached 62%, which is a 3 percentage point increase over the previous period. These data depict an organization that is willing to chip away at the margins, completing expeditiously tasks that improve efficiency and even effectiveness but steadfastly refusing to make meaningful reform to processes involving use of force, excessive use of force, the processes of police-community interactions on the street, supervision, command, and discipline, Ginger wrote. Deputy Chief of Compliance Cori Lowe said there were a few paragraphs that APD officials requested the monitor re-evaluate after they read the draft report. We thought that we were in higher compliance levels than what we were given, she said. And in all fairness, the monitoring team did take those into consideration and did move a few paragraphs into higher compliance and what he originally had. As in the previous report, the monitor praised the Force Review Board, made up of APD command staff and others, for strong attendance and engagement. We continue to see referrals generated to address policy, supervision, tactic, equipment, and training deficiencies, the monitor wrote. In some cases, FRB made requests for internal affairs investigations for misconduct they identified during their deliberations. However, Ginger cautioned, the backlog of use of force cases could negatively impact the effectiveness of the FRB and the long-term influence it has over officers in the field. The training academy, which had received low marks in the prior report, has made meaningful progress this year, including by completing the 2021 Firearms training cycle, Ginger wrote. APD Recruitment staff continue to develop strategies and concepts for recruiting new police officers during the Pandemic, he wrote. In addition, at a time when interest in the profession is down significantly nationwide, the APD Recruiting unit has managed to increase interest in APD by utilizing digital platforms to reach an applicant pool that now includes at least 43 states. Detectives interrupting interviewees giving statements. Interviews that are conducted somewhat haphazardly in random locations. Detectives often dressed inappropriately and unprofessionally asking leading questions and not allowing witnesses to state what happened. A lack of essential critical listening skills. These are some of the issues the External Force Investigative Team laid out in its first quarterly report since it started overseeing and training the Albuquerque Police Departments Internal Affairs Force Division in July. The report covers July 16 through Oct. 16. In one case, a detective told the interviewee, off the record and prior to the interview, that he did not see any issues with the incident, the report states. The EFIT investigator addressed this with the detective, explaining it is inappropriate to provide an opinion to an employee especially prior to concluding an investigation. EFIT is made up of three teams with one supervisor, three full-time investigators and one part-time investigator. The contract is with Debra Lynn Gallant, an accounting and consulting firm in Florida, and the teams are each spending three weeks in Albuquerque at a time. During that time, investigators are on call 24/7 and must respond to a scene within an hour of being notified of a use of force, according to the report. The teams have already made a number of suggestions. After realizing that IAFD had a very disorganized approach once on scene, resulting in tactical officers and the subject individual remaining on scene longer then needed, EFIT made recommendations to streamline the process. While previously union representatives would interrupt interviews, after EFIT met with them they stopped, according to the report. There are now two interview rooms dedicated to use-of-force investigations and all detectives have to wear dress shirts and ties. Prior to EFIT, IAFD would respond to the UOF (use of force) scene, complete the on-scene process and immediately schedule interviews with all Officers, the report states. EFIT suggested that the IAFD Detective/Investigator and the EFIT Investigator prepare a detailed investigative plan that would include the appropriate Officers/Witnesses to interview after reviewing preliminary OBRD (on-body recording device) and UOF reports. There now is a policy that within 72 hours only those individuals are interviewed that are essential in making a determination whether the UOF utilized is in or out of APD policy. They say this change sped up the process without compromising the investigation and means officers can return to the field quicker. There are now 21 detectives, five civilian investigators and five civilians in training in IAFD, according to an APD spokesman. Deputy Chief of Compliance Cori Lowe said EFIT has already been a valuable asset. They have a team here at least one team in town 100% of the time, Lowe said. That is actually doing very, very well because if they see an issue on scene, they can fix it right then and there. Or they can make a recommendation in which APD is going to respond. We have yet to not take a recommendation. As of October, IAFD and EFIT completed 38 investigations within the mandated 90-day period, a dramatic improvement from earlier this year when IAFD only completed nine within a six-month period. Of those, four out of 38 were found to be not within the use-of-force policies. This is a marked increase from the 3% of closed cases that were found to be out of policy in 2020. Lowe, who had been the acting commander of IAFD before she was appointed deputy chief, said that doesnt necessarily mean that the force used was excessive, it also could be out of policy for a lack of de-escalation or other issues. External Force Investigative Teams first report by Albuquerque Journal on Scribd Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal SANTA FE The state agency that runs New Mexicos prison system is asking state lawmakers for $2.7 million in additional funding in the coming year part of an overall $367 million budget request to ramp up staffing levels at facilities in Grants and Santa Rosa. The state Corrections Department took over management of the two prisons from private prison companies this month and agency Secretary Alisha Tafoya Lucero said Tuesday the vacancy rate for corrections officers at the Guadalupe County Correctional Facility in Santa Rosa was at 82.5% at the time of the takeover. Its already been reduced slightly to about 60% due to the hiring of new officers, but the states top prison official acknowledged staffing levels are still far from ideal. Im not going to pretend were at where we need to be, Tafoya Lucero told the Journal. She also said the prison is currently only housing about half the inmates it can hold due to the staffing shortage, adding, I wont increase the population of that facility until its safe to do so. Statewide, New Mexicos vacancy rate for corrections officers is at 31% despite efforts in recent years to increase pay levels and improve retention. The starting pay rate for certified officers at state-run prisons is currently set at $20 per hour compared to about $15.75 per hour at private-run prisons. But a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for workers at hospitals, prisons and other congregate settings imposed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grishams administration does not appears to have led to a mass employee exodus, as only a small number of guards left their jobs or were dismissed for failing to comply. Of the 2,388 corrections officers employed at state and private-run prisons around New Mexico, 2,237 have been fully vaccinated and 140 have received medial or religious exemptions, Corrections Department spokesman Eric Harrison said. In addition, seven corrections officers were dismissed and 19 have resigned since August instead of complying with the mandate, according to the agency. It didnt have as big on an effect as I thought it might, Tafoya Lucero said Tuesday of the vaccine mandates impact, though she said some prisons were hit harder by resignations than others. Some New Mexico prisons have seen COVID-19 outbreaks and there have been more than 2,900 recorded cases among inmates at the states 10 prisons, according to Department of Health data. The state had 5,654 incarcerated inmates as of Tuesday or about 73% of prison bed capacity statewide, Tafoya Lucero said. Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the states male inmate population had dropped over 10% and the female population almost 25%, according to the New Mexico Sentencing Commission. Sen. George Munoz, D-Gallup, the vice chairman of the Legislative Finance Committee, said Tuesday the panel will consider the decreasing inmate population as it crafts a budget recommendation in advance of the 30-day legislative session that starts in January. He also said the states law that bars retired state employees from returning to work while still collecting pension benefits is complicating efforts to ramp up staffing at the Grants prison in particular. Overall, the Corrections Department is seeking a 1.2% budget increase for the fiscal year that starts in July 2022 from $363.1 million to $367.3 million. In addition to more money for staffing the Western New Mexico Correctional Facility in Grants and the Guadalupe County Correctional Facility in Santa Rosa, the agency is also seeking additional funding to expand housing options for inmates released from custody on probation and parole. SUMAS, Wash. Residents of this small U.S. city along the Canadian border were assessing damage from flooding that hit an estimated three quarters of homes, as Washington state and British Columbia tried to dry out from an intense, days-long rain storm that cut off key roadways and forced hundreds of evacuations. Skies were sunny Wednesday morning in the area around Sumas, Washington, where about 500 rescues and evacuations were reported. Were looking at going door-to-door, as waters go down in different parts of town, Sumas Mayor Kyle Christensen told The Seattle Times. Half is on dry ground, half has water. By Wednesday afternoon, only one river in western Washington had active flood warnings. The soaking fueled by a so-called atmospheric river that dumped torrents rain on the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia from Saturday through Monday reminded people of western Washingtons record, severe flooding in November 1990 when two people died and there were more than 2,000 evacuations. While the weather was improving, the situation remained dire in British Columbia, where the Canadian government was sending in the military to help with floods and mudslides that destroyed parts of several major highways. One death was reported and officials said Wednesday that more deaths were expected. Immediately across the border from Sumas, police using helicopters and boats had evacuated about 180 residents of a flooded low-lying area of Abbotsford, British Columbia. Evacuations continued Wednesday. Mayor Henry Braun said Wednesday that conditions were bad overnight because a key pumping station was in danger of being overwhelmed. He said crews spent Tuesday night sandbagging around the station and things were holding steady. Im feeling much better today than last night, Braun said, although he cautioned the danger had not passed. Those evacuated in Abbotsford joined thousands of others in the province who were forced from their homes by floods or landslides starting Sunday night. On Facebook, the City of Sumas said Wednesday that water levels were continuing to drop and it looked like the community wouldnt be affected by additional potential flooding in Abbotsford. It said crews were working hard to clear roads and return power to some parts of town. These families and businesses need our prayers and support as we start the process of cleanup and rebuilding over the next few days, the city said in another Facebook post. To the south, a flood warning for Washingtons Skagit River will remain in effect until Thursday because it will take time for the floodwaters to drain, the National Weather Service said. Officials recommended that residents of several nearby islands evacuate. Across the border, the body of a woman was recovered from a landslide near the small community of Lillooet, British Columbia. Royal Canadian Mounted Police said at least two other people were reported missing. British Columbia Premier John Horgan declared a state of emergency Wednesday following the unprecedented flooding. In Washingtons Whatcom County, home to Sumas, the county sheriffs office said on Facebook that authorities and search crews on Wednesday had located a body believed to be a 59-year-old man who had last been seen clinging to a tree after his truck was swept into a flooded field in the town of Everson. In the city Ferndale, also southwest of Sumas, officials had urged people in homes and businesses Tuesday to evacuate near the rising Nooksack River and bystanders had rescued a man who had driven into floodwaters by mistake. Evacuation notices were rescinded Wednesday and the flood warning had ended by Wednesday afternoon. Southwest of Ferndale, authorities said Wednesday that all routes off the Lummi Peninsula, home to the Lummi Nation, were closed because of water over the roads. Officials in the city of Bellingham said only a few roads there remained closed on Wednesday because of flooding and officials were also assessing damage. More rain fell in Bellingham from Saturday through Monday about 5.57 inches (14.14 centimeters) than normally falls there during all of November, according to National Weather Service data. The normal monthly rain total is 5.2 inches (13.2 centimeters) for November, the weather agency said. Transportation officials on Washingtons Olympic Peninsula where the Coast Guard earlier in the week rescued 10 people stranded by floodwaters on Wednesday were also assessing conditions and clearing debris from roads. Officials said Wednesday that in the far northwest corner of the peninsula, people on the Makah Reservation have been prevented from leaving or entering because of landslides on nearby highways, The Seattle Times reported. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee on Monday declared a severe weather state of emergency in 14 counties. On a visit to Whatcom County Wednesday, he said some 500 homes had damage from the storms. Inslee said he spoke with the mayors of Everson and Sumas and was astonished at the devastation he saw, The Bellingham Herald reported. Im told they did top all-time flood levels in some places, he said. Some of the floodwaters came after warmer rains quickly melted 4 feet of snow that previously fell in the Mount Baker wilderness. Inslee said Whatcom County should prepare for repeated floods and address the causes of climate change. We have to realize that were going to face decades of increased floods in our state of Washington, he said. Inslee promised to use state and federal money including funds from President Joe Bidens recent infrastructure bill to ease the effects of climate change. ___ This story has been updated to correct the name of the mayor of Sumas, Washington. ___ Baumann reported from Bellingham, Washington. BATON ROUGE, La. The Louisiana inmate whose Supreme Court case was instrumental in extending the possibility of freedom to hundreds of people sentenced to life in prison without the opportunity for parole when they were juveniles was freed on parole Wednesday after spending nearly six decades behind bars. Henry Montgomery, 75, was released from prison just hours after the parole boards decision and went to the offices of the Louisiana Parole Project, a nonprofit which is supporting him after his release. There he was embraced by tearful staff and former juvenile lifers who were freed as a result of the court case that bears Montgomerys name. It feels so wonderful, said Montgomery during an interview with The Associated Press. When asked what he plans to do now that he is out of prison, Montgomery said he wanted to pay his respects to his mother and grandmother and other family members who died when he was behind bars. Montgomery had been convicted in the 1963 killing of East Baton Rouge sheriffs deputy Charles Hurt, who caught him skipping school. Montgomery was 17 at the time. He was initially sentenced to death but the states Supreme Court threw out his conviction in 1966, saying he didnt get a fair trial. The case was retried, Montgomery convicted again but this time sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He served decades at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. A three-member board voted unanimously in favor of parole. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the meeting was held on Zoom with Montgomery appearing on camera at Angola. Hes been in prison for 57 years. He has an excellent disciplinary record. He is a low risk by our assessment. Hes got good comments from the warden, said board member Tony Marabella as he voted to approve Montgomerys release with certain conditions including a curfew and that he have no contact with the victims family. Montgomerys release owes back to two specific Supreme Court cases. In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled in Miller v. Alabama that mandatory sentencing of life without parole for juvenile offenders was cruel and unusual punishment. But it didnt settle the question of whether that decision applied retroactively or only to cases going forward. In 2016, the Supreme Court settled the matter when it took up Montgomerys case and extended their decision on such sentences to people already in prison. The decision ushered in a wave of new sentences and releases. Since the courts Montgomery decision, about 800 people who had been sentenced to life without parole as juveniles have been released, according to the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth. But, until Wednesday, Montgomery remained in prison. After the Supreme Court decision, he was resentenced in 2017 to life with parole and the state judge who resentenced Montgomery called him a model prisoner who appears to be rehabilitated. But then the parole board rejected his application two times, the most recent rejection coming in 2019. Andrew Hundley is a former juvenile lifer who was released due to the Montgomery decision and went on to found the Parole Project in 2016 to assist people who have served long prison sentences reenter society. He said many former juvenile lifers who were released and were able to go on with their lives felt a collective sense of guilt that Montgomery whose case made their releases possible was still behind bars. For juvenile lifers still incarcerated, his release carries a different message, Hundley said. For individuals who continue to be in prison, Henry gives them hope that they may be judged by who they are today and not the worst mistake they ever made, Hundley said. The Parole Project will help Montgomery with housing, signing up for health care or medications, getting an ID card and learning how to navigate society. The reentry started with a cheeseburger, fries and an orange soda his first meal out of prison and his first cellphone which staff members said they would help him set up. Montgomery also noted the huge changes that had taken place in Baton Rouge since he was incarcerated freeways that didnt exist decades ago, for example and said he didnt even recognize some places. Shon Williams was on hand Wednesday to welcome Montgomery. He was a former juvenile lifer who served time in Angola with Montgomery. He recalled Montgomery taking a sign language class in prison that Williams taught despite his arthritis and Montgomery giving him advice in prison to never give up. Williams said he was holding back tears watching Montgomery on Wednesday. If it wasnt for him Id still be in Angola, Williams said. During the hearing, Hundley and others spoke of what Montgomery had accomplished in prison including his years of work at the prisons silk screen shop and the length of his stay. He was also instrumental in establishing a boxing team. His release was not without opposition. Hurt, the sheriffs deputy who Montgomery killed, was married and had three children. Two of his daughters have met with Montgomery in prison and forgiven him, but family members have opposed his release. A prosecutor from the area where Montgomerys crime occurred spoke against his parole as did one of the deputys daughters, Linda Hurt Woods. I do not believe that he should be released at this time, said Woods, saying that the decision shows deep disrespect to law enforcement officers. He made a decision at 17 years old. You know right from wrong at 17. I did. Montgomery himself said little during the roughly half-hour hearing. He is extremely hard of hearing, and his lawyer often had to repeat questions from the board members. At times Montgomery said he was struggling to find words to express himself. Im really sorry that I, that this happened, Montgomery said. I am going to have to live with this all my life, the rest of my life. Speaking later to the AP he said: I destroyed my life, they life and the people that I hurt, referring to his own family and that of the slain deputys. ___ Follow Santana on Twitter @ruskygal. Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal Outlining her priorities as she enters a critical election year, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said she will propose a reduction in New Mexicos gross receipts tax a move intended to address a chronic weak point in the states unusual tax system. The tax cut, if successful, would shave one-quarter of a percentage point off the statewide rate, or enough to save a family 25 cents on a $100 purchase. It would cost about $145 million a year in state revenue. New Mexicos gross receipts tax similar to a sales tax but also applied to the sale of services, not just goods has been a focus of debate for years at the Capitol. The tax is especially problematic for small businesses, experts say, because they must pay it when hiring outside help for accounting, legal or other services a cost that builds on itself with each transaction, eventually passed on to the consumer. Speaking to business leaders Wednesday, the Democratic governor said now is the right time cut the rate. The state is awash in cash, she said, thanks to federal stimulus funds and strong economic growth. It has a chilling effect, Lujan Grisham said of the tax. Weve got to do a tax overhaul that can really make a difference. We have the resources. A Republican legislator, in turn, said the governors proposal was too small to make a real difference. While it may be a step in the right direction, Sen. William Sharer, R-Farmington, said in an interview, its not tax reform. The governor outlined the initiative one of many in a breakfast meeting Wednesday with hundreds of business and civic leaders gathered for the Economic Forum of Albuquerque, a nonpartisan group. Lujan Grisham also pledged to ask the Legislature to make it easier to hold people in jail if theyve been accused of a violent crime, to create a $100 million fund to add police officers and to pass a law designed to make New Mexico a hydrogen hub for the nations efforts to address climate change. Her half-hour remarks provided a peek at her priorities as lawmakers prepare for a 30-day session starting Jan. 18. A special session dedicated to redistricting is set for next month. Increasing for decades Lujan Grisham said the states financial reserves now stand at 37% of annual spending, making it a good time to tackle changes to the tax code. The gross receipts tax rate reaches 9% in some parts of the state. In Albuquerque, for example, the rate is 7.875%. Tax experts say the rate was never intended to be so high. A gross receipts tax is meant to cover a broad base of transactions, with the trade-off being that the rate is low. Richard Anklam, executive director of the nonpartisan Tax Research Institute, warned legislators in July that the rates had climbed to the absolute top of our capacity. He said in a written statement released by the Governors Office on Wednesday that reducing the tax would benefit all New Mexicans. New Mexicos gross receipts tax rates have been increasing for decades, making pyramiding worse, burdening our households and rendering our small businesses less competitive, he said. Stephanie Schardin Clarke, the states secretary of taxation and revenue, said the reduction would help provide valuable tax relief to New Mexico families and businesses, while adding a competitive advantage for New Mexico businesses. A recent expansion of gross receipts taxes to internet sales, she said, would help pay for the cut. The governors proposal would reduce the state portion of the rate the amount before cities and counties add their taxes from 5.125% to 4.875%. The states share of the rate hasnt fallen since 1981, though a 2004 law repealed the gross receipts tax on food. Talking point Sen. Sharer and Rep. Jason Harper, R-Rio Rancho, have repeatedly proposed overhauling the gross receipts tax code and reducing the rate. Lujan Grishams predecessor, Republican Susana Martinez, also pushed for changes to the gross receipts tax system. The Legislature where Democrats hold hefty majorities in both chambers has approved some changes to the gross receipts tax code, though not the broader overhaul sought by Republicans. Many of the proposals have been aimed at maintaining revenue neutrality, meaning any reduction in revenue by lowering the rate would be offset by other changes in the tax code, such as eliminating tax breaks. Sharer said Wednesday that the governors proposal doesnt amount to anything but a talking point. The state deserves much broader changes to its tax code with the aim of a low but flat tax, he said, without the host of exemptions that now poke holes in the revenue. House Majority Leader Javier Martinez, D-Albuquerque, said lawmakers have over the last three sessions successfully prioritized equitable tax reform that puts working New Mexicans first. I look forward to seeing the governors full proposal and continuing the work of building a more fair tax system. Legislative agenda Lujan Grisham is up for reelection to a second term in 2022, and a large field of Republican candidates is competing for the nomination to challenge her. All 70 seats in the state House and other statewide offices, such as attorney general, are also on the ballot. Besides a tax cut, Lujan Grisham outlined a host of legislative priorities Wednesday, including: Continuing a state push to offer more robust child care benefits, a move she said would make it easier for parents to work and address the 83,000 job openings in New Mexico. The state, she said, should target universal access to child care. Establishing a fund to help recruit and retain police officers statewide. The governor said she would ask for $100 million next year as part of a 10-year push for 1,000 more officers. Revising the states bail reform law, she said, to drive a wedge in the revolving door in our criminal justice system. Lujan Grisham said she wants the changes to target people charged with committing a violent crime with a weapon. I can tell you its not going to be an easy lift in the Legislature, the governor said. Criminal justice reform is hard. Passage of a hydrogen law to help attract investment and spur innovation in companies seeking to decarbonize more of the economy. She described it as a matter of economic justice that would help communities hit hard by the transition away from coal power plants. NEW ORLEANS Energy companies including Shell, BP, Chevron and ExxonMobil offered a combined $192 million for drilling rights on federal oil and gas reserves in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, as the first government lease auction under President Joe Biden laid bare the hurdles he faces to reach climate goals dependent on deep cuts in fossil fuel emissions. The Interior Department auction came after attorneys general from Republican states led by Louisiana successfully challenged a suspension on sales that Biden imposed when he took office. Companies bid on 308 tracts totaling nearly 2,700 square miles (6,950 square kilometers). It marked the largest acreage and second-highest bid total since Gulf-wide bidding resumed in 2017. Driving the heightened interest are a rebound in oil prices and uncertainty about the future of the leasing program, industry analysts said. Biden campaigned on pledges to end drilling on federally owned lands and waters, which includes the Gulf. Prices are higher now than theyve been since 2018, said Rene Santos with S&P Global Platts. The other thing is this fear that the Biden administration is here for another three years. Theyre certainly not going to accelerate the number of lease sales and they could potentially have fewer sales. It will take years to develop the leases before companies start pumping crude. That means they could keep producing long past 2030, when scientists say the world needs to be well on the way to cutting greenhouse gas emissions to avoid catastrophic climate change. Yet even as Biden has tried to cajole other world leaders into strengthening efforts against global warming, including at this months UN climate talks in Scotland, hes had difficulty gaining ground on climate issues at home. The administration has proposed another round of oil and gas sales early next year in Wyoming, Colorado, Montana and other states. Interior Department officials proceeded despite concluding that burning the fuels could lead to billions of dollars in potential future climate damages. Emissions from burning and extracting fossil fuels from public lands and waters account for about a quarter of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The thing that is really bedeviling people right now is this conflict between the short term and long term when it comes to energy policy, said Jim Krane, an energy studies fellow at Rice University in Houston. We still need this energy system that is basically causing climate change, even as were fighting climate change. Wednesdays livestreamed auction invited energy companies to bid on drilling leases across 136,000 square miles (352,000 square kilometers) about twice the area of Florida. Federal officials estimated prior to the sale that it could lead to the production of up to 1.1 billion barrels of oil and 4.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Shell Offshore Inc., the largest leaseholder in the Gulf, said the 20 tracts on which it successfully bid $17.9 million could offer development opportunities near existing platforms or new areas. The need absolutely continues for continued competitive leases in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, said Shell spokesperson Cindy Babski. Chevron USA was the top bidder, offering almost $49 million for 34 tracts. BP Exploration and Production had $30 million in high bids on 46 tracts, and Anadarko US Offshore had almost $40 million in high bids including the days highest bid, $10 million on 30 tracts. ExxonMobil bid nearly $15 million in two areas off the Texas shoreline in the northwest Gulf. Those 94 tracts are in shallow water less than 656 feet (200 meters) deep where oil has mostly played out and there are few active leases. Not far away in the Houston Ship Channel, Exxon is pursuing a government-industry collaboration that would raise $100 billion to capture carbon dioxide from industrial plants, carry it away in pipelines and inject it deep under the floor of the Gulf of Mexico, a process known as carbon capture and sequestration, or CCS. The Exxon bids have to be a play on their proposed CCS project, said Justin Rostant with industry consulting firm Wood Mackenzie. ExxonMobil spokesperson Todd Spitler declined to say if there was a link between its bids and the carbon capture proposal. The company is evaluating the subsurface geology for future commercial potential and will work with the Interior Department on its plans after leases are awarded, he said. Shallow waters have typically been more attractive to smaller oil firms with less to spend on costly deep water exploration, said Rice Universitys Krane. As managing carbon becomes more viable, he said, shallow tracts will become attractive for things beyond oil production. Environmental reviews of the lease auction conducted under former President Donald Trump and affirmed under Biden reached an unlikely conclusion: Extracting and burning the fuel would result in fewer climate-changing emissions than leaving it. Similar claims in two other cases, in Alaska, were rejected by federal courts after challenges from environmentalists. Climate scientist Peter Erickson, whose work was cited by judges in one of the cases, said the Interior Departments analysis had a glaring omission: It excluded greenhouse gas increases in foreign countries that result from having more Gulf oil enter the market. Federal officials recently changed their emissions modeling methods, citing Ericksons work, but said it was too late to use that approach for Wednesdays auction. An attorney for environmental groups challenging Wednesdays sale in federal court said it was based on incorrect data that doesnt reflect its impact on the environment. Its basically a giveaway to industry of millions of acres of the Gulf of Mexico so they can lock in production for years, at a time when we need to be shifting away from fossil fuel development, said Earthjustice attorney Brettny Hardy. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for about 15% of total U.S. crude production and 5% of its natural gas. Federal officials have 90 days to award or reject the bids. __ Brown reported from Billings, Montana. ___ Follow Matthew Brown on Twitter: @MatthewBrownAP GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. An FBI-led law enforcement task force searched four western Colorado locations, including the home of an elections clerk, amid an investigation into allegations that the clerk was involved in a security breach of elections equipment earlier this year, a district attorney said. The FBI, the Colorado Attorney Generals office and local authorities conducted the searches, which were authorized by a federal court, on Tuesday in Mesa and neighboring Garfield counties, Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein told Colorado Politics. Tina Peters, the elections clerk for Mesa County, which includes the city of Grand Junction, said her home was searched, the media outlet reported. The FBI raided my home at 6 a.m. this morning, accusing me of committing a crime, Peters said. And they raided the homes of my friends, mostly older women. I was terrified. Late Wednesday, Rubinstein and Attorney General Phil Weiser issued a statement confirming that Peters home was searched and disputing claims by a legal defense fund for Peters that authorities used excessive force during the operation. At no time was force used on Ms. Peters or her home. Ms. Peters was allowed to move around her home and fix herself breakfast while agents gathered items before departing, Rubinstein and Weiser said. Peters, a Republican, is being investigated by the FBI and by Colorado state officials in an alleged breach of elections equipment in Mesa County in May. Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat, successfully sued to have Peters and a deputy, Belinda Knisley, prohibited by a judge from administering the November midterm election. Peters has denied any wrongdoing. Knisley was subsequently suspended and charged with felony second-degree burglary and a cybercrime misdemeanor count by Rubinsteins office. Knisley also has denied wrongdoing. Colorado Politics reported that Peters first commented about the searches during an appearance on an online channel operated by Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO and a supporter of Peters and former President Donald Trump who has repeatedly made discredited claims that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. Peters added that authorities used a battering ram, destroying the front door of one of her friends homes. Rubinstein didnt disclose the other locations that were searched, telling The Associated Press in an email that all documents related to these operations are sealed by court order. The searches involved potential criminal activity by employees of the Mesa County Clerk and Recorders Office and others associated with those employees, Rubinsteins office said in a statement. The FBI office in Denver didnt immediately respond to an email requesting comment. The searches came amid an ongoing dispute between Peters, who presided over elections in conservative Mesa County in 2020, and Griswold, a Democrat and vocal presence nationally for ensuring election integrity. Peters has become an advocate for those who believe, without evidence, that the 2020 election was fraudulent although she has said elections in Mesa County, which voted overwhelmingly for Trump, were secure and accurate. In contrast, Democrat Joe Biden handily defeated Trump in Colorado in 2020, and Democrats control the governors office, the state Legislature and all statewide offices. Griswold sued to remove Peters as county clerk and recorder after Griswold said images of election equipment management software from Mesa County were obtained by elections conspiracy theorists and posted on far-right blogs. Griswolds office has said one of the images was taken May 23 from inside a secure room in Mesa County where the voting equipment was stored and had been accessed that day by Peters, who allowed a non-employee into the room. After Griswold filed the lawsuit, Peters was absent from Colorado for several weeks, only appearing publicly in broadcasts hosted by Lindell. Peters claimed that Griswolds investigation is an attempt to take over one of the few remaining conservative counties in Colorado. Griswolds office has identified the person it says was allowed into the secure room but has refused to say anything more about who he is or why he was there. The Associated Press isnt naming him until more information becomes available. He has not been charged with a crime. ___ This story was first published on November 17, 2021. It was updated on November 19, 2021, to correct the story summary to show Tina Peters is the elections clerk for Mesa County, not El Paso County. WARSAW, Poland Hundreds of migrants who were camped in the cold on the Poland-Belarus border have been moved to a nearby warehouse in Belarusian territory, reports said Wednesday, with some still harboring hopes of entering the European Union. The move came a day after a melee broke out in the border crisis, with migrants throwing stones at Polish forces massed on their side of the razor-wire fence, injuring 12, and they responded with water cannons and tear gas. Warsaw accused Belarusian forces of instigating the conflict, while the government in Minsk denounced Polands violent actions. The migrants, mostly from the Middle East, have been stuck at the border since Nov. 8. Most are fleeing conflict or despair at home and want to reach Germany or other western European countries. The West has accused Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko of using the migrants as pawns to destabilize the 27-nation bloc in retaliation for its sanctions on his authoritarian regime. Belarus denies orchestrating the crisis, which has seen migrants entering the country since summer and then trying to cross into Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. On Wednesday, Polands Border Guard tweeted a video showing migrants with bags and backpacks being directed by Belarus forces away from the camp near the Kuznica border crossing, and Polish Deputy Interior Minister Maciej Wasik said he had received information they were leaving on buses. The Belarus state news agency Belta reported they were moved to a heated, warehouse-like building about 500 meters (yards) from the border near Bruzgi, giving them the chance to rest indoors after many days in tents. One of them, an Iraqi Kurd named Miran Ali, took video in the warehouse and said Belarusian authorities told them they wouldnt be forced to return home. In response, the migrants chanted Belarus! Belarus! Belarus! in gratitude. This is the joy and happiness of Kurdish people after they were told that they will not be sent back to Kurdistan by force, and that they can wait here until Germany or one of the cities in Germany take them there, Ali said as he recorded the video. These people are expressing happiness and optimism in this cold and ugly camp. They sat on blankets, most still wrapped in heavy jackets and raincoats. Belta reported about 1,000 migrants agreed Tuesday to move into the building to wait for the situation to resolve, and it quoted some of them as saying that they are not planning to return to their home countries. Most of the buildings space was allocated for the migrants, who were offered food, water, medical aid, mattresses and pillows, the news agency said. Some migrants opted to stay camped near the border. Polands Defense Ministry posted video showing people and tents there, with some smoke rising from campfires. The next steps in the crisis are unclear. Although arrangements have been made for flights from Minsk to Iraq to repatriate those who want to return, it is uncertain how many will go. Iraq has appealed for its citizens to fly home, telling them the way into the EU is closed. The first flight from Minsk for the voluntary repatriation to Iraq is expected Thursday. Belarus also released video from its State Border Committee, alleging it showed Lithuanian border guards with dogs pushing migrants away from the Belarus-Lithuania frontier Tuesday night. Lithuania denied the claim, releasing its own video of the incident. It blamed Belarusian officials for pushing the group of 13 migrants toward the Lithuanian side and preventing them from returning to Belarus after being stopped by the Lithuanian guards. German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke with Lukashenko for the second time this week, stressing that migrants should be given the chance to return to their home countries with the help of the UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration. Steve Alter, a spokesman for the German Interior Ministry, denied Berlin was planning to bring the migrants to Germany. The road to Belarus is a dead end for most people who want to go to Germany. There are no plans to approve taking people in, he said. German government spokesman Steffen Seibert said U.N. aid was starting to reach the migrants and it was important to ensure humanitarian agencies gain permanent access, even if it meant talking to Lukashenko, whose legitimacy is questioned by the West following a disputed 2020 reelection. It makes sense to also talk to those who have the opportunity to change this situation in Minsk, even when it comes to a ruler whose legitimacy, like all other European member states, Germany does not recognize, he said, adding that Merkel has coordinated with other EU partners and remains committed to the blocs stance of tightening sanctions on Minsk. Meanwhile, Polish President Andrzej Duda said there is no military threat at the border from the primarily civilian police and border guards that are there to prevent illegal migration. The presence of the Polish military there is chiefly as a backup, he said on a visit to Montenegro. Duda stressed that Poland wont accept any international decisions on the border standoff that are made without Warsaws participation, referring to the talks involving Merkel and Lukashenko. Information on both sides of the border is hard to verify due to government restrictions. A state of emergency in Poland is keeping journalists, human rights workers and others away from the border along a zone that is 3 kilometers (2 miles) deep, and Belarus limits the presence of independent journalists. Estonia, which also is affected by migrant movements but to a lesser degree, said it would build a temporary razor wire barrier of up to 40 kilometers (25 miles) on its eastern border with Russia as an interim security solution. This northernmost of the three Baltic nations with a population of 1.3 million, Estonia shares a 294-kilometer (183-mile) land border with Russia and a 340-kilometer border with Latvia. It does not neighbor Belarus. Estonian Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets told broadcaster ERR on Tuesday that the crisis stems from Lukashenkos bid to be recognized by the West as president and have EU sanctions lifted, stressing they must stay in place. In our view, it is important that the European Union remains united and exerts its influence on Belarus through action, Liimets said, adding new sanctions should be imposed as soon as possible. ___ Salar Salim in Baghdad, Daria Litvinova in Moscow, Frank Jordans in Berlin, Jari Tanner in Tallinn, Estonia, and Vanessa Gera in Warsaw contributed. ___ Follow APs coverage of migration issues at https://apnews.com/hub/migration PACIFIC GROVE, Calif. There is a ray of hope for the vanishing orange-and-black Western monarch butterflies. The number wintering along Californias central coast is bouncing back after the population, whose presence is often a good indicator of ecosystem health, reached an all-time low last year. Experts pin their decline on climate change, habitat destruction and lack of food due to drought. An annual winter count last year by the Xerces Society recorded fewer than 2,000 butterflies, a massive decline from the tens of thousands tallied in recent years and the millions that clustered in trees from Northern Californias Mendocino County to Baja California, Mexico, in the south in the 1980s. Now, their roosting sites are concentrated mostly on Californias central coast. This years official count started Saturday and will last three weeks but already an unofficial count by researchers and volunteers shows there are over 50,000 monarchs at overwintering sites, said Sarina Jepsen, director of Endangered Species at Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation. This is certainly not a recovery but were really optimistic and just really glad that there are monarchs here and that gives us a bit of time to work toward recovery of the Western monarch migration, Jepsen said. Western monarch butterflies head south from the Pacific Northwest to California each winter, returning to the same places and even the same trees, where they cluster. The monarchs generally arrive in California at the beginning of November and spread across the country once warmer weather arrives in March. The Western monarch butterfly population has declined by more than 99% since the 1980s. On the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains, another monarch population travels from southern Canada and the northeastern United States across thousands of miles to spend the winter in western Mexico. Scientists estimate the monarch population in the eastern U.S. has fallen about 80% since the mid-1990s. Whether the population of monarchs that fly to Mexico from the eastern side of the country has rebounded is not yet known. Results of an annual county by experts with the World Wildlife Fund in Mexico wont be released until next year. Monarchs from across the West migrate annually to about 100 wintering sites dotting central Californias Pacific coast. One of the best-known wintering places is the Monarch Grove Sanctuary, a city-owned site in the coastal city of Pacific Grove, where last year no monarch butterflies showed up. The city 70 miles (112 kilometers) south of San Francisco has worked for years to help the declining population of monarch. Known as Butterfly Town, USA, the city celebrates the orange-and-black butterfly with windowpane patterns in its wings with a parade every October. Messing with a monarch is a crime that carries a $1,000 fine. I dont recall having such a bad year before and I thought they were done. They were gone. Theyre not going to ever come back and sure enough, this year, boom, they landed, said Moe Ammar, president of Pacific Grove Chamber of Commerce. This year a preliminary count showed more than 13,000 monarchs have arrived at the site in Monterey County, clustering together on pine, cypress and eucalyptus trees and sparking hope among the groves volunteers and visitors that the struggling insects can bounce back. Scientists dont know why the population increased this year but Jepsen said it is likely a combination of factors, including better conditions on their breeding grounds. Climatic factors could have influenced the population. We could have gotten an influx of monarchs from the eastern U.S., which occasionally can happen, but its not known for sure why the population is what it is this year, Jepsen said. Scientists say the monarch population had sharply dropped because of the destruction of their milkweed habitat along their migratory route as housing expands into their territory and use of pesticides and herbicides increases. Along with farming, climate change is one of the main drivers of the monarchs threatened extinction, disrupting an annual 3,000-mile (4,828-kilometer) migration synced to springtime and the blossoming of wildflowers. California has been in a drought for several years now, and they need nectar sources in order to be able to fill their bellies and be active and survive, said Stephanie Turcotte Edenholm, a Pacific Grove Natural History Museum docent who offers guided tours of the sanctuary. If we dont have nectar sources and we dont have the water thats providing that, then that is an issue. Monarch butterflies lack state and federal legal protection to keep their habitat from being destroyed or degraded. Last year, they were denied federal protection but the insects are now among the candidates for listing under the federal Endangered Species Act. ___ Rodriguez reported from San Francisco. BALTIMORE U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved a long-anticipated document on Communion on Wednesday that stops short of calling for withholding the sacrament from politicians such as President Joe Biden who support abortion rights but offers plenty of tacit justification for individual bishops to do so. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops first major statement on Communion in 15 years, The Mystery of the Eucharist in the Life of the Church, does not explicitly address the debate over elected officials, abortion and the sacrament that has surrounded the document over the past several months and partly inspired its creation in the first place. Instead, it gives an overview of church teaching, emphasizing the centrality of the Eucharist in the faith and worship and in part reflecting concern among bishops that many Catholics dont know or accept such teachings. It was approved by a 222-8 vote at the conferences fall assembly in Maryland after receiving only minor revisions in recent days by drafters on the bishops Committee on Doctrine. Drafters added a reference to defending the unborn along with other vulnerable persons, such as immigrants, older adults and victims of racial injustice. They also bolstered the definition of scandal as weakening the resolve of other Catholics to follow church teachings. The latter revision came in a passage reaffirming a 2006 statement saying its a scandal if a Catholic in his or her personal or professional life were knowingly or obstinately to reject the churchs doctrines or moral teachings. The document does not identify Biden or other politicians by name, though it says at one point, Lay people who exercise some form of public authority have a special responsibility to embody Church teaching. It calls on Catholics to examine their conscience and make sure theyre in harmony with church teachings, and says bishops have a special responsibility to respond to situations that involve public actions at variance with the visible communion of the church and the moral law. Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, who chairs the Committee on Pro-Life Activities and whose work includes advocacy against abortion, took the document as affirming the importance of our responsibility for the care of the souls of these politicians. Naumann, wearing a facemask with the words REMEMBER The Unborn, called for bishops to find common ground where politicians agree with the churchs vision for the dignity of the human person. But he also urged them not to be afraid to fulfill our obligations to let them know how serious it is to dissent from church teaching. Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, an outspoken critic of the president, asked colleagues to amend the document by quoting the church catechism and the Bible as saying anyone who creates scandal would be better off having a millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the sea. The proposal was met with silence when put to a voice vote and was not adopted. The conference cannot dictate a blanket policy on denying Communion to politicians; each bishop has authority in his own diocese. While some bishops have said they would deny the sacrament to Biden, the archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Wilton Gregory, has affirmed that the president is welcome to receive the sacrament there. Biden has said that Pope Francis, too, told him in a recent private meeting in Rome to continue receiving Communion. While the Vatican has not confirmed that, Biden did subsequently go to Mass and receive Communion at a church in Rome evidence that Francis did not forbid priests in the Diocese of Rome, which he oversees, from giving Communion to Biden. The document highlights the centrality of the doctrine of transubstantiation, which says that when a priest celebrates Mass, the bread and wine is transformed into Jesus actual body and blood. It says Catholics can perceive this as a reality through faith, even though the elements appear to the senses to be bread and wine. Some bishops have expressed concern over Catholics acceptance of the doctrine, citing a 2019 survey that found most church members dont believe in transubstantiation. Other researchers have questioned that finding, however, saying that when survey questions are phrased differently, higher numbers of Catholics align with church teaching. Auxiliary Bishop Andrew H. Cozzens of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, who is spearheading efforts to increase Eucharistic devotion, said the statistic that convinced the bishops there was a crisis was the fact that 75 percent Catholics dont go to Mass on Sunday. If people believed in the Eucharist, how could they possibly miss Mass on Sunday? The document also says the sacrament is central to church unity and worship and leads to personal and moral transformation, motivating believers to take care of vulnerable people and, in a broader sense, the environment. Bishops began working on the document after Biden took office, with some citing confusion over the president presenting himself as a devout Catholic despite his political stance on abortion. The Vatican repeatedly sent caution signals to the U.S. bishops as they prepared the document. The papal ambassador to the United States, Archbishop Christophe Pierre, on Tuesday urged bishops to listen before they teach, even in situations where some want to clarify confusion. And earlier this year, the head of the Vaticans doctrine office urged bishops to go slowly on the document, pursuing dialogue among themselves and with Catholic politicians. Also during the fall meeting, bishops are launching a broader initiative to promote devotions centered on the Eucharist with plans for a major gathering focused on the sacrament in 2024 in Indianapolis. Later Wednesday, Naumann expressed optimism about a pending request by the state of Mississippi before the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision permitting abortion. Parishes and dioceses, he said, need to be ready for increased requests for assistance if the court allows states to ban abortion. Naumann touted a new program, Walking with Moms in Need, in which parishes assess and support programs for expectant mothers in their communities. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content. NEW YORK Two of the three men convicted in the assassination of Malcolm X are set to be cleared Thursday after insisting on their innocence since the 1965 killing of one of the United States most formidable fighters for civil rights, their lawyers and Manhattans top prosecutor said Wednesday. A nearly two-year-long re-investigation found that authorities withheld evidence favorable to the defense in the trial of Muhammad Aziz, now 83, and the late Khalil Islam, said their attorneys, the Innocence Project and civil rights lawyer David Shanies. Aziz called his conviction the result of a process that was corrupt to its core one that is all too familiar even today. I do not need a court, prosecutors or a piece of paper to tell me I am innocent, he said in a statement. But he said he was glad his family, friends and lawyers would get to see the truth we have all known, officially recognized. He urged the criminal justice system to take responsibility for the immeasurable harm it caused me. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. tweeted that his office would join the mens attorneys in asking a judge Thursday to toss out the convictions. These men did not get the justice that they deserved, Vance told The New York Times, which first reported on the developments. Innocence Project co-founder Barry Scheck called the case one of the most blatant miscarriages of justice that I have ever seen. One of the civil rights eras most controversial and compelling figures, Malcolm X rose to fame as the Nation of Islams chief spokesperson, proclaiming the Black Muslim organizations message at the time: racial separatism as a road to self-actualization. He famously urged Black people to claim civil rights by any means necessary and referred to white people as blue-eyed devils, and he later denounced racism. About a year before his death, he split from the Nation of Islam and later made a pilgrimage to Mecca, returning with a new view of the potential for racial unity. Some in the Nation of Islam saw him as a traitor. At age 39, he was gunned down as he began a speech in Harlems Audubon Ballroom on Feb. 21, 1965. Aziz, Islam and a third man, Mujahid Abdul Halim also known as Talmadge Hayer and Thomas Hagan were convicted of murder in March 1966 and sentenced to life in prison. Hagan said he was one of three gunmen who shot Malcolm X, but he testified that neither Aziz nor Islam was involved. The two, then known as Norman 3X Butler and Thomas 15X Johnson, maintained throughout that they were innocent and offered alibis at their 1966 trial. No physical evidence linked them to the crime. Thomas 15 Johnson and Norman 3X Butler had nothing to do with this crime whatsoever, Hagan said in a sworn statement in 1977. Hagan was paroled in 2010. A message was left Wednesday at a phone number he had when paroled. He identified two other men as gunmen, but no one else was ever arrested. According to The New York Times, the re-investigation found the FBI had documents that pointed to other suspects, and a still-living witness supported Azizs alibi that he was at home with a leg injury at the time of the shooting. The witness, whom authorities had never interviewed before and was identified only by the initials J.M., said he spoke to Aziz on the latters home phone the day of the killing, the newspaper said. Also, the review found that prosecutors knew about but didnt disclose that undercover officers were in the ballroom when the gunfire erupted, and police knew that someone had called the Daily News of New York earlier that day saying that Malcolm X would be killed. The New York Police Department and the FBI said Wednesday that they had cooperated fully with the re-investigation, and they declined to comment further. Aziz was released in 1985. Islam was released two years later and died in 2009. Both continued to press to clear their names. I did not kill Malcolm X, Aziz said at a news conference in 1998, after the Nation of Islam tapped him to run the mosque where the slain leader had preached. A decade later, Islam told a gathering at a Harlem bookstore: I need to be exonerated. I had to walk 22 years in prison. And after their release, he and Aziz lived under the cloud of being Malcolm Xs supposed assassins. Exonerating these men is a righteous and well-deserved affirmation of their true character, Shanies said in a statement. Deborah Francois, a counsel in his office, called the convictions the product of gross official misconduct and a criminal justice system weighed against people of color. The Manhattan district attorneys office publicly acknowledged it was considering reopening the case after Netflix aired the documentary series Who Killed Malcom X? last year. The series explored a theory by scholars that the two men were innocent and that some of the real killers had escaped. ___ Associated Press writers Michael R. Sisak and Karen Matthews contributed to this report. Correction: A previous version of this story included the wrong name for the federal American Rescue Plan Act. The story has been updated. Copyright 2021 Albuquerque Journal SANTA FE New Mexicos Supreme Court sided Wednesday with a bipartisan group of senators in a dispute over spending authority for $1.7 billion in federal relief funds, barring Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham from spending any more of the federal dollars without legislative approval. The ruling, which was announced after the states highest court heard arguments from attorneys and deliberated for roughly one hour, clears the way for the Legislature to appropriate nearly $1.1 billion in allocated money received under the American Rescue Plan Act in the coming weeks though the governor would have the ability to fully or partially veto any legislative spending plan. Sen. Jacob Candelaria, D-Albuquerque, an attorney and one of the two senators who filed the court petition seeking to prevent Lujan Grisham from unilaterally spending the federal funds, called the ruling an affirmation of the Legislatures power of the purse strings. For me, the day is a huge victory for the Constitution, Candelaria told reporters shortly after the ruling. The Legislature has the obligation and the duty to allocate these funds. He also said lawmakers could act on the unspent federal relief funds intended to help states recover from the COVID-19 pandemic during a special session on redistricting expected to be called next month or during a 30-day legislative session that starts in January. However, it remains unclear whether the ruling will also apply to other federal programs that provide money to New Mexico. A written opinion detailing the full scope of the ruling and its implications on future disputes is expected to be issued in the coming days. Shortly after the Supreme Court announced its ruling, Lujan Grisham said she was disappointed but pleased to have the legal clarity on how to move forward. It was a question, and now we have an answer, the Democratic governor said in a response to reporters questions at the Capitol. She said she would consult with legislators immediately on how quickly the money can be allocated and put to work. And she joked that lawmakers shouldnt plan to go on vacation over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. It means we have some extra work to do together, Lujan Grisham said of lawmakers. The most important takeaway, the governor said, is that New Mexico has a tremendous influx of money that can be put work improving the state. Look, Im not going to let it rain on my parade, she said of the decision. Justices not swayed During the Wednesday court hearing, the governors general counsel Holly Agajanian argued previous legal precedent supported Lujan Grishams handling of the relief funds. The governors attorney also said its appropriate for the governor to exert authority over federal funds that are intended for specific purposes and can be clawed back by the federal government if certain deadlines and reporting requirements are not met. But those arguments did not appear to sway justices, as Chief Justice Michael Vigil at one point asked Agajanian, Didnt you just rewrite the Constitution? Supreme Court Justice David Thomson was blunt in saying the Constitution makes clear the Legislatures leading role in appropriating public funds. I learned that in second grade they control the purse strings, Thomson said. The justices also appeared to grapple with how their ruling might impact spending decisions connected to future federal aid programs. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court hearing featured the unusual sight of legislators appearing directly before the states highest court. In addition to Candelaria, Sen. Daniel Ivey-Soto, D-Albuquerque, also argued before the court in support of the Legislatures authority to appropriate public funds. He was one of four Democratic senators all chairmen of influential committees who moved to intervene in the court case last week on the side of their fellow senators. While the full scope of the ruling is not yet clear, it represented Lujan Grishams first legal setback in the states highest court. Before Wednesdays hearing, the Supreme Court had upheld the governors decision to bar indoor restaurant dining during the COVID-19 pandemic and also ruled that businesses negatively impacted by pandemic-related restrictions were not entitled to compensation from the state to cover their losses. A tug-of-war The Supreme Court case came after a protracted political spat between the Governors Office and some legislators on budgetary matters, including a surge in emergency state spending on COVID-19 tests, face masks and other supplies. The tug-of-war intensified after Lujan Grisham used her line-item veto authority in April to strike down legislative earmarks for more than $1 billion in federal stimulus dollars from a state budget bill. The vetoed earmarks included funding for a state unemployment fund, a popular college scholarship program and highway repairs. However, the governor announced in June her administration would target more than $656 million of the federal money to replenish the unemployment fund, which was all but drained by a deluge of pandemic-related claims for jobless benefits. Lujan Grisham has also earmarked smaller amounts of the federal dollars for COVID-19 vaccine incentives and a temporary wage supplement for individuals working in New Mexicos chile fields. Its unclear whether those spending decisions will be affected by the Supreme Courts ruling, as the court challenge filed by Candelaria and Senate Republican floor leader Greg Baca of Belen focused on the roughly $1.1 billion of unallocated funds. Baca, who attended the Wednesday court hearing but was forced to watch from a different courtroom after he declined to divulge his COVID-19 vaccine status, said he was glad that during a time of political polarization a bipartisan group of senators could come together on the court challenge. Im excited to see the court side with the people and the Constitution, Baca told reporters. But he said its likely there will be partisan disagreements about how the money is ultimately spent, saying, I can almost guarantee you we wont agree on how its spent. What it means The New Mexico Supreme Courts ruling that prevents Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham from unilaterally spending roughly $1.1 billion in unallocated federal relief funds means it will be up to the 112-member Legislature to craft a spending plan for the money. Some considerations: The Legislature is scheduled to meet for a 30-day session starting in January and a special session focused on redistricting next month. The governor will have to approve any plan approved by lawmakers and has the ability to fully or partially veto legislation. The federal American Rescue Plan Act allows for spending in four different areas pandemic-related public health and economic impact, premium pay for essential workers, revenue replacement, and infrastructure improvements. Under the federal bill, money received does not have to be obligated until the end of 2024 and unspent funds are not subject to recapture until 2026.Journal Capitol Bureau reporter Dan McKay contributed to this report. MANKATO, Minnesota Charlie Kirk stood 80 miles from where George Floyd was murdered, faced an overwhelmingly white audience, and declared he was going to say things no one dares say out loud. What followed was an avalanche of aspersions and debunked claims about Floyd, the Black man whose death at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer set off a global reckoning over racial injustice and broad calls for change. But the white conservative agitator had a counter view: Floyd was a scumbag, he said, unworthy of the attention. The insult lodged at Floyd, a 46-year-old father suspected of passing off a counterfeit $20 bill, was intended to be shocking. But anyone familiar with Kirk shouldnt be surprised. For years, the conservative provocateur and his group, Turning Point USA, have built a following inflaming racial divides and stoking outrage. Kirk thrived during President Donald Trumps tenure. He landed speaking spots at the Republican National Convention in 2016 and 2020 and occasionally counseled Trump on campaign messaging and tactics. Now the 28-year-old is expanding his reach, trying to rally a next generation of aggrieved white conservatives. On a tour of college towns, he blasts schools and local governments for teaching about racism, with a confrontational style some call dangerous. Yet Kirk is drawing large crowds of millennials and Gen Zers, millions of online followers and donor cash, often with little media attention. Kirk is stoking fear among a group that is coming of age in a time of social restlessness, said Nekima Levy Armstrong, a Minneapolis civil rights lawyer and activist. Hes taking the discontent that some people may be experiencing and combining it with racial animus, which is a dangerous recipe in a country that is still in the midst of racial turmoil, she said. Like many leading Republicans, including Virginia Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin and Trump, Kirk seizes on opposition to critical race theory. The once obscure academic framework has been transformed by conservatives into a catchall term for education about inclusion, diversity and systemic racism in the U.S. Kirks answer is a free K-12 alternative curriculum described as the key to a reliable, honest and quality America-first education, and is aimed primarily at homeschooling parents. Its just one offering in Kirks buzzing conservative content portal designed to meet young people where they live online. Theres also an array of podcasts hosted by Kirk and other conservative figures, and a Professor Watchlist to label instructors who discriminate against conservative students and advance leftist propaganda. Turning Point Live is a three-hour streaming talk show aimed at Gen Z and featuring 20-something host John Root. Recent guests include Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee and Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, both Republicans. And theres plenty of swag: Buy merch. Save America, the site suggests. Turning Point USAs online audience is large and growing. It averaged 83,000 monthly unique visitors over the past three years, but it grew to a monthly average of 111,000 in the past year, according to the digital intelligence firm Similarweb. Thats more than three times the traffic for conservative radio host Laura Ingrahams website over the past year. That traffic is driven in part by at least a dozen social media accounts across Twitter, Facebook and Instagram that, combined, have more than 10 million followers online. Money into Kirks nonprofit network has followed the traffic. Turning Point USA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, meaning contributions are tax-deductible and its donors are not disclosed. But in 2019, the most recent year for which tax records are public, Turning Point USA raised more than $28 million, according to Internal Revenue Service filings. Thats almost twice what it raised in 2014, its first-year as a tax-exempt charity. Though Turning Point USA doesnt have to disclose its donors, some are foundations established by wealthy conservatives, which report their donations to the IRS in annual tax filings. A partial list reads like a roster of conservative megadonors, including foundations affiliated with the late megadonor Foster Friess and the Uihlein and Bradley families, who also help finance leading conservative policy groups such as American Legislative Exchange Council, the Cato Institute and the Federalist Society. Kirk also leads a fundraising group aimed specifically at political advocacy. That group, Turning Point Action, has endorsed several congressional candidates for 2022. The list includes Washingtons Joe Kent, Illinois Catalina Lauf, Floridas Anna Paulina Luna and Ohios Max Miller, all candidates who ran to oppose GOP House members who voted for Trumps second impeachment. Kirk has shown a knack for anticipating the outrage of the moment. He was quick to assail shutdown orders at the dawn of the pandemic, and then claimed falsely that Trump won the 2020 election. He has attacked Olympic gymnast Simone Biles, blamed spiking violent crime on efforts to defund police departments and months before Youngkin was seizing on parental outrage in Virginia, Kirk had turned to critical race theory. He works within the framework of the Trump movement. He is a good barometer of what the Republican right wing feels it can get away with, said Michael Hayden, a spokesman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit group that tracks far right figures and organizations. Turning Point USA was listed among the 11 groups involved in the March to Save America rally that preceded the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Days before the rally, Kirk boasted on Twitter about sending buses full of patriots to DC to fight for this president. He later deleted the tweet. Online contributions to Turning Points website spiked immediately after the riot, according to Similarweb, which can track frequency of online payments but not amounts. Kirk is not among the more than a dozen rally organizers subpoenaed by the House select committee investigating the Capitol siege. A committee spokesperson would not comment on whether Kirk has been interviewed or approached by the committee. Lately Kirk, who did not respond to interview requests, has stayed out of the headlines. However, an event in Idaho drew attention last month when a man shouted from a crowd: How many elections are they going to steal before we kill these people? Kirk answered by denouncing the comment, but blamed the left: They are trying to make you do something that will be violent, that will justify a takeover of your freedoms and liberties. Raised in the upper-income Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights, Kirk became politically involved young, volunteering in middle school and high school on political campaigns. His quick rise began shortly after high school when he quit attending Harper College, a Chicago-area community college, to pursue political activism and co-founded Turning Point USA with Chicago-area tea party activist and mentor Bill Montgomery. Kirks Exposing Critical Racism Theory tour has promoted recent stops in Alabama, Idaho, Michigan, Oregon, South Carolina, Texas and Vermont. Last month, he packed a convention center ballroom in Mankato, Minnesota, with roughly 600 people mostly teenagers and college students on a Tuesday evening. Once a prairie farming hub south of Minneapolis, Mankato has swelled into a diversifying mini-metro. Minnesota State University, food production plants and the Mayo Clinics satellite campus all have drawn African and Latin American immigrants, while the Black population has grown steadily. For 90 minutes, Kirk spoke directly to the virtually all-white crowd and told them radical leftists want them to feel ashamed. Just because youre a white person does not mean you have to begin apologizing simply for how God made you, he said. He repeated widely debunked claims about Floyds criminal record and suggested that the cause of Floyds death was a drug overdose, rather than homicide, as the medical examiner found. Rep. Jim Hagedorn, the local Republican congressman, was in the audience and later said in a Facebook post that he enjoyed attending and hearing Kirk discuss the need to stand up and defend America and our founding principles. Riley Carlson, the campus coordinator for Turning Point USA at Minnesota State, said she didnt know much about critical race theory before the event. Were just excited Charlie is here to explain it, said the senior from St. Michael, a Minneapolis suburb. Theres so many different ways you can look at it. And Im looking for where I stand on it. Kirks message is a hard sell to most young people. Roughly 60% of voters younger than 30 said they think racism is a very serious problem in the United States, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 110,000 voters in the 2020 election. Its the largest percentage of any age group surveyed. Meanwhile, Trump lost younger voters by 30 percentage points last year, VoteCast shows. Its a wedge issue to fire up a shrinking base, said John Della Volpe, director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics and an expert in young voters. But it demonstrates Kirks finger is on the pulse of conservative anger, said Peter Montgomery, a senior fellow with the liberal People for the American Way. Fearmongering about critical race theory has really seemed to rise to the top of the messaging of the groups I watch, he said. Theres been a pivot toward that and Kirk has been wise to the fundraising power it promises. - Associated Press writers Hannah Fingerhut, Mary Clare Jalonick and Amanda Seitz in Washington and Michelle R. Smith in Providence, Rhode Island, contributed to this report. __ This story has been corrected to remove a reference in the 16th paragraph to foundations affiliated with the Charles and David Koch network. Turning Point USA does not receive funding from them. Current Recipient Dr. Olja Simoska The American Chemical Society has awarded the 13th Irving S. Sigal Postdoctoral Fellowship (2020-2022) to Dr. Olja Simoska. Olja completed her doctoral studies in December of 2019, under the supervision of Prof. Keith J. Stevenson at the University of Texas at Austin. Her doctoral dissertation is titled Real-time Monitoring of the Dynamic Metabolism and Responses of Pathogenic Bacteria using Electroanalytical Methods. The electrochemical results from her doctoral research provide a strong quantitative basis for understanding microbial infections and virulence mechanisms in very complex biological systems. She has very impressive academic accomplishments, awards/honors, and publications/presentations lists. For her Irving S. Sigal Postdoctoral Fellowship, Oljas research will focus on methodically exploring genetic engineering approaches to improve extracellular electron transfer and performance of microbial fuel cells. Her postdoctoral research will be under the supervision of Prof. Shelley D. Minteer at the Chemistry Department at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City. Past Recipients Dr. Herdeline Ann M. Ardona (2018-2020 Sigal Fellow) Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Irvine (appointment in late 2020) Fellowship Topic: Herdeline completed her doctoral studies in 2017 at Johns Hopkins University, under the supervision of Professors John D. Tovar and Hai-Quan Mao. Her postdoctoral research will be on Biohybrid Integration of Photoresponsive Polymeric Interfaces under the supervision of Professor Kevin Kit Parker at the Wyss Institute of Biologically Inspired Engineering, Harvard University. Herdelines doctoral dissertation is titled Molecular Engineering Strategies for the Development of Energy Transporting Conjugated Systems Towards Bioelectronics. Her doctoral research focused on the development of new ways to effectively generate localized electric fields within the internal electronic conduits of peptide-based nanomaterials and exploring the underlying molecular design rules that govern their self-assembly mechanisms. For her Irving S. Sigal Postdoctoral Fellowship, Herdeline will develop photoresponsive polymeric surfaces that can be integrated with biohybrid tissues. This photomodulated platform can potentially enable a label-free spatiotemporal control over the actuation of engineered in vitro tissues. Dr. Lisa Olshansky (2016-2018 Sigal Fellow) Assistant Professor of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL Fellowship Topic: For her Irving S. Sigal Postdoctoral Fellowship, Lisa will investigate how nature controls the reactivity of metallocofactor intermediates for the oxidation of strong chemical bonds. Lisa completed her doctoral studies in 2015, under the supervision of Professor Daniel G. Nocera at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Lisas postdoctoral research will be on Artificial Metalloenzymes for Structure-Function Correlations of CH Bond Oxidation, under the supervision of Professor A. S. Borovik at University of California, Irvine. Oxidation reactions performed by metalloenzymes maintain specificity and catalytic efficiencies not yet matched by synthetic systems and the general understanding of how nature harnesses the energy of OO bond homolysis for CH bond functionalization remains incomplete. The proposed studies by Lisa aim to reveal the underlying structure-function (and dysfunction) relationships operative within oxygenase metalloenzymes that are critical to metabolic and signaling pathways, and in the management of reactive oxygen species. These questions will be probed through the preparation of artificial metalloproteins in which the host-guest interaction of streptavidin and biotin is used to insert biotinylated metal complexes into the protein interior. Combining chemical modulation of the ligand scaffold with genetic modification of the surrounding protein microenvironment, the ability to control and systematically vary all aspects of the metal ion coordination sphere will be achieved. These studies represent a method with which to prepare novel biomimetic systems and a means to correlate the structure-function paradigms underlying bioinorganic oxygenase reactivity. Dr. Maraia Ener-Goetz (2014-2016 Sigal Fellow) Fellowship Topic: Development and Implementation of Peptide Cavities to Control Ultrafast Proton Transfer. Maraia completed her doctoral studies in December 2013, under the supervision of Professor Harry B. Gray in the Department of Chemistry at California Institute of Technology. She conducted her postdoctoral studies in the research groups of Professors Tom Spiro and David Baker at University of Washington and in collaboration with Professor James Mayer of Yale University. Maraias doctoral dissertation was on Electron Flow Through Cytochrome P450. For her Irving S. Sigal Postdoctoral Fellowship, Maraia investigated how proteins direct the movement of one of the smallest chemical reactants: the proton. Proteins harness proton transfers (PTs) to drive structural changes and tune important catalytic reactions. Cell survival depends on precise control over these processes, however, the ubiquity of hydrogen bonds and ultrafast timescale of PT hinder the detailed study of PT mechanisms in biological systems. To address these challenges, Maraia developed two-component model systems to probe PT within a peptide pocket, and studied the ultrafast vibrational dynamics of the PT processes using Femtosecond Stimulated Raman Spectroscopy (FSRS). A broad array of molecular interactions between the PT-pair and peptide cavity were engineered by an iterative process of computational peptide design and experimental characterization. Realization of these objectives helped to develop better and more accurate models of enzyme active sites, and aided the study of similar interactions within complex, native biochemical systems. Dr. Siddhesh S. Kamat (2012-2014 Sigal Fellow) Assistant Professor, Department of Biology and Chemistry, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Pune, Pune, Maharashtra Fellowship Topic: Lipidomic and functional proteomic methods to identify the major reactive oxygen species (ROS)-generated lipid products. Dr. Kamat was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate in the lab of Benjamin F. Cravatt, in the Department of Chemical Physiology & The Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology, at the The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA. Here, Dr. Kamat was investigating novel metabolic pathways with emphasis on the serine hydrolase family of enzymes. He applied this research into investigating novel biological mechanisms and pathways prevalent in various diseases. Currently, at IISER Pune, Dr. Kamats chemical biology lab is interested in using chemical probes in conjunction with advanced mass spectrometry based metabolomics and proteomics techniques to study biological processes in particular lipid signaling & metabolism. Dr. Samuel J. Lord (2010-2012 Sigal Fellow) Bioinfomatics Specialist I, Department: M. Hughes Medical Institute, University of California, San Francisco, CA Fellowship Topic: Using supported lipid bilayers to investigate the physical underpinning of signaling in cells. Dr. Lord was a postdoctoral fellow in the Dyche Mullins' Laboratory at the University of California in San Francisco, CA. Here, he continued the research that was supported by the Sigal Fellowship, using fluorescence microscopy and supported lipid bilayers as tools to study how the spatial organization of biomolecules and mechanical forces within and between cells influence cell-cell signaling. Dr. John Hoerter (2008-2010 Sigal Fellow) Investigator III, Geonomics Division, The Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation (GNF), San Diego, CA Fellowship Topic: Dynamics, Degredation, and Chemical Modification of Non-Coding RNA. Dr. Hoerter was a Research Fellow in the Laboratory of Professor Nicholas Gascoigne, Department of Immunology and Microbial Science at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, CA. Here, Dr. Hoerter continued the research that was supported by the Sigal Fellowship, the study of intermolecular interactions at the immunologic synapse. Currently, he is an Investigator in Drug Discovery Oncology at GNF. Dr. Shanlin Pan (2006-2008 Sigal Fellow) Professor, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, The College of Arts and Sciences, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL Fellowship Topic: Photoluminescence Enhancement by Surface Plasmon Resonance of Metallic Nanostructures and Its Applications. Dr. Pan did his postdoctoral work at the University of Texas at Austin. Currently, as a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Alabama, Dr. Pans research areas include electrochemistry, clean energy storage and harvesting, Raman and fluorescence spectroscopy, nanostructured metal and semiconductor electrode materials. Dr. Matthew G. Woll (2004-2006 Sigal Fellow) PTC Therapeutics, Dunellen, NJ Fellowship Topic: A New Strategy to Asymmetrically Open Aziridines with a Heterobimetallic Catalyst. Dr. Woll did his postdoctoral work at Harvard University under the supervision of Professor Eric N. Jacobsen. Currently, Dr. Woll is a Principal Scientist at a small pharmaceutical company, PTC Therapeutics, in Dunellen, NJ. He is working on a treatment for Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA). Dr. Hendrik Luesch (2002-2004 Sigal Fellow) Professor and Chair, Department of Medicinal Chemistry, College of Pharmacy, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL Fellowship Topic: Elucidation of the Mechanism of Action of Aoratoxin A, a Cytotoxic Marine Natural Product. Dr. Luesch was a Postdoctoral Fellow at The Scripps Research Institute working with adviser Professor Peter G. Schultz in the area of functional genomics and chemical biology. In 2005, he joined the faculty of the Department of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Florida as an assistant professor and was tenured and promoted to associate professor in 2010 and to full professor in 2015. Dr. Luesch combines his interest in marine natural products chemistry with genomics and proteomics approaches for the discovery and characterization of potential drugs and molecular drug targets. Dr. Sarah E. OConnor (2000-2002 Sigal Fellow) Director, Department of Natural Product Biosynthesis, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, Jena, Germany Fellowship Topic: Characterization of the EpoA Subunit of the Epothilone Synthetase Complex: Biosynthesis of a Potent Anti-Cancer Agent. Dr. OConnor was a Postdoctoral Fellow in Biochemistry at Harvard Medical School under the supervision of Professor Christopher Walsh. In 2003 she joined the faculty of the Department of Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and became an assistant professor and then was promoted to associate professor in 2007. Currently, Dr. OConnor is a Project Leader at the John Innes Centre Department of Biological Chemistry in Norwich, UK. Dr. OConnor is working on plant natural product biosynthesis. Dr. Danith H. Ly (1998-2000 Sigal Fellow) Professor, Department of Chemistry, Mellon College of Science, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA Fellowship Topic: A New Strategy for the Design and Synthesis of Artificial Proteins and Enzymes Based on Peptide Nucleic Acid (PNA) Recognition: Development of Artificial Restriction Enzymes. Dr. Ly did his postdoctoral work at UC Berkeley and at Scripps Research Institute under the supervision of Professor Peter G. Schultz, 19982001. He joined the Department of Chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University in 2001 as an Assistant Professor. Currently, as a Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, Dr. Ly is working on the development of molecular tools and reagents to regulate gene expression and probe protein localization and dynamics in cells and intact organisms. Dr. Paul S. Cremer (1996-1998 Sigal Fellow) Professor of Chemistry at the J. Lloyd Huck Chair in Natural Sciences, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, The Eberly College of Science, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA Fellowship Topic: Investigation and Manipulation of Supported Lipid Bilayers and Model Membranes by Integrated Microelectronic Components Created with Nanolithography. Dr. Cremer did his postdoctoral work at Stanford University under the supervision of Professor Steven G. Boxer. Currently, Dr. Cremer is the J. Lloyd Huck Chair in Natural Sciences at Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Cremers laboratory works at the crossroads of biological interfaces, nanomaterials, spectroscopy, and microfluidics. NEW YORK (AP) Two men convicted in the assassination of Malcolm X are set to be cleared after more than half a century. The New York Times reported Wednesday that prosecutors now say authorities withheld evidence in the civil rights leader's killing. The newspaper reports that Muhammad Aziz and the late Khalil Islam are being exonerated after a nearly two-year investigation by their lawyers and the Manhattan district attorney's office. A court date is expected Thursday. District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. told the newspaper that the men did not get the justice they deserved. Malcolm X was gunned down as he began a speech in Harlem's Audubon Ballroom on Harlem's Audubon Ballroom on Feb. 21, 1965. Borosil Ltd., India's leading consumer ware brand, today, announced that it has renewed and expanded its sponsorship with The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) and has become their official associate sponsor for the Indian contingent. Borosil will provide support via this sponsorship for Indian athletes leading up to the upcoming Asian Games, Commonwealth Games and the 2024 Olympics. On the occasion of the announcement, Mr Rajeev Mehta, Secretary General IOA said: "We are extremely pleased to strengthen our partnership with Borosil Ltd which has been beneficial for all our Indian athletes. Borosil is a trusted homegrown brand that has touched all our lives with healthy nutrition and hydration. I would like to thank Borosil for showing their continued support for Team India." On this proud moment, Mr Shreevar Kheruka, Managing Director of Borosil Limited said, "This is a very proud moment for us to be associated with Indian Olympic Association. As an Indian company, it is our honour to support our great nation's sporting endeavours. We are glad to be part of the enabling process to support Indian athletes in their endeavours and look forward to them bringing laurels to India in the world of sports. In 2018, Borosil was associated with IOA as their Official Hydration Partner for national athletes who represented India at the 18th Asian Games and Summer Youth Olympics. Borosil provided Indian athletes and officials with their Hydra range of bottles to ensure that the contingent used the best and safest products to stay hydrated during their training and competitions. This collaboration will grow Borosil's reach and have a positive impact on the Indian sporting ecosystem. The Government has focused on citizen centric communication in a language they understand and through platforms they access be it TV News, Radio, Social Media or Online Digital Media, said Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting Anurag Singh Thakur while addressing the media on the occasion of National Press Day yesterday (November 16, 2021). He further added, The National Press Day is a day to reflect upon the role of media and press in raising the issues that matter to the citizens of India. The Media is a watchdog and as such has a key role to play in a vibrant democracy Iike India. Giving a call for a collective fight against fake news, Thakur said, On this day, I call upon my media friends to make all efforts to curb the menace of fake news and fake narratives. The Government of India on its part has taken measures like establishment of Fact Check Unit at PIB, which has gained in popularity. The Minister concluded his remark by inviting the media to build a new aspirational India and said, As we mark the 75th year of Indias independence and look towards the next 25 years let us work together as partners in realising the dreams of every Indian. Bengaluru Airport recently launched a digital marketing campaign #TimetoReconnect, which focuses on reassuring passengers about safe airport experiences and encourages people to travel and reconnect with their loved ones. Through this campaign, BLR Airport aims to encourage people to reconnect with their friends, family, or even their personal self and at the same time be reassured of a safe airport environment. The campaign is aimed at everyone who opts to travel through the BLR Airport. At the heart of the campaign are three well-narrated short digital films, which focus on various aspects of airport operations, including vaccinated staff, contactless payments, and contactless travel and finally giving those reassurances to the travellers to travel safely. Through the use of social media platforms, BLR Airport will reach out their audiences with the nicely narrated impactful films and reassure them. In an exclusive conversation with Adgully, Shalini Rao, Chief Marketing Officer, Bangalore International Airport Ltd (BIAL), elaborates on the entire purpose of this campaign and how they plan to educate and communicate with travellers, as well as the power of storytelling in challenging times. The pandemic had halted travel completely. What were the challenges that you faced once the government granted permissions with a lot of restrictions to allow travellers to travel with strict protocols? In May 2020, when we resumed scheduled domestic flight operations, there were a set of guidelines by GoI and GoK that we had to adhere to. The changing travel guidelines and new norms of flying were confusing to the passengers at the start, but we ensured that our staff members helped and guided passengers every step of the way. We started a campaign titled #WeAreHereForYou, where we continuously shared videos, FAQs, travel regulations to educate and guide passengers on-ground and on the digital space. The entire airport ecosystem, involving airlines, security teams, concessionaires, came together to assure passengers about a safe airport experience at the Bangalore Airport. To enable a healthy airport experience, we introduced a contactless journey from parking to boarding at BLR Airport in May 2020. The technology enabled minimum surface contact and minimum exposure between passengers and airport personnel. Advanced digital thermal screening for passengers and staff, RTPCR testing facilities on campus and stringent protocols for contact tracing, quarantine and isolation followed its due course. We also had stringent sanitisation protocols in place to ensure the highest standards of hygiene within the Airport premises. From sanitisation to fumigation, we ensured our safety measures were executed round-the-clock. Today, we have over 700 hand sanitising points within the Terminal. Whats the objective of the campaign #TimetoReconnect, which you have created to reassure the travellers? As we slowly move away from virtual connect to human connect, we have observed that people are now waiting to travel again, but safety is on everyones mind. The #TimetoReconnect campaign focuses on reassuring passengers about safe airport experiences, vaccinated staff and encourages them to travel and reconnect with their loved ones. Since the pandemic began, people are missing the social interactions and connections they used to enjoy in the past. These include, connecting with their loved ones, impromptu getaways, pre-flight food indulgences, gift shopping and mini splurges. Through this campaign, BLR Airport aims to encourage people to reconnect with their friends, family, or even their personal self and at the same time be reassured of a safe airport environment. The campaign is aimed at everyone who opts to travel through BLR Airport (arrival or departure). Whats the end objective of the campaign and how do you plan to measure the effectiveness of the campaign? As an airport, we have always believed in bringing people closer together, but the pandemic had restricted this social interaction. During the festive season, we observed our passenger traffic increase, it was time for all of us to reconnect with our loved ones, embark on new journeys, fulfil our travel bucket list while being cautious and safe about our personal wellbeing. At the heart of the campaign are three short digital films (two of which are live on our Social Media channels), which focus on various aspects of airport operations, including vaccinated staff, contactless payments, and contactless travel. As an extension of the campaign, we launched a contest asking people who do they want to Reconnect with and why. Five lucky winners would win return flight tickets to any destination of their choice on the AirAsia India network. The goals we had aimed at the start of the campaign was to encourage people to travel again, ensure more passengers travel through the airport with an increased confidence in air travel as the safest mode of transportation during the pandemic. We have seen that in the growth trajectory of passenger numbers in the last one month, since the advent of the festive season, vis-a-vis the dull period between March and June owing to the second wave of COVID-19. Our purpose was also to remind people about the little things they enjoyed about travel; something they had stopped/ restricted doing due to the pandemic, thereby bringing an element of nostalgia for example: grabbing a bite of their favourite idli-vada before boarding, relishing their favourite filter coffee at the airport, indulging in some retail therapy before their holiday, seeing familiar faces at the airport or making new friends on the journey. Our first two films have gone live and cumulatively crossed 6 million views across YouTube and all our social media channels. The third film is expected to go live in December, before the year-end holidays. The Reconnect contest witnessed participation from over 15,000 passengers and social media users during the one-month long contest period. What kind of protocols is the airport following to ensure social distancing and contactless travel? How are the airlines supporting and collaborating well with the airport authorities? Driven by a customer-centric mindset, we have ensured that stringent measures are in place at every passenger touch point to make air travel as safe as possible during the pandemic. BLR Airport introduced contactless travel from parking to boarding, contactless payment options at all the stores and continued sanitisation of facilities, round-the-clock. To safeguard the health and well-being of passengers, majority of frontline staff at the airport are vaccinated and follow COVID-19 appropriate behaviour. We had organised vaccination camps in partnership with the Government of Karnataka and various hospitals in the city to ensure employees working in the Airport campus were vaccinated. Heightened safety, hygiene measures and vaccinated frontline workers ensure safe and positive experiences for passengers, during the pandemic and beyond. The airlines have supported us throughout the journey in our fight against COVID-19. Airlines ensured that passengers were masked up, wore face shields and PPE kits, as per guidelines of GoI. Travel business needs continuous engagement with your loyal customers. What kind of strategy have you planned to stay engaged with your audience? Being in the service industry, customer engagement is of paramount importance to us both on-ground and online. To continue the engagement with our passengers, visitors, and online followers, we run various campaigns through the year. This involves commercial driven campaigns and activations on deals, discounts, and sales at stores. The communication for all the on-ground activations is taken online on our digital mediums as well to create awareness. On online platforms, we run contests, videos, quiz, games, etc. to continue engagement with our followers. Engaging content is critical for the success of any brand. Knowing your target audience is essential to creating tailored marketing campaigns and successfully engaging customers through social media. Last year, during COVID-19 we launched a FAQ series on our website and social media channels to keep our follower base updated about the latest travel guidelines. Over a period, the FAQ page became the most visited webpage on our website and our FAQ posts on social media gathered an average engagement rate of over 10% owing to all the queries. Depending on the scenario, the brand communication strategy must evolve to continue the engagement with the audience. How do you plan to leverage digital films on social media? Whats going to be your social media channels? BLR Airport has presence on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. We always use our social media platforms to narrate our stories and we believe films are a beautiful and impactful way of storytelling. The contactless journey film launched by us last year managed to gather over 6.5 million views across all SM platforms. All our key milestones such as opening of new runway, international connectivity, sanitisation procedures, or new product/ service launch at the Terminal, are captured primarily through films. You can view the latest films of #TimetoReonnect campaign here Kempegowda International Airport Bengaluru - YouTube. The films are aimed at reminding them of little moments of indulgence and interaction that used to take place when they travelled through the airport regularly. Will you look at mass media in some markets in the South? We are unlikely to look at mass media at this stage, but we could revisit that going forward. A lot of it will also depend on how passenger volume and business pick up over a period of time in the current COVID-19 scenario. Search engine giant Google has become the top-ranked brand in YouGovs 2021 Best Brand Rankings for India for the third consecutive year (54.2). YouGovs latest rankings reveal the Top 10 brands in terms of overall brand health according to urban Indians. The rankings are based on the Index score from YouGov BrandIndex, which is a measure of overall brand health calculated by taking the average of Impression, Quality, Value, Satisfaction, Recommend and Reputation. Google is followed by its subsidiary brand, YouTube, which remains in second (53.7) this year as well, with a marginal improvement (of +0.4) in its year-on-year brand health score. Both WhatsApp and its parent brand Facebook recorded a decline to their scores over the past year, moving down one place and three places to fourth (48.3) and ninth (34.6), respectively. Technology giant Amazon moved up to third (50.6) despite noting a decline in its year-on-year brand health score. On the other hand, Amazons video-on-demand streaming service Amazon Prime strengthened its brand health perception over the year, making an entry into the Top 10 list in fifth (36.0). Another new entrant in the list is Samsung. The technology behemoth has made large strides over the past year, securing itself a place in the 2021 Top 10 rankings (32.4). E-commerce giant Flipkart has moved up three places in the rankings to sixth (35.9), with a marginal improvement (of +0.6 points) in its year-on-year brand health score. MakeMyTrip has also moved up one place to seventh (35.2) despite witnessing a decline (of -1.9) in its brand health score compared to last year. Dettol Soaps completes the Top 10 list, consolidating its position amidst the pandemic, climbing up two places to eighth in the 2021 rankings (34.8). The rankings also show the brands which have improved the most over the past 12 months. Telegram is the most improved brand of the past year, with a change in score of +6.2. Tata Motors is second (+3.9) in the list of improvers, followed by Samsung (+3.7). With travel restrictions easing and vaccination rates improving in India, it is not surprising to see Hotels and Booking companies appear in the list of most improved brands. Taj Hotels & Palaces took the fourth place (+2.9), followed by Tata acquired Air India in eighth (2.6) and Yatra in tenth place (2.3), respectively. Finally, Punjab National Bank (2.7), Lifebuoy Soaps (2.7), Myntra (2.6) and Kia Motors (2.3) are other names that complete the list of Top 10 Improvers in India. Methodology: The brands in YouGov Annual Rankings were ranked based on the Index score, which is a measure of overall brand health calculated by taking the average of Impression, Quality, Value, Satisfaction, Recommend and Reputation. The Index Rankings chart shows the brands with the highest average Index scores between October 1, 2020 and September 30, 2021. The Index Improvers chart ranks the brands with the highest increase in Index, comparing scores from the previous 12-month period. To be included in the improver list, the variance must be positive. Both scores are representative of the general population of adults 18+ (some are online representative). All Index scores listed have been rounded to a single decimal place; however, we have used additional precision to assign ranks. All brands have been tracked for at least 6 months to be included in the rankings and have been tracked for at least 18 months to appear in the Improvers tables. Amidst the relief and rehabilitation efforts after devastating rains last month, poll-bound Uttarakhand is also readying itself to elect its next government. Ahead of the assembly elections, News18 India's renowned Bhaiyaji aka Prateek Trivedi is travelling to the state to bring viewers insights from ground zero of the upcoming battle. Under the umbrella programming for election Sabse Bada Dangal, the show Bhaiyaji Kahin will travel through key constituencies while giving a unique platform to the voters to highlight their concerns and expectations. Through the show, the immensely popular anchor Prateek will also engage in candid conversations with all the stakeholders the voters, political leaders and the biggest newsmakers. From Almora to Haldwani and Nainital to Rudrapur, the show will endeavor to capture ground-level sentiments impacting the electorate, ranging from the impact of the pandemic and recent natural calamities, infrastructure, and tourism amongst others. Popular for its unique travelogue-cum-chaupal format, Bhaiyaji has become a household name over the last few years. Traversing the length and breadth of the state, the show is set to provide a national platform to the people and leaders of Uttarakhand as they prepare for the upcoming elections. Watch Bhaiyaji Kahin Sabse Bada Dangal starting today, Monday to Friday at 5.45 PM on News18 India Pee Safe, Indias leading hygiene and wellness brand has launched an integrated campaign called To-Let-Go ahead of World Toilet Day on 19th November 2021. The campaign tagline Dont hold the flow, just carry Pee Safe and go with the flow speaks for the name "To-Let-Go", which is focused on making people aware of safe toilet practices, especially while using public restrooms, in order to avoid toilet borne infections such as UTI. The campaign also aims to improve toilet conditions by appreciating and acknowledging their very existence. With a mix of online and offline activities and influencers, the campaign aims to reach out to 10 million people pan India. The campaign will kick off with a GIANT giveaway of 10,000 toilet seat sanitizers across the country. Toilets are important particularly for those who lack access. Life without a toilet is dirty, undignified, and unsafe. A toilet alone encompasses various other elements in it public health, gender equality, education, economics, and our surroundings. Even the urge to pee is universal whether you are at home or outside. However, lack of access to a clean toilet or good hygiene habits can exacerbate the situation. Through its campaign, Pee Safe aims to spread awareness on these aspects and on inculcating good toilet hygiene and habits. Pee Safes campaign comprises quirky awareness videos on how people manage their urge to pee when they lack access to clean washrooms especially women. The brand will also be giving away free toilet seat sanitizers to spread awareness regarding best hygiene practices and the risk of UTIs. Approximately 200 influencers will also be a part of this campaign. Speaking about this, Vikas Bagaria, Founder and CEO, Pee Safe, said, The World Toilet Day is significant for a number of reasons. The urge to pee does not count time or place! It can come just about anywhere we are. However, what is also needed is access to toilets and in India, particularly, clean does not always mean sanitized. Now with the pandemic, the importance of a hygienic toilet has increased manifold since lack of access and unclean habits can lead to a number of infections. Pee Safes campaign is extremely special in this regard. Adding further, Vikas Bagaria, said, As a brand, our first and foremost priority has been to raise awareness on all aspects of hygiene. Our first product emerged from a personal experience of having used an unhygienic toilet. It was but natural for us to then take awareness and availability of related products hand in hand. Even during this integrated campaign, we aim to cover all these and keep working towards a better and healthy future for India. Pee Safe will also reach out to the majority of its offline stores, where free toilet seat sanitizers will be given out on all orders above INR 99 for one day, regardless of what they buy. The giveaway will take place in both online and offline formats across India. Pee Safe is also hosting an exclusive giveaway with 20+ colleges across the country with an aim to drive awareness on toilet hygiene. Apart from its toilet seat sanitizers, Pee Safe offers a number of other products around toilet hygiene. Some of these include vaginal wash, intimate wipes, etc. Right from the messaging to product packaging, Pee Safe ensures that information and awareness is spread in a quirky, fun, and engaging manner. The brand regularly engages with influencers and uses its social media handles to post far-reaching content that is very relatable for its target audience. Pee Safe constantly endeavors to enhance public health through bold, topical and pan-India digital initiatives on menstrual hygiene methods and need as well as the role of intimate and personal hygiene. The brands online business has seen a 40% jump in the current quarter and it has achieved over 70% growth annually (FY20-21). Currently, Pee Safe is in the process to raise $10 million in Series B funding. Further, Pee Safe is looking at expanding its retail presence from the current 10,000 stores to having a few franchise-owned brand exclusive stores (FOFO) to enhance customer experience across India. They have already expanded overseas and are building local production of toilet seat sanitizers in Europe. Redhill, a Singapore-headquartered full-service global communications agency, has announced new hires and internal promotions to bolster its senior leadership team across India, the Middle East and Africa, and Southeast Asia. Pavan Sahu has been promoted to Deputy Managing Director and will continue to accelerate Redhills growth in India and Indonesia. Since joining Redhill in 2019 as Senior Director, Pavan has led communications strategies, crisis communications and brand reputation management for Redhills office in India, as well as driving communications strategies across Indonesia and Singapore. Some of the key clients Pavan has worked with include Danone, Truecaller, Crayon, Builder.ai and GudangAda. He has also strengthened Redhills capabilities in the cryptocurrency space with clients such as Zipmex, DeFiance Capital and Luno. Redhill has an established track record of providing robust communication services to our clients in India. We remain fully committed to expanding our footprint and supporting more clients with their communication needs in India, and Pavans promotion to Deputy Managing Director marks an important milestone in the four-year growth journey of the India team, said Marienelle Castelino, Managing Director, Redhill. Redhill also announced senior leadership appointments and promotions in other regions to drive growth and add depth to the agencys global operations. Anit Kurian, based in Dubai, UAE, has been appointed as Managing Director, Middle East, and Africa. In this role, he will be responsible for leading Redhills operations in the region. A seasoned communications expert, Anit brings nearly two decades of experience leading clients in different markets and industries and working in global agencies such as Golin and Burson-Marsteller in the MENA region, and Archetype in India. Umesh Nair has been appointed Deputy Managing Director, leading Redhills technology practice and overseeing Redhills operations in Malaysia. Umesh has around 15 years of experience in digital marketing and corporate reputation across technology, banking, aerospace, and telecom. Before joining Redhill, he was the Managing Partner at MSL Malaysia, where he strengthened earned media capabilities at Publicis Groupe. He also served as Head of Reputation at Edelman Malaysia. We are delighted to welcome Anit and Umesh to the Redhill team. Both Anit and Umesh bring decades of management and communications experience to the table across multiple countries and verticals, said Pranav Rastogi, Managing Director, Redhill. Charu Srivastava will lead the government, public and corporate sector at Redhill. Charu joined Redhill in 2019 as Director and during her time has built the companys government and corporate practice to include a diverse portfolio of clients. Under her stewardship, Redhill recently won key clients in the government, technology and B2B industries, including Singapores Ministry of Law, Australia's Victorian Government Trade and Investment, Singapore Business Federation, 2C2P, BigPay, Cloud4C, SC Ventures and Hitachi. Our current senior leaders have proven track records and a wealth of experience and expertise to keep up with our rapid growth, which is why we continue to invest in them even as we hire externally. Charu has performed exceptionally well in growing her respective verticals exponentially despite the challenging environment due to the pandemic. Ultimately, I am confident that Pavan, Anit, Umesh and Charu will help take Redhill to new heights in the coming years, Pranav continued. Redhill celebrated its seventh anniversary in October 2021. In the last year, Redhill grew by almost 50% and hired 59 new employees, while signing on key clients across verticals such as: Travel & Hospitality (Sindhorn Midtown, Retykle, Treeline Urban Resort, Voco Hotels) Healthcare & Pharma (Cochlear, CellVec, NSGBiolabs, BD, HealthifyMe) Education (Busy Bees, Michigan Ross) Luxury & Lifestyle (Vivo, Dji, CloseComfort, SonyLIV, Yours, Style Theory, Marina) Food & Beverage (Danone, Fat Belly, Lime House, Beyond Coffee, Spruce) Banking & Finance (VP Bank, Oyen, Cover Genius, Vistas Media Capital) Fintech & Crypto (BigPay, BidFX, CardUp, Kristal.AI, MarketWolf, Aegis Custody, 2C2P, Zipmex, DeFiance Capital) Government (Ministry of Law Singapore, Ministry of Tourism Cambodia, Australia Victorian Government Trade & Investment, Textile & Fashion Federation Singapore, MDEC, Estonia e-residency) Technology (Hitachi, Cloud Kinetics, Cloud4C, Glance, InMobi, Bigo Technology, Crayon, Truecaller, The Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT), Lionsbot, BukuWarung) Venture Capital (Vertex Ventures, 500, Hive Ventures, SC Ventures, Lightspeed, Good Startup, SoftBank Ventures Asia) This is a testament to the breadth of the agencys expertise. Redhill recently enhanced its offering to include digital capabilities with Redhill Studio, which combines creative design with digital expertise. Its a decade in cinema for Telugu cinemas actor Vijay Deverakonda, this November and Sony MAX is here to celebrate the same in a filmy way. The channel brings to its viewers a scintillating romantic comedy in Dwaraka starring Vijay Devarakonda and Pooja Jhaveri on 20th November. Directed by Srinivasa Ravindra, the film scores on a crackling chemistry between the lead actors coupled with a hefty dose of comedy that will leave you in splits. And not to forget, some power packed action scenes by the man himself that will keep you at the edge of your seats. Dwaraka features Vijay Deverakonda in a completely different avatar, as he essays the role of a con artist Erra Srinu, who disguises himself as Sri Krishnananda Swamy, a holy man and cons people. However, his life turns upside down when he falls in love with the sweet, innocent and truth loving Vasudha (Pooja Jhaveri). But how can a love story bloom without a twist? Srinu has to fight off his nemesis to win his love and its not an easy ride for him. How will their love story transpire? Will Vasudha accept him after learning his truth? Watch out for the answers in this highly entertaining and gripping romantic drama, this month on your TV screens. BJP Spokesperson, Anila Singh has ridiculed, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, general secretary of All India Congress Committee in charge of Uttar Pradesh for promising 40% reservation for women and said that she must hold her promise not only in UP but also in parliamentary elections. Attacking Priyanka Gandhi and the Congress party, Singh said that Priyankas promises are empty words and Congress has no organization on the ground.As a woman, I appreciate and welcome what she(Priyanka Gandhi ) has said. Why 40%, Priyanka should do 100 percent reservation for women. Just for the heck of promising 40% seats to women when you know it very well that when you have no holding in UP are empty words she said.Singh was in a conversation with Kailashnath Adhikari, MD, Governance Now during the webcast of the Visionary Talk series held by the public policy and governance analysis platform.Singh also said that the Congress partys Uttar Pradesh results in 2014, 2017, and 2019 are self- explanatory and it has no organization on the ground. Congress can even promise a scooter or a car, but Priyanka must hold her promise not only for UP but even for other states as well as parliamentary elections.Singh added that the way former Punjab chief minister, Amarinder Singh was shown the door by Congress, shows there is internal wrestling going on in the party in Punjab and it is in disarray.On being asked why despite huge vaccination numbers in India, people were still talking about dead bodies flowing in the Ganga she said, when people all over the world have praised UP government for the speed of the vaccination program of its 25crore population, the opposition and certain sections of media have projected that dead bodies were flowing in Ganga, crematoriums were full and bodies wrapped in sheets were being buried near the Ganges.She further asked if the coronavirus was only infecting Hindus and not Muslims and why only dead bodies of Hindus were being shown. Were people from the Muslim community not dying. Were dead bodies not being cremated in cemeteries? Cameras should have turned there too. This was a conspiracy because elections were due in UP and because the Hindus who are a majority in UP and have shown their confidence in the Bhartiya Janta Party were being brainwashed that grave injustice was being meted out to them.Why is a community being divided on the name of religion. Why are you talking only about Hindu dead bodies? The cameras should have turned towards cemeteries too. Both sides of the picture should have been shown. This was an international conspiracy she said.Responding to a question on the recent incidents of violence in Tripura and Amravati in Maharashtra and how social media can be regulated so that such incidents do not happen in future, she said it was clarified by the chief minister, Biplab Kumar Dev, deputy CM, Jishnu Dev Verma, other ministers and also by the MHA that no mosque was demolished in Tripura. But in Maharashtra, a false narrative was spun that a mosque was burned and minorities were attacked and videos (clearly audible) with messages to destroy properties of Hindu community were circulated.She attacked chief minister, Uddhav Thackeray for keeping quiet over the issue.In greed of power, Chief minister, Uddhav Thackeray is sitting hand on hand and watching everything quietly, she said.Shiv Sena, which claimed to be a part of Hindus, today is sitting tight with a cloth tied around its eyes and mouth. Those who are supporting the party are playing the victim card placard and supported with a free reign by Shiv Sena.She asked why repercussions of Tripura are not being felt in Uttar Pradesh but instead happening in Maharashtra. This, she said, shows that Uddhav Thackeray is a totally failed CM. He is not able to handle the situation. He is playing in the hands of Congress and NCP. Hindus have been intentionally attacked. The Federal Council Bern, 17.11.2021 - The need to protect the population from hate speech and disinformation on the internet requires a broad discussion in all countries, including Switzerland. During its meeting on 17 November 2021, the Federal Council has instructed DETEC to present a discussion paper on whether and how communication platforms could be regulated by the end of 2022 with a view to strengthening user rights and dealing with non-transparent business practices. The discussion paper follows on from a report by OFCOM on the opportunities and risks posed by Facebook, YouTube and Google. Communication platforms such as search engines (e.g. Google), social network platforms (e.g. Facebook) and multimedia platforms (e.g. YouTube) are used by large sections of the population in Switzerland and are playing an increasingly important role in the formation of opinion. Unlike traditional media, these platforms are not subject to journalistic standards. There is no obligation to ensure that the content is true, for example. Surveys show that people in Switzerland fear that they are being exposed to increasing amounts of fake news on social networks and video portals. Unlike in the EU and the USA, to date there are no plans in Switzerland for platform operators (intermediaries) to introduce specific legal regulations on hate speech, misinformation, non-transparency and user rights. Various studies commissioned by OFCOM have concluded that the population is entitled to effective protection against illegal hate speech and disinformation, and that the rights of users must also be better protected. Against this background, a broad discussion is needed in Switzerland on the role played by intermediaries in society and on their governance. Positive and negative influence of platforms On the one hand, the new platforms offer opportunities for a further democratisation of public communication. They make it easier for individuals, organisations and groups to participate directly in public discourse, to contribute their points of view and to express criticism publicly. This increases the diversity of publicly available information and opinions. On the other hand, the openness of the platforms also has various negative effects. For example, they provide an easy way to spread illegal and harmful content such as hate speech and misinformation. Just as problematic is the fact that the intermediaries can delete content according to their own non-transparent rules. Users have no rights or only insufficient ones in the case of the platforms; for example, they cannot defend themselves against the latters' decisions and do not know on what basis they can see which content. The rise of internet platforms has meant falling advertising revenues and dwindling audience revenues for the traditional media. Sooner or later, this has a detrimental impact on the quality of journalistic media products. It is already apparent that news media coverage is focusing on fewer and fewer topics and geographical areas. In other European countries, owing to the prominent role of communication platforms in society and their considerable potential for harm, there is a growing conviction that duties of due diligence must be imposed on intermediaries. The EU and the US are thus currently drawing up legal frameworks to regulate the activities of intermediaries. Against this backdrop, by the end of 2022 DETEC is to report to the Federal Council on whether and how communication platforms could be regulated. Address for enquiries Federal Office of Communications OFCOM Media contact +41 58 460 55 50, media@bakom.admin.ch Publisher The Federal Council https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start.html General Secretariat of the Federal Department of Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications; General Secretariat DETEC https://www.uvek.admin.ch/uvek/en/home.html Federal Office of Communications http://www.ofcom.admin.ch The Federal Council Bern, 17.11.2021 - The Swiss financial centre should be a credible location worldwide for investors who want to contribute to the environment and society in a comparable and measurable manner. To this end, the Federal Council adopted various measures during its meeting on 17 November 2021. The Federal Council recommends that financial market players use comparable and meaningful climate compatibility indicators to help create transparency in all financial products and client portfolios. This can be done with implied temperature indicators, for example. Here, the production plans of companies included in the portfolios are compared with a pathway that is needed to limit maximum warming to 1.5 Celsius. Such indicators provide clients with a straightforward understanding of how financial products can be classified in terms of their impact on the climate. At the same time, the Federal Council is encouraging the financial sector to join net-zero international alliances and is working towards industry agreements with this in mind. Net zero means that global emissions of greenhouse gases may not exceed the amount that can be absorbed by natural and technical sinks. Greenwashing occurs when clients of financial institutions are knowingly or unknowingly deceived or misled about sustainability characteristics of financial products and advisory processes. Therefore, it makes sense to promote uniform definitions of sustainability impacts. The subsidiary role of the state should be maintained insofar as possible. Since Switzerland has entered into climate-related commitments for the financial market by signing the Paris Agreement, an initial focus on climate impacts is appropriate. This focus is in line with international developments such as those of the G20 and EU. The Federal Council has also instructed the Federal Department of Finance (FDF), in cooperation with the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (DETEC), to inform it by the end of 2022 of the extent to which the financial sector has implemented the above-mentioned recommendations and to propose measures if need be. Finally, the Federal Council has instructed the FDF, in cooperation with the DETEC and FINMA, to propose by the end of 2022 how financial market legislation could be amended particularly with regard to transparency in order to avoid greenwashing. Address for enquiries Communications State Secretariat for International Finance SIF Tel. +41 58 462 46 16, info@sif.admin.ch Publisher The Federal Council https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start.html Federal Department of Finance https://www.efd.admin.ch/efd/en/home.html The Federal Council Bern, 17.11.2021 - At its meeting on 17 November 2021, the Federal Council adopted the dispatch on renewing the Monetary Assistance Decree. This is to ensure that Switzerland can continue to take international monetary assistance measures when necessary. In addition, the Federal Council approved contributions to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for its Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) interest subsidies and debt relief for Sudan. The Monetary Assistance Act of 2004 and the Monetary Assistance Decree enshrined therein provide Switzerland with appropriate instruments for engaging in international monetary cooperation. The existing Monetary Assistance Decree, which permits a total of up to CHF 10 billion in international monetary assistance by the Confederation, expires in April 2023. Continuing it until April 2028 with the same amount should ensure that Switzerland will maintain its ability to swiftly participate in measures to stabilise the global financial system when necessary. Now that the dispatch has been submitted to Parliament, the parliamentary process can begin. In addition, the Federal Council approved a further contribution by Switzerland of CHF 50 million to the IMF's PRGT interest subsidies and a federal contribution of CHF 7.5 million to the IMF's debt relief for Sudan. Global financial stability is especially important to Switzerland as an internationally highly interconnected and dynamic economy with its own currency and a major financial centre. For this reason, it has engaged in international monetary cooperation for many years, in particular through its membership in the IMF. Address for enquiries Communications State Secretariat for International Finance SIF Tel. +41 58 462 46 16, info@sif.admin.ch Publisher The Federal Council https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start.html State Secretariat for International Financial Matters http://www.sif.admin.ch OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) A former Oklahoma County judge says his "sexual conduct" with a prosecutor did not influence his rulings in a murder case that went to jury trial earlier this year. Former Oklahoma County Judge Timothy Henderson presided over a case on Feb. 2 where jurors convicted Robert Leon Hashagen III of first-degree murder. He is now seeking a new trial because of the sexual allegations, according to The Oklahoman. "The integrity of the judiciary ... is very much in question here," Hashagen's attorney, James Lockard, argued at an evidentiary hearing Monday. "We can't have faith that the verdict is a fair one." The married judge resigned in March after three female attorneys came forward with allegations of sexual misconduct against him. One of the three attorneys was a prosecutor in the Hashagen case. She said the judge began sexually abusing her in April 2016 and continued until July or August of 2018. Henderson described the sexual involvement as consensual and said he maintained his role "as a neutral and detached judicial officer" at all times during the Hashagen case. "My rulings were fair and supported by the evidence and facts presented by the attorneys," he said. The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals in October ordered the evidentiary hearing and will rule on the new trial request after getting a report. I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same. . .so help me God Part of the Oath of Office for military officers, cabinet members, members of Congress, civilian appointees, other civil servants. Article VI, United States Constitution. I will. . . to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. Part of the Presidential Oath of Office, Article II, section 1, United States Constitution. George Washington added, So help me God. These limited Oaths are important in helping to explain our history. The added words so help me God transfer the promise from a promise to the nation to a promise to God. What is that promise? It is a narrow promise, a specific promise, a promise to defend the US Constitution, a part of what is called Positive Lawone of four bundles of Law that constitute the Rule of Law in America. For members of the armed forces, the promise means, in part, loyalty to the notion of civilian control of the military. For the President, the promise means, in part, loyalty to the parameters of power relative to the Office of President of the United States and respect for the stated and reserved powers of the states and the reserved powers and rights of the People. Amendments IX and X, United States Constitution. See also this essay about the notion of Federalism. Why this narrow commitment? The reason is practical and strategic. The document that emerged from the Constitutional Convention in 1787, and was ratified in 13 state conventions, included elements of compromise in conflict with other bundles of American Rule of Law. The dangerous and fragile times dictated the measures, in the opinion of some of the Founders, and they wanted the new Constitution supported. George Washington felt strongly that there would be no independent America without a more muscular set of rules than was provided by the Articles of Confederation, our first constitution. So, instead of amending the Articles of Confederation, an entirely new document was created. Image: George Washington taking the oath of office from an 1893 history of the United States. No known copyright. This explains the narrow promisean Oath to follow the new Constitution and its rules and follow them faithfully so that the new nation might survive intact. The nation did survive. America was not attacked again militarily until 1812 when Britain tried to re-take her former colonies. The interceding twenty-nine years gave the country a chance to gain its strength. It did just that. Many of the Founders also intended to buy time in hopes that the Constitution would align with other parts of our Rule of Law, especially the values stated directly in the Declaration of Independence and in the moral teachings of Christianity. After the Civil War, we did bring the federal Constitution closer in alignment with Natural and Moral Law and it is certainly closer in alignment today. But that was then. This is now. What might be an appropriate Oath for today? A broader Oath for today, from the President and others in federal public trust, might be to swear to preserve, protect, and defend the Sovereignty of our nation, our Unalienable Rights, the religious underpinnings of our Moral Law, in addition to the Constitution and federal statutes that are part of Positive Law. The Oath might also include a promise regarding the spirit of comity and courtesy with which the promise is to be carried outUnwritten Law. All of this, so help them God. The rights we enjoy, for instance, come from God and are part of Natural Law. All persons in our system have an initial right to Life and to Liberty. The unborn have a right to have their lives considered in a calculation of who lives and who dies. An individuals right to Liberty is unalienableit cannot be separated from his or her being, by the elected or the appointed or by any document. Liberty is checked by duty and by internalized moral valuesvalues that come from the family and the communitynot those hired to be stewards of those values. The Sovereignty of the Nation is not a Presidents or a Congresss to give away. It may not be transferred directly or indirectly to a transnational governing structure or scheme by Treaty or by any other means. The Sovereignty of the American nation is in the hands of her People. Only they, and only they by direct vote, could give the nation away or dissolve her borders. Perhaps the simplest way to visualize the system the Oath represents is to see it as a Spring basket with a large purple plastic egg, a dark-chocolate bunny, and some green artificial grass. The egg represents our Rule of Law in its entiretyincluding the US Constitution. The chocolate bunny is our economic system independent but closely aligned to the purple plastic egg, and the green grass is the American culture including the rights and liberties of the People within that culture. The hand-woven basket is in Gods hands and it is In God We Trust. Many of those drunk with elected and appointed national power in the United States today seem not to remember even their limited Oaths of Office or their larger duties of stewardship. You are but part of the egg in the basketyou are not the bunny, you are not the grass, you are not the basket, and you certainly do not hold the basket in your hand. Paraphrasing the new Lt. Governor of Virginia, Who do you think you are? As George Washington tells us, The Power. . . will always be with the People. Perhaps a broader Oath of Office will bring this point home to those we elect and appoint to national public trust. M. E. Boyds Apples of GoldVoices From the Past That Speak to Us Now is available at www.amazon.com using the title and subtitle. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Alfred Dreyfus, the central figure in a political and legal affair that divided France, died in 1935, but he has re-emerged as an object of polemical discussion as the result of ludicrous fulminations of French history by Eric Zemmour, ultra-nationalist TV pundit and potential presidential candidate. Zemmour, whose parents were Algerian Jews, has risen spectacularly and become prominent in far-right, anti-immigrant political circles. In October 2021, he voiced two astonishing and troubling assertions: the claim that Marshal Philippe Petain, head of the Vichy government, had protected French Jews during the Nazi occupation, while Jews were rounded up by French police to be deported to their death in Nazi camps, and a statement that the truth about the innocence of Captain Alfred Dreyfus was murky, and we will never know whether the allegations against him were valid or were lies. This view of Dreyfus's possible guilt had already been stated in an article in 1994 by a lawyer for the right-wing Jean-Marie Le Pen that the pardoning of Dreyfus was contrary to all known jurisprudence. Other far-right commentators have suggested that the Dreyfus affair was orchestrated by a secret and occult power and that it weakened France before World War I, an innuendo of Jewish conspiracy. At the heart of the Dreyfus affair, past and present, was anti-Semitism. The Dreyfus affair began with the discovery by French security officials of a letter, found in the wastebasket of a German military attache at the German Embassy in Paris, offering to sell French military secrets to the Germans. Captain Dreyfus, the only Jew on the French general staff, was accused of the crime, arrested, and convicted by secret court-martial in 1894, supposedly for spying on France and passing military secrets to Germany. He was stripped of his rank in a humiliating ceremony and sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil's Island in French Guiana. The country was divided on the issue, with French nationalists, prelates of the Catholic Church, and some prominent intellectuals approving the conviction, among whom were virulent anti-Semites such as the writers Charles Maurras and Maurice Barres. On December 2, 1897, Maurras wrote to Barres that "the entire party of Dreyfus ought to be put in front of a firing squad." Anti-Semitic hatred lasted until the end. When Maurras after the war was convicted on January 27, 1945, for complicity with the enemy during the war and was sentenced to national degradation and life imprisonment in isolation, he shouted, "This is the revenge of Dreyfus!" Despite his appalling and abhorrent record, Maurras was much admired. T.S. Eliot saw Maurras as a "sort of Virgil who led us to the gates of the temple." President George Pompidou praised him as a prophet of the modern world. Dreyfus did not want to appear as a hero in his own drama and did not play any active public role in asserting his innocence, but Emile Zola did, after the real villain in the affair, Major Walsin-Esterhazy, had been identified but in a military court found not guilty. As a result, journalist and author Zola, at that time probably the most popular French writer, wrote an open letter, J'Accuse, of 4,000 words published in what is probably the most famous front page in the history of journalism. The letter electrified the country. L'Aurore distributed 300,000 copies of the day's paper, as distinct from the usual 3,000. Zola had galvanized those believing that Dreyfus was innocent. The letter, printed on January 13, 1898, in L'Aurore, whose publisher was George Clemenceau, was addressed to the president of the French Republic, Felix Faure, stating that there was a spot of mud on his name because of "the abominable" Dreyfus affair and the acquittal of Esterhazy, a great blow to all truth, all justice. Dreyfus, Zola declared, was wrongly convicted. He blamed the army leaders for covering up information and evidence, for miscarriage of justice, for judicial errors. France, he told the president, has "a stain on her cheek." The truth was ignored and darkened. Zola castigated the French military leaders as spirits of social evil and wanted to hasten the explosion of truth and justice. He ended with a dare to bring him to criminal court and for an investigation to take place in broad daylight. Zola had deliberately taken advantage of the 1881 Press Law, according to which defamation could be published but was punishable as slander against military officials. Zola was arrested and tried for libel, sentenced on February 7, 1898, to a year in prison, and removed from the Legion of Honor. When in July 1899 his appeal seemed certain to fail, he fled the country, living for a year in England. By his letter, Zola manifested the influence of the press and of intellectuals challenging injustice. He was right. Truth is on the march, and nothing shall stop it. Interestingly, the artist Camille Pissarro wrote to L'Aurore on January 18, 1898, that he wanted his name to be added to "the protestation of the awful judgment of the country's court martial." Pissarro, himself the subject of anti-Semitic bile, agreed to be part of a committee to award a medal to Zola. The art world was divided, with Monet, Signac, and Vallotin agreeing with Pissarro, while others, some former friends Cezanne, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Mary Cassatt, and above all Edgar Degas were opposed. Among other protesters, Edvard Grieg refused a musical invitation in France because of French injustice to Dreyfus. In 1898, the French intelligence officer admitted he had forged documents to prove that Dreyfus was guilty. Nonetheless, Dreyfus was court-martialed again and again found guilty. He was offered and accepted a pardon, though there was nothing to pardon, by President Emile Loubet in 1899; was released from prison; and lived in a state of house arrest. Finally, the conviction of Dreyfus was overturned by a military commission in 1906. He died on July 12, 1935, aged 74. Zola died on September 29, 1902, in his Paris apartment of carbon monoxide, probably caused by a badly ventilated chimney. The death may have been accidental, but it is suspected of having been a murder by blocking the chimney. Zola is today buried in the Pantheon, after his initial burial at Montmartre's cemetery. At that event on October 5, 1902, the author Anatole France spoke of Zola's heroic honesty, his virtue. His destiny and his heart gave him the fate of the greatest men. Zola deserves well of his country for not having lost faith in its ability to rule by law. Anatole France ended his eloquent tribute with a dazzling compliment: "he was a moment in the history of human conscience." Zola was transferred from the Montparnasse cemetery to the Pantheon on June 4, 1908. Dreyfus, who was present at the ceremony, was wounded by two shots fired by a nationalist journalist. Every year, Zola has been honored. In October 2021, he and Dreyfus were bound together in a symbolic link of their destinies in the struggle for truth and to repair injustice. It is an opportunity to reflect on fundamental issues, the correct functioning of the legal system, the virus and evils of anti-Semitism, the role of the media, and the role of intellectuals in democratic societies. On October 26, President Emmanuel Macron inaugurated a museum, the first of its kind, dedicated to the Dreyfus affair, a collection and exhibition in the house of Emile Zola, in Medan, west suburb of Paris. Nothing, said Macron, could repair the humiliations and injustices that Dreyfus had suffered, but let us not aggravate them by leaving them forgotten or repeated. The museum is part of the Zola house, devoted to preserving his memory and the crucial role he played in challenging the conviction of Dreyfus. The Maison Zola-Musee Dreyfus was co-financed by Pierre Berge, the late partner of Yves Saint Laurent, the foundation for the memory of the Shoah, and antiracism campaigners, some of whom called for Dreyfus to be posthumously promoted to the rank of general. One of its sponsors was Elie Wiesel. The new museum will display a collection dedicated to the Dreyfus Affair: 500 documents, objects, anti-Semitic caricatures, photographs, songs, and posters. The museum will naturally focus on the Dreyfus Affair and Zola's action, which was a turning point, but it will also posit broader questions of tolerance, human rights, separation of religion and politics, secularism, and anti-Semitism. Truth will march on. Image: Peter Reed via Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. If a party wants to get something big done, it needs a plan. A complete plan should include: A long-term objective A guiding strategy to achieve the objective Tactics to enhance the probability of success Specific actions to realize the desired outcome In a competitive arena, like politics, parties usually keep their plans secret. But after observing ones opponent for a bit, its usually possible to reverse engineer what their plan is. Well, weve had a few decades to observe the Democrats, and I think their plan has become pretty obvious. Its also apparent that their plan has some serious flaws. Objective I dont think anyone would dispute that the overarching objective of the Dems is to achieve a long-term lock on power. In fact, there is nothing wrong with that objective. The good or evil in the plan isnt the objective. It is how the objective is achieved and used. Strategy Its pretty obvious that the Democrat strategy is to win by any means necessary -- including cheating. Nothing is off the table. Theyve demonized their opponents with propaganda and witch-hunt investigations. Theyve used thugs and Deep State bureaucrats to intimidate the opposition. Theyve altered election rules and used fraud to tilt the scales in their favor. That pretty much covers the by any means necessary waterfront. Notice what their strategy is not to win the debate of ideas. Theyve stopped even attempting to sell their agenda to the American public. The Dems dont debate bills before passing them anymore. They have to pass the bill to see whats in it. They know they cant win by having a winning argument. That explains why they never alter course based on feedback from the electorate. Americans spoke loud and clear during the 2021 off-year election. The Dems doubled down on what they were already doing. Public be damned, just fortify their position before the next election. Tactics The Dems have used a number of tactics to enhance their probability of success. They have created a coalition of special interest groups to win elections. Environmentalists, feminists, LGBT, minorities, unions, etc. have come together to defeat anything the evil conservatives pursue. Theyve used their very own propaganda ministry (the MSM) to deceive the electorate. Four years of fake stories convinced Americans that it would be evil to vote for Trump and virtuous to vote for Biden. What Americans were not given was the necessary information to make an informed decision. The Dems provide the narrative, and the propagandists sell it. The truth does not factor into their tactics. The Dems have also used the power of the Deep State to attack opponents. For the promise of more power and funding, the Deep State has happily assisted. The DoJ and FBI conspired to execute a coup against a duly elected president. Now the DoJ is attempting to crush political dissent by labeling peaceful protests domestic terrorists. Perhaps most alarmingly, the Dems have employed thugs to intimidate Americans into inaction. Antifa and Black Lives Matter have vandalized, burned, and even murdered to advance the narratives created by the Democrats. Who can forget restaurant patrons harassed, politicians attacked on the street, judges intimidated, and jurors threatened? The Dems have responded by providing bail and declining to prosecute the thugs. Actions The by any means necessary party was able to get into power (just barely) in the 2020 election. They proposed a series of actions that would have cemented their lock on power for years to come. These included: Packing the courts Ending the filibuster Nationalize elections Redistribute wealth Fortunately for Americans, their actions havent worked out so well. A Complete Plan Doesnt Make a Good Plan Lets take a look at how the Dem plan is working, starting at their actions and working back to their strategy. Had they pulled off their planned actions, it certainly would have been hard to pry them out of office again. But luckily, they picked the village idiot to lead the charge. President Gremlin has not only failed, but he has also failed spectacularly. The Dems arent talking about court-packing, election reform, or filibuster nuking anymore. Gropey Joes negotiating skills have even managed to turn his spending plan into an all-out civil war within his own party. Luckily for conservatives, the Dems had no alternative to Joe -- he really is the best they have. Their tactics have inherent vulnerabilities which are now exposed. The Deep State and the MSM could only be effective while they did their dirty work in darkness and retained a facade of credibility. But either through hubris or necessity, they went too far and theyre exposed now. At the very time that Americans are livid about rising crime, the Dems have sided with criminal thugs. They wont be able to run on a platform of law and order for years to come. Lastly, the cracks in their coalition are beginning to show. Special-interest groups must compete for resources, priority, attention, decisions, and etc. However, eventually, the coalition members were bound to start competing with each other, and that has exposed a major vulnerability of the coalition. Both feminism and the LGBT movement began wanting fair treatment for their respective members. But fair treatment morphed into a demand for equitable results. Now we have men competing in womens sports. Winner -- LGBT. Minority groups wanted the best possible education for their children. Only through a better education could their kids hope to lead a better life. However, the teachers' unions wanted to crush educational alternatives to create a monopoly for the public-school systems. The Democrats sided with the unions against things like school vouchers. In so doing, they have perpetuated failing public schools. Winner -- teachers unions. The same foundational cracks are forming between labor unions and environmentalists. Even their army of thugs is in conflict. BLM is fundamentally Marxist. Antifa is anarchist. How long can they work together? And on and on. A coalition of disparate special interests is a house of sand. It looks impressive but crumbles with the first waves. The Bleak Future They Face This is where the leftists and their useful idiots in the Democrat party stand -- theyve won an election but jeopardized their future prospects. Their colossal ineptitude has undermined their message of competence and roused the American people. Theyve exposed their vulnerabilities for conservatives to exploit. The tactics theyve employed have inherent vulnerabilities. Their coalition is beginning to crack. Conservatives need to grab the biggest crowbar they can find and pry away. Luckily, the Democrats are hostages to their leftist sponsors and show no inclination to adjust their tactics. Bill Clinton knew how to triangulate. No Democrat after him has even considered this. Conservatives can attack their vulnerabilities in complete confidence that they will continue doing the same things. By the time they realize their tactics are flawed, it will be too late. Their strategy to retain power by any means necessary is also flawed. It misses the point that we are a government by the people and for the people. How did they think they could achieve political dominance without the consent of the people? Leftists and their political wing, the Democrats, have: Picked a strategy that is anathema to a country of self-governance Settled on tactics that are deeply flawed Placed success in the hands of the most incompetent fool to ever occupy the Oval Office So hows that stolen election working out for them? 2022 cant get here soon enough. John Green is a political refugee from Minnesota, now residing in Idaho. He currently writes at the American Free News Network (afnn.us). He can be followed on Facebook or reached at greenjeg@gmail.com. Image: Peter Breughel To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. The Pentagon's annual report on China's military included a section on the PLA's nuclear buildup. The report states that the People's Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) "is developing new intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that will significantly improve its nuclear-capable missile forces." Nuclear warhead production has increased. At least three new ICBM silo fields are being constructed, "which will cumulatively contain hundreds of new ICBM silos." The PLARF's road-mobile DF-26 intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBMs) force is growing. China plans to "modernize, diversify, and expand its nuclear forces," including land, sea, and air-based platforms (the triad), according to the report. The Pentagon estimates that by 2027, the PLARF will have at least 700 deliverable nuclear warheads and at least 1,000 deliverable nuclear warheads by 2030. China's ICBM force consists of CSS-10 Mod 2 missiles with a range of 11,200 kilometers, DF-41 missiles that can strike targets 12,000 kilometers away, and CSS-4 Mod 2 and Mod 3 missiles with a maximum range of 13,000 kilometers. With these three missile types, China can deliver nuclear warheads to the entire continental United States, Alaska, and Hawaii. Some of these missiles have MIRV capability, meaning they can deliver multiple warheads to multiple targets. China's nuclear weapons expansion has been characterized by the head of U.S. Strategic Command as "breathtaking," a "strategic breakout" designed to give China a "coercive capability" to deter the U.S. from defending its allies against Chinese aggression. Meanwhile, Russia is engaged in its own nuclear buildup, and it may eventually outnumber the U.S. in warheads by ten to one. And China and Russia have gradually become strategic allies as both seek to undermine America's role as the organizer of the liberal world order. According to the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, as of July 2020, the United States under the 2010 treaty called New START, negotiated by the Obama administration, fields 1,550 nuclear warheads on 700 strategic launchers (though we have more in our stockpile). This includes 400 Minuteman III ICBMs, 14 ballistic missile submarines that each carry up to 90 warheads, and 20 deployed B-2 bombers that each carry up to 20 nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. President Trump had restored some secrecy to the U.S. strategic force and started a modernization program, but the secrecy decision was reversed by the Biden administration, which has pledged "nuclear transparency," and the administration appears set on pursuing arms control with Russia, even as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is anything but transparent about its strategic nuclear force and is engaged in a significant buildup of that force. But the numbers and the different approaches to transparency and arms control do not tell the whole story. A recent study by the Heritage Foundation noted that the U.S. nuclear force faces three challenges: aging nuclear warheads, delivery systems, and command and control systems; a crumbling infrastructure; and an aging workforce. The Heritage Foundation study notes that the United States "has not designed or built a nuclear warhead since the end of the Cold War." What does all of this mean? According to Peter Huessy, president of GeoStrategic Analysis, the nuclear balance is changing, and not for the better. China, he writes, "may be on a path toward developing 2,5003,500 nuclear warheads from its new silo building." Meanwhile, the U.S. disarmament community is pressuring the Biden administration which is staffed by several former members of that disarmament community to reduce U.S. nuclear weapons and adopt a "no first use" policy meaning that the U.S. will pledge never to use nuclear weapons first in a conflict, effectively ending the role of nuclear weapons in deterring a conventional attack on us or our allies. In the past, U.S. nuclear superiority helped defuse crises that could have led to all-out war Soviet occupation of northern Iran in 1946, the Berlin blockade, Chinese attacks on Quemoy and Matsu in the 1950s, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the threat of Soviet intervention in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. The United States, instead of pursuing arms control with Russia and further reducing our once superior nuclear arsenal in the face of a massive Chinese buildup, should once again use our technological know-how and productive capacities to regain and maintain nuclear superiority. China is rattling sabers over Taiwan, as it did in the 1950s. Russia is threatening Ukraine and NATO members in parts of Europe, as it did in the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s. Our Asian and European allies are watching how we respond. U.S. nuclear superiority helped America win the Cold War without fighting World War III. "[W]ithout nuclear deterrence," wrote Edward Luttwak in his masterful essay "How to Think about Nuclear War," "great power conflicts would resume as before 1945." "By what doctrine of theology, by what theory of morality, by what rule of ethics," he asked, "is it decreed that the small risk of nuclear war is a greater evil than the virtual certainty of the large-scale death in great-power wars no longer deterred?" Hopefully, someone in the Biden administration is asking that question. Image: CristianIS via Pixabay, Pixabay License. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. In the horror movie The Purge, the U.S. government annually gives its citizens a 12-hour period in which to commit any and all crimes with no consequences. The only thing the filmmakers missed in predicting today's Democrat Party stance on rioting, arson, and anarchy in the streets is the time frame. Twelve hours isn't nearly enough time to properly riot, silly! You need at least a weekend for sufficient criminality. I mean, those Molotov cocktails don't construct themselves. Sometimes you need weeks to get all the rage out of your system, like in Minneapolis, or even months, like those slowpokes in Seattle. To paraphrase Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the former mayor of Baltimore, anarchists need sufficient time in which to destroy. And the Democrat Purge isn't only an annual event. No, it can happen any time a cop shoots a black man, justified or not, or any time leftists get a court verdict they don't like. And they certainly won't be liking the verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial in Kenosha, Wis. Any remotely fair person who's followed the trial and watched videos of the incident can easily see two things: the despicable mainstream media, as usual, lied their butts off about what actually occurred in a ham-handed attempt to please their Democrat masters. And the prosecutors, likewise looking to curry favor with the left, never had a case for murder this was clearly a case of self-defense. Best-case scenario for the partisan prosecutors: A craven jury may convict Rittenhouse on a lesser charge to avoid facing the rabid mob themselves. But whether Rittenhouse is found innocent or guilty of a minor crime, anarchists, race-hustlers, loony leftists, and sundry miscreants of all stripes will dependably lose their Schiff when the verdict's read and scream for blood. And the Democrats in charge of things will, in so many words, declare a Purge and let their constituents spill just as much blood as they like. The police will be told to stand down and watch, and to their discredit, they will. Block highways? Detain, abuse, or even assault drivers? No problemo during a Purge. Torch buildings, cars, and stores, even police stations, at will? Social justice, baby! Beat up innocents, throw bricks, spit on cops? Go ahead during a Purge, it's Democrat-sanctioned. Every crime imaginable is allowed during such times: arson, assault, homicide, destruction of property, grand theft, and vandalism on an industrial scale. The only thing Dems won't allow during a Purge is protecting your property and yourself, hence the absurd Rittenhouse trial. If you, unfortunately, live in a Democrat-run city, you're about to experience a violent, lawless period where absolutely anything goes and nothing, nothing will happen to the perps. The cops will just watch, and the FBI's too busy going after Trump-supporters. Sadly, something may very well happen to your home, your business, your loved ones, or even your incisors! Perhaps this is a good time for that trip to Florida you and the family have been talking about. Soak in the sun, watch the palm trees sway, have a pina colada or two, and wait patiently for the Democrat-run Purge to end. Image: Piqsels. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Joe Biden's policy toward Russia now can be said to be weaker than that of Germany a shocking development, considering the history of Germany shirking its duties to NATO. The New York Times reports: The approval process to certify Nord Stream 2, an undersea gas pipeline running from Russia to Germany that has sparked concerns about Russian influence in Europe, ground to a halt on Tuesday when a German regulator said the owners of the pipeline had failed to file the necessary paperwork. The action means that the recently completed pipeline will not begin supplying gas to Germany anytime soon, and it comes against the backdrop of a politically charged jump in energy prices in Europe and rising tensions between Moscow and Europe over a refugee crisis in Belarus and Russian troops gathering near Ukraine. The news caused a jump in European natural gas markets, with the price of U.K. natural gas futures soaring more than 17 percent on Tuesday, amid concerns that Europe will run short of gas this winter. It also comes as Germany finds itself in political limbo, with Chancellor Angela Merkel, a firm supporter of the pipeline project, reduced to a caretaker role while leaders from the Social Democratic, Green and Free Democratic parties debate the makeup of a new government, one that has the potential to be less favorable to its predecessor's pet energy project. The paperwork involved is not simple, as The Guardian reports: The German energy regulator said it would not continue its approval process until the Nord Stream 2 company, which is registered in Switzerland, transfers its main assets and staffing budget to its German subsidiary. "A certification for the operation of Nord Stream 2 will only be considered once the operator is organised in a legal shape compliant with German law," the regulator said. This means that the approval process will have to start over once the subsidiaries are reconfigured. More delays. Underlying this, Russia is currently massing troops on its border with Ukraine, from which it already has stolen territory, and whose territorial integrity it has no regard for. Nordstream 2 would allow Russian natural gas to reach Western Europe without passing through Ukraine, thereby depriving Ukraine of the ability to retaliate against Russia by cutting off gas supplies and depriving Russia of a massive amount of hard currency revenue, which the regime desperately needs. The German Federation's willingness under outgoing Chancellor Merkel to rely more on Russia as an energy source via the Nordstream 2 pipeline had been challenged by President Trump, who placed sanctions on it. But last May, the Biden administration announced that it was waiving the sanctions, allowing the project to be completed. The move to delay Nordstream 2 will impose major costs on not only Germany but much of Western Europe: Europe faces a looming winter gas crisis, which has fuelled fears of a widespread industrial slowdown due to factory shutdowns and potential power outages. It is also expected to drive a cost of living crisis for homes and small businesses. Gas prices have reached record highs in recent months, ignited by a global surge in demand after the Covid-19 economic slowdown last year, and fuelled by Russia's reluctance to export extra supplies to Europe to help meet demand despite rocketing market prices. Some countries have accused Russia, which is Europe's largest gas supplier, of withholding extra gas supplies to Europe in order to pressure Germany to approve the gas project. The Kremlin has denied this. The boss of commodities trading giant Trafigura, Jeremy Weir, warned that Europe could face "rolling blackouts" this winter due to tight gas supplies and low gas storage levels. "We haven't got enough gas at the moment quite frankly; we're not storing for the winter period. So hence there's a real concern that there's a potential if we have a cold winter that we could have rolling blackouts in Europe," Weir told an industry conference. The return of the Cold War will actually make Western Europeans cold. Meanwhile, Biden looks weak and has forfeited U.S. leadership. Hat tip: Mike Nadler. Photo credit: Pjotr Mahhonin, CC BY-SA 4.0 license. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. I have a couple of dinosaur-sized bones of contention with the Democrat party. Bone number one is its obsession with illegal immigration. Bone number two is the vaccine mandate. The Democrats' obsession with illegal aliens appears to be the ultimate human capital strategy ahead of canceling student loan debt. What's a real head-scratcher about this immigration policy is that it has near-unanimous Black support. Indeed, Black Democrats accepted with little outcry Biden's rapid-fire deportation of 14,000 Haitians. These Black Democrats are browbeaten by their party to support migratory preference for Latinos over all other immigrants. A state-sanctioned influx of Central and South Americans inevitably dilutes Black representation in society and at all levels of government an ominous development, given the relatively recent passage of the Voting Rights Act, which occurred shortly before I was born. One need not oppose leftist dogma to consider such preferential migration nothing less than systematic disenfranchisement of the Black community. Additionally, while it's largely a progressive policy, its ranks include the "cheap labor" wing of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. My second dinosaur-sized bone of contention with Democrats is their vaccine mandates. I grew up during the final stages of desegregation and don't relish anything resembling it. This explains my aversion to vaccine passports and workplace directives demanding inoculation or termination. These policies mirror Jim Crow a little too closely in my opinion. In fact, I unlovingly call these unconstitutional mandates "Germ Crow." I had a Germ Crow run-in last year at my former job. Its politburo unilaterally declared I needed a negative COVID-19 test result to return to work after a bad allergy attack. I was the only person in the building to face this demand despite White coworkers being out sick in droves. Mardi Gras 2020 had just happened, and with it came the first virus variant. Image: Illegal aliens heading to America (cropped). YouTube screen grab. True to its communist cousins in China using the excuse of COVID to profile Africans, the workplace politburo used a new pandemic to disguise old prejudice toward me. Progressivism at home and abroad is just the same dictatorship, albeit with different accents. When it comes to mandates, the accounts from overseas aren't more encouraging. It's too easy to juxtapose unconfirmed stories from last year about infected Chinese people whose homes their government welded shut, with footage showing months of violent arrests starring Australian police officers. In a far cry from demoralized American de-policing, cops Down Under are tackling anti-mandate protesters, unmasked pedestrians, and even beachgoers. England hasn't been as aggressive, but its lockdowns have led to mass demonstrations. I'm watching international news and seeing worrying stuff about social creditstyle segregation, where the vaccinated get privileges denied the unvaccinated, something occurring in both France and Austria. While we're teetering on the edge of mandate state expansion, many countries in Europe and elsewhere are poised to radically restrict freedom for the foreseeable future. Warnings about globalists planning world domination don't seem so far-fetched anymore. Not after the last couple of years. For the above reasons and more, migratory preference and Germ Crow are my dinosaur-sized bones of contention with leftists. These "bones" (areas of disagreement) are by no means exhaustive, but I'm not typing an Encyclopedia Britannicalength post. Suffice it to say, Democrats provide me with endless examples of unacceptable policies. Forcing my demographic out of now-defunct majority-minority status and forcing unemployment on workers practicing medical freedom forces me to draw harsh new conclusions about the left to add to my old harsh conclusions. The left's mania for micromanaging our lives is cause enough for wrath. It seems my list of dinosaur-sized bones of contention with leftists is destined to be infinite. Cap Black. Writer/Commentator on Liberation and Liberty. #ActualSuperHeroForLiberty Advocate. #HaltHunger Organizer. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. This guest essay on "The Steele Dossier," by Columbia Journalism School professor Bill Grueskin, constitutes, arguably, a new development in ostensible expressions of regret: the attack apology. Although Prof. Grueskin acknowledges that the Steele Dossier was largely "fictitious," the pain this admission causes him seems palpable. And due to his obvious discomfort, the words "false claim," "baseless allegations," "outright fraud" do not emerge from his computer. Here is one of the professor's acknowledgments: "Many of the dossier's allegations have turned out to be fictitious or, at best, unprovable." Many? Which of the dossier's allegations is fact, and which is provable? And by what theory? The professor is silent. Still, he wonders how so many journalists "were taken in so easily because the dossier seemed to confirm what they already suspected." That Donald J. Trump was a Russian asset? Grueskin, give us a break. What the anti-Trump campaign, beginning with false allegations of DNC hacking and the Steele Dossier, prevented, as the late Professor Stephen F. Cohen noted many times on the John Batchelor radio show (now a podcast), was normal relations with Russia. In mid-essay, this question from the journalism school professor: "So where did much of the press go wrong?" (Much of the press? Pretty damn well all the media.) His immediate answer: Donald Trump. Here is one of Grueskin's two paragraphs answering where he thinks the press went wrong: First, Mr, Trump had long curried Mr. Putin's favor. Moreover, Mr. Mueller showed, and filed indictments that explained, how the Russians interfered in the 2016 campaign, hacking into Democrats' emails and taking advantage of Facebook and other social media companies to foment chaos and dissent. (The jargon in The Mueller Report is "sow chaos.") What does Grueskin mean by long currying Putin's favor? Whom did Mueller indict? (Grueskin does not elaborate. What makes his charge of Russian "hacking into Democrats' emails" "provable"?). In addition to Paul Manafort (see immediately below), Roger Stone, Michael Cohen, a bunch of alleged Russian agents who never will stand trial, George Papadopoulos, and Michael T. Flynn what did his unfair indictment have to do with the dossier or collusion, other than serving as scapegoat for the totalitarian-minded Democrats who could not abide the election of Donald J. Trump in 2016? Grueskin is silent on these details, but what are key details to propagandists other than obstacles to their lies? Grueskin continues: Mr. Trump's choice of Paul Manafort to serve as his campaign chairman reinforced the idea that he was in the thrall of Russia. [Trump or Manafort?] Those fears were borne out when a bipartisan Senate committee found Mr. Manafort to be a 'grave counterintelligence threat' because of his ties to a Kremlin agent. So given all that [all what?], it was easy to assume that the dossier's allegations must also be true. The distinction between what journalists assume and what we verify is often the difference between fiction and reality[.] [Since when is providing "fiction" the mark of a journalist?] The Mueller Report does accuse Russia of hacking into Clinton campaign computers, but the report does not provide details on how that "hacking" was carried out. See, for example, the Report, beginning at page 98 (Washington Post edition), and the pages forward. The Nation, not your right-wing periodical, published, August 9, 2017, an article on the report of experts that it is not possible that the DNC computer was hacked, citing technical reasons beyond, to use a Mueller term, "my purview." This report found that the DNC was not hacked; the leaked information was by someone with access to DNC computers. In short, the leaked information was an inside job. As to Mueller and Manafort, this explanation of the Manafort indictment appears on page 621 of The Washington Post edition of The Mueller Report: "[Manafort] was charged in federal court in Washington, DC, on October 30, 2017, with crimes related to his work as a political consultant in Ukraine" and then, February 2018, charged with "fil[ing] fraudulent loan applications to banks[.]" What does consultancy in Ukraine have to do with Russia, much less the Steele Dossier? Nothing at all. Throughout the essay, Grueskin tried to explain away the mindset driving "journalists" to accept the dossier's allegations as true. For example, he commented that as "reporters" considered President Trump a liar, the dossier might be true. In a parenthetical comment, he wrote, "Washington Post fact-checkers would catalog more than 30,000 Trump falsehoods during his term." Without bothering to apply mere scrutiny, let alone strict scrutiny, to this bizarre claim, Grueskin would have us accept at face value the false claims of the virulently anti-Trump Washington Post. Mr. Grueskin, in mid-essay, offered this apologia for "reporters," not for the former president: "The situation also became complicated because some reporters simply didn't like or trust Mr. Trump or didn't want to appear to be on his side." My translation: most "reporters," in covering Donald Trump, didn't want to let the facts interfere with their biases. Their aim was not journalistic. It was political: defeat Trump. Or, after his election, hurl him out of office. Therefore, those whom Grueskin calls "journalists" or "reporters" are nothing of the kind; they are political hacks, partisan propagandists, lying scriveners, pure and simple. Grueskin also cited the comment by Barry Meier, in his book, Spooked: "Plenty of reporters were skeptical of the dossier, but they hesitated to dismiss it, because they didn't want to look like they were carrying water for Trump or his cronies." Aha! By dint of projection, Grueskin helps us understand why the media did not dismiss the dossier, the allegation of collusion, and the rest of the lies spewed by the anti-democratic information network throughout the first term of President Donald J. Trump. These propagandists were carrying water for Hillary Clinton and the anti-Trump Resistance, comprising congressional Democrats, the intelligence "community," and, of course, the media intent first on defeating Donald J. Trump in 2016 and, having failed that goal, working assiduously throughout his term to unseat him, even to the point of unseating him after he left office. And so Donald J. Trump was accurate all along when he directed a sharp comment at the media. The anti-Trump media are the enemy of the truth. How can propagandists who refuse to report actual events be anything other than "the enemy of the people"? Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. Anybody objectively watching the Kyle Rittenhouse trial could see that he should never have been charged. Witness testimony and video footage established clearly that Kyle acted in self-defense when he shot at three men, all of whom were vigorously engaged in trying to kill him. My worry from the beginning, though, has been that the jury will be so intimidated by the gathering mobs that it will affect their verdict. The facts seem to support my concern. Despite the clear evidence presented, which should have led to a verdict in an hour or two at most, the jury did not reach a verdict on Monday. According to Jacek Posobiec, "Two jurors holding decision up, outright citing backlash, per US Marshall in Kenosha." Two jurors holding decision up, outright citing backlash, per US Marshal in Kenosha Jacek Posobiec (@JackPosobiec) November 16, 2021 As Posobiec explains, the jurors are well aware of the threats against them: Including doxxing threats from anarchist groups Jacek Posobiec (@JackPosobiec) November 16, 2021 Given that the state was so nervous that there would be a repeat of last August's mob violence that the governor mobilized the Wisconsin National Guard in advance of the verdict, those jurors, if they indeed did as the marshal allegedly said, have legitimate reason to be afraid. Keep in mind as you think about the incipient violence that this trial, despite the media's best efforts to whip people in a frenzy, had nothing to do with race because Kyle is white, as are (or were) the people he shot. As jury deliberations continue in #Rittenshouse case, 500 Wisconsin National Guard members are on standby. Theyll assist local law enforcement if requested by county and city officials pic.twitter.com/ZQgIFZl7rn Matt Smith (@mattsmith_news) November 16, 2021 Not only have the people gathering managed to ignore the facts of Kyle's conduct, but they have also bought into the media's efforts to turn the dead men and the one living guy into heroic martyrs on behalf of race. In fact, Joseph Rosenbaum was a convicted child rapist who tried to kill police and was running around calling people the n-word. Anthony Huber (dead) and Gaige Grosskreutz (wounded) were also felons with violent records. However, to the mob, what matters is that Kyle is White and he had a gun. In the America the Democrats have created in the last few years, those facts alone are a hanging offense. Indeed, as the fate of the January 6 defendants shows, just being White and not a Democrat is a hanging offense. It's all well and good to talk about being brave and doing the right thing, but we are not a brave generation in America. We live in an era devoted to safety and people who have families and have no way to defend them and who fear that any defense will leave them in Kyle Rittenhouse's shoes are not unreasonable in trying to find an "out." Not brave, as I said, but not unreasonable. That "out" could be a hung jury or a guilty verdict. In the latter case, if the jurors have a conscience, they'll hope the verdict is reversed on appeal, but at least they'll have kicked the can down the road, away from themselves and their families. What is heartening is that only two of the twelve jurors seem to fear the mob. That means ten out of the twelve people in that jury room believe that Kyle Rittenhouse is innocent and are willing to go back into the courtroom and say so. I hope they can prevail on the other two jurors to do the right thing. If they don't, we have ceased to be a country with the rule of law and, instead, become a country governed by mob rule on the ground and totalitarian diktats from on high. Rather than being a free, first-world nation, we will be just another failed state. Anybody objectively watching the Kyle Rittenhouse trial could see that he should never have been charged. Witness testimony and video footage established clearly that Kyle acted in self-defense when he shot at three men, all of whom were vigorously engaged in trying to kill him. My worry from the beginning, though, has been that the jury will be so intimidated by the gathering mobs that it will affect their verdict. The facts seem to support my concern. Given that the state was so nervous that there would be a repeat of last August's mob violence that the governor mobilized the Wisconsin National Guard in advance of the verdict, those jurors, if they indeed did as the marshal allegedly said, have legitimate reason to be afraid. Keep in mind as you think about the incipient violence that this trial, despite the media's best efforts to whip people in a frenzy, had nothing to do with race because Kyle is white, as are (or were) the people he shot. As jury deliberations continue in #Rittenshouse case, 500 Wisconsin National Guard members are on standby. Theyll assist local law enforcement if requested by county and city officials pic.twitter.com/ZQgIFZl7rn Matt Smith (@mattsmith_news) November 16, 2021 Not only have the people gathering managed to ignore the facts of Kyle's conduct, but they have also bought into the media's efforts to turn the dead men and the one living guy into heroic martyrs on behalf of race. In fact, Joseph Rosenbaum was a convicted child rapist who tried to kill police and was running around calling people the n-word. Anthony Huber (dead) and Gaige Grosskreutz (wounded) were also felons with violent records. However, to the mob, what matters is that Kyle is White and he had a gun. In the America the Democrats have created in the last few years, those facts alone are a hanging offense. Indeed, as the fate of the January 6 defendants shows, just being White and not a Democrat is a hanging offense. It's all well and good to talk about being brave and doing the right thing, but we are not a brave generation in America. We live in an era devoted to safety and people who have families and have no way to defend them and who fear that any defense will leave them in Kyle Rittenhouse's shoes are not unreasonable in trying to find an "out." Not brave, as I said, but not unreasonable. That "out" could be a hung jury or a guilty verdict. In the latter case, if the jurors have a conscience, they'll hope the verdict is reversed on appeal, but at least they'll have kicked the can down the road, away from themselves and their families. What is heartening is that only two of the twelve jurors seem to fear the mob. That means ten out of the twelve people in that jury room believe that Kyle Rittenhouse is innocent and are willing to go back into the courtroom and say so. I hope they can prevail on the other two jurors to do the right thing. If they don't, we have ceased to be a country with the rule of law and, instead, become a country governed by mob rule on the ground and totalitarian diktats from on high. Rather than being a free, first-world nation, we will be just another failed state. Image: BLM on the move in Kenosha. YouTube screen grab. To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. When NYC mayor-elect Eric Adams ran for the job, his platform promised to significantly reduce crime and bring the Big Apple back to its better days that is, the days before a left-wing nut named de Blasio got elected, presumably, if actions demonstrate intent, to destroy the residents, the businesses, and the tourist industry. I don't know if there's any logical thought still remaining in the minds of New Yorkers, but if there is, even the lowest-I.Q. individual would agree that de Blasio couldn't have done more damage if he had run a giant bulldozer from Battery Park to Harlem, crushing everything in his path. How that nihilist was able to win two terms is an indictment of the vacuous voters in that rapidly deteriorating burg. Adams, a former police captain with the NYPD, wasted no time in declaring that as soon as he took office, he would quickly overturn dopey de Blasio's disbanding of Anti-Crime, the most productive crime deterrence unit in the history of Gotham City. I guess it was expected that hizzoner-elect would be hated by those who live off the misery of their own race by objecting to anything that might put the bad guys in the hoosegow. As soon as Adams's declaration became public, a thuggish "leader" of Black Thugs Matter made a counter-declaration. Some wannabe Marxist, named Hawk Newsome, hurried to the microphone and threatened riots and bloodshed if Adams followed through with his campaign vow to reinstate the prolific plainclothes unit. To his credit, Adams responded quickly to the petty rabble-rouser, saying such comments further endanger the lives of blacks "because you know where that blood ends up? In the streets of our community. And we have to be honest about that." He's correct! But expecting honesty from a lowlife like Newsome is like expecting virtue from a child molester! In fact, during a saner time in our history, a cretin like Newsome would be arrested for inciting to riot. In the interest of full disclosure, I was recruited into Anti-Crime soon after its inception in 1971. Also known as the Street Crime Unit, Anti-Crime consisted of a small percentage of very active cops from each precinct who would be mainly tasked with arresting armed felons, taking them off the streets of the city. Wearing regular street clothes and driving unmarked cars gave us an advantage over the uniformed cops, who drove blue and white sedans with the bubblegum machines on top, which could be easily spotted by the jackals lying in wait for their unwary victims. For nine years I worked in a unit of twelve plainclothes cops, three cars working days, and three working nights. We worked in pairs, and, in addition to investigating past crimes, we responded to active calls of "felony in progress." Most of the time, we were first on the scene, because marked units were often tied up with calls for domestic disturbances (AKA family disputes), vehicular accidents, report preparation of past incidents, etc. Yet we were always grateful for backup by those units when we ran into situations that required more boots on the ground or help in blocking streets when we got involved in vehicle pursuits. Moreover, there's no sweeter sound than a siren wailing in the distance when you're struggling with a guy carrying a weapon who has made it clear that he's not going easily. Not only did our unit take tons of guns off the street, along with the hard-asses carrying and using them, but we also removed a truckload of knives, chains, machetes, blackjacks, and an assortment of other bludgeons used in homicides, rapes, and robberies. Our unit was about 5% of the manpower in the precinct, yet we made the majority of felony collars each month. The amount of crime prevention is inestimable, but one thing was assured: there was a dramatic decrease in crime in areas with Anti-Crime units. It's truly sad that so many innocent residents lost their lives, their homes, and their businesses during the insane de Blasio regime. Those who have survived the most incompetent nerd in the city's history can only hope that Adams will come to their rescue with some proven commonsense methods of saving lives, instead of wasting taxpayer's money on ludicrous roadway graffiti that glorifies thugs and other assorted menaces to society! Image: Krystalb97 via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped). To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here. (ANSAmed) - ROME, NOV 17 - Italian President Sergio Mattarella on Wednesday said Parliament is a temple of democracy, addressing the Spanish Congress. "Each Parliament is a temple of democracy", said the president, who was welcomed in Congress by a long applause. "Discussion of different opinions finds its place there, ahead of a synthesis aimed at the common good. "Such a debate is the essence of democracy and the affirmation of the rule of law, because it registers within the limits and guarantees of the Constitution. "Meeting point of all citizens and - at the same time - point of departure to guarantee social peace, wellbeing and development", Mattarella said. (ANSAmed). MADRID - Spanish police arrested four people considered part of a group of 13 suspects who are still missing after passengers on November 5 fled on the runway of the airport of Palma de Mallorca from a plane that landed on the island over an alleged emergency, Spanish news agency Efe and other local media outlets have reported. The plane was flying from Casablanca to Istanbul. The suspects arrested were still in Mallorca. In the hours following the incident, which halted the airport for about three hours, Spanish police had already arrested 12 people, who are now in preventive custody. Investigators believe the attempt to flee was previously organized by a group of people planning to enter Spain illegally. On a Moroccan Facebook group a post had been published suggesting to simulate a medical emergency on a flight to Turkey to force it to land in Spain and then flee. Spanish authorities believe the incident followed the suggested plan. Channel 4 is to fund a dedicated casting team to find a Scottish family to star in Gogglebox. Pete Wishart MP, chairman of the Scottish Affairs Committee at Westminster, welcomed the decision which followed his committees evidence session on public broadcasting in Scotland with Channel 4. During the evidence session in September, Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross told bosses at the broadcaster there had not been a Scottish family on the programme since 2016. Channel 4 chief executive Alex Mahon told the committee: We do get complaints about the lack of representation on Gogglebox which is one of our biggest shows. She described this as being a continued pressure. Ms Mahon has since written to MPs to confirm that the broadcaster has agreed a separate budget for a dedicated casting team to find a suitable Scottish family to appear on the hit show. It is hoped that at least one Scottish family will be appearing on the programme from the New Year. During the Scottish Affairs Committee session held on September 20, MPs explored a number of areas ranging from privatisation, Channel 4s presence in Scotland and the impact Covid-19 has had on its production companies. Mr Wishart said: Channel 4 has impressive credentials for supporting independent producers and offering opportunities for young people wishing to explore the sector. We are bursting at the seams with talent in Scotland, and I am pleased to hear Channel 4s efforts to harness this potential. A theme which came up in our evidence session was the lack of a Scottish family on Gogglebox. It is clear some have approached the channel with similar concern, often offering themselves as an option. I am therefore pleased to see a dedicated team tasked with this and look forward to seeing the successful family on our screens in the new series. The Prince of Wales has urged the UK and Jordan to make protecting the environment a priority as the two nations build back after Covid-19. In a speech marking the 100th anniversary of the founding of Jordan, Charles said Britains former protectorate was a voice of moderation, understanding and tolerance in the region under the leadership of King Abdullah II. The prince, who has spent two days touring Jordan with the Duchess of Cornwall, learning about its heritage, work supporting refugees and efforts to bring religions together, said it was a special joy to be among friends after the sorrow, separation and grief of Covid. The future king noted the role Britain played especially soldier and adventurer Lawrence of Arabia in helping to shape the Middle East with regional figures. Charles told the guests at the Jordan Museum: As both our countries build back after Covid-19, I need hardly say that we must place a priority as we have never done before on protection of our environment. He highlighted how Jordans serious water shortage issue meant climate change was keenly felt, adding: I have recently attended the Cop26 climate summit in the UK where some important steps were taken to limit the global rise in temperatures. Success will require the sustained commitment of the global community to ensure that countries like Jordan have the support they need to find ways of adapting to a changing climate. Charles was presented with his portrait by Syrian refugee artist Faihaa (Arthur Edwards/The Sun/PA) Charles also evoked the spirit of TE Lawrence famous for his role fighting alongside Arabs during the revolt against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. The prince said: There can be little doubt that the great Arab revolt led by Hashemite Sharif Al Hussein Bin Ali changed the face of the Middle East. TE Lawrences chronicles of their struggle gave the Arab forces a near-mythical place in British memory, and indeed across the world. But the battered carriage from the Hijaz railway, which rests outside this museum, reminds us that their acts of courage were no myth. Those historic events, which saw British soldiers fighting side by side with their Arab partners, laid the foundation for the eventual establishment of the Jordanian state. Mail On Sunday editor Ted Verity will replace Geordie Greig at the helm of the Daily Mail, the papers owner has announced. Lord Rothermere, chairman of Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT), said on Wednesday that Verity will take over as editor of Mail Newspapers, which includes overall responsibility of the Daily Mail and The Mail On Sunday. Verity has been editor of the Mail on Sunday for the past three years while Greig was editor of The Mail On Sunday for the previous seven years and has spent the past three as editor of the Mail. Lord Rothermere said: Under Geordies leadership, the Daily Mail has continued to inform and entertain millions of readers with the very best journalism, becoming the biggest-selling newspaper in the UK and winning multiple prizes for Daily Newspaper of the Year. Geordie has been an outstanding editor of the Daily Mail and, before that The Mail on Sunday, and I thank him for his contribution over the last decade. Greig, who joined the Daily Mail in 1983 as a junior reporter, will become a consultant editor, Lord Rothermere said. Greig said: I am grateful to Lord Rothermere for 10 extraordinary years as editor of his newspapers. I thank everyone who has worked with me; my colleagues have been heroic and inspiring. I wish my successor Ted Verity good luck and also continued good fortune to The Mail. I look forward to new opportunities ahead and will bring the best of what I learnt from my years at The Mail on which I first joined in 1983 as its most junior reporter on the graveyard shift. The suspect in the Liverpool Remembrance Sunday bomb attack was a kind Christian who loved baking cakes, churchgoers have said. The congregation at Emmanuel Church in Fazakerley, Liverpool, was said to be in shock after the news that the bombing at Liverpool Womens Hospital involved Emad Al Swealmeen. Al Swealmeen attended the church between 2017 and 2019, where parishioners knew him as Enzo. Reverend Mike Hindley said: Enzo was here for a couple of years until 2019 when we gradually lost touch with him. Its just bewildering that a guy who was a really kind guy has ended up in that situation. He said the 32-year-old joined the church from Liverpool Cathedral and made no secret of the fact he had mental health problems. He added: Im still processing it. Its shocking to have somebody who you know who is going through something that has led them to a suicide bombing. Joy Gambardella, lay reader at the church, said Al Swealmeen had been a lovely, lovely man who was a committed Christian. She told the PA news agency: He used to love baking and he did a baking course, he also did pizza making. He used to make cakes for the church and sell them. She added: I would never, ever expect he could have done something like that, ever. I think the crucial thing is what happened to him when everything locked down because thats when everyones mental health went all over the place and we dont know what happened to him. Al Swealmeen, who was born in Iraq, attended a cake-decorating course at the City of Liverpool College from 2018 to 2019. (PA Graphics) Christian volunteers Malcolm and Elizabeth Hitchcott said he stayed with them in 2017. Mr Hitchcott told BBC Radio Merseyside: He arrived here on April 1, 2017. He was with us then for eight months, and during that time we saw him really blossoming in regards to his Christian faith. He really had a passion about Jesus that I wish many Christians had, and he was ready to learn. He was absolutely genuine, as far as I could tell. I was in no doubt by the time that he left us at the end of that eight months that he was a Christian. Liverpool Cathedral confirmed Al Swealmeen was baptised in 2015 and confirmed there in 2017, but lost contact with the cathedral the following year. Mr Hitchcott said Al Swealmeen had been refused asylum in 2014 after he was sectioned following a mental health incident where he was waving a knife at people from an overpass. A spokesman for Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust, which provides mental health services, said Al Swealmeen was not under their care at the time of the explosion, although he had received treatment in the past. Counter-Terrorism Police North West said Al Swealmeens episodes of mental illness would form part of their investigation. Police said he had lived at a property in Sutcliffe Street, in the Kensington area of Liverpool, for some time and began renting a property in Rutland Avenue, near Sefton Park, in April. The force said significant items had been recovered from the Rutland Avenue address, where searches have been taking place since Sunday. Royal wedding cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason has described being honoured with an MBE at the age of 22 as very, very special. After performing at Windsor Castle for the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in 2018, the classical musician returned to collect an MBE for services to music. Kanneh-Mason, who became the first black BBC Young Musician in 2016, was joined by his father, Stuart, as he was presented with the award by the Princess Royal on Wednesday. He previously revealed to the PA news agency that he did not feel nervous playing at the royal wedding, and appeared equally unruffled after collecting his accolade. Sheku Kanneh-Mason comes from a musical family (Aaron Chown/PA) The softly spoken musician, who has been playing the cello since the age of six and comes from a musical family with six siblings, said: It feels like a massive honour to collect this today. Its very, very exciting to be recognised for doing what I love anyway its very, very special. The rising star is the third of seven children born to immigrant parents from Antigua and Sierra Leone. He has performed at the BBC Proms every summer since 2017, including 2020 when he gave a breath-taking pandemic performance with his sister, Isata, to an empty auditorium. During the spring 2020 lockdown, Kanneh-Mason and his siblings performed via virtual livestreams from their family home in Nottingham. He told PA there has never been any rivalry between them. He said: I think we just inspire each other and encourage each other, and it was highlighted in the lockdown that we could play together with each other, that was always something I was grateful for growing up. I enjoy sharing music that I have thought about and spent time working on, I enjoy sharing that with the audience, its a very exciting experience and thrilling to perform, he added. Sheku Kanneh-Mason played at a royal wedding (Yui Mok/PA) I just feel very lucky, always, when Im on stage. It has been difficult to not have that audience during the pandemic, so its great to have that back. Its always such a special thing. Kanneh-Mason revealed his biggest musical muse is late cellist Jacqueline du Pre. He said: I always enjoyed watching her play and her approach to music which was always 100% passion and commitment to every note she played. Kanneh-Mason is the highest-charting cellist of all time in the UK, after his 2020 album Elgar, based on Edward Elgars Cello Concerto, hit number eight, making it the first to ever break into the top 10. He is also the first British classical instrumentalist in more than 30 years to reach the top 10 after violinist Nigel Kennedy released Vivaldis Four Seasons in 1989, which peaked at number three. Kanneh-Masons performance of three pieces of music at the royal wedding, including his tear-jerking rendition of Ave Maria, is believed to have been watched by an estimated two billion people across the world. The cellist studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London as a bicentenary fellow and plays a Matteo Goffriller cello from 1700 which is on indefinite loan to him. LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -A crew member working on the "Rust" movie last month said in a lawsuit that the script never called for a gun to be fired during a rehearsal scene with Alec Baldwin, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Baldwin killed a cinematographer when the gun, loaded with a live round, went off on the set. The lawsuit was filed in Los Angeles on Wednesday by Mamie Mitchell, who was the script supervisor on the low-budget Western being made in New Mexico. It names Baldwin and the movie producers. Mitchell is claiming assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and deliberate infliction of harm, the Hollywood Reporter said on Wednesday, citing a copy of the court papers it obtained. Mitchell and her attorney, Gloria Allred, were due to hold a news conference in Los Angeles later on Wednesday. The lawsuit is the second to be filed over the shooting. Authorities in Santa Fe are still investigating and no criminal charges have been filed. It said the script called for three tight camera shots for the scene - one of Baldwin's eyes, another on a bloodstain, and a third on Baldwin's torso "as he reached his hand down to the holster and removed the gun. There was nothing in the script about the gun being discharged by defendant Baldwin or by any other person, the lawsuit says. Baldwin and the producers of the movie could not immediately be reached for comment. Cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed on Oct. 21 and director Joel Souza was wounded when a gun Baldwin had been told was safe fired off a live bullet, investigators have said. Other live rounds have also been found on the set. (Reporting by Jill SerjeantEditing by Mark Heinrich) FILE PHOTO: Flags of the U.S., Canada and Mexico fly next to each other in Detroit, Michigan WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Leaders of the United States, Canada and Mexico will meet for the first time in five years on Thursday to promote economic integration, but tensions over the auto industry, 'Buy American' policies and a Mexican energy bill could weigh on talks. President Joe Biden has revived the so-called Three Amigos summit - to be held at the White House on Thursday afternoon for the first time since 2016, after it was ditched by former President Donald Trump. Bilateral meetings will be held earlier in the day. The meeting aims to further joint economic cooperation, but both Canada and Mexico are worried about Biden's 'Buy American' provisions and a proposed electric vehicle tax credit that would favor unionized, U.S.-based manufacturers. The United States is Mexico's and Canada's top trade partner, and cars and trucks are the most-traded manufactured commodity between the three, said Colin Robertson, an ex-Canadian diplomat, now at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute think tank. "The North American automotive industry is deeply integrated and competing as a bloc in the manufacture of a world-class e-vehicle and battery industry makes good economic sense for all three countries," Robertson said. Both Canada and Mexico want a level playing field as they compete to lure companies to set up plants for the EV supply chain. But Biden's social spending and climate bill being considered in Congress includes up to $12,500 in tax credits for U.S.-made EVs, including a $4,500 credit for union-made vehicles. Mexican Economy Minister Tatiana Clouthier this week chided the United States for closing itself off https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-diplomacy-mexico-canada-idUSKBN2I21H8, saying protectionist policies could aggravate problems with mass migration. In the trilateral meeting, the White House has said it is aiming to create a "regional vision for migration." Other subjects to be discussed include fighting COVID-19 and climate change together. However, the bilateral meetings are likely to be where more pointed discussions are held. Besides EV tax credits, Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is likely to bring up Enbridge Inc's Line 5 pipeline https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/canadian-lawmakers-call-action-us-canadian-leaders-pipeline-dispute-2021-04-15, which the state of Michigan wants to close on environmental grounds. For Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the meeting could be where Biden addresses Mexico's contentious bill https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/mexican-congress-pushes-back-debate-power-bill-into-2022-2021-11-04 to change electricity market rules to give Mexico's state-owned power company priority over private investment. Lopez Obrador said on Wednesday he would explain the plan to Biden and Trudeau if it came up. "It's very simple," he told a news conference. "We want to keep electricity prices from increasing, and to end abuses by private companies, especially foreign companies." Lopez Obrador argues past governments rigged the market in favor of private interests. But the legislation has drawn fire from the U.S. government and business groups, which are concerned it may not be compliant with Mexico's North American trade obligations. Federico Pena, a former U.S. energy secretary, told Reuters that he hoped Mexico would try to iron out its differences lest it create a precedent that sullied its reputation. "For Mexico to still be respected as a country for investment, it has to be very mindful about changing contracts radically to the detriment of companies that relied on the good faith of negotiations of the previous administration," he said. The leaders started holding the Three Amigos summit in 2005 and met most years until 2016. (Reporting by Steve Scherer in Ottawa, Dave Graham in Mexico City and Jarrett Renshaw in Washington, writing by Steve Scherer; editing by Richard Pullin and Rosalba O'Brien) monkeypox Getty A Maryland resident was diagnosed with monkeypox after returning from a trip to Nigeria, the Centers for Disease Control confirmed Wednesday. The rare virus, named because it was originally found in colonies of monkeys used for research, first causes fever, headache, muscle aches, chills and swollen lymph nodes, and after one to three days patients develop a rash that spreads over the body. Monkeypox typically spreads through respiratory droplets, or from touching body fluids or the rashes. The CDC said that the Maryland resident has mild symptoms and is now in isolation after flying back to the U.S. through Washington, D.C. The federal health agency is currently working with local and international health officials and the airline to identify anyone who may have come in contact with the patient. But because airline passengers were required to wear masks on the flight due to the COVID-19 pandemic, health officials believe that the risk of monkeypox transmission from the patient is "low." "Public health authorities have identified and continue to follow up with those who may have been in contact with the diagnosed individual," Dr. Jinlene Chan, from the Maryland Department of Health, said in a statement. RELATED VIDEO: 11-Year-Old Making Masks for Healthcare Workers Surprised With Money for New Sewing Machine Monkeypox is most often found in central and west African countries or in travelers coming from those areas. This is the second case of monkeypox in the U.S. this year, after a person in Texas who had also traveled from Nigeria was diagnosed in July. Prior to this year, the last cases in the U.S. were from 2003. The Maryland Department of Health instructed any travelers returning from central or western Africa to look out for monkeypox symptoms and alert their doctor if they start feeling sick. FILE PHOTO: Shmuel Peleg, the grandfather of Eitan Biran, arrives to the District court in Tel Aviv JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A six-year-old boy, the sole survivor of an Italian cable car disaster who was kidnapped and taken to Israel by his grandfather, will remain in the country for the next seven days, Israel's Supreme Court said on Wednesday, as it reviews a request to appeal his return to Italy. Eitan Biran's maternal grandfather lost an appeal at a district court on Thursday against a family court's decision in October to send the boy back to his paternal aunt in Italy in a cross-border custody battle. The child had been living with the aunt since his parents, younger brother and 11 other people died when a gondola plunged to the ground in northern Italy in May. In September, while visiting Eitan, his maternal grandfather, without the aunt's consent, drove him to Switzerland and chartered a private jet onward to Israel. The aunt petitioned the family court for his return to Italy. The court found that the grandfather's actions amounted to kidnapping under the Hague Convention on the return of abducted children. The grandfather's lawyers have asked Israel's top court to hear another appeal. On Wednesday, the court gave a Nov 23. deadline until the sides hand in their arguments, after which it will issue its ruling on whether yet another appeal may be filed. Until then, the court said, all proceedings in the case were to be halted. The aunt's lawyers said in a statement that they had hoped that the grandfather "would do the right thing and free Eitan to return home to his regular life." They said they were confidant the Supreme Court would uphold the two previous rulings. The grandfather and the aunt cannot be named due to Israeli court restrictions. (Reporting by Maayan Lubell,; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Angus MacSwan) WASHINGTON House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy sought to navigate the delicate intraparty divisions over the new infrastructure law, making the case on Tuesday that Republicans should focus on criticizing Democrats instead of each other. At a closed-door House Republican caucus meeting, McCarthy called on lawmakers to stay unified and not attack their GOP colleagues, two sources familiar with the meeting said. McCarthy suggested they should focus their fire on Democrats Build Back Better bill, one of the sources said. His plea comes as some far-right members who are closely aligned with former President Donald Trump have begun attacking fellow Republicans who voted for the $550 billion infrastructure package. Publicly, McCarthy has been one of Trump's loudest defenders, but he has struggled to hold together a caucus that has publicly feuded over the former president. Trump has threatened to work to unseat those Republicans who supported the bipartisan infrastructure law that was a key piece of President Joe Biden's legislative agenda. Trump issued a flurry of statements blasting it as a "Non-Infrastructure" bill and complaining that it "gives Biden and the Democrats a victory just as they were falling off the cliff." Some of the lawmakers who voted for the bill have received death threats, including Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich. In the House, 13 Republicans voted for the proposal earlier this month, helping push it across the finish line amid defections from a small group of progressive Democrats. In the Senate, 19 Republicans voted for it in August after a group of 10 senators, evenly split between the parties, crafted the bill. Trump's opposition to the infrastructure deal has largely been about the politics, not the policy, arguing that it gave Biden a win that he can now tout to voters. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, a moderate who Trump is trying to defeat in 2022, responded to his attacks by saying there has been an "unfortunate backlash" by some who put politics above good governance. "To deny good policy just because you don't want to give the occupant of the White House a win penalizes the whole country," she said in an interview. Republicans who voted for the bill pushed back on Trumps attacks and pointed to his own efforts to strike an infrastructure deal with Congress making the case that the policy enjoyed his support as recently as last year. "I don't appreciate that. I think that we're all working to try to do what's good. This is good for the country," Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said Tuesday after a White House signing ceremony for the bill. "[Trump] wanted an infrastructure package and this reflects a lot of probably what he would have wanted in his. So it's good for us. So I don't appreciate that." Capito said it was "obviously a big investment in roads and bridges and highways" for West Virginia, as well as broadband, which she said "we're still lagging" in. When he was president, Trump called for a $2 trillion infrastructure bill, a topline that Speaker Nancy Pelosi agreed to in 2019, but the negotiations collapsed after Trump demanded that Democrats stop investigating his administration before he was willing to proceed. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, a Trump adversary, also bristled at the ex-president's efforts. "I have given up trying to ascribe motives to the former president or to explain his posture," Romney told NBC News. Trump has repeatedly criticized Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., for backing the bill and giving members of his caucus the green light to craft it with Democrats. McConnell, without responding directly to Trump, has praised the bill as a "godsend for Kentucky." Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., a conservative who supported the infrastructure law, defended his vote. "I think spending money on roads, bridges, airports, seaports, lake control, broadband is good policy," he said on Tuesday. "Our infrastructure is crumbling." Asked why he believes there's so much animosity over a bipartisan transportation bill, Wicker said, "I haven't really spent much time considering that question." "I just think it's a good bill," he said. Fort Worth Police Department officer Aaron York Dean is seen in a booking photo at the Tarrant County Jail in Fort Worth, Texas, U.S. October 14, 2019. Tarrant County Jail/Handout via REUTERS. THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) A former Fort Worth police officer faces a murder trial early next year for fatally shooting a Black woman through a back window of her home in 2019 while responding to a call about an open front door. A Tarrant County judge on Tuesday scheduled Aaron Deans trial in the fatal shooting of 28-year-old Atatiana Jefferson for Jan. 10, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports. Jury selection is set to begin six days earlier, although Judge David Hagerman indicated he's expecting Dean's lawyers to seek a change of venue. A location change could further hold up a case, which has been delayed repeatedly over the more than two years since Dean shot Jefferson during a late-night wellness check at her mothers house. His case was among many that were postponed when the coronavirus pandemic caused courts across the country to postpone jury trials. Dean, 37, resigned from the city police force two days after shooting Jefferson. He was charged with murder and released on a $200,000 bond. Following the shooting, Fort Worth police released body camera footage that showed Dean walked around the side of the house, pushed through a gate into the fenced-off backyard and fired through a window a split-second after shouting at Jefferson to show her hands. Police went to the house after a neighbor called a non-emergency line to report that the front door was ajar. Dean, who is white, was not heard identifying himself as police on the video. The citys police chief at the time, Ed Kraus, said Dean acted without justification and that there was no sign he or the other officer who responded even knocked on the front door. Kraus said Dean would have been fired if he had not quit without giving a statement to investigators. A judge has issued a gag order in Deans case. He declined to comment to a Star-Telegram reporter in court. Former President Donald Trump has been rolling out a steady stream of endorsements targeting fellow Republicans who joined Democrats in voting for his impeachment, the creation of the Jan. 6 committee or the just-signed infrastructure bill. In West Virginia, Trump on Monday endorsed Rep. Alex Mooney, who he said "recently opposed the horrendous Biden Administrations 'Non-Infrastructure' plan, and he opposed the January 6th Committee, also known as the Unselect Committee of partisan hacks and degenerates." Thanks to redistricting, Mooney is taking on fellow Republican Rep. David McKinley, who voted for the infrastructure bill and the House Jan. 6 committee. McKinley defended his vote on the infrastructure bill which Trump had urged Republicans to oppose in an op-ed in the Charleston Gazette-Mail over the weekend. "For my West Virginia constituents, this bill will bring significant investment in hard infrastructure: roads, bridges, sewer and water lines, broadband into every county, flood relief, and upgrades to our aging electric grid. The bill also provides funds to continue research into capturing carbon from coal- and gas-fired power plants," McKinley wrote. Mooney celebrated Trump's endorsement on social media and told West Virginia MetroNews that he had met with Trump for an hour at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida over the weekend. "It is a big deal," Mooney said of the endorsement from Trump, who remains very popular in his district. "I think you'll see it in just about every [campaign] ad." Trump on Monday also endorsed John Gibbs, an official at the Department of Housing and Urban Development during his administration, who is running against Rep. Peter Meijer, R-Mich. Meijer was one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump this year on a charge that he incited the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. In a statement, Trump said "Meyer" which is how Meijer's name is pronounced has been "a terrible representative of the Republican Party and beyond." Trump nominated Gibbs last year to be the director of the Office of Personnel Management, but he was not confirmed following CNN's reporting about inflammatory tweets he sent about Democrats in 2016. The tweets included suggestions that Hillary Clinton's campaign manager took part in satanic rituals. Gibbs was asked about the tweets during a hearing and said: "Like all Americans, I have political opinions that I've expressed in the past. But I'm very proud to say that during my service in the government, I've always led in a nonpartisan manner." In his endorsement, Trump said Gibbs "will fight hard for the great people of Michigan." Trump had previously targeted Republicans who voted for his impeachment, including Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, but he has broadened his scope in recent days. Over the weekend, Trump said he was looking for primary challengers to endorse in races against several other Republicans, whom he referred to as "sellouts" and "known losers" who voted for impeachment, the Jan. 6 committee or the infrastructure bill. "Any interest from good and SMART America First Republican Patriots to run primary campaigns," Trump asked in a statement before listing the targeted lawmakers. He promised the potential challengers, "You will have my backing!" The list omitted three Republicans whom Trump had blasted for backing the infrastructure bill, Reps. Nicole Malliotakis of New York, Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania. Malliotakis repeatedly defended her vote as good for her constituents on social media. "I cast my vote FOR the bipartisan infrastructure bill and AGAINST advancing the socialist spending spree," she said on Twitter. WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States is planning to invest billions of dollars in expanding COVID-19 vaccine manufacturing capacity to make available an additional one billion doses per year, a Biden administration official said on Wednesday. The announcement to be made Wednesday comes as the administration of President Joe Biden faces pressure from activists to increase the vaccine supply to poorer countries. The investment in vaccine production is part of a private-public partnership to address vaccine needs at home and around the world and also to prepare for future pandemics, Dr. David Kessler, who oversees vaccine distribution, and Jeff Zients, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, told the New York Times, which first reported the plan. The plan is estimated to cost several billion dollars and will be paid for with funds from the American Rescue Plan Biden signed into law in March, Kessler told the newspaper. The administration official told Reuters the government was preparing to offer makers of the mRNA vaccines substantial help to expand infrastructure and capacity, including facilities, equipment, staff, or training. "In the short term, this would make a significant amount of COVID-19 vaccine doses available at cost for global use, and in the long term, it would help establish sustained domestic manufacturing capacity to rapidly produce vaccines for future threats," the official said. Kessler told the Times the goal was to ensure expanded capacity in future. "The goal, in the case of a future pandemic, a future virus, is to have vaccine capability within six to nine months of identification of that pandemic pathogen, and to have enough vaccines for all Americans," he said. (Reporting by Jeff Mason and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Bernadette Baum) A bottle of smallpox vaccine is held by a doctor at CDC headquarters in Atlanta in 2003. (Tami Chappell/Reuters) WASHINGTON The FBI and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are investigating questionable vials labeled "smallpox" and found in a freezer last night at a Merck facility outside Philadelphia, according to an alert sent to Department of Homeland Security leadership on Tuesday night. There were reportedly a total of 15 questionable vials, according to the unclassified "For Official Use Only" alert, a copy of which was obtained by Yahoo News. Five of the vials were labeled as smallpox and 10 were labeled as vaccinia." The vials were secured immediately. The discovery of the vials prompted a lockdown of the facility, which has since been lifted. The FBI and CDC launched investigations, which remain ongoing. There is no indication that anyone has been exposed to the small number of frozen vials. The frozen vials labeled Smallpox were incidentally discovered by a laboratory worker while cleaning out a freezer in a facility that conducts vaccine research in Pennsylvania, a CDC spokesperson told Yahoo News. CDC, its Administration partners, and law enforcement are investigating the matter, and the vials contents appear intact. The laboratory worker who discovered the vials was wearing gloves and a face mask. We will provide further details as they are available, the spokesperson said. Smallpox, a disease caused by the variola virus, is considered so deadly that only two labs in the world are authorized to store samples of the virus, including one in Russia and the other at the CDC in Atlanta. A hazmat team prepares to enter a building. (Douglas Graham/Roll Call/Getty Images) Scientists have debated for years whether to destroy any remaining samples, citing the danger of a mishap that could unleash a disease that has been eradicated since the 1970s. Those in favor of keeping samples have argued they are needed to develop new vaccines in response to a new outbreak. The majority of Americans are not vaccinated against smallpox, and those who were vaccinated would likely now have waning immunity. The CDC will arrive on site tomorrow to take custody of the vials and transport them to another facility for testing, the alert notes. No personnel were reportedly exposed to the material. There is no indication that anyone has been exposed to the small number of frozen vials. The frozen vials labeled Smallpox were incidentally discovered by a laboratory worker while cleaning out a freezer in a facility that conducts vaccine research in Pennsylvania," the CDC said in a statement to Yahoo News. "CDC, its Administration partners, and law enforcement are investigating the matter and the vials contents appear intact. The laboratory worker who discovered the vials was wearing gloves and a face mask. We will provide further details as they are available. Merck, DHS and FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Thank you for reading! Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading. Express your opinion! Fill out this form to submit a Letter to the Editor. Submit YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The Secretary General of the 47-nation Council of Europe, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to remain committed to solving conflict by peaceful means. I am concerned about reports of on-going incidents between Armenia and Azerbaijan that have already cost human lives. News of a ceasefire is welcome and I call on both sides to maintain it. When joining our organization more than twenty years ago, both Armenia and Azerbaijan committed themselves to solving conflict by peaceful means. This commitment remains unchanged and must be strictly respected, the CoE Secretary General said. Marija Pejcinovic Buric stated that the Council of Europe reiterates its full support to the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group in their continuing efforts to help Armenia and Azerbaijan find a peaceful solution to their differences. We stand ready to facilitate dialogue between these two member states, with a view to building confidence and promoting reconciliation, Marija Pejcinovic Buric said. YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 17, ARMENPRESS. The OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs are currently in Vienna to discuss the current situation, ARMENPRESS reports the representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova said during a briefing with journalists. Referring to the activities of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs, Zakharova recalled their November 15 statement, emphasizing that they continue their active mediation efforts, within the framework of which they recently met in Paris with the Foreign Ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan. Once again, we highlight the urgent organization of the visit of the Co-Chairs to the region, Zakharova said. Rheinmetall, the largest supplier of military vehicles to the Australian Defence Force has successfully completed demonstration trials of the Soucy Composite Rubber Track (CRT) system on the Lynx KF41 Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV). Follow Army Recognition on Google News at this link Rheinmetall KF41 Lynx IFV (Picture source: Army Recognition) Rheinmetall Managing Director Gary Stewart said the CRT demonstration confirmed the Lynx IFV was capable of utilising both steel and composite rubber tracks. The vehicle was reconfigured from its base steel track system to the CRT, successfully demonstrating vehicle operation on the CRT system and then returned to the base Steel Track configuration with great success. The Rheinmetall Lynx IFV has the modularity and flexibility to be operated with both types of track systems, allowing armies to configure the vehicle to meet the operational need. This ensures the Lynx IFV can support the benefits of either system. In tomorrows battlefield, flexibility is key to match vehicle capability to the required threat environment. Lynx with its design for modularity is able to be configured to meet that emergent environment, he said. Mr. Stewart said the flexibility of incorporating CRT as a track option on Lynx increased the vehicles ability to meet a dynamic threat environment. With the flexibility of the CRT fitted to the Lynx, the platform can be configured for a lighter all up weight (due to weight saving in track) to allow easier air transportation and to potentially reduce overall running costs through the service life of the vehicles. Both track systems have their advantages and while it is for the end user to determine whether a Steel or Composite Rubber track is most appropriate, the flexibility of the Lynx design to be configured with either provides the greatest flexibility to defence, Mr. Stewart added. Rheinmetall KF41 Lynx IFV (Picture source: Rheinmetall) According to Jammu and Kashmir Police, terrorists had lobbed the grenade at a CRPF naka party Paramilitary soldiers check the scooter of a civilian at a market in Srinagar, Tuesday, Nov 16, 2021. (AP/Mukhtar Khan) Baramulla: Two Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) jawans and one civilian were injured as terrorists hurled a grenade at security forces in Palhalan Pattan area of Baramulla district in Jammu and Kashmir, informed police on Wednesday. According to Jammu and Kashmir Police, terrorists had lobbed the grenade at a CRPF naka party. More details are awaited. San Angelo, TX (76909) Today Sunny with gusty winds. High around 85F. Winds W at 20 to 30 mph. Winds could occasionally gust over 40 mph.. Tonight Mainly clear. Low 42F. Winds NW at 15 to 25 mph. Higher wind gusts possible. Having just survived the Great Depression, Harley-Davidson jumped at the opportunity of supplying fighting forces with motorcycles and, for what its worth, it became the premier supplier of such machines: by the time the war ended, over 90,000 motorcycles had been made.The two-wheelers in the WLA family represented the bulk of that output, but there were other bikes Harley made and tried to shove them under the militarys nose. One such product was the Experimental Army, or XA, a two-wheeler that, ironically, was built using German-made hardware.The XA used an opposed twin, 45ci shaft-drive engine, reverse-engineered from the powerplant BMW used in the R71. It was a flathead and came tied to a 4-speed transmission.Harley started work on the XA in 1942 and ended up making about 1,000 units before becoming convinced the Army had no need for them. Its unclear how many survive to this day, hence every time one pops up, its bound to gain quite the attention.And what do you know, heres one, waiting to be sold from the Harley-Davidson Heritage Collection during the Mecum auction in Las Vegas at the end of January 2022.What sets this particular bike apart is that its offered complete with a Tommy gun and ammo boxes. Theyre not the real deal, but authentic reproductions, yet that doesnt make them any less cool.The seller does not say how much they expect the XA to fetch, but we do know it goes with no reserve, so the sky is the limit. The 1983 Honda CX650 Custom well be inspecting today comes with an assortment of modern goodies installed under current ownership, such as top-shelf spark plugs, a youthful battery, and new Challenger tires from Kendas inventory. To bring the engines performance back to optimal parameters, its valves were adjusted, and the carburetors have been treated to a thorough scrub.After flushing the fluids, the owner refurbished the original forks using fresh seals. Otherwise, Hondas classic warrior retains its stock specifications, featuring a little over 29k miles (46,700 km) on the odometer. The CX650 is put in motion by a longitudinally-mounted 673cc V-twin powerplant that boasts dual constant-velocity Keihin carbs, four valves per cylinder, and a compression ratio of 9.8:1.When the four-stroke mill purrs at about 8,000 rpm, a maximum power output figure of 65 ponies will be sent to a five-speed gearbox, which spins the rear 15-inch cast alloy wheel through a shaft final drive. Upon touching the ground, this force enables its bearer to reach speeds of up to 111 mph (179 kph).Braking is taken good care of by a single brake rotor and a two-piston caliper up front, along with a traditional drum setup at six oclock. The 83 MY creature sits on air-adjustable 39 mm (1.5 inches) leading-axle forks and twin preload-adjustable shock absorbers. When all the vital juice is added, the Japanese pearl will tip the scales at 481 pounds (218 kg), while its fuel capacity is rated at 3.3 gallons (12.5 liters).This CX650 Custom is currently up for grabs on the BaT (Bring A Trailer) website, where it will be listed at no reserve until Monday afternoon (November 22). If youd like to see the entity parked in your garage, well have you know that youre going to need around 4,500 freedom bucks to surpass the top bid, which is placed at $4,200. EV First things first, though. Thanks to a high-capacity lithium-ion battery pack, the Solterra can give you an 80% charge from zero in less than one hour using DC fast charging. You can also charge theat home, thanks to its Level 1 and Level 2 compatibility. The maximum estimated range is said to be more than 220 miles (354 km), which is decent.We dont know the exact EPA rating, and we also dont know anything regarding pricing, but we expect Subaru to make this information available in due course. The Solterra wont go on sale until mid-2022.Now, about that X-Mode it features Grip Control, incorporating both Hill Ascent and Descent Assist. You can easily take the Solterra off the beaten path thanks to its 8.3 inches of ground clearance. You also get 215 hp (218 ps) and 248 lb-ft (336 Nm) of torque, courtesy of the front and rear electric motors.In terms of practicality, the Solterra offers up to 126 cu-ft of passenger and cargo space, including up to 30 c-.ft of usable cargo space behind the rear seats.This being a Subaru, you can expect them not to skimp on any of the active safety features, which is why you get a comprehensive suite of goodies such as EyeSight Driver Assist Tech, Blind Spot Monitoring with Lane Change Assist and Rear Cross-Traffic Alert, plus Parking Support Brake (which is standard), a 360-Degree Surround-View Camera (first time in a Subaru), standard LED headlights with High Beam Assist and standard Safe Exit Assist.The latter is a new safety feature that notifies occupants before exiting the vehicle of any approaching vehicles. It does this via an audible and visual warning.As for the interior, theres an all-new multimedia system with an available 12.3-inch touchscreen display, which comes standard with wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto , as well as a wireless charging phone dock in the center console.Once on sale, the Solterra will join the Outback, Forester , Crosstrek, and Crosstrek Plug-in Hybrid in Subarus rugged fleet of notoriously dependable family cars. On November 11th, the rocket's upper stage arrived at the launch vehicle integration facility in French Guiana , where it was joined by the core stage and boosters. It was then raised into the vertical position and mated with the top of the core stage.Powered by an HM7B engine, the Ariane 5 upper stage will carry around 15 tons (14 metric tons) of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen propellant to deliver enough force to leave our skies with the giant telescope. Once it separates from the core stage, the upper stage will send the telescope on its million-mile (1.5 million-kilometer) journey away from Earth.Webb will be the world's largest and most powerful space telescope. The European Space Agency (ESA) is providing the telescope's launch vehicle as part of an international cooperative agreement. For this mission, ESA managed the Ariane 5 adaptations in collaboration with industry partners.To fit into the rocket, the telescope must fold its 6,5 meters (21 ft) mirror , which will then be commanded to unfold as it reaches its destination in space (precisely, the second Lagrange point or four times the distance to the Moon).Webb arrived in French Guiana in October after a 16-day voyage at sea. Preparations have already begun for the telescope's big journey, and soon, it will join the rocket for integration.On December 18th, the giant observatory will leave Earth and will travel for about a month. Once deployed, Webb will help scientists peer into all phases of cosmic history and study how galaxies and planets were formed, searching for evidence of possibly habitable alien worlds. For the latest episode in the series, he and the crew traveled to visit Costa Mesa, California-based SOCO. But dont confuse it with the restaurant chain because we are talking about the South County Auto Salon. And just like any other automotive customization shop, they too have a shop truck. Only this one is a showstopper on its own.The build of this slammed 1963 Chevy C30 dually with a swapped Cummins turbo diesel started with a C10 that was converted to a late 1980s C30 chassis. They picked it up from Tennessee and has become their designated shop truck. Believe it or not, this bagged wonder does whats its supposed to do, going wherever it needs to with a flatbed (and a Hot Rod) attached to its hitch assembly.Naturally, not much stuff does get carried in the bed, on the other hand. Primarily because they dont want to scratch the work of art it has been turned into, but also because its way too lifted to be usable. After all, the builders needed space to fit the airbag suspension, C30 chassis and allow for the trucks laid-out appearance.Under the hood resides a 12V 5.9-liter Cummins turbo diesel engine that was swapped from a 1993 Dodge pickup truck, and its still untouched by aftermarket goodies. Although thats probably going to change soon. Plans also include a transmission swap, a completely new bespoke chassis with a huge Wilwood brake kit, as well as uniquely-designed wheels... probably because those 22s up front and the 24s in the rear werent enough of a crowd draw!Anyway, some other highlights include the single-side 3.5-inch custom exhaust thats well hidden next to one of the dually wheels, the crimson TMI interior with a towering-high gearshift lever, and retro-looking modern creature comforts. The cockpit can be seen from the 4:30 mark, while the mandatory drive kicks off at the 6:25 mark. Only this time around, dont expect to see a traditional burnout as well! Thats not whats happening with the two F-15C Eagles we have here, airplanes that look anything but deadly and cold when not engaged in battle, but flying instead in the partially clear skies they call home. The Eagle, initially designed by McDonnell Douglas, is in essence a tactical fighter, and weve seen some ugly machines designed for the same purpose, as beauty its not necessarily a battle-required trait.It seems to be for the Eagles though, and their beauty is best seen when a camera captures the sleek silhouette of not one, but two such machines, slightly banked, with clear blue sky and white specks of clouds in the background.The Eagles seen here are deployed with the 67th Fighter Squadron, also known as the Fighting Cocks. The unit, created back in 1941, is part of the 18th Operations Group and calls home the Kadena Air Base in Japan.The Cocks are one of just two squadrons in the Western Pacific to fly Eagles and have been in the area since 1943. The squadron took part in fights since 1944, providing escort for allied transport and bombers, and later was saw action during the Korean and Vietnam wars.Over the years, the 67th used a variety of military aircraft, starting with the Seversky P-35 and Curtiss P-36 Hawk, and ending with the F-4 Phantom and the Eagle. The latter has been used by the pilots of the unit ever since it came into service at the end of the 1970s. As promised ever since the beginning of the month, Boeing traveled to the 2021 Dubai Airshow with the full complement of flying machines it makes, from the civilian Dreamliners to the military MV-22 Osprey tiltrotor. None of these beasts seems as exciting though as the 777X, especially now that we have official footage of it in action above the events dedicated site.The 777X was born as an idea all the way back in 2013. Its a widebody offshoot of the well-known 777, meant to be about 10 percent more fuel-efficient, and 10 percent cheaper to operate than a similar plane made by the companys competitors.When testing of the plane ends, Boeing will launch two versions of it, the 777-8 and 777-9. The formers edge is the 16,170 km (a little over 10,000 miles) range, while the latter relies on the huge number of passengers it can carry, 426, to make an impression.That makes the 777X quite the large mechanical beast, so seeing it perform a couple of maneuvers usually reserved for fighter planes is quite the rare event. Yet thats exactly what the pilots of the plane did in Dubai.Below this text is a rather short, 1.2 minutes-long clip that shows the 777X taking off almost vertically, then flying above the heads of the curious crowd. It comes and goes, and almost rolls over at one point (on purpose) as it tries to prove its capabilities.Needless to say, once production starts, the airplane will give up showing off, so enjoy it doing tricks while you still can. Full Self-Driving Back in 2018, Mr. Musk threatened to take Tesla private. Along with speculation into cryptocurrency, it prompted the SEC to slap him with a $20 Million fine. He said the notoriety was worth it to make light of how the American financial system favors the good ol boys.Meanwhile, the FAA is having fun scrutinizing every aspect of Starship and its Super-Heavy launcher. Their statement of September 17th reiterates that a launch license cant be granted because the big program falls outside of their 2014 Environmental Impact Statement.It seems as if the media is also having a field day with the debacle over the repeal of. My father in-law has been a Beta tester at every opportunity, and his Model X has done every task in a flawless manner. Nevertheless, CNN says Tesla owners now fear their cars. Taking the initiative to jump on the bandwagon, the nations most powerful banking institution filed a suit in NYC late Monday afternoon. Reuters says their gripe stems from the stock price back in 2018. They had negotiated an option to buy Tesla stock if the price dropped to a certain level.They were betting on Teslas price to drop so they could purchase a chunk while it was affordable. But they apparently complain that the price wasnt fixed, and that Tesla owes themin damages related to this supposed lost opportunity. Instead of investing in the company, JPM was betting on the price to drop. Instead, it doubled ten times by the time the purchase warrants had expired. Before this lawsuit is dragged into years of litigation, perhaps it could set a precedent for other entrepreneurs.Americans are tired of being squeezed. Big banks would have us rent a shoebox for $1,400 then offer us a mortgage for $700 a month. Here in North Florida, 93 octane is $4.30 per gallon, and half a cart of groceries is a solid Ben Franklin. If Tesla modeled itself like the big automakers, the cost of this suit would be amortized in raising prices to the consumer. Instead, the boss will likely use this as a great opportunity to point out the cronyism that exists between the power players.Henry Ford lost histo predatory banks, so he vowed to never go public again. Later in life, his friends allowed him a peek behind the curtains. After witnessing how financiers and the Federal Reserve throttle our economy he said: It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.During the crisis of 1907 , J.P. Morgan locked the nations powerful bankers in the parlor of his house in Jekyll Island, Georgia. It was there that our financial future was laid out. Times have changed, and it seems that the bank that bears his name has resorted to unscrupulous antics to make money, and were hardly surprised.Entrepreneurs need not lose hope, because the reign of the dinosaurs is coming to an end. Crypto has taught us all that Wall Street is grasping for relevance, so imagine what their friend in Big Oil will do when Americans fully embrace electric commuting. The future looks bright to us! While this partnership is still in its infancy and we have little details on the new vehicles design, specs, and features, Northrop Grumman tells us the lunar rover will be agile, flexible, affordable, and will enhance human and robotic exploration both on the Moon and eventually on Mars.All partners involved in the project will bring their vast and proven expertise to the table. As the leader of the team, Northrop Grumman will be in charge of systems integration, avionics, navigation, sensors, controls, cargo storage, to name its main responsibilities.Michelin will be in charge of developing the airless tires of the lunar rover, while AVL will handle the electric propulsion system. Intuitive Machines will provide vehicle launch and landing functionality for the LTV, applying the same technology used for its Nova-D lander, which can deliver a payload of up to 1,100 lb (500 kg) to the lunar service. Lunar Outpost will leverage its know-how in dust mitigation and thermal technologies used for its MAPP rover, built for extraterrestrial and extreme environments.In addition to the aforementioned partners, Apollo astronauts Dr. Harrison (Jack) Schmitt and Charles Duke will also be part of the team and contribute to the design and optimization of the LTV, so that it can meet the needs of NASA researchers and Artemis astronauts.Described by Northrop Grummans Rick Mastracchio as not just a spacecraft but the ultimate off-road vehicle, the new lunar rover will be a science platform and a remotely-controlled robot.NASA recently announced that the first crewed Artemis landing on the moon will most likely take place no earlier than 2025. As reported by TechCrunch , even though there is no contract solicitation at this moment, NASA did provide some details on what it might look for in the next lunar vehicle. It should be able to travel up to 12.4 miles (20 km) on the lunar surface on a single charge, and it should be able to carry a minimum of 1,763 lb (800 kg).We'll keep you updated on how the development of the new LTV goes. A deeper collaboration between the government and university research is the goal of a new contract awarded by AFRL to Utah State University Space Dynamics Laboratory, worth a whopping $1 billion. This is a culmination of the long-term partnership between the two institutions, with the Space Dynamics Lab being designated a University Affiliated Research Center (UARC).Although it sounds like huge spending, Col. Eric Felt, director of the AFRL Space Vehicles Directorate, says that this new contract will allow AFRL to bring most of its space-related projects in one place, instead of awarding several smaller individual contracts, which wouldnt be cost- and time-effective. The main objectives of the Space Dynamics Laboratory will be related to technology development and mission support.Future research projects developed under this contract will focus on a multitude of areas, including nuclear-related science, advanced satellite navigation, quantum and photonic sensors, plus information-related capabilities. These projects will be overseen by the Space Vehicles Directorate, acting as a center of excellence for space within AFRL.Earlier this year, the same Directorate inaugurated the Space Warfighting Operations Research and Development (SWORD) Laboratory, a 26,000 square feet (2,415 square meters) facility that integrates several laboratory spaces and offices. SWORDs mission is to develop technologies specifically related to the deterrence of various types of threats in space. This is because space is not just a source of knowledge, but also an area with high-security threats, especially as the space industry becomes increasingly important. You can already tell how much the automotive industry has changed in these past decades, but so did BMW. From the standpoint of exterior design, the period when Chris Bangle was calling the shots is widely believed to be the beginning of the end. I dont necessarily agree with that claim, but I am completely aware the E65 7 Series isnt as beautiful as the E38 7 Series.Under group head of design Adrian van Hooydonk and BMW division head of design Domagoj Dukec, the Munich-based automaker took a turn for the absolute worst. The buck-toothed G22 4 Series opens the list of transgressors, followed by the M3, M4, iX, and the all-new Concept XM. The latter's production version will be the 10th utility vehicle in the lineup next year when it's expected to premiere in production-ready form.Whats a Concept XM, you wonder? Its a preview for the first M-specific utility vehicle produced by the peeps at BMW M, also known as the X8 until today. I originally thought I was looking at an Angry Birds pig or something like that when I first saw the honking front grille of the show car, a front grille that would make even the new LX or Tundra blush.A unique X for the M brand, displaying the new front-end design of the BMW luxury class, the Concept XM is the most expressive statement in almost 50 years of BMW M. The statement proves how disconnected the designers are from BMW customers, but then again, Domagoj Dukec made it clear that its not our goal to please everyone .Expected to premiere on the 29th of November , the XM is believed to feature three powertrain options. Codenamed G09 and internally known as Project Rockstar, the nasty-looking utility vehicle is expected with three powertrain options. The S58 inline-six engine in combination with a plug-in hybrid system is rumored to produce in the ballpark of 650 horsepower. A bit later on, the XM with the S63 eight-cylinder engine and a plug-in hybrid system is believed to crank out anything between 740 and 750 horsepower.Impressive though it may be from the standpoint of performance, I can't wait to see Frank Stephenson rip the newcomer to shreds on his YT channel. Meet the Pedal-Bedzz, affectionately also known as the Cramper Van, for all the obvious reasons. It was never officially recognized by Guinness as the worlds smallest yet fully functional camper, but based on its compact dimensions, its definitely a strong contender. It is the creation of Andy Saunders , the British mechanic and fabricator often referred to as the Banksy of cars. Saunders has several Guinness titles for his creations, so no wonder he didnt seek one for the Cramper Van.What sets the Cramper Van apart from his other ingenious builds is the fact that it is not motorized. While it is a camper for all intents and purposes, it is legally a bicycle, so you dont have to register it, pay tax or deal with the hassle normally associated with car ownership. You will have to have Arnold Schwarzeneggers legs if you plan on actually using it, though.The Cramper Van, like most of Saunders creations, is a one-off. It was actually created in 2013 as a marketing gimmick for Kampers and Kars, a company that deals in motorhome and camper sales and repairs. Saunders co-owns the company, taking over from his father when he passed away.In the years that have passed since the Cramper Van was unveiled, its attained a sort of mythical status and the kind of worldwide fame only the Internet can provide. It has also come to be regarded as one of the many strange, but ingenious creations that prove a lot can be achieved with very little Most of the appeal of it lies in the fact that its incredibly small its tiny, to be more accurate. Saunders came up with the idea when he heard a fellow mechanic wax poetic about whether you could turn a bike into a camper . Within 15 minutes, he had the idea for it. Two weeks later, the Cramper Van was born, and the final cost, not including Saunders work, was under 1,000 ($1,343 at the current exchange rate).Saunders found a 1960 Butllins bicycle cart lying around and purchased a Bedford Bambi autohome for the project. He then proceeded to cut both off to shorten and narrow them and then welded them together. The result is a bike cart that allows for double pedal power and a camper that provides amenities for a proper, four-person tea party inside.At 4 x 4 feet (1.2 x 1.2 meters), the camper lives up to its Cramper name, but it still packs seating for four people and a table, a two-burner stove and a sink, as well as a small 2.6-foot (0.8-meter) bed that can sleep one adult. Assuming guests are more on the shorter side, they might even have a chance to stand up inside.All this was possible through ingenious use of the very small available space. For instance, one of the benches for seating lifts up to uncover the stove and the sink, so you have to have the tea ready for serving before you sit down, or else. The bed is in the cab-over area, and Saunders himself says its more for short napping than for actual sleep.Perhaps the most striking thing about the Cramper Van is that it remains a bicycle . Propulsion is by pedal power only, and even Saunders admits that taking it up a hill is a challenge even when both set of pedals are being used. It can be pedaled but you do need legs like Arnold Schwarzenegger, the creator said back in the day. You certainly wouldnt want to go camping in it around too many hills.Camping is probably not an option altogether with this thing, but it could still work as a fancier Buttlins bike for picnics and daily excursions out and about. The cab-over part offers protection in case of an unexpected shower, a very essential detail given the predictably rainy British weather, while the camper is more than enough for a cozy lunch or afternoon tea. The camper is insulated, so if youre caught in a proper downpour, at least youll be dry and warm. Cramped, but otherwise very comfortable kWh WLTP FWD AWD It gets even worse. Toyota presented the bZ4X Concept in April at the 2021 Auto Shanghai. The Nissan Ariya was officially unveiled on July 15, 2020. Yet, next spring, Toyota will start delivering the bZ4X to American customers, while Nissans electric crossover will only arrive at the U.S. shores by fall 2022.At least Nissan already revealed how much it would charge for the Ariya. Toyota has only mentioned at the 2021 LA Auto Show that it will have about 250 miles (402 kilometers) of range. The 71.4-battery pack would retain 90% of capacity after ten years or 150,000 miles (240,000 kilometers). Under thetest cycle, the bZ4X should achieve a range of 311 mi (500 km).The bZ4X will be either(front-wheel drive) or(all-wheel drive), but Toyota did not mention how much range the slightly larger battery pack in the latter, with 72.8 kWh, will deliver. It currently presents a TBD (to be defined) in the table Toyota provided.Apart from the seven bZ (beyond zero) vehicles Toyota plans to release until 2025 (including the bZ4X), it said it would have eight other pure electric cars that are not under that moniker. We do not know which EVs it will reveal, but the company said these 15 EVs would be part of its world range which means they can be restricted to some markets. The Japanese carmaker also said that it will have 70 electrified models globally by 2025. That includes hybrids, plug-in hybrids, and FCEVs (fuel cell electric vehicles). Just a few months ago, we reported that TVR's Griffith was still under development and that the company needed funds to get it ready for production.Thankfully for the British marque, the new "funding and technology partnership" signed with Ensorcia Metals Corporation will bring both a source of lithium for its future EVs, along with the funds it needs to develop and build those vehicles. The goal is to have a net-zero and sustainable business, as ElectricCars Repor t notes. TVR is still working on its factory in Ebbw Vale, Wales, where it intends to build the Griffith. The facility should be ready for action in the first quarter of 2022. Once the factory is refurbished, though, the company still needs to get everything ready for production, which will start at a later date.The TVR Griffith's development will be assisted by Ensorcia Automotive, which is an affiliate company of Ensorcia Metals Corporation. The Ford-sourced V8 that was tuned by Cosworth is still the base for the Griffith, a model that was first shown back in 2017.Unfortunately, several media reports announce that the first units of the Griffith will reach customers in late 2023. That may be too much waiting time for some customers, who probably have moved on to other brands since they noticed they could not buy the Griffith yet.It is important to note that the design of the vehicle and its performance may be outdated in 2023, especially if you consider the first time when the model was seen in public. If the reports are correct, we shall see if waiting six years for a model is too long. 4WD A family of fours dream road trip in South Australia turned into a nightmare when their camping vehicle got stuck in the mud after major storms. Lindsey and Ori Zavros, together with their two children, have been traveling in South Australia and documenting their journey on social media for over a year.Their last posts showed them arriving at the Simpson Desert, considered the countrys largest and most dangerous desert.The fatal combination between the difficult terrain and terrible weather led to their Mitsubishi Cantergetting stuck in the mud on Friday, November 12. Although local authorities became aware of this emergency that same day, when the family set off an emergency beacon, they were unable to rescue the four passengers immediately because of the same weather and road conditions.The Zavros ended up stranded for four days, in their vehicle , in the middle of nowhere (the closest city, Oodnadatta, was 95 miles/150 km away).Authorities were at least able to drop emergency supplies and a satellite phone from a helicopter, after making sure that nobody inside the van was injured, adding to the Zavros own supplies inside the van. Finally, on November 16, the South Australia Police announced that the Zavros family was brought back to safety by a rescue helicopter, and flown to Coober Pedy. The Mitsubishi Canter was left at the scene, for the time being.Fortunately, all the four members of the van life family are now safe, but this can be seen as a cautionary tale for anyone who plans to adventure in challenging areas. Vega is the European Space Agency s satellite launch vehicle and has been in operation at Europes Spaceport since February 2012. It has launched a total of 111 satellites into orbit, showcasing impressive capabilities in both orbital and suborbital missions.The recent flight was the rockets third launch performed in the last six months. Built by Airbus Defence and Space, the three satellites carried by Vega will circle our planet to detect signals from radars and radio communication systems located in regions where surface sensors cannot reach.The launchers latest successful flight validated its ability to carry strategically important satellites into orbit, clearing the way for Vegas successor: Vega-C . Following the 20th flight, there will be a period of transition during which both vehicles will be deployed for various missions.The new rocket is based on the Vega launch vehicle, which consists of four stages: three solid-propellant stages, an upper fourth stage, and a payload fairing. However, the fairing is larger on Vega-C.The spacecraft will be capable of carrying out more launches each year and will have an increased payload capacity (with 1,764 lbs/ 800 kgs more) compared to its cousin. Although it will be larger, the rocket will not add to the launch costs.Actually, the costs will remain the same as for Vega, thanks to the P120C motor. And thats not all. The new launcher will support a wide variety of payload carriers that will be used for different payloads.Vega-C is expected to conduct the first flight in the first quarter of 2022. Until then, the European Space Agency will oversee this transition, build on the accomplishments of Vega and prepare future adaptations for a Vega-E suitable for a rapidly evolving and competitive market. The alleged new factory would be built sometime by the half of this decade, as German media reported. As a reference, Volvo Cars currently has two factories in Europe that can build up to 800,000 vehicles per year.According to the report from Automobilwoche, Volvo Cars intended to build up to 1.2 million vehicles per year in Europe, which would mean the new factory would have a capacity of around 400,000 vehicles per year, if not even more.Representatives of Volvo Cars told Reuters that the company has not decided on the topic at this stage. However, they did point out that they have grown rapidly over the past decade and aim to continue to grow at a similar pace going forward. Moreover, Volvo's officials explained that they can already produce 1.2 million vehicles annually at their six existing factories.In other words, if Volvo Cars did want to build 1.2 million vehicles per year, which would be possible today, the goal would be to build even more than that. Furthermore, European production means that the Swedish brand wants to manufacture more units of a certain model or model line.Mind you, modern vehicle factories can be flexible and build a broad range of models, but it is simpler and more cost-effective to keep just a few models in a production unit. Doing so optimizes the supply chain, training programs, and other logistical challenges.Since production costs are higher in Europe, Volvo Cars might choose to build its more expensive models in the new facility. If we consider the fact that Volvo wants to switch to all-electric vehicles in the near future, the new factory could be just for EVs. Thank you for reading! Please purchase a subscription to read our premium content. If you have a subscription, please log in or sign up for an account on our website to continue. The U.S. Department of Educations Office for Civil Rights is investigating allegations of discrimination in a Texas school district, NBC News reports. Why it matters: Carroll Independent School District, which is located in wealthy, suburban Southlake, Texas, has been at the forefront of the ongoing national battle over how to teach students about racial issues. The department notified Carroll ISDs officials that it has opened three investigations into complaints about discrimination against students based on their race, gender and national origin, according to NBC News. The Department of Education has the power to require a school district to make policy changes and submit to federal monitoring. Context: District officials promised to make sweeping changes three years ago, after a video of Southlake high school students chanting the N-word went viral though those changes never came. In Southlakes most recent elections, candidates running on an anti-critical race theory platform won the majority of school board seats, effectively killing the proposed diversity plan. What theyre saying: Our focus will always be what is best for our students as we prepare them for their next steps in their educational journey, Karen Fitzgerald, a Carroll ISD spokesperson, told NBC. The bottom line: These investigations can take months or years, so the Southlake saga is far from over. America's young women are on the cusp of a rite of passage that's been reserved for men until now: registering with the Selective Service when they turn 18. Driving the news: Whether allowing women to serve in combat also means they should have to sign up for the military draft has been a debate for decades. Now, an unlikely coalition of feminists, veterans and conservatives could make it law as part of the Senate's expected passage of the National Defense Authorization Act. The House included the change when it passed its version of the NDAA in September. The Senate could act as early as this week. A majority on the Senate Armed Services Committee backed the change in a markup over the summer. One group of Republicans now is renewing an effort to block it as the Senate considers amendments before a final vote, but it's not clear they have the numbers to stop it. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has said for years the draft also should apply to women. The change is in line with the recommendation of a March 2020 study by the National Commission on Military, National and Public Service. Earlier this year, President Biden, through his female acting solicitor general, asked the Supreme Court to let Congress rather than the courts decide. How it works: The change would require Americans ages 18-26 to sign up regardless of their gender identification. That would ensure their information is available in case there were ever another draft. Why it matters: It would certainly represent a major cultural milestone as women take on greater nontraditional and leadership roles across all facets of American life, from politics to industry to the military. It also could solve for shifting definitions around gender in society today. But, but, but: The impact seems more symbolic than substantive for now. Today's military is comprised of volunteers both men and women. While President Jimmy Carter reinstated Selective Service registration for males in 1980 after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the last U.S. draft was in the Vietnam War. What they're saying: We have evolved quite a bit since those kinds of things were written and conceived of," Rep. Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.), a former Air Force officer, told Axios. "God forbid, if we're in that place where we need to call on everybody to help us, we will need all kinds of skills," Houlahan said. "Cyber-related skills, as well as other sorts of skills that we don't necessarily currently think of when we think of the Selective Service." Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) told Axios that "so much of the trajectory for women in the armed services is based on what experience they're able to accrue, particularly combat experience," and that along with that "it makes sense to that me that everyone should be eligible for Selective Service." Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), the first female combat veteran elected to the Senate, said: "We are now competing in the space of combat arms, and I think it's important that we all serve to the best of our capacity." The other side: Sen. Josh Hawley (R-M0.) is driving an amendment to strip the new requirement from the NDAA, and about a dozen GOP senators either have joined Hawley's effort or previously said they oppose requiring women to register. They cite a mix of concerns about women's safety, implications for national security and allusions to broader culture wars in U.S. politics, such as the debate over whether transgender athletes should be able to compete in women's sports. Opponents include Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida, Ted Cruz of Texas, Tom Cotton and John Boozman of Arkansas, Mike Lee of Utah, James Lankford of Oklahoma, Steve Daines of Montana, Roger Wicker and Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi and Roger Marshall of Kansas. Cruz told reporters: "God bless that woman if she wants to go serve in the military and is prepared to fight. That that is a choice that is available to her. NASA isn't likely to land astronauts back on the surface of the Moon before 2026, according to a new report. Why it matters: It suggests NASA may not meet its newly updated deadline of 2025 for the space agency's flagship human spaceflight program designed to get astronauts on the lunar surface again. The Trump administration established the Artemis program, and the Biden administration has continued it as a major part of NASA's portfolio. What's happening: A new report from NASA's Office of Inspector General found the Trump administration's original deadline for landing on the Moon in 2024 isn't feasible. Instead, the report says the first human Artemis landing will be in 2026 at the earliest due to delayed technology development and budget shortfalls. Some of the main outstanding issues include developing next-generation spacesuits for use on the Moon and a privately built, human-rated lunar lander. "Currently NASAs most ambitious and costly activity, the Artemis program faces schedule, procurement, technical, and funding risks," the report says. Details: The Artemis program relies on a number of technologies that have been difficult to develop or have been delayed in one way or another. The Space Launch System rocket which was expected to make its debut flight this year won't fly until next year at the earliest. SpaceX won a much-contested contract from NASA to build a human lander for the space agency in April, but protests from other bidders like Blue Origin have delayed the company's work on that vital piece of technology. The program is also expensive, with NASA "projected to spend $93 billion on the Artemis effort up to FY 2025," according to the OIG report. Get smarter, faster on the modern space era with our free, three-video short course. "We urge both sides to take immediate concrete steps to reduce tensions and avoid further escalation. We also call on the sides to engage directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation," Blinken said. As noted in the Minsk Group Co-Chairs statement on November 15, the recent increase in tension between Armenia and Azerbaijan underscores the need for a negotiated, comprehensive, and sustainable settlement of all remaining issues related to or resulting from the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the top U.S. diplomat added. Military clashes that erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan along their border on Tuesday afternoon were halted later that day through Russias mediation. Both sides had accused each other of committing aggression. Turkey reportedly expressed support for its regional ally, Azerbaijan, while Armenia appealed to Russia for assistance in defending its territory. The ceasefire was announced shortly after the Kremlin said in a statement, without elaborating, that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian discussed the situation during a phone call earlier on November 16. Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu also held phone calls with both his Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts and called on them to stop activity that provokes escalation, Russian news agencies reported, citing the Russian ministry. Yerevan admitted that two Armenian combat positions had been lost and an unspecified number of soldiers killed and wounded as a result of the Tuesday clashes. Armenia also claimed that Azerbaijani forces lost a significant number of armored vehicles and troops. According to Armenias Defense Ministry, 12 Armenian soldiers were taken captive by Azerbaijani forces. Their situation remained unknown after the announced ceasefire. The chairman of Armenias parliamentary foreign-affairs committee, Eduard Aghajanian, told RFE/RLs Armenian Service earlier that according to preliminary estimates, 15 Armenian soldiers may have been killed during the fighting. Azerbaijan said two of its soldiers were injured when Armenian military units used mortars and artillery against an Azerbaijani position in Kalbacar and Lachin districts bordering Armenia. The renewed deadly clashes along the border started about a year after a ceasefire stopped an intense Armenian-Azerbaijani war over the Nagorno-Karabakh region in which about 7,000 people were killed. Last years hostilities were halted due to a Moscow-brokered ceasefire agreement that reaffirmed Azerbaijans territorial gains and brought about 2,000 Russian peacekeepers to the part of the Nagorno-Karabakh region remaining under the control of local ethnic Armenian forces. On November 16, the European Union also urged Armenia and Azerbaijan to show restraint. Calling for urgent de-escalation and full cease-fire, European Council President Charles Michel described the situation in the region as challenging. The EU is committed to work with partners to overcome tensions for a prosperous and stable South Caucasus, Michel wrote on Twitter. Michel also said that he had discussions with both Pashinian and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in light of todays developments. Meanwhile, Azerbaijans Defense Ministry said that seven of its soldiers were killed and 10 others wounded in renewed fighting on the shared border that erupted on November 16. According to a statement by Armenias Defense Ministry, 13 Armenian soldiers were captured by Azerbaijani forces and another 24 Armenian servicemen have gone missing and their fate remains unknown. The statement added that one Armenian soldier was killed in the fighting that was stopped through Russias mediation. Both sides blamed each other for starting the latest conflict amid tensions between the two former Soviet nations that have simmered since a six-week war last year over Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan said its forces prevented large-scale provocations by Armenian forces in the Kalbacar and Lachin districts bordering Armenia. In turn, Armenias Defense Ministry accused Azerbaijani soldiers of shooting at its positions along the border, using artillery, armored vehicles, and guns. Later on November 16, Russias Defense Ministry reported that hostilities on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border had ceased after a cease-fire was reached with Moscows mediation. Armenia confirmed that report. The situation along the border has been tense since the two South Caucasus nations fought a 44-day war over Nagorno-Karabakh last year that killed nearly 7,000 people and ended with a cease-fire that granted Azerbaijan control of parts of the region as well as adjacent territories previously held by Armenians. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Washington was deeply concerned about reports of intensive fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In a statement released on November 16 the top U.S. diplomat said: We urge both sides to take immediate concrete steps to reduce tensions and avoid further escalation. We also call on the sides to engage directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation. As noted in the Minsk Group Co-Chairs statement on November 15, the recent increase in tension between Armenia and Azerbaijan underscores the need for a negotiated, comprehensive, and sustainable settlement of all remaining issues related to or resulting from the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Blinken added. On November 16, the European Union also urged the two sides to show restraint. Calling for urgent de-escalation and [a] full cease-fire, the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, described the situation in the region as challenging. The EU is committed to work with partners to overcome tensions for a prosperous and stable South Caucasus, Michel wrote on Twitter. As quoted by the Russian Kommersant daily, Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigorian, who was taking part in the meeting of his counterparts from other post-Soviet nations in the Russian capital, said that Armenia is preparing a written application to its ally Russia to come to its aid under a mutual assistance agreement signed between the two countries in 1997. Grigorian already orally appealed to Russia to provide assistance to Armenia in defending its territorial integrity in the face of what Yerevan described as Azerbaijans aggression on November 16. After hours of deadly border clashes Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed to a ceasefire arranged by Russia late on Tuesday. The ceasefire was announced shortly after the Kremlin said in a statement, without elaborating, that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian discussed the situation during a phone call. Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu also held phone calls with both his Armenian and Azerbaijani counterparts and reportedly called on them to stop activity that provokes escalation. After the cessation of fighting Armenia continued to insist that Azerbaijani troops are still inside its sovereign territory. Azerbaijans armed forces are currently in the sovereign territory of Armenia. This is an act of aggression. In 1997, Armenia and Russia agreed to help each other in such cases. In this regard, we have turned to Russia, Grigorian told Kommersant. Grigorian said that Armenia is in favor of a diplomatic solution to the problem, but if it turns to be impossible, it deems that the problem must be solved militarily. It was due to the active participation of the Russian side that yesterdays fighting was stopped, but the issue has not been resolved, as Azerbaijans armed forces remain in the sovereign territory of Armenia, said the secretary of the Security Council of Armenia, invoking Soviet-era maps. In his remarks on Armenias Public Television on Tuesday Grigorian said that Armenia deems that first of all it is possible to solve the crisis with the assistance of Russia and the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a defense pact of several post-Soviet states of which Armenia is a member. At the same time, he did not rule out a scenario when the Armenian government would consider turning to other partners as well. During a news briefing in Moscow on Wednesday, official representative of Russias Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova said that Russia is serious about both its bilateral and multilateral obligations. Corresponding consultations are being held bilaterally... As for the CSTO, then, according to our information, they are closely monitoring the situation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, she said, as quoted by Russias RIA news agency. At the same time, Zakharova stressed that Russia considers it important for Armenia and Azerbaijan to start the process of delimitation of their border as soon as possible. Secretary of the Security Council of Azerbaijan Ramil Usubov also attended the Moscow meeting on November 17. Citing its sources, Kommersant reported, however, that no contacts between the Armenian and Azerbaijani officials were planned as part of the gathering. In a statement released on Wednesday, the 27-nation bloc said it is deeply concerned over the recent violence along the Armenia-Azerbaijani border, which has regrettably led to loss of life. The President of the European Council, Charles Michel, discussed the evolving situation with the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, and the Prime Minister of Armenia, Nikol Pashinian, over the phone and called for urgent de-escalation and full respect of the ceasefire. The EU urges Armenia and Azerbaijan to exercise utmost restraint, disengage their military forces on the ground and respect the commitments undertaken in the framework of the two trilateral agreements. We call on both sides to resume negotiations to work towards a comprehensive settlement of outstanding issues, including border demarcation, the EU said. The EU stressed that it supports the statement of the Minsk Group Co-Chairs of November 15. The EU reiterates its commitment to work with Armenia and Azerbaijan to help overcome tensions and contribute to building a South Caucasus that is secure, stable, prosperous and at peace for the benefit of all people living in this region, the statement concluded. Earlier, on November 16, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken also said that Washington was deeply concerned about reports of intensive fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In a statement the top U.S. diplomat said: We urge both sides to take immediate concrete steps to reduce tensions and avoid further escalation. We also call on the sides to engage directly and constructively to resolve all outstanding issues, including border demarcation. As noted in the Minsk Group Co-Chairs statement on November 15, the recent increase in tension between Armenia and Azerbaijan underscores the need for a negotiated, comprehensive, and sustainable settlement of all remaining issues related to or resulting from the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Blinken added. Armenia and Azerbaijan accused each other of provoking fresh fighting along their border on Tuesday, with both sides reporting casualties following hours of hostilities that were halted due to a ceasefire arranged by Russia. Armenia continues to accuse Azerbaijan of occupying dozens of square kilometers of its sovereign territory. Azerbaijan rejects the accusations. The issue of the un-demarcated border has been raised since May when Armenia first accused Azerbaijan of violating what were Soviet-era administrative borders between the once socialist republics within the USSR. Armenia said then that Azerbaijan had advanced several kilometers inside its sovereign territory at two sections of the eastern border. Azerbaijan denied the accusations, claiming that its troops were stationed in territories that Baku regained as a result of a six-week war against ethnic Armenian forces in Nagorno-Karabakh in the fall of 2020. The latest deadly skirmishes occurred along the Armenian-Azerbaijani border on November 16 and were halted due to a ceasefire reached through Russias mediation. Most questions during todays question-and-answer session in the Armenian parliament were addressed to the prime minister and regarded the latest clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan. When asked to comment on Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramovs statement that a joint commission should be set up to settle border issues between Yerevan and Baku, Pashinian said that embarking on the process of delimitation and demarcation of borders is our agenda. We have stated about it also in our government program. Therefore, if Azerbaijan accepts this agenda, we need to understand what it is that hinders it, he said. Pashinian reminded that still in May he said at a government session that there was a document on the table that he was going to sign. But why wasnt that document signed? [The document wasnt signed] because it did not reach the stage of the offer of signing, the Armenian leader said. According to Pashinian, since then Russia three times made proposals on border demarcation and in all three cases Armenia agreed to move forward based on them. In my impression the process did not move forward because of Azerbaijans not giving a concrete answer, said Pashinian, stressing that Armenias proposals on border delimitation and demarcation made in May still remain valid. Pashinian also commented on repeated public offers from Azerbaijan to sign a peace treaty with Armenia. We, in our turn, have also offered and are offering to sign a peace treaty with Azerbaijan. We have said that the whole purpose of the OSCE Minsk Groups negotiation process has been to reach a point of signing a peace treaty. This is not a new thing. I want to say that all negotiating packages so far have had as their end goal the signing of a peace treaty. So, it is strange for me to hear all the time that Azerbaijan offers to sign a peace treaty with Armenia and there is no response from Armenia, Pashinian said. When we speak about a full restoration of the negotiation process, and when we engage in the negotiation process, our goal is to sign a peace treaty. The signing of a peace treaty should be preceded by work to agree on the text of the treaty. This requires quite a large amount of work. We have never refused to do this work. On the contrary, we have expressed our readiness to do it, and we also consider it to be our agenda, he added. Regarding the work of a Russian-Armenian-Azerbaijani working group at the level of deputy prime ministers on the unblocking of regional transport links, Pashinian said that the impression that it has stopped is wrong. Work is being done on a daily basis, simply for now it hasnt been able to achieve a concrete result, he said. Over the last two weeks, Bakersfield City School District has experienced the quarantine of 925 staff members and students, marring the beginn LONDON (AP) Queen Elizabeth II met with the British militarys chief of staff at Windsor Castle on Wednesday, the first time she was seen carrying out a face-to-face engagement since she missed the national Remembrance Sunday service due to a sprained back. The 95-year-old monarch looked well as she chatted with Gen. Nick Carter in Windsor Castles Oak Room. The queen, who wore a colorful floral dress, stood to welcome Carter, who is preparing to step down from his role as the armed forces chief at the end of November. The Oak Room is the queen's sitting room and office, and her elderly pet dorgi Candy - a cross between a corgi and dachshund - was seen greeting Carter as he entered the room. Concerns about the monarch's health were raised last month, when she spent a night in a London hospital after being admitted for medical tests. In late October, palace officials said the monarch had been told by doctors to rest for two weeks and only take on light duties. Those concerns intensified after she pulled out at the last minute from Sundays national Remembrance service to pay tribute to Britains war dead. Buckingham Palace officials, who had said it was the monarchs firm intention to make the event, announced Sunday that she decided she had to miss the ceremony because she sprained her back. Elizabeth is Britains longest-lived and longest-reigning monarch. She is due to celebrate her Platinum Jubilee - marking 70 years on the throne - next year. During her rest period, the queen has continued to work from home, doing desk-based duties and spending most of her time at Windsor Castle, west of London. She canceled plans to attend the U.N. climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, sending a video message instead to world leaders attending this month's conference. She also canceled an earlier trip to Northern Ireland. The queen held an in-person meeting with Prime Minister Boris Johnson last week but was not photographed doing so. Conde Nast Traveler recently praised a San Antonio hotel for being one of the most romantic getaways in Texas. On Thursday, November 11, the magazine released its list, naming Hotel Emma in its article. The listing featured gem spots like the Hotel Drover in Fort Worth, The Bloomhouse Airbnb in Austin, The Carr Mansion in Galveston, and more. All listings featured on Conde Nast Traveler were independently selected by its editors. In the article, the magazine stated the local hotel is set inside the former Pearl Brewery along the "less-touristy part of the River Walk." The listing says Hotel Emma is all about the details. Jerry Lara /San Antonio Express-News "Look closely and you'll see remnants of old machinery, repurposed as light fixtures and works of art. Macarons at turndown service and seersucker Dos Carolinas robes are a nice touch, too," the article reads. "At the on-site Sternewirth Bar, ask for the Three Emmas cocktail, along with the juicy backstory involving a lovers' quarrel. When hunger strikes, some of the best restaurants in the city can be found just steps from the hotels front door, but for dinner and a show, make reservations in advance at Jazz, TX." This isn't the first recognition Hotel Emma has received from publications. The hotel has also been listed as a top hotel from Travel & Leisure and U.S. News and World Report. In 2019, pop icon Cher stayed at the hotel and called it "one of the most unique, beautiful hotels ever." She was in San Antonio for her tour when she learned about the hotel's fascinating backstory. Jerry Lara /Staff photographer According to the hotel's website, Emma Koehler, wife of Pearl Brewery president Otto Koehler, was injured in a car accident in 1910. Her husband hired a live-in nurse and her friend, both named Emma, to take care of her. Otto was soon having affairs with both women. On Nov. 12, 1914, Otto visited the Southside house he had set up the pair in. An argument occurred, and the taller, blonder Emma shot him dead. She was charged with murder, fled to Europe as a WWI nurse, then returned to San Antonio four years later. She was found not guilty by an all-male jury, according to the hotel's website. She later married one of the jurors. The other nurse Emma got married, while Emma Koehler took over Pearl Brewery after her husband was killed. She led employees through Prohibition before passing away in 1947. The Port Arthur Police Department is investigating a drive-by shooting that occurred on Monday night. Officers received a call at approximately 11 p.m. from the 3400 Block of Seventh Street to report gunshots. When the officers arrived, they learned a house had been hit several times by gunfire during a drive-by shooting. None of the occupants were injured, PAPD said in a news release. Technicians have processed the scene of the crime and possible suspects that have been identified. The incident occurred fewer than 2 miles about 5 minutes away from where a toddler was struck in a July drive-by shooting. The 1-year-old child had to be flown to a Houston hospital after being hit by the bullets in the aggravated assault in the 2100 block of Evergreen Drive. Related: Port Arthur toddler shot in drive-by shooting That same night in July, the department got another call for deadly conduct in the 3100 block of 18th Street only about 3 miles or 10 minutes from the location of where the toddler was shot. In that incident, a residence also was struck multiple times by gunfire, however no one was injured. PAPD said no connection has been made to the other incidents at this time. No further information was immediately available. meagan.ellsworth@beaumontenterprise.com twitter.com/megzmagpie NEW ORLEANS (AP) The U.S. Interior Department on Wednesday will auction vast oil and gas reserves in the Gulf of Mexico estimated to hold up to 1.1 billion barrels of crude, the first such sale under President Joe Biden and a harbinger of the challenges he faces to reach climate goals that depend on deep cuts in fossil fuel emissions. The livestreamed sale invited energy companies to bid on drilling leases across some 136,000 square miles (352,000 square kilometers) about twice the area of Florida. It will take years to develop the leases before companies start pumping crude. That means they could keep producing long past 2030, when scientists say the world needs to be well on the way to cutting greenhouse gas emissions to avoid catastrophic climate change. The auction comes after a federal judge in a lawsuit brought by Republican states rejected a suspension of fossil fuel sales that Biden imposed when he first took office. The Democrat campaigned on promises to curb fossil fuels from public lands and waters, which including coal account for about a quarter of U.S. carbon emissions, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Yet even as hes tried to cajole other world leaders into strengthening international efforts against global warming, Wednesdays sale illustrates Biden's difficulties gaining ground on climate issues at home. The administration last week proposed another round of oil and gas lease sales in 2022, in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado and other western states. Interior Department officials proceeded despite concluding that burning the fuels could lead to billions of dollars in potential future climate damages. We had Trumps unconstrained approach to oil and gas on federal lands and Bidens early attempt to pause drilling. Now it looks like the Biden administration is trying to find a new policy, said researcher Robert Johnston with Columbia Universitys Center on Global Energy Policy. Theyre being very cautious about undermining their fragile momentum on climate issues, he added. The energy bureau said in pre-sale documents released Tuesday that it received bids on 307 tracts totaling nearly 2,700 square miles (6,950 square kilometers). Thats the largest total for a single sale since Gulf-wide bidding resumed in 2017. Those seven sales have generated almost $1 billion in total revenue. Environmental reviews of the Gulf of Mexico sale conducted under former President Donald Trump and affirmed under Biden reached an unlikely conclusion: Extracting and burning the fuel would result in fewer greenhouse gases than leaving it in the ground. Similar claims in two other cases, in Alaska, were rejected by federal courts after challenges from environmentalists. Climate scientist Peter Erickson whose work was cited by judges in one of the cases said the Interior Department's analysis had a glaring omission: They left out greenhouse gas increases in foreign countries that would result from having more Gulf oil on the market. The math is extremely simple on this kind of stuff," said Erickson, a senior scientist with the Stockholm Environment Institute, a nonprofit research group. If new leases expand the global oil supply, that has a proportional effect on emissions from burning oil. Therefore, giving out these leases in the Gulf of Mexico would be increasing global emissions. The Interior Departments Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in recent months changed its emissions modeling methods, citing Ericksons work. But officials said it was too late to use the new approach for Wednesdays lease sale, which they said had been through "a rigorous process with specific timelines." "The environmental analysis for Lease Sale 257 was already complete and as such does not contain the newer approach to considering the impacts of foreign consumption of oil and gas, the agency said in a statement provided to The Associated Press. Administration officials declined AP's interview requests. For upcoming sales, spokesperson Melissa Schwartz said Interior is conducting a more comprehensive emission review than any prior administration, as it appeals the court order that forced their resumption. Erik Milito, president of the National Ocean Industries Association said he was uncertain that using the new approach would have changed the governments conclusions, since drilling for oil in other parts of the world is less efficient and hauling imports also adds to carbon costs. He described the Gulf as the backbone of U.S. oil production and said companies consider it a strong investment. The continued use of the old analysis rankles drilling opponents who say Biden isn't following through on his climate pledges. We're talking about transitioning away from a fossil fuel economy and they are selling a giant carbon bomb of a lease sale, said attorney Drew Caputo with Earthjustice, which has a lawsuit challenging the Gulf lease sale pending in federal court. That creates a property right to develop those leases. It's a lot harder to keep the carbon in the ground if you sell the lease. Some Democrats also objected to the sale. The chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva, said Biden promised to lead on climate issues but continues running a fossil fuel program with a long history of mismanagement. The administration needs to do better, Grijalva said in a statement Tuesday. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for about 15% of total U.S. crude production and 5% of its natural gas. Industry analysts had predicted some heightened interest in Wednesday's sale since oil prices rose sharply over the past year. It's also a chance for companies to secure drilling rights before the administration or Congress can increase drilling fees and royalty rates or adopt new restrictions on environmental permits, said analyst Justin Rostant with industry consulting firm Wood Mackenzie. An outright ban on new leases and drilling seems unlikely after the federal court shot down Biden's temporary suspension, he added. Different companies have different approaches and different strategies, Rostant said. Some could think this might be the year to go big. __ Brown reported from Billings, Montana. ___ Follow Matthew Brown on Twitter: @MatthewBrownAP 5 1 of 5 Credit: Texas Department of Public Safety Show More Show Less 2 of 5 Credit: Texas Department of Public Safety Show More Show Less 3 of 5 4 of 5 Credit: Texas Department of Public Safety Show More Show Less 5 of 5 On Wednesday, the Texas Department of Public Safety issued a Silver Alert for Joseph Bennett. According to the alert, Bennett was last seen at the 1600 block of Eagle Lane in Beaumont at 11:22 p.m. on Nov. 16. In the alert, Bennett is described as a 65-year-old white male with green eyes and is listed at 6 feet, 2 inches tall with a total weight of 150 pounds. Additional description information includes an "amputated left pointer finger." A man was sentenced to prison for transporting 15 migrants inside the after-market compartment of a Penske box truck, according to court documents. Christian Ayala had pleaded guilty on Sept. 16 to conspiracy to transport migrants. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Marina Garcia Marmolejo sentenced Ayala to 18 months in prison followed by two years of supervised release. The case dates back to July 11, when Ayala drove a Penske box truck to the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint on Interstate 35. Agents referred the vehicle to secondary inspection after a K-9 unit alerted to possible contraband, and Ayala stated that he did not have identification. In secondary, the K-9 unit alerted again to the back of the truck. Agents opened the back of the truck to find an empty compartment. However, an X-ray scan revealed anomalies that appeared to be individuals hidden in a non-factory compartment behind a false wall. An agent spent 35 minutes removing the screws covering the false wall. When agents accessed the compartment, they discovered 15 individuals who had crossed the border illegally. One individual was determined to be an unaccompanied minor from Mexico. The (15) individuals were covered in sweat and appeared to be dehydrated, states the affidavit. Ayala stated he would get paid $4,000 to drive the Penske truck to San Antonio. Cellphone data extraction revealed Ayala conspired with Kevin Galvez and others to transport migrants in the Penske truck. A video recorded on July 8, 2021, revealed Ayala and Galvez inside the Penske box truck inspecting the false wall and after-market compartment, states the affidavit. On Oct. 14, Galvez pleaded guilty to human smuggling conspiracy and is awaiting sentencing. Jefferson County has reached to house jail inmates for the cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur, which could lead to the development of a new facility to address crowding, mental health and substance abuse. The Jefferson County Commissioners Court on Tuesday morning unanimously approved agenda items to authorize authorizes Judge Jeff Branick to execute an interlocal agreement between the county and cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur. In September, Jefferson County ended its contract with the cities following a nearly decade-long disagreement on the cities share of daily prisoner costs atthe county jail. Sheriff Zena Stephens confirmed to The Enterprise that agreements tentatively have been reached with both cities, which were expected to meet Tuesday as well. Jefferson County Auditor Patrick Swain added that the cities also will have to officially approve each contract, with will be effective Nov. 1. Jefferson County has approved it on our side, Jefferson County Auditor Patrick Swain said. Port Arthur Police Chief Tim Duriso said the city has not presented and officially reached an agreement yet, but it is very close. He also expressed support for the diversion center. Related: How Texas fails the mentally ill I am all for that. I think that is a great idea, he said. A lot of the smaller crimes that we see, we notice that they are tied to mental health and substance abuse issues. When you look at some of the smaller crimes a long stents in jail is not really (beneficial) for them. I think that is going to help us with the problem. Beaumont Police Chief Jimmy Singletary said the city planned to comment on the proposal on Wednesday. The former contract was drafted in 1986. Since then, Stephens said, there have been several changes, such as the medical treatment of prisoners and at what point which agency is responsible for those costs. The city of Beaumont owes the county about $3.6 million, and Port Arthur owes just under $1 million for unpaid costs to house inmates, according to former Enterprise reporting. Beaumont and Port Arthurs prisoners make up about 80% of the county jails population, yet the cities were paying only 35% of their total billed amount, county officials told The Enterprise previously. We tried to work with mediation in 2019. We couldnt reach a settlement with that mediation, which spurred the commissioners to cancel the current contracts and work on it, Swain said. The new contract has a few key differences, including resolving the dispute over how much money is owed tot he county under the old contract. The new agreement would break down the cost to $75 per day per Class C inmate. It also includes a cap at $75 per day for Class A, B and Felony prisoners brought to the county jail facility. Related: Pilot program to divert mentally ill from jail shows promise, officials say The new contract also spells the responsibilities of all agencies involved and includes language to clarifies when a prisoner is officially considered a county prisoner. The county has asked the city of Beaumont for a contribution of $2 million to develop a Mental Health and Substance Abuse Diversion Facility for Jefferson County inmates, Swain and Stephens said. Stephens said the facility would allow officers who run across individual with a mental health or substance abuse problem to drop them off at a diversion center instead of being entered in the criminal justice system. Similar diversion facilities have been built in other Texas counties, including Harris, Tarrant and Bexar Counties. Stephens said these centers have a partnership with district attorneys offices and have mental health and substance abuse professionals who work in the facilities. What we are doing now is stacking a bunch of charges on folks who really arent culpable for the crimes they are committing because they are mentally ill, intoxicated or drugged up, Stephens said. These centers would not only divert them from the criminal justice system but also give them the resources and the help they need to try to get them well. Since starting the program in August 2014, Harris County saw a significant reduction in the amount of time offenders were booked into jail and stayed there, but it also dealt with significant challenges in engaging and retaining individuals who face severe mental illness such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Ultimately, lawmakers recommended an expansion of Harris County's pilot diversion operation because of the promise it showed, according to a The Houston Chronicle. Related: Jefferson County jail again suspends visitation amid COVID cases Jefferson County also will add some money to the pot from American Rescue Plan Funding. The city of Port Arthur is being asked to contribute $545,000, which is based on the same formula that was used to determine how the facilitys operating costs will be shared. We basically have $2.5 million dollars contributed to this facility to alleviate crowding in the jail, Swain said. According to previous Enterprise reporting, the approximately 1,200-bed Jefferson County facility has seen the population rise to a historic amount, with over 1,050 inmates due to a pandemic-related slowing of the criminal justice system. While a timeline was not yet available, Swain said the American Rescue Plan requires that a project be selected and started by 2024 and completed by 2026. During Tuesdays meeting, Jefferson County Precinct 4 Commissioner Everette Bo Alfred thanked the officials for finally coming to a conclusion for this long-running contract. meagan.ellsworth@beaumontenterprise.com twitter.com/megzmagpie DALLAS (AP) One of the 18 older women a man is charged with killing in the Dallas area over a two-year span ran a restaurant in Vietnam before leaving on a helicopter as Saigon fell and was a generous person who loved giving people $2 bills, her son-in-law testified Tuesday. My mother-in-law was a hoot. She was very fun to be around, Richard Rinehart said. Billy Chemirmir is on trial for capital murder in the death of Rinehart's mother-in-law, 81-year-old Lu Thi Harris. Chemirmir faces life in prison without parole if convicted. Prosecutors decided not to seek the death penalty. Chemirmir was arrested in March 2018 after 91-year-old Mary Annis Bartel survived an attack at her apartment at an independent living community for seniors in Plano. She died in 2020. Jurors listened Monday as Bartel said in a taped deposition that she knew she was in grave danger as she opened her door to a man wearing green rubber gloves. Bartel described a pillow being smashed into her face and her attacker using all his weight to keep me from breathing. When police tracked Chemirmir to his nearby apartment the next day, he was holding jewelry and cash. Documents in a large red jewelry box police say he had just thrown away led them to a Dallas home, where Harris was dead in her bedroom, lipstick smeared on her pillow. Prosecutor Glen Fitzmartin has said that earlier that day, Harris and Chemirmir had been checking out at the same time at a Walmart store. Rinehart testified on Tuesday said that the jewelry box found in the trash belonged to his mother-in-law, as did numerous pieces of jewelry that officers found as they arrested Chemirmir. Evidence presented Monday showed that Chemirmir was also in possession of numerous $2 bills at the time. Rinehart testified Tuesday that his mother-in-law loved giving them as gifts. Police have also said that a set of keys found with Chemirmir when he was arrested opened the front doors of Harris' home. Rinehart said that Harris, who he called Kim, was born on a Chinese island. When she was a young girl, prior to World War II, her family moved to what is now Vietnam. He said she grew up in Saigon, which is now Ho Chi Minh City, and eventually owned a restaurant and bar there. The restaurant was located across the street from an oil company where the man who became her second husband, William Harris, worked. When the demise of Saigon was imminent, she had already married Mr. Harris and he was called out to Hong Kong by his company but he had arranged paperwork for her and she actually got out of Saigon on a helicopter on the American Embassy to an aircraft carrier on the South China Sea, Rinehart said. Rinehart said that after leaving Vietnam, the couple lived in Tanzania before William Harris retired and they moved to Dallas. William Harris died in 2008. Rinehart said his wife, Loan Rinehart, died of cancer in 2013. He said one of Lu Thi Harris' sons still runs her restaurant in Vietnam. Following Chemirmir's arrest, authorities announced they would review hundreds of deaths, signaling the possibility that a serial killer had been stalking older people. Over the following years, the number of people Chemirmir was accused of killing grew. Fitzmartin said jurors would also be hearing about the killing of 87-year-old Mary Brooks, who was found dead in her Richardson home in January 2018. Chemirmir has been charged in her death. He said that Brooks death had originally been called a natural death, but after an investigation following the arrest of Chemirmir, the medical examiner changed the cause of death to homicide. Fitzmartin said that the day before Brooks was found dead, she was at a Walmart, the same Walmart that Harris was at before her death later in the year. Fitzmartin said that a vehicle model known to be driven by Chemirmir was parked next to Brooks vehicle. On Tuesday, the medical examiner who performed Harris autopsy testified that while she had small broken blood vessels and some bruising, he had to rely on investigative information to determine the cause of death. Travis Danielsen, who worked for the Dallas County medical examiners at the time of Harris death, said he determined her cause of death to be smothering and manner of death to be homicide. He said that without information from the investigation, the death would have been ruled undetermined or natural. In asphyxial deaths, as a medical examiner, we rely most heavily, I believe, on the investigative information, he said. Most of the victims were killed at independent living communities for older people, where Chemirmir allegedly forced his way into apartments or posed as a handyman. Hes also accused of killing women in private homes, including the widow of a man he had cared for in his job as an at-home caregiver. The defense did not make an opening statement. Chemirmirs attorney has called the evidence against Chemirmir circumstantial. A supporter wears a mask with the image of Sen. Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr. before the Philippine politician filed his candidacy papers for a 2022 presidential run, at the Commission on Elections in Manila, Oct. 6, 2021. Human rights advocates and people victimized by martial law under the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos asked the Philippines election commission Wednesday to disqualify his son from the 2022 presidential race because of a past conviction for a tax violation. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. lied on his certificate of candidacy in saying he had never been convicted of any crime an omission that would automatically disqualify anyone from seeking public office alleged the Campaign Against the Return of the Marcoses and Martial Law (CARMMA), a group petitioning the Commission on Elections to remove his name from the presidential slate. Marcos Jr., 64, who is nicknamed Bongbong, is seeking the presidency with the popular daughter of the current president as his running mate. The petitioners seek succor from the Honorable Commission to consider the instant petition, or to at least undertake its mandatory administrative obligation to cancel the candidacy of the respondent, convicted candidate Marcos Jr., as he is indubitably suffering from disqualification because he is a convicted criminal, they said in their 55-page petition obtained by reporters. In 1995, a trial court found Marcos Jr. guilty of four counts of tax evasion for failing to file income tax returns from 1982 to 1985. An appeals court upheld the conviction two years later. Marcos Jr., who comes from one of the most famous political dynasties in Asia, is vying to replace Rodrigo Duterte, whose single, six-year term ends in 2022 as stipulated by the Philippine constitution and whose 2016 presidential campaign was endorsed and bankrolled by the Marcos family. On Tuesday, the presidents daughter, Sara Duterte-Carpio, who is running for vice president, confirmed that she had formed an alliance with Bongbong to campaign for office under his ticket. Marcos Jr. dismissed the new petition as mere propaganda, expressing confidence that the commission would throw out the case. Ive personally seen the documents for our defense and discussed them with our legal team, who, along with some reputable and respectable legal experts, concluded without doubt that the petition ... is without merit and has no legal basis, he said in a brief statement. This was the second petition to block Marcos Jr.s bid for the presidency. The first, filed by another group of Filipinos opposed to the Marcoses, has not gained widespread attention. The commission did not immediately respond to queries about when it would take up the latest petition. The outcome of both petitions could be elevated to the Supreme Court. Marcos Jr. has been elected to public office before serving as a governor, congressman and senator. He also ran for the vice presidency in 2016, which he lost. During his past candidacies, there were no petition seeking to block his electoral runs. Petitioners tortured under Marcos Sr. Those whose names appeared in the petition filed on Wednesday included victims of human rights abuses during the Marcos era, including Bonifacio Ilagan, congressman and former journalist Satur Ocampo, former congresswoman Liza Maza, and Carol Araullo. They were jailed, tortured or harassed during the Marcos presidency, which lasted from the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s and included 14 years of martial law. The group also alleged that Marcos Jr. was an active participant in the dictatorship, actively claiming [a] stake to enjoying the fruits of the stolen millions and preventing the government from reclaiming these assets. It warned the Commission on Elections that his win might lead to a white-washing and further proliferation of historical revisionism of the gravely inhumane abuses and extremely grand corruption committed by his father. Allegations of human rights abuses were rife as thousands of activists went missing or were killed during the rule of the Marcos family patriarch, who declared martial law in 1972. Under his rule, the Marcos family also added to the general hardship of Filipinos by plundering billions of dollars from state coffers. The elder Marcos was chased out of the country by the people power revolt in 1986 and died in Hawaii in 1989, where he lived in exile. His wife, Imelda, and children were allowed to fly home three years later and started rehabilitating the family name. Candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the son and namesake of the late Philippine dictator, flashes a victory sign as he shows his certificate of candidacy after filing to join the May 2022 presidential race, in Manila, Oct. 6, 2021. [Rouelle Umali/BenarNews] Marcos Jr., who is trying to follow his fathers footsteps to the Malacanang presidential palace, has come out atop in recent opinion polls. His most formidable rival would be Leni Robredo, the outgoing vice president and opposition coalitions bet, who beat him in the 2016 election. The respected pollster Social Weather Stations (SWS) said that 47 percent of those Filipinos surveyed last month said they would choose Marcos Jr. with Robredo a far second, at 18 percent. Other serious bets are former world champion boxer and Sen. Manny Pacquiao; Francisco Domagoso, the popular mayor of Manila; Sen. Panfilo Lacson; and Sen. Christopher Bong Go, a former aide to President Duterte. In the SWS poll, Domagoso placed third, followed by Pacquiao in fourth position. On Wednesday, Duterte-Carpio said that her father had rejected her decision to join hands with Marcos Jr. Two days earlier, Rodrigo Duterte filed papers for election to the Senate, reversing course on his earlier announcement that he planned to retire from politics after leaving the presidential palace. Our party made an alliance and sought support for myself and Bongbong Marcos after accepting the challenge to run, she said. According to a Filipino political scientist, they may be from different parties, but the names on the Marcos-Duterte-Carpio ticket represent second-generation members of influential Philippine families. The Philippines has always been ruled by dynasties, Aries Arugay, a professor at the University of the Philippines and a visiting fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore said Wednesday. He gave a bleak outlook in speaking about what he called dynasty cartels joining forces to control government in the Philippines. It could spell the end of Philippine democracy or at least the end of liberal democracy, Arugay said during a webinar organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think-tank. John Bechtel contributed to this report from Washington. Naval ships from Japan and the United States conducted their first ever anti-submarine warfare exercise in the South China Sea, the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force said, as Tokyo steps up joint maritime activities in those disputed waters with Western and Southeast Asian partners. The deployment of ships and planes to the region, while seen as in line with Japans maritime strategy toward Southeast Asia, will no doubt meet with protests from China, which claims most of the South China Sea. A JMSDF statement said the helicopter destroyer JS Kaga, destroyer JS Murasame, a P-1 maritime patrol aircraft and an unnamed submarine took part in the drill Tuesday with the U.S. Navys USS Milius and a P-8A maritime patrol aircraft. It did not reveal the exact location of the exercise. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF), or the Japanese Navy as its commonly known, said in the statement: In this exercise, the JMSDF submarine conducted (an) anti-submarine warfare exercise with the U.S. Navy in the South China Sea for the first time, further improving our tactical skills and interoperability between the JMSDF and the U.S. Navy. The Japanese ships, together with four helicopters, an Oyashio-class submarine and a maritime patrol aircraft, are part of the JMSDFs Indo-Pacific Deployment 2021 (IPD21) task group formed to highlight Tokyos interest and commitment in a free and open Indo-Pacific, as well as Japans cooperation with other navies in the region, according to Japanese defense officials. The IPD21 started in late August and the ships are scheduled to return to Japan by Nov. 25. Before the anti-submarine exercise, on Nov. 14 the JS Kaga and JS Murasame conducted a bilateral exercise with the Philippine Navy frigate BRP Jose Rizal after a port call to Subic in the Philippines. The two destroyers also made a port call in Cam Ranh Bay in central Vietnam on Nov. 5 to 7 and took part in a goodwill exercise with the Vietnamese Navys Gepard-class frigate Dinh Tien Hoang. During the second half of November, there will be more bilateral and multilateral exercises, according to the JMSDF. Most notably, from Nov. 21 to 30 in the waters around Japan, two multilateral exercises will be conducted with the JMSDF, the U.S. Navy, the Royal Australian Navy, the German Navy and the Royal Canadian Navy. A total of 20 JMSDF ships and 40 JMSDF aircraft, 10 U.S. Navy ships, two Australian Navy ships, a Canadian ship and a German Navy ship will take part in these drills. Then-Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (center) reviews the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force fleet with at Sagami Bay, south of Tokyo, Oct. 18, 2015. [Reuters] Major policy shift Japan whose military activity is constrained by its post-World War II pacifist constitution introduced a major security policy shift under the government of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Since then, the Japanese Navy has expanded its presence and joint maritime activities in the South China Sea in order to promote a regional rules-based order. Japan has greatly increased its ability to project its maritime power and shrugged off longstanding taboos on security policy in doing so. Geopolitically it is a response to a heightened perception of risk due to Chinas military modernization program and regional hegemonic ambitions, Jeff Kingston, director of Asian studies and a professor at Temple University in Tokyo said in an earlier interview with Radio Free Asia, a sister entity of BenarNews. Japan participates in the Quad [grouping among the U.S., India, Japan and Australia] and has been an advocate of a free and open Indo-Pacific, a concept aimed at containing the expansion of Chinas regional influence that involves, among other things, joint naval exercises, Kingston said. Analysts said the South China Sea is playing an important part in Japans maritime strategy where Tokyo is taking a multilateral approach to pushing back on Chinese territorial claims. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said more than 40 percent of Japans maritime trade passes through the South China Sea. Chinas growing assertiveness against other claimant states in the South China Sea, and Japan in the East China Sea presents another grave concern for Japan, said a new report by the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore. Japan has traditionally been a provider of maritime capacity-building assistance for Southeast Asian states, offering activities ranging from joint exercises, training opportunities in Japan for defense personnel to equipment transfer, the report said. Vietnam and the Philippines, the nations that straddle the north section of the South China Sea and flank the important PRC submarine base on Hainan Island have become important maritime security partners for Japan, wrote John Bradford, executive director of the Yokosuka Council on Asia Pacific Studies, on the Center for International Maritime Security website. Bradford added that the JMSDFs relationship with the Philippine Navy is the most developed of its Southeast Asia partnerships. According to the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the JMSDF has provided 12 patrol vessels, 13 high-speed boats, a coast monitoring radar system and training to the Philippine Navy. To Vietnam, it transferred six patrol vessels and seven used vessels together with related equipment. Japan is carrying out capacity-building projects in countries in the South China Sea as Southeast Asia has clearly become a new nexus in Japans maritime strategy, Bradford said. Thai demonstrators seeking to amend the 2017 Constitution protest outside of Parliament in Bangkok, March 13, 2020. Thailands parliament on Wednesday again voted down a bill to amend the military-backed constitution, adopted in 2017 under the junta led by Prayuth Chan-o-cha, to make it more democratic. This attempt and a similar one in November 2020 to change the constitution included an amendment to abolish the Senate, whose pro-royalist members are chosen by the military. Pro-democracy protesters have been demanding this constitutional change since July 2020. Parit Wacharasindhu, of an umbrella group Re-solution, whose members filed the motion before parliament in June, said the Senate was nothing but a tool to help Prayuth, the current prime minister and former army chief, retain power. The 2017 Constitution is of Prayuth, for Prayuth and by Prayuth, Parit told MPs on Tuesday. If we analyze it, its origin and contents have one only purpose to let Prayuth extend his regime. The Constitution permits more senators than in the past decades. The 250 senators authority to jointly select a prime minister with 500 lower house members contradicts the principle of one vote in a democracy. Prayuth became prime minister after spearheading a coup that toppled a civilian government in 2014. After the 2019 general election, the ex-general who received nearly all of the Senate votes and nearly 500 total was elected to the post of PM. The Senate speaker abstained in his capacity as the presiding officer. Aggressive wording As was expected, lawmakers voted against the amendment bill 473 to 206, with 6 abstentions, House Speaker Chuan Leekpai said after a two-day debate that ended Wednesday. Speaking out against the proposed amendment, Sen. Seri Suwanpanond told lawmakers that the bill contained aggressive wording and infringed on many organizations. While House members terms end in March 2023, the handpicked-senators will stay a year longer to vote for a new prime minister. Analysts said this could aid Prayuth, should he decide to stay in office, or a successor likely linked to the junta he led after the 2014 coup. The draft amendment, signed by more than 130,000 people, called for removing junta-picked officials at the Constitutional Court and other independent organizations, and required prime ministerial candidates to have been elected to the House. It also sought the creation of mechanisms to prevent coups along with no amnesty for coup leaders, and allowed investigations of the armed forces, courts and independent organizations. Military leaders have been seen as staunch royalists who protect the countrys three pillars the nation, religions and the monarchy and who have led more than 20 coups since 1932, the year Thailand converted from absolute monarchy to constitutional monarchy. Youth-led protests Since July 2020, youth-led pro-democracy protesters have rallied to demand that Prayuth step down, the constitution be rewritten and the monarchy be reformed. The vote against the amendment comes after the Constitutional Court ruled last week that demands voiced by three prominent pro-democracy protest leaders to reform the monarchy had violated the constitution. The court ordered the trio to refrain from criticizing the royal family. The Constitutional Court is one of the independent organizations targeted by the proposed amendment. The ruling led to new protests. Since the Constitutions adoption in 2017, lawmakers and public petitioners have sought to amend it on at least four separate occasions. Only one of those efforts passed an amendment to change the electoral system which, analysts said, could favor bigger parties including one backing Prayuth, as well as the opposition Pheu Thai Party. The change approved in September would create a two-ballot system where voters elect candidates in single-seat constituencies and a second ballot to vote for a political party. The number of representatives to be directly elected would increase by 50 to 400 while the number of members to be appointed through proportional representation by party-choice votes would fall by 50 to 100. Bennington, VT (05201) Today Partly cloudy skies during the evening will give way to cloudy skies and light rain after midnight. Low 32F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies during the evening will give way to cloudy skies and light rain after midnight. Low 32F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 80%. If you'd like to leave a comment (or a tip or a question) about this story with the editors, please email us We also welcome letters to the editor for publication; you can do that by filling out our letters form and submitting it to the newsroom. You are the owner of this article. PITTSFIELD A defendant in an Adams home invasion took a plea deal Tuesday, making it an early day for the jury that had been convened to weigh his case. Jordan Hawkins-Darden, 25, pleaded guilty to an amended charge of larceny under $1,200 and was sentenced to one year in the Berkshire County Jail and House of Correction by Judge John Agostini. The sentence was in line with a recommendation from Assistant District Attorney Andrew Giarolo. It also matched the sentence given to co-defendant Jacob Galipeo this year. Neither one of them had any adult record; they were both equally culpable in this matter, Giarolo said, adding that the principals of equity and equality mandate that Hawkins-Darden receive the same penalty as his co-defendant. Trial set to begin in 2018 home invasion, and the case hangs on a witness seeking immunity A jury has been seated to hear the case of a Springfield man accused in an armed home invasion in Adams. And the key witness in the case has signaled that he intends to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. We have several young people who made an extremely poor decision, and in doing so they truly scared the two victims, Giarolo said, calling the facts of the case extremely serious. A weapon that Giarolo said authorities have every reason to believe was a BB gun was brandished during the home invasion. Prosecutors dismissed two counts each of armed robbery and home invasion. The latter charge carries a minimum sentence of 20 years of incarceration, defense attorney Joshua Hochberg said. Hawkins-Darden admitted to facts sufficient for a finding of guilt on daytime felony breaking and entering and two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon. The charges will be dismissed if he stays out of trouble for two years. The same deal was on the table before Hawkins-Darden decided to proceed toward trial, Giarolo said. Hochberg said he pushed hard to have Hawkins-Darden go to a jury trial because prosecutors had a weak case. On Monday, Giarolo indicated that the state planned to seek immunity for Jacob Blanchard, its critical essential witness. Agostini said the case was a difficult one for prosecutors to try because of a confluence of factors, and noted the involvement of weapons, and the elements of larceny and preplanning involved in the crime. Given as much, Hawkins-Darden got a deal of a lifetime, Agostini said. Agostini said Hawkins-Darden has a separate assault with a firearm case pending in Massachusetts, and other charges pending in Texas, where, his defense lawyer said, he has been living for about the past two years. Four men went to a Jordan Street residence Oct. 18, 2018, to confront the resident about a past dispute, Giarolo said. Had the matter gone to trial, the residents girlfriend, who was home at the time, would have testified that Galipeo knocked on the door and her boyfriend answered, Giarolo said. According to Giarolo, Blanchard would have testified that Hawkins-Darden, who also is known as Facts, punched the resident in the face, and along with an individual identified only as Rell, he entered the home with a BB gun before making off with a quantity of marijuana, as well as the residents cellphone and cash. Jury selection was completed Monday, but Hawkins-Darden opted to take the plea before opening arguments. Adam Hinds stands with local politicians who announce endorsements for Hinds campaign for lieutenant governor in front of Northampton City Hall Tuesday morning. Bidding is just like on TV, the auctioneer joked. Im going to ask for an enormous amount of money, and youre going to raise your hands. Inside Wednesday's tax auction in the town of Florida. According to The Boston Globe, the Massachusetts Statehouse appears to be the only state capitol on the continent where the public remains barred from entering. There is no widely accepted definition for a small business, says Phineas Baxandall, a senior analyst and advocacy director for MassBudget. While pass-through entities, such as sole proprietorships, sometimes are assumed to be small businesses, Baxandall said, that description concerns the way that a business files its taxes, rather than the amount of revenue it generates. An employee works at Berkshire Sterile Manufacturing, a biopharmaceutical firm, at the Berkshire Corporate Center in Lee in 2016. The Massachusetts Biotechnology Council was expected to release the results of its latest survey of diversity and equity in biopharmaceutical companies in the state, collecting data for the first time on the racial and ethnic backgrounds of the workforce. BOISE - The enforcement of the Biden administrations Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) vaccine mandate for private companies with more than 100 employees is being put on hold. The OSHA website now reads While OSHA remains confident in its authority to protect workers in emergencies, OSHA has suspended activities related to the implementation and enforcement of the ETS pending future developments in the litigation. Idaho Governor Brad Little commented on the news Wednesday, saying it was "very welcome news for many Idahoans." The Biden administration is putting his OSHA vaccine mandate on hold, thanks to the states, including Idaho, which are taking a stand against this unprecedented government overreach into the private sector. Our work is not done, and we will continue to fight the Biden vaccine mandates, but this is very welcome news for many Idahoans, Governor Little said. On November 12, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit granted a motion to stay OSHA's COVID-19 Vaccination and Testing Emergency Temporary Standard. Under Governor Littles direction, in cooperation with Attorney General Lawrence Wasden and his office, Idaho is party to three lawsuits challenging Bidens vaccine mandates one involving this OSHA rule for private employers with 100 or more employees, one involving federal contractors, and another involving CMS and healthcare workers. BOISE - Idaho Governor Brad Little and First Lady Teresa Little are inviting Idahoans to view the Idaho State Capitols Christmas Tree and Capitol Christmas decorations beginning the week of November 22, 2021. This years tree is donated by David, Lisa, and Delaney Beale. The tree is located at 1414 N. Harrison Boulevard in Boise. Cutting of the tree will begin about 9:00a.m. Monday. Its journey to the Statehouse is estimated to begin sometime around 11:30a.m. There will be NO in-person tree lighting ceremony this year, but the Idaho Department of Administrations Facility Services crew will begin stringing thousands of LED lights on the tree and decorating the interior of the Capitol starting Tuesday morning. The Idaho State Capitols holiday atmosphere comes alive with splendid decorations and the beautiful Christmas tree, reminding us all of the blessings of the season, Governor Little said. I hope you, your family, and loved ones can visit and reflect on the joy and peace this time of year brings. The Idaho Department of Lands will cut and rig the tree for lifting, Boise Crane will load, and the Idaho Transportation Department will haul the tree to its destination at the Statehouse. Boise City Police will provide the escort. After agonizing with what to do with this gorgeous tree that was planted too close to our home, we came to the unfortunate realization that the tree must be removed, David Beale said. Almost simultaneously, we received a surprise knock on our door from the State, asking us if we would be interested in donating our tree to become the Capitol Christmas Tree. That visit was an absolute blessing. Yes, this fine tree needed to be removed, but to go out serving as a beacon of the holiday season for the steps of the Capitol building, we could not be more pleased, or ask for a sweeter outcome! WARSAW, Poland (AP) Hundreds of migrants who were camped in the cold on the Poland-Belarus border have been moved to a nearby warehouse in Belarusian territory, reports said Wednesday, with some still harboring hopes of entering the European Union. The move came a day after a melee broke out in the border crisis, with migrants throwing stones at Polish forces massed on their side of the razor-wire fence, injuring 12, and they responded with water cannons and tear gas. Warsaw accused Belarusian forces of instigating the conflict, while the government in Minsk denounced Poland's violent actions. The migrants, mostly from the Middle East, have been stuck at the border since Nov. 8. Most are fleeing conflict or despair at home and want to reach Germany or other western European countries. The West has accused Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko of using the migrants as pawns to destabilize the 27-nation bloc in retaliation for its sanctions on his authoritarian regime. Belarus denies orchestrating the crisis, which has seen migrants entering the country since summer and then trying to cross into Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. On Wednesday, Polands Border Guard tweeted a video showing migrants with bags and backpacks being directed by Belarus forces away from the camp near the Kuznica border crossing, and Polish Deputy Interior Minister Maciej Wasik said he had received information they were leaving on buses. The Belarus state news agency Belta reported they were moved to a heated, warehouse-like building about 500 meters (yards) from the border near Bruzgi, giving them the chance to rest indoors after many days in tents. One of them, an Iraqi Kurd named Miran Ali, took video in the warehouse and said Belarusian authorities told them they wouldn't be forced to return home. In response, the migrants chanted Belarus! Belarus! Belarus! in gratitude. This is the joy and happiness of Kurdish people after they were told that they will not be sent back to Kurdistan by force, and that they can wait here until Germany or one of the cities in Germany take them there, Ali said as he recorded the video. These people are expressing happiness and optimism in this cold and ugly camp. They sat on blankets, most still wrapped in heavy jackets and raincoats. Belta reported about 1,000 migrants agreed Tuesday to move into the building to wait for the situation to resolve, and it quoted some of them as saying that they are not planning to return to their home countries. Most of the building's space was allocated for the migrants, who were offered food, water, medical aid, mattresses and pillows, the news agency said. Some migrants opted to stay camped near the border. Polands Defense Ministry posted video showing people and tents there, with some smoke rising from campfires. The next steps in the crisis are unclear. Although arrangements have been made for flights from Minsk to Iraq to repatriate those who want to return, it is uncertain how many will go. Iraq has appealed for its citizens to fly home, telling them the way into the EU is closed. The first flight from Minsk for the voluntary repatriation to Iraq is expected Thursday. Belarus also released video from its State Border Committee, alleging it showed Lithuanian border guards with dogs pushing migrants away from the Belarus-Lithuania frontier Tuesday night. Lithuania denied the claim, releasing its own video of the incident. It blamed Belarusian officials for pushing the group of 13 migrants toward the Lithuanian side and preventing them from returning to Belarus after being stopped by the Lithuanian guards. German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke with Lukashenko for the second time this week, stressing that migrants should be given the chance to return to their home countries with the help of the UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration. Steve Alter, a spokesman for the German Interior Ministry, denied Berlin was planning to bring the migrants to Germany. The road to Belarus is a dead end for most people who want to go to Germany. There are no plans to approve taking people in, he said. German government spokesman Steffen Seibert said U.N. aid was starting to reach the migrants and it was important to ensure humanitarian agencies gain permanent access, even if it meant talking to Lukashenko, whose legitimacy is questioned by the West following a disputed 2020 reelection. It makes sense to also talk to those who have the opportunity to change this situation in Minsk, even when it comes to a ruler whose legitimacy, like all other European member states, Germany does not recognize, he said, adding that Merkel has coordinated with other EU partners and remains committed to the blocs stance of tightening sanctions on Minsk. Meanwhile, Polish President Andrzej Duda said there is no military threat at the border from the primarily civilian police and border guards that are there to prevent illegal migration. The presence of the Polish military there is chiefly as a backup, he said on a visit to Montenegro. Duda stressed that Poland won't accept any international decisions on the border standoff that are made without Warsaw's participation, referring to the talks involving Merkel and Lukashenko. Information on both sides of the border is hard to verify due to government restrictions. A state of emergency in Poland is keeping journalists, human rights workers and others away from the border along a zone that is 3 kilometers (2 miles) deep, and Belarus limits the presence of independent journalists. Estonia, which also is affected by migrant movements but to a lesser degree, said it would build a temporary razor wire barrier of up to 40 kilometers (25 miles) on its eastern border with Russia as an interim security solution. This northernmost of the three Baltic nations with a population of 1.3 million, Estonia shares a 294-kilometer (183-mile) land border with Russia and a 340-kilometer border with Latvia. It does not neighbor Belarus. Estonian Foreign Minister Eva-Maria Liimets told broadcaster ERR on Tuesday that the crisis stems from Lukashenko's bid to be recognized by the West as president and have EU sanctions lifted, stressing they must stay in place. In our view, it is important that the European Union remains united and exerts its influence on Belarus through action, Liimets said, adding new sanctions should be imposed as soon as possible. ___ Salar Salim in Baghdad, Daria Litvinova in Moscow, Frank Jordans in Berlin, Jari Tanner in Tallinn, Estonia, and Vanessa Gera in Warsaw contributed. ___ Follow AP's coverage of migration issues at https://apnews.com/hub/migration Wanting to expand the Sanford Post Office parking lot, Chet Hunt, who owns the post office building, paid $25,000 to a Gladwin contractor but hasnt yet seen any work completed. Im sure I got scammed, Hunt said. Hunt, 85 and a semi-retired realtor living in Hawaii, said it has been difficult for large mail trucks to get in and out of the post office's current parking lot, at 239 West Saginaw Road. So, he wanted to help ease the stress. In April, Hunt started looking for bids to expand the parking lot, but was coming up empty because contractors were so overwhelmed with jobs. Then, Hunt was referred to a contractor, Kyle Willman from Straight Edge Concrete in Gladwin, who later put in a bid. The bid was higher than I wanted to pay, Hunt said, but noted that he wanted to help out a village that's rebounding from the flooding of 2020. Then, Willman asked for an advance of $25,000, saying he needed to buy equipment. Hunt said he wired that sum to Willman from Hawaii in July. My golden rule is to never advance money to contractors, Hunt said. I reluctantly gave it to him. But through business, sometimes you have to take some risks." Hunt said Willman, after receiving the $25,000, told him he would start on the work the next day. But instead, Willman took off on vacation, Hunt said. Willman then gave Hunt a list of days he could start the work. Yet, Hunt said Willman has still not started the work. Shortly after that, Hunts calls to Willman went to voicemail and his emails were not returned. The last message Hunt sent Willman was prior to Nov. 9, when he demanded his money back from Willman for not doing the job. Hunt threatened going to the police, filing a lawsuit and more. Still, Hunt said Willman hasn't returned his calls or emails. Several calls by the Daily News to Willman over the last three weeks were also not returned. Hunt said he has no other recourse but to go to authorities and consult the legal system. He is sad that his good intentions have resulted in this hardship. The people of Sanford are just amazing, Hunt said. I was just trying to make it a real nice post office for them. Whys BioPharma BREAKING R&D SHACKLES? The Indian industry bore witness to biotech companies collaborating with vaccine manufacturers, vaccine technologies being transferred, licenses to manufacture several drugs granted to pharma companies, among other notable developments. These collaborations and partnerships have furthered R&D, commercialisation and distribution of several critical drugs throughout 2021. However, key barriers to R&D-based innovation still persist in the Indian pharma market that needs to be sorted out soon. We shall take a closer look at the industry quest to realise even more, swift innovations and fewer hindrances. 24th Edition of Bengaluru Tech Summit 2021 launches as a hybrid event: To focus on global digital and technological innovations The opening ceremony of the 24th edition of Bengaluru Tech Summit (BTS) was conducted as a hybrid event on 17th November. Organized by the Department of Electronics, IT, Bt and S&T of the Government of Karnataka and Software Technology Parks of India - Bengaluru, the Summit was inaugurated by the Vice President of India, Venkaiah Naidu. With the theme of Driving The Next, the three day summit is scheduled from 17th to 19th November, 2021. Naidu, while acknowledging the recent technological disruptions in many areas, stressed that the real potential of technology can be unleashed when there are significant improvements in sectors such as agriculture, education, healthcare, governance and climate change. Dr Kiran Majumdar Shaw, Chairperson Vision Group on Biotechnology, Government of Karnataka spoke on the need to push biopharma manufacturing and research in India. "The industry body ABLE is proposing a standalone PLI scheme for biopharma manufacturing. As we know, today the Indian biological drugs account for 80 per cent of the drugs pipeline and already account for more than 40 per ent of the global pharma market. It is this high capital investment that the government needs to support to expand the biomanufacturing capability and capacity. If we do not implement the PLI scheme for biopharma manufacturing eminently, we might see other competing nations deny us of leadership in the future", she said. "Another very import policy decision that we are discussing with the government is the research linked incentive based on investment linked tax breaks as well as fiscal incentives based on skill development, intellectual property and academic partnerships. Research and innovation are the cornerstones of non-linear economic growth. Indian companies need to significantly increase R&D investment, and academic research needs to generate intellectual value through licensable intellectual property", she added. The Biotech Track at BTS2021 is curated under a theme- Next wave is Innovation and will focus on key topics like Re-Igniting Innovation Creating Moderna & MRNA Technologies In conceiving Vaccines, Investing in Nextgen Medtech & Diagnostics, Gene-Editing, Oncology: Innovative Treatments And Biomarkers, Vaccine Equity, Showcasing Indias Vaccine Leadership, Cellular Immunotherapies, Latest Innovations In Cell Therapy, Secondary Agriculture and Regulatory. Wunderman Thompson SA wins Rentoza pitch Rentoza has officially appointed the digital division of Wunderman Thompson SA to deliver full-service communication, albeit digitally led. The scope of work includes strategy, content creation, radio, media planning, reporting and community management. Michael Oelschig, the agencys unit managing director, expressed, What is so exciting about this partnership is the ability for Wunderman Thompson to really live its purpose of inspiring growth for ambitious brands. While Rentoza has been around for a few years, they are still a startup in many ways. Through their incredibly exciting, innovative, and of course, ambitious business model, they are primed for exponential growth over the next few years. Being a part of driving that growth with them is really why we do what we do in this business. Rentoza is a subscription and completer non-ownership of products, describing its offer as democratising and dematerialising ownership of technology devices and appliances for all African consumers". The idea is that their customers use the products to achieve their outcomes, and if they no longer need the items, Rentoza simply takes the items back. It was started in 2017 with a goal to provide access to premium products enabling people to always stay on the cusp of the best technology without extending themselves outside of what they can afford. The brand targets a highly aspirational consumer in SA who often wants the best but cannot afford it. Mishaan Ratan, CMO of Rentoza, said, While we saw a lot of brilliant creative executions from the agencies during this pitch process, Wunderman Thompson SA stood out because we felt they had understood and then solved our core business challenge of communicating our business model better than other agencies. We are excited to build out this model with Wunderman Thompson and expose all South Africans to an evolution in access and product consumption with the goal of enabling everyone to "Live life on their own terms". Cofounder of entrepreneurship development company Nonzero, Tania Habimana, has been appointed as the new host of Closing Bell. Tania Habimana Congratulations on the new role! How are you feeling about it? Tell us a bit more about your career path prior to your appointment. You have some accolades behind your name, could you tell us a bit more about those? What kind of impact are you hoping to make as the host of Closing Bell? How do you plan to apply your extensive knowledge? What are the most important aspects of a successful business plan, in your experience? If you could give one piece of advice to youth entering the industry, what would it be? Habimana, a multi-award winning public speaker, has developed a substantial career in understanding how to build a business. In the early days of her career, based out of Europe, she worked on digital transformation in the fashion and retail sector. From here, her career bloomed to what it is today.Closing Bell takes a close-up look at how the markets are moving on that day, what drove them and how investors, as well as analysts, are reacting. We also take a look at macro-economic breaking news and current affairs that have the potential to affect businesses on the continent and provide our audience with the information they need. "On the show, Ill be interviewing analysts, investment managers, executives and CEOs wholl explain their strategies, share opinions, and provide insights on issues affecting the African business environment," said Habimana.Here, we hear more about that career, plans for Closing Bell and some advice for youth trying to enter the industryIts a dream come true. Ive always been passionate about business in Africa and about sharing African business stories. To be able to contribute in this way, on such a respected pan-African platform is a dream.It very much feels like my entire career has been leading up to this moment.After my digital transformation work, I worked on applying everything I had learned to build a business on the African continent. I started by bringing a European menswear brand to sub-Sahara Africa and eventually ventured on my own, as cofounder for Nonzero where we specialised in SME development and human capital development.Throughout this, my career as a public speaker and moderator began to grow. One of my first engagements was with the European Commission where I was invited to moderate the kick-off for Erasmus+ 35 Year Celebration, in the parliament in Brussels. To eventually work on facilitating high-level discussions on the continent such as with the African Union at the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) launch event in Niamey, where I chaired a discussion on SME development and the role of women and youth.All this culminated in the new position Im stepping into.Its honouring to be rewarded and recognised in public, however, its hard to discuss this without acknowledging what goes on in private.I am a product of the people who are and have walked the journey with me. There are so many contributors to achieving these accolades: from my family, my cofounder, to my team, my mentors, my connect group and many more people.What is important is that the work we do, allows people to take action. To turn complex concepts and conversations into simple, straightforward, actionable information for our viewers.To leave no stone unturned, as the saying goes and most importantly, no stone unexamined.Im also hoping to attract more young people and small business owners to the show and provide a platform where they can learn more about business, policy and the continents economic landscape.Simply put, I plan to merge my experience within corporate and as an entrepreneur doing business on the continent, to my interviews with CEOs and market analysts, to gather insights and answers that will help the public make better business decisions, better investments and find the best opportunities.I also intend to bring perspective on impact investing on the continent and movements within the start-up funding ecosystem.Execution.I find that too often founders and business owners spend lots of time developing a plan they never execute. They simply do not follow through on the plan they have built.Meanwhile, entrepreneurship is all about doing. I think entrepreneurs should not be too overly obsessed with lengthy business plans. Sometimes in business, you just have to keep building the plane while flying it. Prioritising market feedback and adjusting accordingly should take precedence over following scripted rules.Learn digital skills.Whether going into business for yourself or looking to enter the job market, gaining digital skills is so critical in todays climate and on top, its a free skill to acquire. Contrary to going to varsity, getting access to Google Skills certification training, Facebook and Instagram Marketing, as well as Linkedin Marketing, are free, and these are tools that can help you better market and sell your products/services (if youre an entrepreneur), and better sell and position yourself digitally (if youre within the job market).All you need is a device, even a phone will do, and access to the internet. Never forget: Justice Department Announces Largest Health Care Fraud Settlement in Its History: American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. and its subsidiary Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Inc. (hereinafter together Pfizer) have agreed to pay $2.3 billion, the largest health care fraud settlement in the history of the Department of Justice, to resolve criminal and civil liability arising from the illegal promotion of certain pharmaceutical products, the Justice Department announced today. Pharmacia & Upjohn Company has agreed to plead guilty to a felony violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for misbranding Bextra with the intent to defraud or mislead. Bextra is an anti-inflammatory drug that Pfizer pulled from the market in 2005. Under the provisions of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, a company must specify the intended uses of a product in its new drug application to FDA. Once approved, the drug may not be marketed or promoted for so-called off-label uses i.e., any use not specified in an application and approved by FDA. Pfizer promoted the sale of Bextra for several uses and dosages that the FDA specifically declined to approve due to safety concerns. The company will pay a criminal fine of $1.195 billion, the largest criminal fine ever imposed in the United States for any matter. Pharmacia & Upjohn will also forfeit $105 million, for a total criminal resolution of $1.3 billion. In addition, Pfizer has agreed to pay $1 billion to resolve allegations under the civil False Claims Act that the company illegally promoted four drugs Bextra; Geodon, an anti-psychotic drug; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug and caused false claims to be submitted to government health care programs for uses that were not medically accepted indications and therefore not covered by those programs. The civil settlement also resolves allegations that Pfizer paid kickbacks to health care providers to induce them to prescribe these, as well as other, drugs. Via: Alex Berenson: From Dose 1 through the March 13, 2021 data cutoff date, there were a total of 38 deaths, 21 in the COMIRNATY [vaccine] group and 17 in the placebo group. Pfizer said publicly in July it had found 15 deaths among vaccine recipients by mid-March. But it told the FDA there were 21 at the same data cutoff end date, March 13. 21. Not 15. The placebo figure in the trial was also wrong. Pfizer had 17 deaths among placebo recipients, not 14. Nine extra deaths overall, six among vaccine recipients. Could the discrepancy result from some odd data lag? Maybe, but the FDA briefing book also contains the number of Covid cases that Pfizer found in vaccine recipients in the trial. Those figures are EXACTLY the same as those Pfizer posted publicly in July. Yet the death counts were different. Pfizer somehow miscounted or publicly misreported, or both the number of deaths in one of the most important clinical trials in the history of medicine. And the FDAs figures paint a notably more worrisome picture of the vaccine than the public July numbers. Though the absolute numbers are small, overall deaths were 24 percent higher among vaccine recipients. The update also shows that 19 vaccine recipients died between November and March, compared to 13 placebo recipients a difference of almost 50 percent. Were the extra deaths cardiac-related? It is impossible to know. The FDA did not report any additional details of the deaths, saying only that none were considered related to vaccination. Related: Covid-19: Researcher Blows the Whistle on Data Integrity Issues in Pfizers Vaccine Trial In a bit of sweet irony, a vehicle previously used to commit crimes will now be used by Brandon Crime Stoppers. Advertisement Advertise With Us SUBMITTED Brandon East MLA Len Isleifson, Spruce Woods MLA Cliff Cullen, Brandon West MLA Reg Helwer, Justice Minister Cameron Friesen and Brandon Police Service public information officer Sgt. Kirby Sararas stand in front of Brandon Crime Stoppers' new vehicle. In a bit of "sweet irony," a vehicle previously used to commit crimes will now be used by Brandon Crime Stoppers. The provincial government is giving the local organization more than $50,000 to help prevent crime and aid in community outreach. The funding includes $11,000 to help fund community outreach and a new vehicle worth approximately $32,500, Justice Minister Cameron Friesen announced Tuesday afternoon. "I think its a sweet irony that a vehicle that in this case was actually used to perpetrate crime was seized by a police agency and now is being spun back into the community as a resource to help solve crime," Friesen said by phone from Winnipeg. Crime Stoppers is a crime prevention organization where people can submit anonymous tips about criminal activity. The group pays cash for tips that lead to crimes being solved. Theres a "big, bold decal" in the back window of the vehicle that tells people the Chevrolet Silverado was previously used to commit crimes, he said. It will be used to travel to different community organizations and promote programming. The vehicle will be a visual reminder of Crime Stoppers in Brandon, Friesen said, and will help the group operate around the community. The money comes from the provinces Criminal Property Forfeiture Fund, which liquidates criminal assets to help fund public safety initiatives. "Brandon Crime Stoppers board members were extremely excited to receive the donated vehicle from Manitoba Justice Criminal Property Forfeiture Branch, which will be an asset to the Crime Stoppers program," Brandon Crime Stoppers chair Rick Thomson stated in a press release. "Brandon Crime Stoppers board would like to thank the Criminal Property Forfeiture Unit of Manitoba Justice for all their assistance in making this vehicle donation happen." Money will also be used to host presentations at schools and Westman Immigrant Services, which a Brandon Crime Stoppers board member said will help raise awareness of the Crime Stoppers tip line. A provincial spokesperson asked the Sun not to name the board member out of concern for their personal safety. "Especially in high school kids, theyre in the know, so to speak, about whats going on," he said. The money will also go toward the Coppers Shopper program, where students receive money and a police chaperone to cover their Christmas shopping. "It does help in running the [organization] itself every dollar we put out is a dollar we have to generate, so it just helps us overall to run the program successfully," he said. Winnipeg and Manitoba Crime Stoppers are also getting cash from the province $28,000 and $12,000, respectively to fund outreach material, equipment and to support the award program for tips. The money for the three organizations came in celebration of National Community Safety and Crime Prevention Month. Since 2009, the Criminal Property Forfeiture Fund has distributed more than $19.9 million from seized criminal assets, according to the province. dmay@brandonsun.com Twitter: @DrewMay_ For more than three decades the YWCA Women of Distinction Awards Gala has celebrated women making a positive impact in the community. Advertisement Advertise With Us For more than three decades the YWCA Women of Distinction Awards Gala has celebrated women making a positive impact in the community. The Women of Distinction Awards first launched in 1985 to recognize women in the community and celebrate their leadership and skills, said YWCA executive director Heather Symbalisty. "They werent being recognized," Symbalisty said. "It really has to do with feminism and speaking up for womens rights and where we stand in the business community and the community overall." At the time, women would have been typically associated with taking care of homes and children. However, there were stand-out women in unique situations, she said, including those taking on strong roles in the community and business world. They stood out because there would have been fewer women visible or acknowledged in the 1980s in that context. The intention to recognize and celebrate these women and their impact has remained the throughline of the awards for the past 32 galas. While the event has experienced some changes over the years, it remains centred on recognizing women from Westman who come from various walks of life, roles and organizations and who are making a difference in the world. It remains important to acknowledge women because even in 2021, they still face disparity in terms of wages and how they are treated in the workplace and community, Symbalisty said. "Its very important for our organization to stand up and do that on behalf of women." While women have made gains in the workplace, there is still much work to be done. There is a continued need to shine a light on equity and equality in the community, and the gala serves as an opportunity to do so, she said. Symbalisty added the hope is that one day, women will be equals in everyone's eyes. "Its still taken a long time for female voices to be heard on all platforms. Were still fighting for equal representation everywhere. A stay-at-home parent works just as hard as someone who is working a full-time role plus parenting. They are doing a job, just one that is not recognized or paid for," Symbalisty said. "Were still given a huge workload, but were still given less pay and less recognition ... The Women of Distinction Gala is an opportunity for us to recognize all those females out there who are stepping out and stepping forward, even with those challenges that we face." It is critical to see and encourage these voices in the workplace to work together because they help change the language by showing women are equal. There's a disconnect that is not always recognized, she said. When women can boost each others voices and places in the workplace or community, it can create seismic change. She takes pride in the role the YWCA plays in spreading this message and the active steps the organization takes to push for equity and equality for all people in the community. The nominees at the Women of Distinction Awards Gala share a common thread of being surrounded by people who recognize how hard they work and the energy they put into meaningful acts each day, even in the face of COVID-19. "They dont give up. They will use their voice to make sure that we are all heard," Symbalisty said. "The leadership that we see in these nominees, the commonality is that they mentor and they bring along everyone that they interact with. They dont leave people behind they really empower each other." By listening to and supporting each other, women and allies can validate any issues or concerns regarding equity and equality brought forward by change-makers, she said. "We really need to see action more working together so that the men in the workplace recognize us and stand with us to change that language," Symbalisty said. "Thats part of our challenge we need our counterparts to stand with us and recognize us and speak up on our behalf as well so were recognized equally." People need to unite to foster a better workplace and cultivate equity and equality among women, men, Indigenous and LGBTQ2S+ community members. "We should all be recognized as humans and work together to correct how things were done and move forward to a better work/life space in our community," Symbalisty said. Change to the current norms is pivotal, Symbalisty said. Her hope is the next generation will have a workplace that is better, but it will take hard work and collaboration to create an impact. The nominees featured at the Women of Distinction Awards have the opportunity to transform the organizations, communities, businesses and the world with the innovative ideas and solutions they can bring into the fold. Symbalisty said boosting these voices helps ensure more diverse ideas are available in the community and workplace. The Women of Distinction Awards Gala takes place Nov. 18 at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium. The evening begins with a dessert reception at 6 p.m. followed by an awards presentation at 7:30 p.m. "Well keep holding it and well keep recognizing the women in our communities and the entirety of Westman until hopefully one day we can start doing a gala in a different format where we are just recognizing everyone. But, until that time, were going to keep highlighting everyone who steps forward and uses their skills and hope that we keep moving forward," Symbalisty said. ckemp@brandonsun.com Twitter: @The_ChelseaKemp Its absolutely critical that we deal with backlogs. So were in the process of setting up that task force that Doctors Manitoba has asked for and others have asked for to ensure that there are doctors and nurses at the table. "Its absolutely critical that we deal with backlogs. So were in the process of setting up that task force that Doctors Manitoba has asked for and others have asked for to ensure that there are doctors and nurses at the table." Premier Heather Stefanson "My thoughts and prayers are with you and any family member or friend or relative you have that is experiencing their surgery being postponed or their diagnostic test." Health Minister Audrey Gordon I think its time that right-of-centre politicians retire the phrase "thoughts and prayers" for good because it has essentially become meaningless. That is if it ever really had some deeper meaning to begin with. Because in the absence of action meaningful, verifiable, demonstrable action thoughts and prayers offer little more than high-nosed public moralizing that stands only to benefit those who utter the phrase, and not at whom those words are directed. "Thoughts and prayers" had become a catch-all phrase offered by Republicans in the United States following repeated mass shootings such as the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012 and the San Bernardino mass shooting in 2015. After another 17 died in a high school attack in Parkland, Fla., angry Americans began tweeting with the hashtag "policy and change" as a pithy rejoinder and called for action rather than more "thoughts and prayers" from those who seek to prevent stronger gun laws. Of course, Gordons use of the phrase had nothing to do with shootings of any kind. According to a CBC report, following an announcement by the province last week that more surgeries would have to be postponed in order to increase intensive care capacity because of rising COVID-19 numbers, Gordon said on Monday that she empathized with those affected by the decision. But as Allison Marion a 67-year-old woman who suffers from osteoarthritis and who has been facing a 26-month wait for hip surgery told the CBC, those words offer no comfort at all. She was told by health officials that it would be eight months before she could see a surgical consultant, and another 18 months before she would find herself in surgery. Her pain is very real, and so are the Tylenol 3 she has to take up to six times per day to manage the pain. It was just last month that a Doctors Manitoba report suggested that Manitobas backlog for various surgeries and procedures had jumped to around 130,000 cases, marking a significant increase from the roughly 110,000 cases the non-profit organization registered in June during the third wave of the coronavirus. At the time, Doctors Manitoba president Kristjan Thompson told reporters that the provincial government had done very little to stem the tide of surgeries that have been delayed due to the disruption of COVID-19. Thompson also expressed frustration with the provinces slow response to the recommendations Doctors Manitoba laid out in its original report in June. While the PCs announced in March that their government would allocate at least $50 million to reduce long wait times for surgery, a freedom of information and protection of privacy (FIPPA) request filed by the NDP revealed that only $2,460,669 of those funds had been spent as of Aug. 31. So when newly minted Premier Heather Stefanson sat in the Brandon Suns boardroom last week and told our editorial board that the task force called for by Doctors Manitoba was in fact moving forward, we took that as a sign the Tories were finally taking the situation seriously. Theres a large number of people who are waiting like Allison Marion in pain. But it was also on Monday that Gordon announced this task force wont begin working until after Stefansons throne speech on Nov. 23. So much for urgency. We dont really doubt that Gordon meant well when she offered thoughts and prayers to those patients who are affected by these ongoing delays. And to be fair to Stefanson, perhaps she considers another week of inaction acceptable, if only because she has been in the lead government role for a matter of weeks. It takes time to get priorities and planning in place, after all. But just a suggestion to our Progressive Conservative government: dont offer meaningless platitudes to Manitobans, particularly seniors waiting months and years for surgeries. After all, talk is cheap, but inaction can be quite costly. Matt Goerzen, editor CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) A Russian weapons test created more than 1,500 pieces of space junk that is now threatening the seven astronauts aboard the International Space Station, U.S. officials said Monday. In this image from video provided by NASA, the International Space Station is seen as astronauts in the SpaceX Dragon capsule undock on Monday, Nov. 8, 2021, (NASA via AP) CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) A Russian weapons test created more than 1,500 pieces of space junk that is now threatening the seven astronauts aboard the International Space Station, U.S. officials said Monday. The State Department confirmed that the debris was from an old Russian satellite destroyed by the missile strike. It was dangerous. It was reckless. It was irresponsible, said State Department spokesman Ned Price. Earlier Monday, the four Americans, one German and two Russians on board were forced to briefly seek shelter in their docked capsules because of the debris. At least 1,500 pieces of the destroyed satellite were sizable enough to show up on radar and with telescopes, Price said. But countless other fragments were too small to track, yet still posed a danger to the space station as well as orbiting satellites. Even a fleck of paint can do major damage when orbiting at 17,500 mph (28,000 kph). Something big, upon impact, could be catastrophic. We are going to continue to make very clear that we wont tolerate this kind of activity, Price said. FILE - In this April 24, 2021 file photo made available by NASA, the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule approaches the International Space Station for docking. Space junk is threatening the seven astronauts aboard the International Space Station and forcing them to seek shelter in their docked capsules. The U.S. Space Command says it's tracking a field of orbiting debris, the apparent result of some satellite break-up event. The astronauts retreated into their docked capsules on Monday, Nov. 15, 2021 after being informed of the threat. (NASA via AP, File) He said the U.S. has "repeatedly raised with Russian counterparts our concerns for a potential satellite test". NASA Mission Control said the heightened threat from the debris might continue for another couple days and continue to interrupt the astronauts' science research and other work. Four of the seven crew members arrived at the orbiting outpost Thursday night. NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, who's midway through a yearlong mission, called it a crazy but well-coordinated day" as he bid Mission Control good night. It was certainly a great way to bond as a crew, starting off with our very first work day in space," he said. The U.S. Space Command said it was tracking the field of orbiting debris. NASA had made no comment by late afternoon, and there was no word late Monday from Russia about the missile strike. A similar weapons test by China in 2007 also resulted in countless debris. One of those pieces threatened to come dangerously close to the space station last week. While it later was dismissed as a risk, NASA had the station move anyway. Anti-satellite missile tests by the U.S. in 2008 and India in 2019 were conducted at much lower altitudes, well below the space station. Until Monday, the Space Command already was tracking some 20,000 pieces of space junk, including old and broken satellites from around the world. Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said it will take days if not weeks and months to catalogue the latest wreckage and confirm their orbits. The fragments will begin to spread out over time, due to atmospheric drag and other forces, he said in an email. The space station is at especially high risk because the test occurred near its orbit, McDowell said. But all objects in low-Earth orbit including Chinas three-person space station and even the Hubble Space Telescope will be at somewhat enhanced risk over the next few years, he noted. John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, said the most immediate concern was the space debris. Beyond that, the United States is monitoring the kinds of capabilities that Russia seems to want to develop which could pose a threat not just to our national security interest but to the security interests of other space-faring nations. Earlier in the day, the Russian Space Agency said via Twitter that the astronauts were ordered into their docked capsules, in case they had to make a quick getaway. The agency said the crew was back doing routine operations, and the space stations commander, Russian Anton Shkaplerov, tweeted: Friends, everything is regular with us! But the cloud of debris posed a threat on each passing orbit or every 1 1/2 hours and all robotic activity on the U.S. side was put on hold. German astronaut Matthias Maurer also had to find a safer place to sleep than the European lab. __ AP reporters Matthew Lee and Robert Burns in Washington contributed. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content. If YouTube has its way, we may soon watch makeup tutorials and buy face powder and eyeliner directly from its site. Facebook is airing infomercial-style shows that will encourage people to shop from small businesses, including one that sells dog bow ties. Lots of internet personalities and businesses already pitch their products on social media. But now, internet companies seem to be making a concerted effort to make shopping an inextricable and seamless part of the online spaces where we come to be entertained and informed but not necessarily to buy stuff. Yes, the internet is turning into home-shopping TV. If YouTube has its way, we may soon watch makeup tutorials and buy face powder and eyeliner directly from its site. Credit:Adobe This is happening for three reasons: greed, fear and China. And the growing mania for digital shopping options is another example of how our experiences online are shaped just as much by corporations interests as by our desires. Austin Cain, 25, an Atlanta-based financial adviser who is helping to organise ConstitutionDAO, said in an interview this week that the groups goal was to purchase the Constitution of the United States in a way that utilises the capabilities of the technology we all believe in. Like many crypto-world phenomena, ConstitutionDAO was born in the grey area between dumb stunt and serious business venture. Last week, when stories about the Sothebys auction began circulating, a group of acquaintances started half-seriously DMing one another on Twitter about bidding on it. They organised a Zoom call and began working through some of the logistics. The copy of the Constitution owned by Dorothy Goldman to be auctioned by Sothebys on Thursday. It is the only known copy to be privately owned. Credit:Ardon Bar-Hama, via Sothebys When I first got on the Zoom call, I was thinking that maybe the odds of this happening were about 20 per cent, said Julian Weisser, a South Dakota-based investor. And then we started talking, and I said, Wow, theres some interest here. For some, the bid was pure caper. But the more earnest participants started seeing parallels between crypto culture a world full of outsiders, iconoclasts and radical governance experiments and the values of the Constitutions original framers. Decentralisation and cryptocurrency (web3) have created structures that allow people to self-govern with unparalleled levels of autonomy and freedom, the groups website reads. Its fitting that we use this technology to honour and protect the greatest historical tool for human governance: the US Constitution. ConstitutionDAO now has roughly 30 volunteer core contributors, who include entrepreneurs, investors, a purple-haired developer and at least two teenagers. None of them are experienced collectors of historical artefacts and they are figuring out many of the details as they go. Over a series of sleepless nights, they put up a website, formed subgroups to research the various legal and financial wrinkles associated with the auction, and opened a Discord server that swelled to more than 13,000 members. The copy of the Constitution being auctioned by Sothebys belongs to Dorothy Goldman, the widow of a New York real estate developer who bought it for $US165,000 in 1988. It is the only known copy of the Constitution that is privately owned a fact that intrigued the members of ConstitutionDAO, who saw an opportunity to make it accessible to a wider audience. If it wins the auction, the DAO plans to partner with a prominent museum or historical society to exhibit the document in a free, public setting. Organisers have had discussions with the Smithsonian and New York Public Library about hosting it, they said, although the artefacts final destination will be decided by a vote of the DAO. Were going to stop it from going into more private hands and actually open-source it, make it a public good, said Alice Ma, one of the organisers. In truth, ConstitutionDAO is more of a symbolic gesture to decentralisation technology than a real-world demonstration of it. Some in the group had initially hoped to make participants fractional owners of the Constitution, but that plan fell apart, possibly because it could run afoul of securities laws. The current plan is to issue crypto tokens, called $USPEOPLE, that will entitle participants to vote on certain decisions governing the Constitutions use but will not confer any actual ownership. If it wins the auction, the DAO plans to partner with a prominent museum or historical society to exhibit the document in a free, public setting. Organisers have had discussions with the Smithsonian and New York Public Library about hosting it, they said, although the artefacts final destination will be decided by a vote of the DAO. In addition, since Sothebys accepts only government-issued currency and does not allow DAOs to bid on auctions directly, the group plans to partner with a crypto exchange that will convert its Ethereum to dollars before the bid and a crypto nonprofit that will place the bid on the groups behalf. According to the groups FAQ document, a limited liability corporation will take control of the Constitution temporarily while the DAO figures out a long-term ownership structure. Buying the Constitution, it turns out, is a hard, weird project, made even harder and weirder by the choice to do it in less than a week with a bunch of internet strangers, inside a new, complicated organisational structure that nobody outside the crypto world fully understands yet. Loading And it could all be for naught if ConstitutionDAO simply gets outbid by someone with deeper pockets. If that happens, participants will get their money back, minus transfer fees. But the groups members are already talking about owning the Constitution as if it is a done deal. Their motto is WAGBI, or were all gonna buy it. This article originally appeared in The New York Times Few things are as deceptive as the apparent chemistry between leaders. Often, it is merely the cream on a bilateral relationship overflowing with mutual interest. Then, it is full of bonhomie, and meetings are designed to help favourably position the leaders with their domestic constituents. It is a friendship based on considerations far beyond the personal. Sometimes, when the interests are competitive rather than co-operative, reciprocal smiles disguise a systemic animosity in order to calm their populations who fear the storm that is brewing. It is a veneer of friendship, and it is almost completely without substantive impact. There is no prize for guessing which category this weeks Joe Biden-Xi Jinping meeting was in. Cordial meeting: US President Joe Biden and Chias President Xi Jinping during their meeting via video link on Tuesday. Credit:Xinhua via AP Cheery headlines suggested the leaders hosed down the threat of war over Taiwan and it did provide some cause for relief but we should be under no illusion that tensions remain. All large commercial buildings designed from next year will be required to operate at net-zero in a major climate policy announcement by the NSW Planning Minister. Rob Stokes said dark roofing will be discontinued on homes built across Sydney and has taken a swipe at the Commonwealths climate agenda while unveiling a suite of measures to ramp up the states emissions reductions response. NSW Planning and Public Spaces Minister Rob Stokes says the government has an obligation to ambitiously reduce emissions. Credit:Louise Kennerley Speaking to an online forum for urban think-tank Committee for Sydney, Mr Stokes also targeted parts of the property sector for their backlash over an earlier decision this year to mandate paler roofs in the south-west growth area, saying he found it incredible legislation was required to force change. There are no practical reasons why we shouldnt be ditching dark roofing on new homes permanently to ensure that future communities of Sydneys west dont experience the urban heat that many communities do now, he said, revealing he had asked planners to include the policy switch under a new umbrella approach to emissions. The NSW government says it has no plans for a northbound toll on the Sydney Harbour Bridge, despite a Transport for NSW document revealing the agency expected an extra fee would be imposed on drivers. Treasurer Matt Kean on Wednesday became the first minister to dismiss concerns over a new toll after the Premier last week said no decision had been made on the matter. Treasurer Matt Kean says the government has no plans to introduce a new toll on the Harbour Bridge. Credit:Louie Douvis A Transport for NSW document responding to community submissions to plans for the Northern Beaches Link was released last week revealing the prospect of tolls being placed on all harbour crossings. But Mr Kean said in a statement the government had no plans to toll the Harbour Bridge in both directions, with Transport Minister Rob Stokes later echoing this. The College of Critical Care Nurses is crunching data to determine why critical care nurses were leaving, but Mr Butcher said the shortage was exacerbated by nurses being redeployed to COVID-19 vaccination hubs to boost immunisation efforts. Other critical care nurses were opting to retire early, choosing to move to another area of nursing due to prolonged stress and burnout, or leaving the industry entirely. The colleges Victorian president, Rose Jaspers said while burnout was a concern before the pandemic, COVID-19 has been the straw that broke the camels back. We have a workforce which had not had a break for two years, the former ICU nurse said. On top of that, their working conditions every day are extreme and challenging. Theyre working phenomenal amounts of overtime, double shifts and extra shifts. Ms Jaspers said hospitals across Victoria were struggling to fill their rosters. She noted that although the number of new coronavirus admissions into ICU was falling in Victoria, nurses were still caring for dozens of coronavirus patients who were lingering in ICUs for up to 12 weeks, including some of the most gravely ill. Ms Jaspers said she was extremely concerned about the workforce in the coming months. With elective surgery resuming, some theatre nurses who were deployed to ICU units to help care for COVID-19 patients would need to return to their normal duties, she said. Adjunct Professor Ward said while it was estimated 20,000 nurses would graduate from university at the end of the year, you cannot replace the nurses giving up their registration with 20,000 first-year graduates, who need full support in understanding the system. Adjunct Professor Ward said Australia needed to do better to support and retain graduates. Mr Butcher said COVID-19 had taken a heavy emotional toll on healthcare workers, many developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression and anxiety at exponential rates compared to before the pandemic. A recent survey by Monash University and Royal Melbourne Hospital of more than 7800 Australian healthcare workers (most of them based in Victoria) found more than 40 per cent had symptoms of PTSD by the final stages of the states second wave. This meant they may have been easily startled or had trouble sleeping, continually recurring thoughts or felt irritable. Of concern, one of the significant predictors of PTSD, along with emotional exhaustion and burnout, was if healthcare workers worried their patients would not receive the appropriate level of care because of a shortage of resources an issue that continues to be the heart of the debate on Australias response to the pandemic. Nurses like to look after people, and when they are forced to lower their standards of care it really, really eats at away at them, Mr Butcher said. Loading Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation state secretary Lisa Fitzpatrick said it was not just critical care units battling staffing shortages. There are pockets of pressure spread out across the workforce, she said. We have a very tired workforce, not just in critical care, but in maternity services too. This has been going on for two years. She said some health services were heavily reliant on midwives doing double shifts because demand had increased in maternity wards triggered by a baby boom in Victoria during the pandemic. Ms Jaspers said more needed to be done to entice graduate nurses into critical care, but the postgraduate program was too costly for many. A Graduate Certificate in Critical Care Nursing at the University of Melbourne costs about $11,000 and will rise by $336 next year. However, those nurses will be paid just an extra $56 a week. Last month, The Age revealed Australia would allow 2000 overseas nurses and doctors to enter the country for work under a plan being finalised by the Commonwealth and states to ease a healthcare staffing crisis. Loading The Victorian Health Department estimates that since the start of the pandemic, the number of healthcare migrants joining the states workforce has plummeted by about 40 per cent. This was due to the difficulty of recruiting doctors, nurses and allied health professionals from overseas while navigating border closures and quarantine arrangements. The men charged over the shooting of another man in the stomach in an inner-Brisbane car park on Monday morning remain locked up after their cases went before a court for the first time. Shaun Kenneth Kirby, 33, was arrested on Tuesday and Lucan Jade Grace, 32, was arrested on Wednesday after the shooting behind the 7-Eleven convenience store in Spring Hill. Neither of the men appeared in person, or made a bail application, when their cases were briefly mentioned in Brisbane Arrests Court Mr Kirbys on Wednesday and Mr Graces on Thursday. Mr Grace has been charged with one count each of attempted murder, arson, unlawful possession of weapons, possessing a dangerous drug, possessing a drug utensil, possessing explosives (ammunition), discharging a weapon in a public place, driving without a licence, as well as two counts of unlawful use of motor vehicle. Hundreds of people have marched through the Brisbane CBD to 1 William Street in protest against mandatory COVID-19 vaccines and rules. The protesters were met with a heavy police presence outside the Queensland governments headquarters, including mounted officers, 4WDs and both uniformed and specially-equipped tactical police. Hundreds of people protesting vaccination mandates have descended on 1 William Street after marching through the Brisbane CBD. Credit:Matt Dennien One protester was seen waving an Australian flag upside down and another held aloft a Eureka flag, while the action prompted the next-door Queensland Parliament to lock its gates. The group stopped outside 1 William Street hoping to speak to Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and booed when it became clear she would not meet with the crowd, before chants of you serve us. Authorities are considering whether to ban politicians, staff and visitors who are not vaccinated against COVID-19 from the Queensland Parliament when new rules come into effect next month. When Queensland hits 80 per cent fully vaccinated, or on December 17, unvaccinated people will be banned from cafes, pubs, stadiums, galleries and libraries, and all staff must also be fully vaccinated. Rules that would mandate a COVID-19 vaccine for anyone wanting to enter the Queensland Parliament are being considered. Credit:Felicity Caldwell That could have ramifications for the Queensland Parliament in the Brisbane CBD, as it features several dining facilities and is also open to the public for tours. Parliament Clerk Neil Laurie said he and the Speaker, Curtis Pitt, were considering the implementation of vaccination mandates for staff and access mandates to the precinct. Disgraced Labor powerbroker Adem Somyurek has returned to Victorian Parliament with a sensational threat to scuttle the Labor governments pandemic legislation, vowing to block reforms that he claims reward autocratic leaders who have ruled by decree. Mr Somyurek belatedly proved his vaccination status on Wednesday, after earlier refusing to do so, paving the way for his return to vote in the upper house on Thursday. After being accused last year of a widespread branch-stacking operation, the former factional heavyweight and upper house MP left the Labor Party to sit on the crossbench as an independent. He was driven out of cabinet, the Labor caucus and then the party, and has since thrown mud at Premier Daniel Andrews in the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission. In a piece published late on Wednesday for the Herald Sun, Mr Somyurek argued the Andrews government did not have the numbers in the upper house to pass the bill in its own right, but only claimed those powers with Labor-leaning crossbenchers. A final decision on whether Aboriginal cultural sites in Western Australia can be destroyed for projects like mines will still rest with a state government minister under proposed legislation, with no rights of appeal for Traditional Owners nor proponents. Several land councils and Aboriginal rights activists say new heritage laws to be introduced to Parliament on Wednesday will not prevent another Juukan Gorge disaster, where mining company Rio Tinto destroyed caves in the Pilbara with evidence of 46,000 years of occupation. Bardi Jawi elder Frank Davey at a Kimberley Land Council protest on the steps of parliament house in June. Credit:Peter de Kruijff But the government is adamant the scales have been rebalanced between industry and culture. Under WAs existing Aboriginal heritage law, introduced in 1972, proponents such as miners and government departments have been able to apply through Section 18 of the act to damage cultural sites regardless of their significance. The on Wednesday discharged Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd (DHFL) and dropped the proceedings against it in a case of cheating and corruption registered by the CBI against its former directors Kapil and Dhiraj Wadhawan, and Yes Bank founder A single bench of Justice S K Shinde allowed the plea filed by challenging the decision of a special CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) court in August this year that had rejected its prayer for discharge. In its plea filed in the high court through senior counsel Ravi Kadam, the company had argued that since it had been taken over by Piramal Capital and Housing Finance, it must be absolved of all previous liabilities. The plea in the high court had been vehemently opposed by CBI counsel Hiten Venegaonkar. Venegaonkar had earlier argued that it would be wrong to discharge of its criminal liability until all statutory appeals in the case were decided. The HC, however, noted that Kapil and Dhiraj Wadhawan had been ousted from the company's board of directors two years ago. "The learned (CBI) Judge has committed an error by permitting the prosecution of the corporate debtor (DHFL) to the accused nos. 2 (Kapil Wadhawan) and 3 (Dhiraj Wadhawan), ousted from the Board of Directors by the RBI two years ago," Justice Shinde said in his order. The CBI's case is that Rana Kapoor, who is currently in jail in connection with a related case being probed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), had entered into a criminal conspiracy with the Wadhawans. As per the CBI, in 2018, Kapoor had conspired with the Wadhawans to receive illegal kickbacks worth several crores from (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 customs department has reportedly asked Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone to explain a ban at the companys Mundra port on handling export and import of container cargoes from Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan from November 15. The department 10 day ago sent a letter to tell Indias largest port operator it needed permission from the Directorate General of Foreign Trade under the countrys exim policy, the Economic Times reported Wednesday quoting an unnamed civil servant. Adani announced the ban on October 11, days after officials seized nearly three tonnes of heroin originating from Afghanistan worth an estimated Rs 20,000 crore from two containers at Mundra port in western Gujarat. "Ports are not authorised to take such unilateral decisions," another civil servant told the Economic Times. At the time of the seizure, Adani Ports had said that port operators are not allowed to examine containers and the company has "no policing authority over the containers or the millions of tonnes of cargo" that passes through the terminals at its ports. are preparing to offer lower fares for passengers without check-in bags in a move to improve seat occupancy and market share. chief executive officer Ronojoy Dutta indicated the airlines interest to offer zero bag fares in an interaction with Bloomberg. Regulatory caps on fares and capacity related to Covid-19 have prevented from taking a decision and the airline is discussing the issue with the government, he said. Were waiting for everything to settle down before we lock something, Dutta said. IndiGos rivals Go First and too are keen on offering zero bag fares, industry sources said. Go First is even looking to amend reservation systems to provide differential fares for those without check-in bags and hand bags weighing less than seven kg, one of the sources said. But a decision cant be taken unless fare caps are removed, according to company executives. While the Directorate General of Civil Aviations February circular on unbundling of services allowed airlines to offer zero bag fares, it came with a caveat. That is, these fares cannot be offered till fare caps remain in place. The zero bag fares were first introduced in the country by in 2015 and was soon followed by other low-cost airlines. However, it was not a hit. Initially the discount offered in zero bag fare was only Rs 200. This also allowed other airlines to match prices and offer free baggage at the same price. The product also faced regulatory challenges on the issue of fees that an airline could charge in case a passenger (who purchased zero bag fare) came to the airport with check-in bags. But with the intensifying competition and increasing cost pressures, airlines are looking at ways to unbundle services. Reviving the zero bag fare is one such option. Allowing airlines to charge for bags, seat selection, meals among others are ancillary revenue sources for airlines. Such fares would help airlines improve their revenues. Even now passenger load factors are around 70-80 per cent. The zero bag fare would help improve seat occupancy and help lure passengers by offering special fares. This could help in targeting corporates and same day return travellers, an aviation industry executive said. It will work if the difference between zero bag fare and lowest normal fare is substantial, he added. Domestic airline executives also pointed out that fares in India are among the lowest in the world, drawing comparisons with the US where airlines charge for carry-on bags. In India, airlines are required to provide 15 kg of check-in bags free. GoKwik, an e-commerce enablement company, has raised $15 million in a Series A round led by Sequoia Capital India. The round also saw participation from existing investors India and RTP Global. Within 250 days of its launch, GoKwik has on-boarded more than 100 brands which cumulatively have an annualised gross merchandise value(GMV) of $250 million. The company has so far been able to increase conversion rates of its customer brands by more than 20 per cent, resulting in an increased GMV of Rs 25 crore per month. The company plans to use the funds to work with large marketplaces, scale up its product and technology teams and launch new products. GoKwik focusses predominantly on solving e-commerce issues like boosting conversion rates across the e-commerce funnel for its customers. Its clients include Mamaearth, Good Glamm Group (Myglamm), LimeRoad, EyeMyEye, boAt, ManMatters, OZiva, The Souled Store, Noise, and VMart. Indias leading airline, IndiGo, on Wednesday announced the resumption of its meals on board. The decision was taken after Ministry allowed airlines to serve meals on all domestic flights. The carriers were not allowed to serve inflight meals, which have duration of less than two hours, since April 15 due to the Covid pandemic. Wolfgang Prock-Schauer, President & Chief Operating Officer, IndiGo, said: As the restrictions ease, we are pleased to resume our delicious food and beverage service, served with 100% hygiene, across all domestic flights. Effective 19th Nov 21, all our customers will be able to buy Food and Beverage on board as well as pre-book their choice of food. The resumption of this facility will not only help customers travelling with young children and senior citizens, but also those catching red-eye flights. We welcome this move as it indicates the sectoral progression towards normalcy. "The menu will include some of the most loved 6E snacks including Paneer Tikka Sandwich, Chicken Junglee Sandwich, Baked Pita with two Dips, and Sesame Chicken Rice Noodle Meal. Customers who wish to avail these delicious snacks, can also pre-book their in-flight meals," the company said. The Ministry on Tuesday said it has allowed airlines to serve meals on all domestic flights. The carriers had not been allowed to serve meals in flights, which have duration of less than two hours, since April 15 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. "The airlines, operating flights on domestic sectors may provide meal services on board, without restriction on duration of the flight," the ministry's order said on Tuesday. The ministry has also permitted resumption of magazine and reading materials for passengers on domestic flights, the order noted. The decision to resume meals and magazines has been taken as "Covid caseload" has reduced due to "proper implementation of appropriate Covid behaviour protocol", it mentioned. When the scheduled domestic flight services were resumed on May 25 last year after the lockdown imposed to curb the spread of coronavirus, the ministry had allowed the airlines to serve in-flight meals under certain conditions. The Digital Economy Mission (KDEM) on Thursday said it is setting up a task force which will be led by Harshil Mathur, the founder and CEO of unicorn start-up The task group will work towards creating a roadmap for the growth of the industry, identifying the opportunities and challenges faced by the ecosystem in the state and leverage the partnering institutions and government to solve them. B V Naidu, chairman of KDEM, said, India has emerged as one of the worlds fastest-growing tech innovation hubs in the world, with Fintech leading the charge as the industry has raised close to $10 billion in investment. Harshil Mathur, founder and CEO, Razorpay Indias financial inclusion and digitisation success story have been made possible by the combined efforts of the government as well as tech innovations, fundamentally disrupting the way masses access financial services, he added. The task group also includes Timmanna Gouda of Whatsloan, Miten Sampat of CRED, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha,. Raveesh Naresh of Khatabook, Harsh Jain of Groww, and Johnson Tellis, an advisory council member of KDEM. Harshil Mathur of said, This collaboration between the industry and government is a critical milestone for India's fintech ecosystem. As cements its place as a global fintech hub, our task force will work with the government and industry players across the board to unlock new areas of innovation and growth. is looking to establish vehicle scrappage centres under a franchise set up with the first one expected to become operational in the first quarter of the next fiscal, a top company official said on Wednesday. The auto major earlier this year had joined hands with the Gujarat government to support setting up of a vehicle scrappage facility at Ahmedabad in Gujarat. "Today, it appears that about 25,000 trucks are dismantled every year in the country and we do not have proper systematic scrappage facilities. Now, we have tied up with a European expert and with his help, we have made a model scrapping centre. "So, we have created this model, and this model we are going to deploy through franchise arrangement," Executive Director and President (Commercial Vehicles) Girish Wagh told reporters in an online press conference. The company has already started sending out a letter of intent (LOI) to the franchise partners to set up the scrappage facilities, he added. "We should see the first one coming in the beginning of the next financial year," Wagh said when asked about the timelines for the start of the initiative. He noted that the government is also quite keen regarding the setting up of the facilities as they see it is an employment generation opportunity. The Ahmedabad-based scrappage centre, which will be for both passenger and commercial vehicles, will have a capacity to recycle up to 36,000 vehicles a year. is setting up the centre in partnership with a partner. When asked about the commercial vehicles sales outlook for the current fiscal, Wagh said, "In the first (quarter), the industry grew by 44 per cent and we grew more than the industry as our market share improved. We expect that GDP growth should be around 9-10 per cent this year as indicated by the RBI, we expect the industry to grow by about 20 per cent over the last year." He added that the industry size should be around 7 lakh units and "we will continue with our market share growth". He, however, noted that the growth seen this fiscal has so far been on a low base of COVID-19 hit last year and the industry is still far away from its peak levels witnessed a few years ago. Wagh said that various headwinds like high commodity and fuel prices and chip shortage continue to impact the business. "Increase in fuel prices has led to an increase in CNG vehicle sales. Today, in the intermediate and light commercial vehicles, more than 40 per cent of our portfolio has in fact migrated to CNG in a short period of time," he added. On chip shortage, he noted that the company is dealing with the issue on a day-to-day basis and added that there could be an impact on the company's production of small commercial vehicles and intermediate commercial vehicles going ahead. Wagh said that probably, the worst is over for the sector and there could be growth in the coming days. "Going ahead, we (commercial vehicles business) should see strong growth. We have scratched the bottom and should start moving towards the next peak and this is generally being driven by mining, infrastructure growth, construction, overall consumption, e-commerce and also the growth of the rural economy. "All these are leading to improvement in volumes on a year-on-year basis," Wagh said. The auto major, which is the leading player in the domestic commercial vehicle segment, is looking to roll out new products, including electric and CNG versions of various models in order to cater to various sectors. (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.) Moody's Investors Service on Wednesday said that Tata Motors' pact with private equity firm is 'credit positive', as it will help the automaker to scale up its electric vehicle business. Last month, announced that it will raise USD 1 billion in its passenger electric vehicle (EV) business from Rise Climate. "We estimate that Capital's USD 1 billion capital injection into Tata Motors's (TML, B1 stable) electric vehicle subsidiary, EVCo, will fund half its EV spending in India (Baa3 stable) through March 2026," Moody's Investors Service said in a statement. intends to use the funds, which it will receive in exchange for compulsorily convertible preference shares issued to TPG, to create a portfolio of EVs and dedicated battery electric vehicle (BEV) platforms. EVCo will also invest in battery technologies and charging infrastructure in association with Tata Power Ltd. Moody's Investors Service noted that the automaker has an early mover advantage in EVs in India, but faces challenges in scaling the business. "The company's planned launch of 10 new EVs through March 2026, will help cement its EV position in India. However, its market share will decline from 71 per cent as EV penetration rises. "The scaling up of the EV market will depend on the pace of development and installation of charging infrastructure. High EV prices also weigh on demand as internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles are relatively cheaper," it added. It however, pointed out that carbon transition is a risk as long as remains primarily concentrated in ICE vehicles. The automaker is taking steps to electrify its products in the passenger vehicle (PV) and commercial vehicle (CV) segments in India but ICE vehicles will still dominate sales and thus carbon transition remains a risk, it stated. Moody's Investors Service also noted that the creation of a dedicated passenger vehicle subsidiary would allow the auto major to go ahead with strategic partnerships with global auto manufacturers. "The company's move to transfer its recently profitable PV operations to a wholly-owned subsidiary will give it greater flexibility in entering strategic partnerships with other automakers. These tie-ups could provide TML with access to new products, technologies and capital," it noted. Tata Motors would bring its strong distribution network and manufacturing ability to the partnerships, it added. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Billionaire Anil Agarwal's Ltd on Wednesday said it is mulling restructuring of the mining behemoth that may include demerger and listing of the aluminium, iron & steel, and oil and gas businesses as standalone entities. Under the restructuring being evaluated, Ltd and three businesses will operate parallelly, chairman Agarwal told PTI. "All the three businesses have great potential for growth and we think the model being evaluated will provide natural avenues for growth as well as enhance shareholder value," he said. Giving an illustration, he said a shareholder of will hold 4x shares once the plan is approved and implemented - share of Vedanta as well as those in the three businesses. "This is the global model and if you look at even Indian industry you will find that Hindalco is a separate company and so is Tata Steel. And we can do the same," he said. Agarwal said Vedanta's board has constituted a committee of directors to evaluate and recommend options to restructure the group. "The idea is to do it as early as possible. I can't give a timeframe but it will be very soon," he said. The plan under evaluation is the same as what port-to-energy conglomerate Adani Group did in 2015 - creating separate listed entities for power, mining, gas and transmission businesses. "The Board of Directors of the Company has decided that, considering the scale, nature, and potential opportunities for various business verticals of the company, the company should undertake a comprehensive review of the corporate structure and evaluate a full range of options and alternatives (including demerger(s), spin-off(s), strategic partnerships etc.) for unlocking value and simplification of corporate structure," Vedanta said in a stock exchange filing. Subject to a detailed evaluation, it is the intention that the aluminium, iron & steel, and oil and gas businesses would be housed in standalone listed entities, it added. This is the with objectives of simplifying and streamlining corporate structure, unlocking value for all stakeholders, and creating businesses, which are positioned better to capitalise on their distinct market positions and deliver long-term growth and enable strategic partnerships. "The Board has also appointed various advisors to assist the Board in evaluating the options," it said. The restructuring would also tailor the capital structure and capital allocation policies based on business-specific dynamics, create distinct investment profiles to attract deeper and broader investor bases; and accelerate emissions reduction and strong ESG practices. Agarwal said the Board has appointed various advisors to assist in evaluating the options. It is anticipated that the Board and advisors will complete their evaluation and consider the way forward as soon as practically possible, he said. "Over the past few years, Group has materially improved the operational performance of the businesses, increased cash flows, reduced debt whilst concomitantly focusing on accelerating investments in energy transition, health and safety, diversity and ESG in general. "This step, which we announced today, whilst pending a detailed evaluation, is designed to create independent, industry-leading, global public companies, where each can benefit from greater focus, tailored capital allocation, and strategic flexibility to drive long-term growth and value for customers, investors, and employees. We will continue to leverage our significant strengths in technology, operations and people to better serve our customers and all stakeholders," he added. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In a bid to unlock value and simplify its corporate structure, Anil Agarwal-led Limited on Wednesday said it had appointed a committee of directors to evaluate and recommend a range of options and alternatives, including demergers, spin-offs or strategic partnerships of its aluminium, iron & steel, and oil & gas businesses. The move comes more than a year after the parent company Resources unsuccessful bid to take Limited private. Subject to a detailed evaluation, it is the intention that these businesses would be housed in standalone listed entities, said in an exchange filing. This step, whilst pending a detailed evaluation, is designed to create independent, industry-leading, global public companies, where each can benefit from greater focus, tailored capital allocation, and strategic flexibility to drive long-term growth and value for customers, investors, and employees, the group's chairman, Anil Agarwal, was quoted as saying. The board has also appointed various advisors to assist in evaluating the options, said the filing. Over the past few years, the group has materially improved the operational performance of the businesses, increased cash flows, reduced debt whilst concomitantly focusing on accelerating investments in energy transition, health and safety, diversity, and ESG in general, Agarwal said. When contacted, the company refrained from giving any timeline for the completion of the evaluation process. These are early days and we believe that this is likely to result in value unlocking, but we would keep a close tab on the revised corporate structure and shareholding pattern, said Amit Dixit, analyst-metals at Edelweiss Securities. Recent aggressive targets in ESG (environmental, social, and governance) are more applicable to business and, hence, would get better appreciation and focus if it were a standalone business, Dixit added. For the last few quarters, the companys business has been contributing the highest in terms of its top line at the consolidated level. In the September quarter, despite an acute shortage of coal, the companys production remained unaffected. Since its (Vedantas) delisting attempt failed, it could not get access to cash. So by separately listing some businesses, the company/group could look to monetise and generate cash to lower its debt, said a Mumbai-based analyst on condition of anonymity. The companys consolidated debt as on September 30, 2021 stood at $6.9 billion (Rs 51,040 crore) with 89 per cent debt in rupee and 11 per cent in foreign currency. Of this, Vedanta Limiteds standalone debt stands highest at Rs 30,462 crore with cash and cash equivalent of just about Rs 1,697 crore. Last year, the group's attempt to delist from the Indian stock exchanges failed as it was unable to garner the number of shares required to complete its process. It was able to garner offers for around 1.25 billion shares, as against the 1.34 billion shares required for the delisting process to go through. Shares of on Wednesday ended at Rs 338.40 per share on the BSE, up 1.81 per cent from the previous close, taking the gains in November to over 11 per cent. The announcement regarding the restructuring of businesses came post market hours on Wednesday. With schools being shut, have explored different ways to keep their creative juices flowing and used the available resources in order to stay engaged, inspired, and motivated. As part of its Children Day initiative, Vedantu, a pioneer in Live online learning, has partnered with Australian visual communications platform Canva, to launch a first-of-its-kind Design Challenge in India, with a design bootcamp to educate school on the essentials of and design thinking. The design bootcamp sessions will be conducted by experts from Canva and Vedantu Master Teachers. With this collaboration, Vedantu and Canva aspire to celebrate the creativity, curiosity and exploration of children and teachers across the country. Since the pandemic, LIVE has seen massive adoption. Teachers have also gone above and beyond their duty to conduct classes through different mediums available. They have emerged as digital content creators and EdTech professionals who are experts in mentoring in an online teaching space. We strive to provide the best-in-class education and opportunities to our students that are beyond academics. Through this partnership with Canva, we will further our vision of unleashing the potential in every child, said Pulkit Jain, Co-founder and Head of new initiatives, Vedantu. This will enable us to provide our students access to a platform to fuel their creative minds and we are thrilled to explore this. We will continue to innovate to reach as many students as possible and create better experiences and outcomes for every child across the country. The theme for the first edition of the Design Challenge is #GoingBackToSchool and is open to all students across the age group of 6-18 years. The challenge will ask students to create artwork on Canva that truly resonates with the theme. Students are required to submit a design that focuses on what is so special about #GoingBackToSchool for them, with the templates available on Canva for Education. Were excited to partner with Vedantu to inspire creativity, design, and visual thinking in students across a range of ages, said Zach Kitschke, CMO, Canva. Our mission is to democratise design and empower everyone to create and we look forward to seeing the Design Challenge unlock all types of Canva, which is tapping the graphic design business, recently became one of the world's biggest privately-owned after being valued at $40 billion after a funding round. It had grown during the pandemic as more customers worked from home. : Andhra Pradesh Governor Biswabhusan Harichandan was admitted to AIG Hospitals in Hyderabad on Wednesday after he was diagnosed with COVID-19, his Press Secretary said. A medical bulletin said in the evening that the Governor has been evaluated by a multidisciplinary team and his condition was clinically stable with normal oxygen saturation at room air. Based on CT findings and previous history of comorbidities, he has been diagnosed with moderate COVID-19. He is being closely monitored by a team of experts, the bulletin said. The Press Secretary, in a release, said Harichandan suffered a minor illness after his return from New Delhi last week. "An RT-PCR test was conducted as a precaution as the Governor complained of cough and cold, he said. The Governor was diagnosed with COVID-19 on November 15. He was taken to Hyderabad by a special flight on Wednesday morning and admitted to AIG Hospitals. (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.) Some of the suspects who attacked senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid's house in this district of Uttarakhand were identified on Wednesday, following which raids were intensified to apprehend them, a senior police officer said. Eight shells and a live cartridge of 32 bore gun, which is used primarily to scare away animals, were also recovered from the premises by a forensic team, Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) Nilesh Anand Bharne said. CCTV footage recovered from the spot led to the identification of some of the attackers and we have intensified our raids to nab them, he said. Teams of Bhowali, Bhimtal and Mukteshwar police formed under Circle Officer Bhupendra Singh Dhoni are continuously conducting raids in order to arrest the suspects, Bharne said. No arrests have been made yet, he added. Khurshid's house in Satkol, about 15 kilometres from Nainital, was vandalised on Monday amid the ongoing controversy over his book "Sunrise Over Ayodhaya: Nationhood In Our Times" in which he draws a comparison between Hindutva and terror outfits like ISIS. Shouting pro-Hindutva slogans, the attackers burnt an effigy of the Congress leader outside his house under the Bhowali police station besides damaging some glass doors and setting one wooden door on fire of the structure. The family of caretaker Sunder Lal was also threatened. Later, an FIR was registered against one named and 20 unidentified people on the basis of a complaint by Lal. (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.) Continuing its attack on the ruling BJP in over the alleged scam, the Congress on Wednesday demanded that Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai clearly state that no irregularities have taken place. The party once again demanded a judicial probe by a sitting judge. Days after the Bengaluru police issued a statement that no large-scale irregularities took place, as claimed by the Congress, the opposition party said there were confusing statements coming from the government. "The Chief Minister says that Congress is trying to keep a non-issue alive, whereas Revenue Minister R Ashoka says that the case should be handed over to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID)," State Congress working president Ramalinga Reddy said in a press conference. Referring to media reports quoting some BJP ministers as saying that the Congress will be in trouble if the investigation takes place, Reddy, a Congress MLA and former minister, sought to know why there was confusion in the government. "Let the Chief Minister clearly say that no such incident has taken place. If we see their contradictory statements, it gives an impression that they (BJP government) are trying to hide something," Reddy told reporters. He also questioned BJP state president Nalin Kumar Kateel's "silence" on this issue. The Congress MLA demanded a judicial probe by a sitting judge. Addressing reporters, Congress MLA and former minister Priyank Kharge wondered why the Chief Minister said the Enforcement Directorate was probing the scam when it was a 'non-issue' for him. "If it's a non-issue, why are the BJP leaders talking about it daily?" Kharge said. He alleged that the police did not file a charge sheet against hacker Srikrishna alias Sriki, who is at the centre of the scam and was arrested in a drug case initially. His interrogation allegedly revealed his involvement in hacking Bitcoin related websites and apps. "It's almost a year when Srikrishna was arrested in the drug case, but why has no charge sheet been filed in the court? Whom is the government trying to shield?" Kharge asked. The alleged scam came to light after the hacker Srikrishna, a tech geek who was arrested in a drug case a year ago, made a statement that he hacked some websites and appsvrelated to the Bitcoin trade and made a fortune. However, police rubbished his claim and asserted that the investigation was conducted by the Central Crime Branch in a fair and professional manner. Based on the credible information on November 4, 2020 on a drug consignment procured through the darknet, CCB Police secured one accused and seized 500 grams of Hydro Ganja. During further investigation, 10 other accused, including Srikrishna, alias Sriki were secured and arrested. During interrogation, Srikrishna confessed before the Investigating Officer about his involvement in alleged hacking of many Cryptocurrency websites. "It is stated that neither were any Bitcoins transferred from the account of hacker Srikrishna nor was any Bitcoin lost. It is a fact that for the purpose of investigation of Cryptocurrency, it was felt necessary to open a Bitcoin account," the police said. It added that on December 8, 2020, government permission was obtained to open a Bitcoin account. "During the process of identifying and seizure of bitcoins, accused Srikrishna showed a BTC wallet, which contained 31.8 BTC. The wallet password was changed in the presence of cyber experts, Government panchas and the entire procedure was recorded under mahazer and submitted to the court," the police said. Further, the Court's permission was obtained to use password to transfer the said Bitcoins to the police wallet account. Upon reaching the said wallet shown by Srikrishna, it showed 186.811 Bitcoins, police said, adding that the Cyber experts opined that the said account claimed by the accused as his personal account was in fact a live wallet of an exchange and the accused did not have private key for this. (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 Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Wednesday told the Bombay High Court the government is trying "shamelessly" to frustrate an ongoing corruption probe against former state Home Minister Anil Deshmukh and that it does not deserve any relief in the matter. The central agency urged the HC to not grant any relief to the government, which is seeking quashing of summons issued to chief secretary Sitaram Kunte and current DGP Sanjay Pandey related to its ongoing probe against Deshmukh. Additional Solicitor General Aman Lekhi, who appeared for the CBI, told a bench led by Justice Nitin Jamdar that the state government failed to initiate a probe into allegations of misconduct and corruption made against Deshmukh earlier this year by former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh. Lekhi said the state government was bound by law to initiate a probe. However, it chose not to do so, and instead, approached the HC seeking, amongst other things, that some portions of the CBI's FIR against Deshmukh be expunged (these related to now dismissed cop Sachin Waze's reinstatement in 2020 and transfers and postings of officers), he said. "An investigation that was the mandate of law did not take place and that's why the HC had to pass April 5 order," Lekhi said, referring to a previous order of the high court directing the to initiate a preliminary inquiry into the allegations made against the NCP leader. The 71-year-old politician is currently in jail under judicial custody after being arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case. "Because of its incompetence and its conduct, the state of is not deserving of any relief from this court. Maharashtra is persistently and rather shamelessly continuing with its endeavor to frustrate (the ongoing probe) and to ensure investigation doesn't take place," he said. Lekhi also opposed the argument made by the state government last month, through senior counsel Darius Khambata, that since, the current director Subodh Jaiswal was the Maharashtra Director General of Police when Deshmukh was home minister, he, too, was a potential subject of the ongoing probe. Khambata had told the HC last month that between 2019 and 2020, when Jaiswal was the DGP, he was a part of the Police Establishment Board and thus, a party to several of the transfers and postings of state police officers that are now being probed by the CBI. The recommendations for the said transfers and postings were approved by Jaiswal, who was the DGP during Deshmukh's tenure as Maharashtra Home minister, Khambata had said. However, on Wednesday, Lekhi pointed out that in August 2020, while Jaiswal was the Maharashtra DGP, he had written to the state government seeking a CID probe into alleged irregularities in the transfers and postings of state police officers. "The CBI director, who was then the DGP, wrote to the state of Maharashtra seeking a probe. He did what was appropriate and what was expected of an ethical police officer," Lekhi said. "If he were guilty, why would he write this letter?" he asked. The CBI counsel questioned the Maharashtra government's locus standi or, its right to approach the court, seeking the present relief. Khambata however, said the CBI's probe was affecting the entire state police force, and therefore, the government had a "parens patriae" (power to protect persons who are unable to act on their own behalf) jurisdiction to approach the HC. "The state of Maharashtra has no intention of delaying, or, scuttling the probe. But the CBI is heavily compromised and the citizens of the country deserve a free and fair probe into the case," Khambata said. Following an order of the high court issued on April 5 this year, the CBI conducted a preliminary inquiry into the allegations made by Singh against Deshmukh. The central agency subsequently registered an FIR against the former minister who resigned from the cabinet after the HC order. In September this year, the CBI summoned chief secretary Kunte and DGP Pandey, asking them to report to its office in Delhi for answering questions related to Deshmukh. The Maharashtra government, however, approached the HC challenging the summons issued to the two senior bureaucrats. The HC will hear the plea further on November 22. (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.) People who tested positive for Covid-19 (confirmed by a PCR test) had an increased risk of mental illness, fatigue and sleep problems, finds a new study. Researchers from the University of Manchester analysed the electronic primary care health care records of 2,26,521 people from across the UK between February 2020 and December 2020. The results, published in JAMA Network Open, showed that there was an almost six-fold increase in the likelihood of reporting fatigue to a GP following a positive PCR test. Further, a three-fold increase in the risk of sleep problems compared to those without a positive test, for people who haven't previously visited their GP for any of these reasons in the past was also observed. There was also an 83 per cent increase in mental illness following a positive PCR test. However, there was also a 71 per cent increase in the risk of mental illness for people who received a negative PCR test compared to the general population. However, researchers believe this throws some doubt about whether Covid-19 is directly causing mental illness, because it is clear that those who get a test are more likely to have risk factors for mental illness, for example pandemic-related anxieties. "While fatigue is clearly a consequence of Covid-19 the risk of experiencing sleep problems is also very high. However, we are sceptical regarding the extent that Covid-19 is directly causing people to become mentally ill, or whether those with a predisposition to mental illness are more likely to get tested," said lead researcher Dr Matthias Pierce, from the varsity. Other studies also showed similar results revealing elevated risks of mental illness, self-harm, fatigue, and disrupted sleep patterns among people testing positive for infection during the pandemic. The researchers said that it is vital that general practitioners recognise the long-term impact of Covid-19 infection on their patient population. Offering follow-up to people who test positive for Covid-19 infection may help identify persisting symptoms. "The increased risk of developing mental health problems in people who tested negative may be due to health anxiety in these patients, and primary care has a role in identifying and supporting such patients," said Carolyn Chew-Graham, Professor of General Practice Research at Keele University in the UK.--IANS rvt/dpb (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 Wednesday reported a net reduction of 2,238 in active cases to take its count to 128,555. Indias share of global active cases now stands at 0.66 per cent (one in 152). The country is eighteenth among the most affected countries by active cases. On Tuesday, it added 10,197 cases to take its total caseload to 34,466,598 from 34,456,401 an increase of 0.1%. And, with 301 new fatalities, its Covid-19 reached 464,153, or 1.35 per cent of total confirmed infections. With 6,782,042 more Covid-19 vaccine doses being administered on Tuesday, Indias total count of vaccine shots so far reached 1,136,879,685. The count of recovered cases across India, meanwhile, reached 33,873,890 or 98.28 per cent of total caseload with 12,134 new cured cases being reported on Wednesday. Now the eighteenth-most-affected country by active cases, third by deaths, second by total cases and recoveries, India has added 78,019 cases in the past 7 days. India now accounts for 0.66% of all active cases globally (one in every 152 active cases), and 9.04% of all deaths (one in every 11 deaths). India has so far administered 1,136,879,685 vaccine doses. That is 3299.47 per cent of its total caseload, and 81.29 per cent of its population. Among Indian states, the top 5 in terms of number of vaccine shots administered are Uttar Pradesh (147670215), Maharashtra (108782191), West Bengal (89586291), Madhya Pradesh (78896023), and Gujarat (78893487). Among states with more than 10 million population, the top 5 in number of vaccine shots per one million population are Gujarat (1235173), Kerala (1229002), Jammu and Kashmir (1220786), Delhi (1202813), and Uttarakhand (1112396). Backwards from here, the last 1 million cases for India have come in 58 days. The count of active cases across India on Wednesday saw a net reduction of 2,238, compared with 1,822 on Tuesday. States and UTs hat have seen the biggest daily net increase in active cases are Mizoram (205), Assam (72), Jammu and Kashmir (27), Delhi (20), and Himachal Pradesh (19). With 12,134 new daily recoveries, Indias recovery rate stands at 98.27%, while fatality rate remained unchanged at 1.35%. The Indian states and UTs with the worst case fatality rates at present are Punjab (2.75%), Nagaland (2.17%), and Uttarakhand (2.15%). The rate in as many as 12 is higher than the national average. Indias new daily closed cases stand at 12,435 301 deaths and 12,134 recoveries. The share of deaths in total closed cases stands at 2.44%. 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 2342.5 days, and for deaths at 1068.5 days. Overall, five states with the biggest 24-hour jump in total cases are Kerala (5516), Maharashtra (886), West Bengal (819), Tamil Nadu (789), and Mizoram (459). India on Tuesday conducted 1,242,177 to take the total count of tests conducted so far in the country to 627,016,336. The test positivity rate recorded was 0.8%. 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 (14.75%), Kerala (13.05%), Sikkim (11.9%), Goa (11.81%), and Maharashtra (10.32%). Five states with the highest TPR by daily numbers for tests and cases added are Mizoram (8.48%), Kerala (7.82%), Manipur (3.51%), West Bengal (2.21%), and Himachal Pradesh (1.33%). 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 (1612334), J&K (1241014), Kerala (1088608), Karnataka (773145), and Telangana (714422). The five most affected states by total cases are Maharashtra (6625872), Kerala (5071135), Karnataka (2992276), Tamil Nadu (2716421), and Andhra Pradesh (2070286). Maharashtra, the most affected state overall, has reported 886 new cases to take its tally to 6625872. Kerala, the second-most-affected state by total tally, has added 5516 cases to take its tally to 5071135. Karnataka, the third-most-affected state, has reported 255 cases to take its tally to 2992276. Tamil Nadu has added 789 cases to take its tally to 2716421. Andhra Pradesh has seen its tally going up by 191 to 2070286. Uttar Pradesh has added 8 cases to take its tally to 1710288. Delhi has added 44 cases to take its tally to 1440484. The use of in Indian has reduced by at least 75-80 per cent since November 2016 when the government demonetised the bulk of the country's currency, real estate consulting firm Anarock said on Wednesday. "One major driving factor behind this is that branded, listed players - who now attract a significant majority of demand to their projects - play by the book and avoid unaccounted monies in their transactions," said Anarock Chairman Anuj Puri. "Today, the sector's rough ride due to has smoothened. Still, DeMo has changed the very fundamentals of why and how residential real estate is bought and sold in India. Today, housing sales happen because of actual demand, not as a means to launder black mone," said Puri. In the pre- period, new supply outstripped housing sales - whereas, in the post- period, housing sales overtook new supply in the top 7 cities, according to Anarock. From 2013 to Q3CY2016, top 7 cities saw a launch of nearly 1.615 million units, while housing sales in this period stood at approx. 1.178 million units. After demonetisation, between Q42016 and Q32021, these cities saw cumulative new launches of approx. 904,000 units and housing sales clocked in at approx. 1.037 million units, a study by Anarock revealed. Telangana Chief Minister on Wednesday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, urging the Centre to direct the FCI to confirm the target of rice procurement from the state during ensuing Rabi season, among others. His letter comes in the backdrop of the continuing war of words between the ruling TRS and BJP over paddy procurement in the state. Rao alleged that the (FCI) was following certain policies which created confusion in the minds of farmers, as well as state governments, like the procurement target not being fixed for the entire year in one go and procurement not keeping pace, though production was increasing year by year. Due to these policies,it was becoming difficult for states to plan an appropriate cropping pattern and explain the same to farmers, he said. For instance, though rice production in Telangana during Kharif 2020-21 was 55.75 lakh metric tons (LMT), the procurement was only 32.66 LMT, which is 59 per cent of the production. This was less than the 78 per cent procured in Kharif 2019-20. Such wide variations in procurement levels does not allow the state to implement a rational cropping pattern, Rao said. To clear these confusions and fix the appropriate target for procurement, he had met Union Minister for Food and Public Distribution Piyush Goyal in September this year and requested that the annual target for procurement be fixed immediately, he said. Though it has been 50 days since he met the minister, no policy decision had been taken and communicated to him, he said. In this context, he requested the Centre to direct FCI to complete procurement of the balance 5.00 LMTs rice produced in Rabi 2020-21 and to enhance the target beyond 40 LMTs for rice procurement during the ongoing Kharif 2021-22 to 90 per cent of production as done in Punjab, he said. Rao also urged that the target of rice procurement from the state during the ensuing Rabi season be confirmed. Rao's letter to the PM came against the backdrop of a war of words between ruling TRS and BJP over paddy procurement and a clash between the activists of the two parties during state BJP president and MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar's visit to procurement centres this week. After a meeting of the TRS Legislature Party on Tuesday, Rao said all state ministers, TRS MPs, MLAs, MLCs and other public representatives would stage a dharna here on Thursday, demanding that the NDA government make clear the paddy procurement target in the state. This was required as state BJP president and MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar has asked farmers to take up paddy cultivation during the coming 'yasangi' (summer) season crop, while the Centre appeared to suggest otherwise, he had said. Farmers should not suffer loss by taking up paddy cultivation in the summer season due to any confusion on the issue, Rao said If there is no response from the Centre after the dharna, people would understand as to what is their attitude, he had claimed. Meanwhile, Bandi Sanjay Kumar alleged on Wednesday that the state government did not start procurement of the rainy season crop which made farmers wait at procurement centres since Dasara festival. "Farmers would not have died of heart attack at procurement centres or committed suicides had the government started procurement properly," he said. On Rao's comments that BJP faced protests from farmers during his visits to paddy procurement centres, Kumar asked why would farmers carry sticks and eggs which hit the BJP workers. On Rao's request that the annual target be fixed for procurement, he said a meeting on the summer crop will be held in February. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) An encounter is underway between security forces and militants in Kulgam district of Jammu and Kashmir, police said Wednesday evening. Security forces launched a cordon and search operation in Pombay area of Kulgam in south Kashmir on receiving specific inputs about the presence of militants there, a police official said. He said the search operation turned into an encounter after the militants fired upon the security forces party. The exchange of fire is still going on and further details are awaited, the official said. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The on Wednesday directed the Centre and states to ensure implementation of the decisions taken in a meeting to curb air pollution, observing that it cannot get into the nitty gritty and the has developed a sort of inertia" of not taking decisions which left to the courts to pass orders. Delhi's air quality improved marginally, registering the 24-hour average air quality index (AQI) at 375 on Wednesday from 403 the day before. Authorities, however, said no major improvement is likely till Sunday. The Commission for Air Quality Management in the NCR and Adjoining Areas, which held the meeting at the direction of the apex court on Tuesday with the Centre, Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Rajasthan, came out with a slew of emergency steps to deal with industrial pollution, thermal plants, vehicular emissions, dust control, diesel generators as well as encouraging work from home. A Bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana, which heard the case for over two hours, said, Enough is enough. We cannot get into all the nitty gritty of the issue. You please take the steps to deal with the emergency situation. The Bench, which did not pass any directions, asked the Centre and the states to implement the measures, decided in the meeting, to curb the pollution. People sitting in five and seven star hotels here keep blaming farmers, that 4-5 per cent is attributed to them. After agrarian laws, what happened to their land holdings? With such small land holdings, can they afford these machines? If you actually have any scientific alternative, propose it to them, they will adopt them," it said. It has been acknowledged that vehicular pollution is the major source of pollution and still gas guzzlers and hi-fi cars are plying on Delhi roads and nothing is being done, the bench said. At the outset, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, alleged that he has been targeted in TV debates with nasty utterances about his submissions on contribution of stubble burning to the air pollution in Delhi-NCR and they claimed that he had misled the court. The Delhi government on Wednesday issued 10 directions, including a ban on the entry of trucks carrying non-essential items in the city and closure of schools and colleges till further orders, even as the air quality improved marginally due to a dip in emissions from farm fires. The Delhi government has banned construction and demolition activities in the city till November 21. It has also ordered its employees to work from home till Sunday. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Asserting that the Centre is working on reducing farming cost and increasing growers' income, Union Minister on Wednesday said new Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) of marginalised cultivators will change the agriculture scenario in the country. More than 11 crore have so far received a total of Rs 1.60 lakh crore assistance under the Prime Minister Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme, he said. "As a result of this programme, over 10,000 new FPOs of marginalised have come up, and they will change the scenario of agriculture in India," the minister said after inaugurating a programme organised as part of 'Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav' in College of Fisheries here. Under the PM-Kisan scheme, income support of Rs 6,000 per year in three equal instalments is provided to all landholding farmer families. The Centre has been emphasising on soil health management and micro irrigation and are now being encouraged to go for multiple crop farming, the union agriculture minister said. "In order to increase farmers' income, efforts have been taken by the present government to bring down the production cost. Farmers can be encouraged to cultivate high-yield crops," he said. Tomar also said the Centre is working for holistic development of the northeastern states. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had given the highest priority to the development of the NE region, he said. The central ministers are also coming to the northeastern states so that they can interact with people and help them in their development and growth, Tomar said. "Road connectivity, railways and airways are developing in the region, which symbolises the growth of the new North East," he said. He congratulated Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Deb for his efforts to undertake various development projects and welfare schemes. The number of Self Help Groups has increased under the present government from 4,000 to 26,000, which is a very good sign," he said. Speaking at the programme, Deb said the farming sector played an important role in the economic development of the state. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Underlining that Pakistan has misused platforms provided by the UN to propagate falls and malicious propaganda against New Delhi, India at United Nations Security Council slammed Islamabad for raking up the Kashmir issue and called upon Pakistan to immediately vacate all areas of Jammu and Kashmir under its illegal occupation. "I would like to categorical about India's position, the entire Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were, are and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India. This includes the areas that are under the illegal occupation of Pakistan. We call upon Pakistan to immediately vacate all areas under its illegal occupation," Dr Kajal Bhat, Counsellor at India's Permanent Mission to the UN, said on Tuesday (local time). "I am constrained to take the floor once again to respond to some frivolous remarks made by the representative of Pakistan earlier today," Bhat said before beginning her response at UNSC. Stressing that this is not the first time that the representative of Pakistan has misused platforms provided by the UN to propagate falls and malicious propaganda against India, Bhat said that Pakistan's representatives "sought in vain to divert the world's attention from the sad state of his country, where the terrorist enjoy free pass by the lives of ordinary people especially those belonging to the minority communities are turned upside down." She also emphasised that member states are aware that Pakistan has an established history and policy of harbouring, aiding and actively supporting terrorists. "This is the country that has been globally recognised as one openly supporting, training, financing and arming terrorists as a matter of state policy," Bhat said. India's Counsellor also underlined that Pakistan "holds the ignoble record of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the UNSC". Stating that New Delhi desires normal neighbourly relations with all countries including Pakistan, she said that India is "committed to addressing outstanding issues if any, bilaterally and peacefully in accordance with the Shimla Agreement and the Lahore Declaration". "However, any meaningful dialogue can be held only in an atmosphere free of terror hostility and violence," Bhat said. Stressing that the onus is on Pakistan to create such a conducive atmosphere, she said, till then India will continue to take firm and decisive steps to respond to cross border terrorism. (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.) External Affairs Minister on Wednesday held a telephonic conversation with his Saudi Arabian counterpart Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud with a focus on developments in Afghanistan and the resumption of travel between India and the Gulf nation. Jaishankar is currently on a visit to Singapore. "Good to talk to Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia @FaisalbinFarha. Discussed resumption of travel and developments on Afghanistan," he tweeted. Jaishankar began his Singapore visit by meeting S Iswaran, the transport minister of the country. "Discussed enhancing travel arrangements between the two countries," the external affairs minister said. Jaishankar's talks with the Saudi foreign minister assumes significance as it took place a day after newly-appointed US special representative for Afghanistan Thomas West visited India. West held separate talks with NSA Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla with a focus on ways to coordinate global efforts on humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan. India has been in touch with all the leading countries in the Gulf region including United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Iran over the developments in Afghanistan after its take over by the Taliban. New Delhi has been calling for a unified global response to bring about desired changes to the Afghan situation and holdig that the territory of Afghanistan must not become a source of radicalisation and terrorism, regionally or globally. India has been particularly seeking steps based on the UN Security Council Resolution 2593 to improve the situation in Afghanistan. The UNSC resolution, adopted on August 30 under India's presidency of the global body, talked about the need for upholding human rights in Afghanistan, demanded that Afghan territory should not be used for terrorism and that a negotiated political settlement should be found out to the crisis. India hosted a regional dialogue on Afghanistan on November 10 that was attended by NSAs of Russia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. In the dialogue, the participants vowed to work towards ensuring that Afghanistan does not become a safe haven for global terrorism and called for the formation of an "open and truly inclusive" government in Kabul. A declaration released at the end of the Delhi Regional Security Dialogue on Afghanistan said Afghan territory should not be used for sheltering, training, planning or financing any terrorist acts and that officials lent strong support for a peaceful, secure and stable Afghanistan. Referring to the looming humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, the officials also pitched for providing assistance to the Afghan people in an unimpeded, direct and assured manner. (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.) Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), on Wednesday blockaded the main entrances of of companies here as well as Tata-run mines in West Singhbum district, to protest shifting of the head office of a few companies including Tata Cummins. MLA from Ghatsila, Ramdas Soren, who is also the East Singhbhum district President of JMM, as well as legislators Sanjeev Sardar (Potka) and Mangal Kalinidi (Jugsalai), led activists from the ruling party in squatting in front of the entrances disrupting traffic for much of the working day. Soren told PTI that they were protesting shifting of Tata firm head offices out of Jharkhand and alleged that Tata Motors and Tata Cummins plan to move to Maharashtra. However, Tata Motors already has its head office registered for many years at Mumbai while Tata Cummins shifted its head office to Pune nearly three years ago. Both firms have large production facilities in Jamshedpur and have shown no indications of shiting those out of the industrial city of Jamshedpur. "We have given them land, our people were displaced to allow the Tatas to establish their plants on our land here," Soren, who was leading the party activists at Tata Motors main gate in Telco locality here, said, adding "Now, they want to move out to Maharashtra. We cannot accept this." The JMM threatened to intensify the agitation, unless the proposal was withdrawn. leaders including Deepak Birua also led similar sit-ins in front of Tatas mines at Noamundi, Badajamda and loading sites in West Singhbhum district. In statement, Tata Cummins Private Limited (TCPL), however, vehemently denied shifting of Jamshedpur operations outsides the state of Jharkhand. "The process for the transfer of Registered Office of TCPL from Jamshedpur to Pune was initiated few years ago to facilitate the ease of administrative operations with the Corporate office. Shifting of Registered Office will not impact the revenue, employment and welfare opportunities for the state of Jharkhand or city of Jamshedpur. We continue abide by all the labor laws and other compliances, as applicable for the state of Jharkhand," the company's statement said. Meanwhile, Singhbhum Chamber of Commerce and Industries (SCCI) strongly opposed the agitation, stating that such acts by a ruling party would have adverse impact on prospective investment opportunities in the state. "We too wish that the headquarter of Tata companies should remain here in Jharkhand but certainly do not support such kind of agitation particularly when the issue could have been sorted out across the table," said Vijay Anand Moonka, President of SCCI. sources said that production and other activities in their plants was normal during the agitation. The Chief Minister Hemant Soren had earlier taken part in a road show in the capital to woo investors to invest in Jharkhand. (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.) Several pilgrims travelled through the on Wednesday and others made plans to offer prayers at the historic Sikh shrine in Pakistan as the route reopened after a 20-month gap. Kanwaljeet Sodhi, a resident of Dera Baba Nanak in Gurdaspur, said, "There were no limits to our happiness when we came to know of the reopening of the and this joy cannot be described in words." Union Home Minister Amit Shah had said on Tuesday that the government has decided to reopen the Kartarpur Sahib Corridor from Wednesday. The links Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan, the final resting place of Sikhism founder Guru Nanak Dev, to Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Gurdaspur district. Gurpurab, which marks the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, will be celebrated on November 19. Pilgrimage to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara was suspended in March 2020 due to the Covid pandemic. The Land Ports Authority of India (LPAI) said the pilgrimage to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara commenced on Wednesday and added that it facilitated travel of pilgrims through the corridor. "First two pilgrims given warm send-off at ICP gate by the Manager ICP. The pilgrimage to Gurudwara Darbar Sahib through Kartarpur Corridor formally commences today. Gurudwara Prabandhak Samiti welcomed them across the border. #KartarpurCorridor #DeraBabaNanak," said the LPAI in a tweet while posting photographs of the pilgrims. "Our team at PTB Dera Baba Nanak is warmly facilitating travel of pilgrims through Kartarpur Sahib corridor," it further said in another tweet. The LPAI develops, sanitises and manages the facilities for cross-border movement of passengers and goods at designated points along the international borders of India. On Tuesday, LPAI chairman Aditya Misha held a meeting with all stakeholders at Integrated Check Post Dera Baba Nanak to take stock of the preparedness, ahead of the reopening of the Kartarpur Corridor. Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, along with his ministers, will be part of the first 'jatha' (group), which will visit the Kartarpur Sahib on Thursday, officials said. The Gurdaspur district administration was busy in preparations for the visit of the first 'jatha' on Thursday, they said. Devotees longing to offer prayers at the historic shrine are ecstatic over the Centre's move to reopen the Kartarpur Corridor. Sodhi, who is a teacher, said they have been waiting for this day for so long in order to pay obeisance at the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara. Neetu Bedi, another resident of Dera Baba Nanak, said that in 2020, she had planned to visit the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara but she could not go as the pilgrimage was suspended because of the Covid outbreak. "This time, we will go and offer prayers at the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara," she said. Residents of Dera Baba Nanak also feel that with the reopening of the corridor, the trade, especially the hospitality sector, will get a boost. RT-PCR report and fully vaccinated certificate are mandatory for pilgrims, the officials said. Daily many people visit Dera Baba Nanak to catch a glimpse of the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara, said residents of the Dera Baba Nanak town. A few days back, Punjab Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu had demanded from the Centre to keep its promise of setting up a 'darshan sthal' fitted with binoculars to allow devotees, who do not have passports, to get a clear 'darshan' of the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara. An estimated 70,000 pilgrims had visited the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara so far after it was opened in November 2019. The Kartarpur Corridor, which provides Indian devotees visa-free access to the final resting place of Guru Nanak Dev, was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on November 9, 2019, to mark the 550th birth anniversary of the first Sikh guru. The Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara is located in Pakistan's Narowal district across the Ravi river, about four kilometres from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine. (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 Wednesday appointed Justice Rakesh Kumar Jain, a former judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to supervise the Uttar Pradesh SIT's probe on day-to-day basis into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in which eight people including four farmers were killed on October 3. A bench comprising Chief Justice N V Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli also took note of the names of the IPS officers provided by the state government, and appointed three officials as part of the state SIT. The CJI said that a detailed order will be passed shortly. The top court said it would hear the case again after the SIT concludes its probe and files the status report and the charge sheet in the case. The Uttar Pradesh government on November 15 had agreed to the apex court's suggestion that a former judge of its choice may be appointed to supervise the state SIT's probe. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Chief Minister on Wednesday directed the Urban Development department to appoint one observer in every municipality to supervise developmental work. Speaking at an administrative meeting here in North 24 Parganas district, the chief minister said it has been brought to her notice that members of the civic bodies' board of administrators were not going around areas under its jurisdiction and monitoring development work. The five-year term of elected representatives who run over 100 municipalities and corporations of the state ended in the last two years, but elections could not be held due to the Covid-19 pandemic. These civic bodies are being run by administrators appointed by the state government. Banerjee said that the observers would also compile a list of the problems faced by common people and submit a report to her office without any delay. The chief minister said that observers should be appointed in 125 municipalities as well as the corporations in the state. She said the much-awaited civic polls in the municipalities of the state would be held once the elections to municipal corporations in Kolkata and Howrah are over. Banerjee also asked Health Secretary Narayan Swaroop Nigam to find the scientific cause behind the surge in the number of malaria cases in the state. "Malaria in our state was eliminated at one point of time. But I think this year the outbreak of malaria is next to the Covid-19 pandemic. What is the scientific cause?" Banerjee asked the health secretary at the meeting. The chief minister was taking stock of the situation in North 24 Parganas district which has reported a considerable rise in the number of malaria and dengue cases, compared to previous years. The chief minister, however, expressed hope that the number of malaria and dengue cases would recede once winter sets in. "Ask the municipalities and panchayat bodies to see that they are controlling the situation. I will ask you to appoint nodal officers to help you, she told the health secretary. Nigam informed the chief minister that the number of malaria cases has gone up everywhere in the state, especially in Kolkata and its surrounding places. "There is also a surge in dengue cases in some areas of Barrackpore, South Dum Dum, Barasat, Madhyagram and Asoknagar (in North 24 Parganas district). There are no deaths as such. We are conducting tests. The situation is under control at the moment," Nigam said, adding that a study is being carried out to find out the cause. Banerjee asked the authorities to distribute Guppy fishes in water bodies to control malaria. Early this month, the chief minister said at least seven persons died of malaria and dengue in in recent times. She also asked the local MLAs to start awareness programmes for people who are yet to get the second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Praising healthcare workers for carrying out a stupendous job in the fight to control the pandemic, Banerjee said that is the only state in the country with zero wastage of COVID-19 vaccine doses. She said that around 88 per cent of the people in North 24 Parganas district have received the first dose of the vaccine while 48 per cent have got the second vaccine. The Trinamool Congress supremo also said that the district magistrates "can appoint 10 persons on contractual basis to help him". "It is impossible to handle everything single-handedly. So, one district magistrate can appoint 10 persons on a contract basis. I will ask the chief secretary to amend the mechanism," she said that the government has decided to hire at least 50 people for senior posts at par with a joint secretary official. Banerjee also asked the Chief Secretary, H K Dwivedi, to write to the Election Commission for extending the tenure of the district magistrates and superintendents of police from three years to five. Banerjee urged Dwivedi to find out ways on how the revenues earned from the export and import centres like Petropol (in North 24 Parganas district) be utilised in different projects, like the building of roads, by bringing them directly to the state treasury. The chief minister said that the Duare Sarkar' (the government at your door) programme in North 24 Parganas district will take place twice in January. The Duare Sarkar programme will be organised from January 2 to 15 and from January 20 to 30, Banerjee said. Asking officials to prepare a list of schemes which could be merged with others, the chief minister said, "There are several small schemes which have now become useless after we launched some new schemes which have become revolutionary. So, prepare a list of those schemes which can be merged with the new ones to help the government meet the financial expenses," she said referring to schemes like 'Dhaner Gola". Banerjee said that the government would be celebrating January 1 as 'Students' Day' to boost the confidence of pupils. (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.) Many liquor vends in were not operational on the first day of the new excise regime, while at shops that were open people had to return empty-handed complaining that lack of adequate supply has led to a "dry day" in the city. Under the new policy, 849 swanky mall-like liquor vends with walk-in facilities where people can pick their choice of liquor were to be opened from Wednesday to offer people a better alcohol-buying experience. However, shops at many places such as Mayur Vihar, New Ashok Nagar, Govindpuri, Kashmere Gate, INA and Dwarka were found either being readied or their shelves empty due to "shortage of supply". At some places, shops were found to be closed. Tuesday was the last business day for nearly 600 government-run operating across the capital. According to the new excise policy, the liquor business will now be handled completely by private players. As many as 260 old private vends had shut their business on September 30. "Vends here are either closed or don't have liquor. Shopkeepers say that the supply dried up," said Devesh Verma who went to buy alcohol at Galleria Mall in Mayur Vihar Extension. Guards at the mall were seen requesting people to try to get liquor on Thursday or Friday. At the newly opened private liquor vends in Dwarka Sector 12 and south Delhi's Govindpuri, shelves were empty. A dealer in Govindpuri complained that he could not replenish his liquor stock despite getting a provisional license. "We are being told that there is some licensing issue with wholesalers so there is a shortage in supply. Liquor shortage is likely to continue for at least two to three days," he told PTI. Excise department officers did not comment when asked about the complaint of liquor shortage. Under the new excise policy, classy liquor vends are being set up in 32 zones across the city. One retail licensee will have 27 per zone. These posh and stylish stores with over at least 500 square feet area would replace the existing liquor vends in the nooks and corners of the city. However, many of them were found to be not ready on the first day of business. In INA, a liquor vend getting the finishing touches and the staff there said they can apply for the stock only after getting a provisional licence from the government after submitting a video of the shop. were found closed in New Ashok Nagar, Laxmi Nagar and Kashmere Gate as well. "There is no point in opening the outlet on the first day as we did not get the stock," a liquor dealer at Kashmere Gate said. Tushar Kasana, who visited many shops in Govindpuri to buy liquor said that the vends are either under maintenance or do not have the stock. "The government should have made adequate arrangements before overhauling the entire system." Another buyer claimed that the shortage of liquor started two to three days ago when only government vends were operating with limited stock. "But today, it feels like a dry day. Most of the shops are under maintenance." According to government officials, provisional licences have been given to around 350 shops and registration of over 200 brands have been done with 10 wholesale licensees. Wholesale licensees have procured nine lakh litres of liquor of various brands, they said. The new excise policy allows the opening of five super-premium retail vends having an area of 2,500 square feet. Liquor tasting facility will also be developed at these super-premium retail vends. According to excise department officials said the new liquor vends will remain open from 10 am to 10 pm but those at the airport can function round the clock. The policy also allows the sale of liquor in bottles at restaurants. The liquor will be served in glasses or full bottles at L-17 restaurants and it will be the sole responsibility of the licensee to ensure no bottle leaves the premises. With the new regime in place, the L-17 licensees, which include independent restaurants or gastro-bars, may serve any Indian or foreign liquor at any area like balcony, terrace, lower area of the restaurant with the condition that the alcohol serving area be screened off from public view. They can also play live music and have professional performances, bands, DJ, karaoke, singing and dancing at the premises. Under the new excise policy, classy liquor vends are being set up in 32 zones across the city. One retail licensee will have 27 liquor shops per zone. The government had kept a total reserve price for all the 32 zones at around Rs 7,041 crore but it earned about Rs 8,917.59 crore through bidding. The excise department said the wholesale prices of all types of liquor are likely to increase by eight to nine per cent. The impact on wholesale price due to incorporation of factors like central sales tax at 2 per cent, profit margin for wholesaler, import pass fee and freight and handling charges, as approved in the Excise Policy 2021-22, will cause 10 per cent to 25 per cent rise for some brands of whisky (Indian manufactured foreign liquor), with fluctuation of each unit from 8 per cent to 25.9 per cent, the government had said in an order last month. (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.) Describing Lord Ram as a personalty who is "ideal of all people", a MLA from Indore district on Wednesday announced to take residents from his constituency for pilgrimage to at his own expense to fulfil their desire to visit the temple town in Uttar Pradesh. The first batch of 600 pilgrims from here will leave for Ayodhya, the birthplace of Lord Ram, on December 18 by a train, Sanjay Shukla, the MLA from the Indore-1 constituency, said in a statement. Shukla said, "Lord Ram is ideal of all of us. I want to fulfil the desire of every person of my assembly constituency to visit the Ram Janmabhoomi in The MLA said 17 wards of the Indore Municipal Corporation fall in his assembly constituency. The legislator said he will take common citizens of each ward for visit every month at his own expense. The BJP took potshots at Shukla over the announcement. Indore city BJP president Gaurav Ranadive said, "Lord Ram has given wisdom to Shukla. Lord Ram belongs to everyone. Accusing the Congress of seeing common people only as a vote bank, the BJP leader said Shukla should not select citizens for Ayodhya visit on the basis of their political leanings. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) has issued notices to 2,296 daily wage workers for participating in the ongoing strike which entered the 21st day on Wednesday though over 100 bus services were operated with the help of a section of employees who resumed duty, officials said. The workers were asked to join duty within 24 hours or face termination, they said, adding 7,400 other employees reported for work during the day. Employees of the loss-making corporation are on an indefinite strike seeking merger of the MSRTC with the state government. A merger will give them status of government employees besides better salaries. The officials said all the 250 bus depots have been shut since November 9 due to the strike, which started on October 28, disrupting most of the services of the transport corporation, one of the largest such bodies in the country with 90,000-plus workforce. They said 2,296 of the 2,584 daily wage workers were served notices, in which they were asked to join duty within 24 hours or face termination of service. Earlier, the state-owned corporation had suspended over 2,000 MSRTC employees for participating in the strike and asking others to join the stir. Despite the strike, 7,400 employees, out of the total 92,266, reported for work on Wednesday, the officials said. This number was lower than Tuesday when 7,623 staffers had rejoined duty. Over the last few days, some employees have been returning to work amid the agitation though their number keeps changing daily. On Monday, 6,895 corporation employees had reported for duty. An MSRTC spokesperson said they operated over 100 services, mainly air- conditioned 'Shivshahi' and 'Shivneri' buses, from various depots in Mumbai. (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 Traffic Police on Wednesday issued an advisory, prohibiting entry of heavy and medium category of goods vehicles into Delhi, and suggesting alternative routes for those moving elsewhere via the Peripheral Expressway. The advisory comes in the wake of high pollution levels in and the NCR, as schools and colleges were shut down till further orders and construction activities stopped except in some cases in the national capital. The Traffic Police said the general public is informed that in compliance with instructions of the Commission for Air Quality Management in the NCR and adjoining areas, heavy and medium goods vehicles (except those carrying essential items) issued till November 21 shall be strictly prohibited from entering Diversions of heavy and medium goods vehicles from Chilla, DND, Kalindi Kunj, Ashok Nagar and Jhandupura borders to other places via have been changed. "Heavy and medium goods vehicles going elsewhere via Delhi from the Yamuna Expressway will be able to go to their destination via the Peripheral Expressway from Zero Point through Pari Chowk," the traffic police said. "Heavy and medium goods vehicles going from via the DND border through Delhi will be able to reach their destination via the Peripheral Expressway by taking a U-turn from the DND toll plaza," it stated. According to the advisory, all such vehicles going from Noida to Delhi via the Chilla border will be able to go to their destination via the Peripheral route by taking a U-turn at the Chilla red light. All such freight vehicles going from Noida to Delhi via Kalindi Kunj will be able to go to their destination via the Peripheral Expressway by taking a U-turn from the Gaushala roundabout at the end of the Mahamaya flyover, it stated. "Heavy and medium cargo vehicles going from Noida to New Ashok Nagar towards Delhi will be able to go to their destination by the Peripheral Expressway by taking a U-turn from the New Ashok Nagar border," the advisory stated. "Heavy and medium goods vehicles going from Noida to Jhandupura towards Delhi will be able to take a U-turn from Jhandupura border to reach their destination via the Peripheral route," it added. The traffic police asked commuters to use alternative routes to avoid inconvenience and sought cooperation of all drivers to ensure implementation of the orders related to controlling pollution in the NCR. (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.) Prime Minister will visit the districts of and will launch multiple development projects worth over Rs 6250 crore on November 19. As per Prime Minister's Office (PMO), at around 2:45 pm, Prime Minister will inaugurate multiple projects in Mahoba in a significant initiative to alleviate water distress. These projects will help alleviate the issue of water shortage in the region and bring much-needed relief to the farmers. These projects include Arjun Sahayak Project, Ratauli Weir Project, Bhaoni Dam Project and Majhgaon-Chilli Sprinkler Project. "The cumulative cost of these projects is more than Rs 3250 Crore and their operationalisation will help in the irrigation of around 65000 hectares of land in the districts of Mahoba, Hamirpur, Banda and Lalitpur, benefitting lakhs of farmers of the region. These projects will also provide potable drinking water to the region," the PMO said in a statement. At around 5:15 pm, the Prime Minister will participate in a programme during which he will lay the foundation stone of 600 MW Ultramega Solar Power Park at Garautha in Jhansi. It is being constructed at a cost of over Rs 3000 crore, and will help provide the dual benefits of cheaper electricity and grid stability. The Prime Minister will also inaugurate Atal Ekta Park in Jhansi. Named after former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the park has been built at a cost of over Rs 11 crore, and is spread across an area of about 40,000 square metres. It will also house a library, as well as a statue of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. The statue has been built by the renowned sculptor Shri Ram Sutar, the man behind the Statue of Unity. (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.) Prime Minister will deliver the keynote address at The Sydney Dialogue on Thursday on the theme India's evolution and revolution. The Sydney Dialogue is being held from November 17-19. It is an initiative of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Prime Minister Modi will deliver the keynote address at The Sydney Dialogue on November 18 around 9 am, the Prime Minister's Office said in a statement. He will speak on the theme of India's evolution and revolution, with the address being preceded by introductory remarks by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison. The dialogue will bring together political, business and government leaders to debate, generate new ideas, and work towards common understandings of the opportunities and challenges posed by emerging and critical technologies. The event will also witness keynote address by Australian Prime Minister Morrison and former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. (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.) Protests were held at several places in on Wednesday over the Hyderpora encounter, demanding an inquiry into the killing of the three persons accused of having terror links and the handing over of their bodies. While voices calling for an independent probe grew louder, former chief minister said he has been assured by Lt Governor Manoj Sinha that he would look into the issue "seriously". The kin of the three persons killed along with a Pakistani militant in the gunfight on Monday were among those who joined the protests held in Jammu, Srinagar, Banihal and Ramban district, where authorities imposed prohibitory orders banning any assembly of people. The families of Altaf Bhat and Mudasir Gul have refuted the police charge that they were terror associates. The father of Mohammad Amir, who the police alleged was a militant, has also claimed that his son was innocent. Conference leader Farooq Abdullah, who is the Lok Sabha MP from Srinagar constituency, said he had a telephonic conversation with Lt Governor Sinha and had apprised him of the situation, including "wavering" statements made by the police. "I informed the LG about the contradictory statements made by police. On Monday, they are civilians trapped in crossfire and Tuesday they are harbourers of terror. If they had so much of the so-called inputs about the deceased on Tuesday, they could have shared on Monday. This is a cooked-up story and needs to be probed," Abdullah said. The former chief minister said that the LG assured him to look into this "seriously". "I hope that those guilty for this barbaric crime will be punished," he said. The families of Bhat and Gul held a protest in Srinagar, demanding justice for the victims and the return of their bodies. The police had said that the bodies of all the four killed in the Hyderpora encounter were buried in the early hours on Tuesday in Handwara area of north Kashmir's Kupwara district. Bhat's brother Abdul Majeed, who works as a revenue official, told reporters he has been continuously in touch with the police and they would have informed him if his brother was involved in militancy. "He (Bhat) was doing business in Hyderpora for the last 30 years. He rented the building and we had furnished their (tenants) verification in police station Saddar. The police should have contacted us if there was anything (adverse)," he said. Majeed said his brother was "a builder, a taxpayer and an innocent man". "You can verify in the whole locality. The police knew him, they used to visit his place every day, have tea with him. They can verify his credentials," he added. Majeed said that on Monday, the 'Task Force' (JK police's counter-insurgency unit known as the special operations Group) came and took his brother thrice for searches in the building. "They took him upstairs and brought him down three times. They used drones. (It was) As if they were shooting a movie there.... "We appeal the LG, request him, that verify and if there is anything (adverse) against my brother, then they can hang me in public in the city centre. "He (Bhat) was innocent, a civilian and not a militant. We want answers, we want justice," Majeed said. In Jammu region's Ramban district, authorities imposed prohibitory orders banning the gathering of five or more people in some villages in the wake of the death of Mohammad Amir, who was a resident of the district, in the encounter. Amir's father Latief Magray refuted the police's claim that his son was a militant and appealed to the Lt Governor to provide "justice to his family" and also return the body of his son for a proper burial. Magray, who had reportedly killed a militant in his village over 15 years ago and had to migrate because of threats from various terror groups, said he would continue his struggle for "justice" for his slain son. "If they have any proof of his involvement in militancy, show it to me! I know he was innocent," Magray said. Meanwhile, PDP president Mehbooba Mufti led a protest in Jammu and demanded that the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) be revoked. Holding a placard that read "Stop killing us, probe Hyderpora killings, end impunity and handover bodies to families", Mehbooba Mufti, along with party activists and leaders, staged the protest outside the party's Gandhi Nagar headquarters. A large posse of police stopped the protesters from moving towards the main road. Asked about the police claim of there being digital evidence against those killed, she said: "If they had prior evidence, why did the police not arrest them, as they have been doing on a daily basis." Mehbooba, on her return to Srinagar later in the day, was prevented by police from joining the protesting families of the civilians, her party claimed. (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 Punjab on Wednesday said its MLAs will pay obeisance at the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara in Pakistan on November 19 under the leadership of state unit chief The Kartarpur Corridor, which links Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan, the final resting place of Sikhism founder Guru Nanak Dev, to Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Gurdaspur district, was reopened for pilgrims on Wednesday. " MLAs will visit Gurdwara Sri Kartarpur Sahib on the occasion of Guru Nanak Dev's Parkash Utsav on November 19. On the occasion of Gurpurab, prayers will be offered for the progress, prosperity and happiness of Punjab," Mann said in a statement here. Gurpurab, which marks the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, will be celebrated on November 19. Pilgrimage to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara was suspended in March 2020 due to the Covid pandemic. (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.) Dear Reader, Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance. We, however, have a request. As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed. Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard. Digital Editor The on Wednesday sought a response from the Centre on a plea challenging certain provisions of the anti-terror law Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. A bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana issued notice to the Centre and tagged the plea filed by ex IAS officer Amitabha Pande and others with a similar petition. Senior advocate C U Singh, appearing for the petitioners, submitted that the UAPA is being used to quell "Heard Mr. C U Singh, senior counsel appearing for the petitioners and carefully perused the material available on record. Issue notice. Liberty is also granted to serve the Standing counsel for the Union of India," the bench also comprising Justices D Y Chandrachud and Surya Kanta said. The plea has sought to declare the proviso to Section 43D(5) (restrictions on grant of bail), as manifestly arbitrary and ultra vires of Article 21 (Right to liberty) of the Constitution. It has also sought the constitution of a redressal mechanism for people accused of carrying out "unlawful activities" to have the same opportunity of clearing their name as is statutorily available under the UAPA to "Unlawful Associations". The plea contended, "accusing a person of having committed a 'terrorist act', by saying the person 'struck terror' cannot be sustained, in the absence of a definition of the word 'terror'... This is open-ended, ill-defined, and arbitrary." "Direct the Union of India to set up a suitable scheme for compensating people who are incarcerated under the UAPA and who are eventually acquitted, with the quantum of compensation increases in proportion to the time spent in jail," the plea said. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Punjab chief may not be part of the 'jatha' which is going to pay obeisance at the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara in Pakistan on Thursday. On Wednesday night, Sidhu's media adviser Surinder Dalla claimed that Sidhu has been officially intimated that he could go on November 20 instead of November 18. "Sidhu saab had made all preparations for going to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara tomorrow," said Dalla, adding that he was supposed to go with the Punjab Cabinet ministers. Sidhu had submitted his application on Tuesday for travelling to the historic shrine in Pakistan to offer prayers, he added. Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi, along with his ministers, will be part of the 'jatha' (group) which will visit the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara on Thursday, officials said. Some MLAs and a few officials will also accompany Channi, they said. The Kartarpur Corridor, which links Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan, the final resting place of Sikhism founder Guru Nanak Dev, to Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Gurdaspur district, reopened on Wednesday. Gurpurab, which marks the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, will be celebrated on November 19. Pilgrimage to the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara was suspended in March 2020 due to the Covid pandemic. (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.) Terrorists enjoy free pass in Pakistan, which has an established history and policy of actively supporting them and holds the ignoble record of hosting the largest number of militants proscribed by the UN Security Council, India has said, slamming Islamabad at the UN Security Council. I'm constrained to take the floor once again to respond to some frivolous remarks made by the representative of Pakistan earlier today," Counsellor in India's Permanent Mission to the UN Kajal Bhat said in the UN Security Council on Tuesday. "This is not the first time the representative of Pakistan has misused platforms provided by the UN to propagate false and malicious propaganda against my country and seeking in vain to divert the world's attention from the sad state of his country where terrorists enjoy a free pass while the lives of ordinary people, especially those belonging to the minority communities are turned upside down, she said. India's Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador R Ravindra had already delivered the statement at the open debate on Maintenance of International Peace and Security Through Preventive Diplomacy'. Bhat took the floor to make a second statement in the Council after Pakistan's Ambassador to the UN Munir Akram raked the issue of Jammu and Kashmir in his remarks at the open debate. India desires normal neighborly relations with all countries including Pakistan, and is committed to addressing outstanding issues, if any, bilaterally and peacefully in accordance with the Simla agreement and the Lahore declaration. However, any meaningful dialogue can be held only in an atmosphere free of terror, hostility and violence. The onus is on Pakistan to create such a conducive atmosphere. Till then India will continue to take firm and decisive steps to respond to cross-border terrorism, she said. Bhat, who hails from Jammu and Kashmir, said in her remarks that UN member states are aware that Pakistan has an "established history and policy of harbouring, aiding and actively supporting terrorists. This is a country which has been globally recognised as one openly supporting, training, financing and arming terrorists as a matter of state policy. It holds the ignoble record of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the UN Security Council," she said. Categorically stating India's position, Bhat said the entire Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were, are and will always be an integral and inalienable part of India. "This includes the areas that are under the illegal occupation of Pakistan. India called upon Pakistan to immediately vacate all areas under its illegal occupation. (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 Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has started taking a close look at the business models of banks and their strategies. More on that story in our top headlines this morning. exchanges may be classified as e-commerce platforms The government is looking at classifying exchanges as e-commerce platforms and imposing 1 per cent tax collected at source on them under the goods and services tax (GST) regime. Read more. India advises against sales of at Adipec conference India said its made a concerted push with OPEC+ on oil production, but advised major consumers against selling their strategic reserves. Read more. Jhunjhunwala-backed Akasa Air signs $9 bn deal for 72 Boeing 737 Max planes Akasa Air, the Indian low-cost airline backed by billionaire investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, has placed an order for 72 Boeing 737 MAX aircraft. The order, valued at $9 billion at list prices, was signed at the Dubai Air Show on Tuesday. Read more. Pfizer's anti-Covid pill can be made by Indian drug firms without royalties Generic drug manufacturers in India, among a total of 95 low- and middle- income countries, will be allowed to sell Pfizers experimental anti-viral Covid pill, the pharma major said on Tuesday. Read more. Banks' strategies, business models under RBI lens: Shaktikanta Das The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has started taking a close look at the business models of banks and their strategies after it transpired that some of them are interested in serving their investors rather than their depositors. Read more. The on Wednesday expressed its dissatisfaction with the content of debates on television, on court connected matters, and said that TV debates are causing more air pollution than anything else. At the beginning of the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta submitted before a bench headed by Chief Justice N.V. Ramana, that the Centre did not mislead the court on the exact contribution of stubble burning, 4 per cent in winters and 7 per cent in summers, and data in the report was on annual average basis. Mehta said some nasty statements were made in TV studios in connection with figures related to the stubble burning. The bench, also comprising Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Surya Kant, however, made it clear that it has not been misled. The bench said: "We were not misled at all. You said 10 per cent but it was pointed out in the affidavit that it was 30 to 40 per cent (in the annexure)..." The Chief Justice said, "These kinds of criticisms keep happening. Our conscience is clear and we work for public interest..." He further added that "Debates on TV are creating more pollution than everyone else...We must focus on working out a resolution." Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, representing the Delhi government, argued on Centre's figures on crop stubble burning by farmers, in connection with air pollution in the capital. Singhvi added that the Centre's figures on stubble burning contribution to the air pollution, says that it varies from 0 to 58 per cent. He added, "Possibly Mr Mehta has taken a four- or six-month average (to arrive at the annual figures)." The Chief Justice said the top court is focussing on steps to bring down the air pollution, and told Singhvi not to raise the stubble burning issue again and again, and rather focus on steps the Delhi government proposes to curb air pollution. Singhvi said: "We are not blaming anyone... both are Centre's figures." The bench reiterated that it is not inclined to penalise the farmers and the state governments should persuade them to stop stubble burning. The bench pointed out that nobody understands the plight of the farmers. The top court is hearing a case filed by a 17-year-old Delhi student relating to air pollution in Delhi and adjoining areas due to stubble burning. --IANS ss/dpb (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.) CEO Adar Poonawalla on Wednesday termed vaccine hesitancy as the greatest threat in overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic while urging all adults to get vaccinated at the earliest. He said that 200 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine were lying with the states and people should get themselves vaccinated as soon as possible. "The vaccine industry has worked tirelessly to provide enough stocks for the nation. Today there are over 200 million doses available with states. I urge all adults to get vaccinated as soon as possible. Vaccine hesitancy is now the greatest threat in overcoming this pandemic," Poonawalla said in a tweet. Earlier in the day Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya also appealed to all eligible citizens to get vaccinated. The cumulative COVID-19 vaccines administered in the country has exceeded 113.68 crore mark. Of all the vaccine doses administered, around 90 per cent are Serum's Covishield and close to 10 per cent are Bharat Biotech's Covaxin. The number of fully vaccinated individuals against COVID-19 has surpassed the partially vaccinated eligible population for the first time in India. The country has in total administered over 113.68 crore doses, according to the provisional report at 7 am. This has been achieved through 1,16,73,459 sessions. Out of which, 75,57,24,081 doses were administered as the first dose and 38,11,55,604 doses were administered as second dose. The number of fully vaccinated individuals (38,11,55,604) exceeds those who have been administered a single dose (37,45,68,477). (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.) : Vice President M on Wednesday emphasised the need to ensure affordable and accessible for all and suggested that modern multi-specialty hospitals also start satellite centers in rural areas. Inaugurating Yoda Life Line Diagnostics Pvt Ltd here, he praised the Central government's decision to set up at least one medical college in each district, an official release said. He further suggested that governments envision one medical college in each revenue sub-division, which would not only address the shortage of trained manpower in the medical profession, but also increase people's access to quality Appreciating the Governments' efforts in making accessible to all, he further called for redoubling the efforts in providing infrastructure support for medical centers across the country. Talking about COVID-19 pandemic, Naidu praised the frontline COVID warriors for their dedication and hard work. Lauding Indian scientists and researchers for coming out with a vaccine against COVID-19 in record time, he urged everyone to come forward and get 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 Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on Wednesday has given its approval for provisioning of mobile services in uncovered villages of 44 aspirational districts across five states of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Odisha. The Cabinet cleared utilisation of the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) for provision of mobile connectivity in 7,287 uncovered villages across five states at an estimated cost of Rs 6,466 crore. Briefing media on the Cabinet decisions, Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur said these uncovered villages of 44 aspirational districts across five states of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Odisha will get 4G-based mobile services. "So, a total 7,287 uncovered villages will get telecom towers and services, and lakhs of people will get connectivity," Thakur said. The estimated cost of implementation of Rs 6,466 crore includes operational expenses for five years. The project would be funded by the USOF, and would be completed within 18 months of signing of the agreement, an official release said. The work related to provision of 4G mobile services in identified uncovered villages would be awarded through an open competitive bidding process as per extant USOF procedures. "The present proposal for provisioning of mobile services in the remote and difficult uncovered areas of aspirational districts across five states of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Odisha will enhance digital connectivity useful for self-reliance, facilitate learning, dissemination of information and knowledge, skill upgradation and development, disaster management, e-Governance initiatives...," the release said. The move would also enable establishment of enterprises and e-commerce facilities, provision of adequate support to educational institutes for knowledge sharing and availability of job opportunity, while fulfilling the vision of Digital India. "As part of Janjatiya Gaurav Divas launched on November 15 to honor the contribution of tribals to the culture of the nation, PM Modi, in today's Cabinet meeting, approved to provide telecom connectivity, mostly solar-powered, to multiple tribal villages. A total of Rs 6,466 crores will be invested in covering 7,287 villages of 44 districts, including 1,218 villages of Andhra Pradesh, 3,933 of Odisha, 610 of Maharashtra, 699 of Chhattisgarh, and 827 of Jharkhand with work to be completed in next 12-18 months," said Minister of Communications Ashwini Vaishnaw. (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's government is aiming to complete the privatisation of five to six state-owned companies, including Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd, in the current fiscal year, the secretary of the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management said on Wednesday. Tuhin Kanta Pandey said the government is aiming to close the privatisation of BEML and Shipping Corp of India and to list state-owned Life Insurance Corp on local bourses in the year to March 2022. Pandey said divestment is in due diligence stage. "Can expect financial bids for NINL, SCI, BEML, Pawan Hans in December-January," said Pandey. He said government is targeting December for handing over Air India to Tata Group. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is pushing ahead with LICs IPO -- which could raise between Rs 40,000 crore and Rs 1 trillion -- to help plug a widening budget gap. India may sell a 5%-10% stake in the company as part of a broader divestment target. The government may also allow foreign direct investment in LIC to ensure a diversified and strong demand across various segments of investors. The sale of the Bharat Petroleum Corp, a state-run refiner-cum-fuel retailer, would fetch about $13 billion for the exchequer and other shareholders. The government will invite financial bids for of five to six public sector undertakings (PSUs) in December-January, and close these transactions in the current financial year, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM) Secretary Tuhin Kanta Pandey said. After 19 years, of five to six PSUs will take place this year itself, Pandey said at the Global Economic Policy Summit. BEML, Shipping Corporation of India ( SCI), Pawan Hans, Central Electronics, Nilachal Ispat Nigam are the PSUs the government is looking to privatise this year, he said. Pandey said of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) is in the due diligence stage. Three bidders have reportedly shown interest in acquiring the oil marketing company. These are the transactions which we think that financial bidding can take place in December-January, and we can actually privatise them during this year itself, Pandey said. While there is a consultative process at the official and ministerial level to accomplish things faster, the Cabinet Secretary also held a meeting to further simplify the process, he said. The government is also working to launch the initial public offering of Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) in January-March, Pandey said. This IPO will be a big event for markets, he added. The country needs 100 million in the formal sector in the next ten years to take advantage of its demographic dividend and it should get into the global supply chain to generate many of those by negotiating effectively, industry players and experts have emphasised. "We need something like 100 million in the next 10 years which means that the non-agriculture sector has to generate 14 per cent job growth every year," said Aditya Ghosh, co-founder of Akasa Airlines, at the Global Economic Policy Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry. Even as he comes from the services sector, Ghosh said the tertiary sector is not going to be the one which is going to generate most of these 100 million "Manufacturing and formal sector has to be a big focus area for job generation," he suggested. He pointed out that 50 per cent of the formal salaried class had to move to the self-employed or casual labour due to Covid. To bring them back to the formal sector is a massive challenge, he said. Ghosh said Covid has done a weird thing -- while it has impacted the entire world in a secular manner, countries have started erecting walls, protectionism started in a big way. "We can't create 100 million jobs ourselves. The challenge is how do we use our talent as an export commodity to geographies, industries, sectors where there is a shortage," the former president of Indigo said. He said the irony is that India is going to face a shortage of 4-5 million technology and digital jobs in the next 18 months and the challenge is how to address the issue of lack of resources in skill-oriented industries. Tata Chemicals CEO and managing director R Mukundan said,"Most people see jobs growth as devoid of our trade policy, but I think these are inter-linked." He said India needs to be linked to the global supply chain which will create a lot more employment. "We seem to have this perennial fear that the Indian industry would be completely crushed by opening up. We have seen exactly the reverse of this in the last period of liberalisation. May be some of the free trade agreements (FTAs) were not rightly structured, but we must go aggressively in inking them. We need to get access for our service providers in global markets while we negotiate the trade deals," he said. Rana Hasan, regional economic advisor, south Asia at Asian Development Bank, said the issue of protectionism and automation as a deterrent for job generation are over-stated. He said if India doubles its share of global trade from the current 1.7 per cent, it would see huge expansion in volumes and quality of jobs even if the world trade declines. Besides, zero worker factories that are being talked about are still 10-15 years away, Hasan said. He talked about the importance of well-managed cities and formal industries to generate jobs and reduce the gender gaps in wages. Puneet Chhatwal, managing director CEO, The Indian Hotels, said there are huge opportunities to not only create jobs in the tourism sector but to position the sector globally. Preetha Reddy, executive vice chairperson, Apollo Hospitals, said with BYJU'S like companies in India, e-learning should be tapped to strategise skill training to generate employment in the health sector. After convening a virtual meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, US President on Tuesday (local time) said that Washington is "not going to change its policy", reported Sputnik. "We are not going to change our policy at all," Biden said. "They have to decide - they, Taiwan, not us - and we are not encouraging independence. We are encouraging that they do exactly what the Act requires," Sputnik quoted Biden as saying. On Monday (local time), Biden held a virtual meeting with Xi for over three hours. Both leaders exchanged views on bilateral relations on issues of fundamental importance shaping the development of China-US relations. The meeting saw the two leaders locking horns on the issue of Xi had said that China will be compelled to take resolute measures, should the separatist forces for "Taiwan independence" "provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line." Chinese President had noted the new wave of tensions across the Taiwan Strait, and ascribed the tensions to attempts by the Taiwan authorities to look for US support for their independence agenda as well as the intention of some Americans to use the issue to contain China, Xinhua news agency reported. "Such moves are extremely dangerous, just like playing with fire," Xi said. "Whoever plays with fire will get burnt." Beijing claims full sovereignty over Taiwan, a democracy of almost 24 million people located off the southeastern coast of mainland China, despite the fact that the two sides have been governed separately for more than seven decades. Taipei, on the other hand, has countered the Chinese aggression by increasing strategic ties with democracies including the US, which has been repeatedly opposed by Beijing. China has threatened that "Taiwan's independence" means war. (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.) is strengthening its technology partnership with India through the establishment of a new consulate in Bengaluru and a centre of excellence for critical and emerging technology policy in India, Australian foreign minister Marise Payne said on Wednesday. Her comments came hours after Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Australia's plan to set up the consulate in his virtual address at the Bengaluru Tech Summit. In a statement, Payne said the new Consulate-General will focus on deepening Australia's ties with India's vibrant innovators, technologists and entrepreneurs. " is strengthening our technology partnership with India through the establishment of a new Consulate-General in Bengaluru and a Centre of Excellence for Critical and Emerging Technology Policy, also to be based in India," she said. Payne said the consulate will support Australian businesses in one of the world's most important commercial centres. "Half of the next billion internet users are projected to be in India, and India's digital economy, centred on Bengaluru, is set to grow to USD 1 trillion by 2025," she said. Apart from its high commission in Delhi, at present has consulates in Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata. "Through our Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, India and Australia are at the forefront of determining the design, development and use of emerging technologies," Payne said. "Our existing Cyber and Critical Technology Partnership and its bilateral grants program were a significant first step in strengthening these ties," she said. The foreign minister said the Centre of Excellence for Critical and Emerging Technology Policy will bring together Australian and Indian technologists, policy practitioners, academics, researchers and thought leaders. "It will promote stronger investment opportunities and cutting-edge innovation in cyber, critical and emerging technologies. It will amplify Australia's and India's policy impact globally while visiting fellows from around the Indo-Pacific will broaden the Centre's influence," she said. Payne said the centre will provide a practical platform for Australia and India to work together to shape technology governance that aligns with our values and supports an open, inclusive and resilient Indo-Pacific. (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.) on Wednesday asked its all-weather ally to create enabling conditions for thousands of Chinese nationals working on the USD 60 billion CPEC projects, apparently flagging concerns over security and the slow pace of construction. The China- Economic Corridor (CPEC) is the flagship project of China's ambitious multi-billion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and it links China's Xinjiang province with Pakistan's Gwadar port in Balochistan province. Media reports from said Chinese investors were concerned over the slow pace of construction on the projects. On Monday, Pakistani officials hosted a meeting of Pakistan-based Chinese companies and briefed them about further investment opportunities in the country. Asked for his reaction, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told a media briefing here: we hope the Pakistani side will provide more enabling conditions and convenience for Chinese companies doing business in Pakistan. He did not elaborate further. Zhao said: the development of CPEC enters the stage of high speed and quality development. We believe we will better focus on agriculture, industrial development, people's livelihood, while ensuring the good operation of the existing projects in a way we will try to make it a demonstration project, Zhao said. has been asking Pakistan to ramp up the security of its thousands of workers currently working on various projects of the CPEC after a number of attacks on them in recent months. In August this year, 13 people including nine Chinese personnel were killed and several injured in a bomb attack on a bus carrying Chinese engineers to the Dasu area of Upper Kohistan district where a Chinese company is building a 4,300-megawatt hydropower project on the Indus River. had rushed a special team amid confusing signals from Pakistan that it could be a gas blast. Pakistan later admitted it was a bomb blast, stating that traces of the explosive substance were found at the scene. The CPEC is a collection of infrastructure and other projects under construction throughout Pakistan since 2013. Originally valued at USD 46 billion, the projects were worth USD 62 billion as of 2017. India has protested to China over the CPEC as it is being laid through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The BRI was launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping when he came to power in 2013. It aims to link Southeast Asia, Central Asia, the Gulf region, Africa and Europe with a network of land and sea routes. The BRI is seen as an attempt by China to further its influence abroad with infrastructure projects funded by Chinese investments all over the world. (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.) SE is the latest fashion brand to face criticism in China, after an exhibition in Shanghai featured a photo that state media said was smearing Asian women. The photograph, included in the LADY DIOR show, depicts an Asian woman dressed in a traditional costume and holding a Dior bag. It drew ire in an editorial published by the state-owned Beijing Daily on Monday with the headline: Is This the Asian Woman in Diors Eyes? Shot by a local Chinese photographer, the image makes Chinese consumers feel uncomfortable, the report said. It features spooky eyes, gloomy face, and Qing Dynasty-styled nail armor, according to the article. Social media posts by Dior, newspapers and the photographer all drew angry responses from the public, though theres been no talk of a boycott. Dior didnt have an immediate comment. The photographer is playing up to the brands, or the aesthetic tastes of the western world, the publication said. For years, Asian women have always appeared with small eyes and freckles from the Western perspective, but the Chinese way to appreciate art and beauty cant be distorted by that. Dolce & Gabbana Dolce & Gabbana experienced similar criticism three years ago after it posted videos featuring a Chinese model awkwardly attempting to eat cannoli and other Italian foods with chopsticks. Widely deemed offensive, the ads incited a consumer backlash and a sharp sales decline even after its founders apologized. While the luxury Italian fashion house lured back some customers, sales remain lower than they were before the misstep. Consumers still arent able to find Dolce & Gabbana on Chinas major e-commerce platforms such as Tmall. Beijing News, in a commentary published in October, said it wont be easy to regain market share without respecting Chinese consumers. Global brands are facing a dilemma as they try to satisfy the demands of Western shoppers and human-rights groups for greater sustainability, without triggering conflict in Theres growing nationalism among consumers in the worlds largest retail economy, amid escalating geopolitical tensions with the West. A social media backlash hit Hennes & Mauritz AB this spring, with revenue in falling at least 40% in its most recent quarter after it expressed concern about forced labor in Xinjiang. Nike Inc. has also come under pressure to walk a fine line in -- its fastest-growing market -- amid a brewing controversy over its business practices there. Its not the first time Dior angered China over political sensitivities. In 2019, it gave a presentation at a university that included a map of the country. It excluded Taiwan. Pakistan's Parliament in its joint sitting on Wednesday enacted a law to give Indian death-row prisoner the right to file a review appeal against his conviction by a military court. Jadhav, a 51-year-old retired Indian Navy officer, was sentenced to death by a Pakistani military court on charges of espionage and terrorism in April 2017. India approached the Court of Justice (ICJ) against Pakistan for denial of consular access to Jadhav and challenging the death sentence. After hearing both sides, the Hague-based ICJ issued a verdict in July, 2019, asking Pakistan to give India consular access to Jadhav and also ensure review of his conviction. On Wednesday, the joint sitting comprising members of the Senate and the National Assembly was called to pass a set of laws which were passed by the latter in June this year, including one to enable Jadhav to appeal against his conviction, but those laws failed to get the nod of the upper house. The Court of Justice (Review and Re-consideration) Bill, 2021 aimed to fulfill the obligation under the verdict of the ICJ and was presented by Law Minister Farogh Nasim and was passed by the joint sitting of the House through voice vote. The law allowed Jadhav to challenge his conviction in the high court through a review process which was a requirement of the ICJ verdict. The joint sitting is called when the differences between the National Assembly and Senate are unbridgeable. The current impasse was due to the fact that the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and allied parties enjoy majority in the National Assembly but are in minority in the Senate or the upper house. Earlier, the ICJ (Review and Re-consideration) Bill, 2020 was among the 21 bills passed by the National Assembly in June, but the Senate refused to pass them. The government had also tried to enforce the ICJ verdict through promulgation of a special ordinance in 2019 in the wake of the ICJ verdict. When the government promulgated an ordinance to let Jadhav file a review, he refused. Later, the Pakistan government through its defence secretary filed a case in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) in 2020 to appoint a defence counsel for Jadhav. The IHC formed a three-member larger bench in August 2020 which has repeatedly asked India to nominate a lawyer from Pakistan for Jadhav but New Delhi so far refused by insisting that it should be given a chance to appoint an Indian lawyer. The last hearing was on October 5, 2021 and the IHC once again asked the government to ask India to appoint the counsel before the next hearing scheduled for December 9. Among other laws passed in the joint sitting include a key bill to grant right of vote to overseas Pakistan through internet and use of Electronic Voting Machines. Advisor on Law Babar Awan presented the bill to amend the Elections Act, 2017 [The Elections (Amendment) Bill, 2021] and the lawmakers present in the session voted in favour of the bill to table it in the Assembly. The Opposition vociferously opposed it but it was enacted through a voice vote, prompting them to stage the boycott of the proceedings. Earlier, opposition and treasury members almost came to blows when the opposition lawmakers tried to stop the proceedings of the joint house session. The Senate comprises 100 and the National Assembly 342 lawmakers but both houses are short of one member each, hence the total strength was reduced to 440. Later, main Opposition leader and Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) chief Shehbaz Sharif accused the government of bulldozing the legislation while Pakistan People's Party chief Bilawal Bhutto Zardari announced to challenge the new laws in the Supreme Court. (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.) will be providing professional training to Afghanistan's aviation staff in areas of security, traffic controlling, firefighting, air forecast, and airport management, said the Afghan embassy in the country. Citing a statement, Khaama Press reported that the bilateral agreement was reached during the visit of Afghanistan's foreign minister Amir Khan Motaqi to Both the countries also agreed to be conducting ten flights every week between Kabul and Islamabad. Two flights would be carried out by large planes and the rest flights by small ones. "The number of seats will be increased from 1,000 to 1,500 and planes will be able to fly from any airport of to Kabul, Mazar-e-Sharif, and Kandahar," the statement read which was cited by Khaama Press. Meantime, Afghanistan's planes will also be allowed to fly to the airports of Islamabad, Quetta, and Peshawar, it added. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) While many other technology giants embrace the metaverse as the next frontier of growth, sees Googles future in its oldest offering: internet search. I feel fortunate our mission is timeless, Pichai, who is chief executive officer of and its parent, , said in an interview during the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore. Theres more need to organize information than ever before. Earlier this month, Alphabet briefly crossed $2 trillion in market value thanks to sales and profit growth during the pandemic. When asked where the next trillion would come from, Pichai pointed to his companys core service. Consumers will ask computers more questions with voice and multimodal experiences, he predicted. Being able to adapt to all that and evolve search will continue to be the biggest opportunity, the CEO said. Since taking over in 2015, Pichai has pushed the company deeper into cloud computing and artificial intelligence, while facing an increase in regulatory scrutiny. In the interview, Pichai ticked off Googles key growth businesses cloud, the YouTube video service and its app store and said AI investments were underlying each of them. The India-born executive also said he expects that more of Googles products will be developed and tested in Asia first, before spreading across the globe. Not in China, though. After icing plans to bring search to mainland China in 2018, following an employee uproar, has kept most of its services out of the most populous nation. I dont see that changing, Pichai said. But he doesnt share other Silicon Valley executives dim view of Chinas tech advances. Pichai acknowledged that Google is neck to neck with Chinese in AI and quantum computing, but argued that the U.S. and China have room to collaborate in areas like climate change and AI safety. Some of Googles largest peers, such as Microsoft Corp. and Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc., have pitched their futures around the virtual worlds of the metaverse. Google has taken several approaches at virtual and augmented reality products, with limited success. Ive always been excited about the future of immersive computing, he said. This doesnt belong to any company. This is the evolution of the internet. Pichai said he doesnt own any cryptocurrency. I wish I did, he said. Ive dabbled in it, you know, in and out. Federal regulators have proposed suspending a Trump administration rule that would have allowed railroads to haul liquefied natural gas while they take a closer look at the potential safety risks. The rule, which was backed by both the natural gas and freight rail industries, had already been on hold because several environmental groups and 14 states filed lawsuits challenging it. The federal Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration said the uncertainty about the rule also kept companies from investing in the specialized rail tank cars that were required, so railroads haven't actually handled any shipments of the flammable and odorless liquid known as LNG since the rule was issued last summer. The rule would have required enhancements including a thicker outer tank made of steel with a greater puncture resistance to the approved tank car design that, for decades, has been approved for shipments of other flammable cryogenic materials, such as liquid ethylene and liquid ethane. But in their lawsuit, environmental groups argued that those new railcars, which have yet to be built, were untested and might not withstand high-speed impacts, increasing the threat of an explosive train derailment along rail lines that cross directly through the heart of most cities. We don't believe that LNG by rail should have ever been authorized in the first place, so we look forward to the authorization being suspended, said Bradley Marshall, who is a senior attorney with Earthjustice which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the environmental groups. A spokesman for California Attorney General Rob Bonta also praised the Biden administration's decision to suspend the rule. Bonta's office said he would continue the challenge to the rule started by his predecessor because he believes this rule is unlawful and regulators didn't properly evaluate all the environmental risks. Besides California, the other states that challenged the rule included Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington. Washington D.C. was also part of the lawsuit. The lawsuits have all been put on hold while federal regulators review the rule, which could take until the summer of 2024. Before this rule was issued last summer, federal hazardous materials regulations allowed shipments of LNG by truck, but not by rail, except with a special permit. The move to abandon the rule allowing LNG shipments by rail comes as natural gas prices and exports are surging in the And ongoing court and regulatory battles have slowed development of pipelines that would help deliver the nation's world-leading gas production to markets. The long-term growth in LNG exports has continued to set records, according to the latest federal figures. U.S. LNG exports averaged 9.6 billion cubic feet per day during the first six months of this year as the economy continued to recover from the coronavirus pandemic. A spokeswoman for the Association of American Railroads trade group defended the rail industry's safety track record and said railroads would be able to handle LNG shipments if given the opportunity. Railroads continue to be the safest way to move hazardous materials over land with 99.99% of all hazmat shipment arriving at their destination without incident, said Jessica Kahanek with the railroad group. The rail industry remains confident that DOT's ongoing research will affirm that with the right precautions rail is a responsible transportation solution for moving LNG if their customers request it. One of the industrial backers of the idea of shipping LNG by rail included a proposed project from a subsidiary of New Fortress Energy that wanted to use rail to haul LNG from northern Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale natural gas fields to a yet-to-be-built storage terminal at a former explosives plant in New Jersey, along the Delaware River near Philadelphia. The Trump administration had issued a special permit to that project in 2019. If it were built, most of that LNG was expected to be exported to foreign markets for electricity production. (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.) Treasury Secretary told Congress Tuesday that she believed she would run out of maneuvering room to avoid the nation's first-ever default soon after December 15. In a letter to congressional leaders, Yellen said that she believed Treasury could be left with insufficient resources to keep financing the government beyond December 15. Yellen's new date is slightly later than the December 3 date she provided to Congress in a letter to Congress on October 18. That letter was based on the fact that Congress had just passed a $480 billion increase in the debt limit as a stop-gap measure. As she has done in the past, Yellen urged Congress to deal with the debt limit quickly to remove the possibility of a potential default on the nation's obligations. To ensure the full faith and credit of the United States, it is critical that Congress raise or suspend the debt limit as soon as possible, Yellen wrote to congressional leaders. (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.) Shares of Enterprises (AHEL) continued at their upward march, with the stock hitting a fresh record high of Rs 5,460 on the BSE on Wednesday. They rallied 7 per cent in today's intra-day trade and have surged 20 per cent in the past four days after the company reported a strong set of numbers for the quarter ended September 2021 (Q2FY22). In comparison, the S&P BSE Sensex was down 0.2 per cent during the same period. The Q2FY22 performance of AHEL was better-than-expected with a rise in the average revenue per occupied bed (ARPOB) and a lower average length of stay (ALOS). The company also acquired a 65 per cent stake in the 180-bed Excelcare Hospital in Guwahati at an enterprise value of Rs 210 crore, and is seeking to acquire a 300-bed facility in Mumbai in the next few years and 300 more beds in Bengaluru by acquisition in the next two years. CLICK HERE FOR FULL DETAILS. Apollo is one of the leading integrated healthcare service providers with avenues like hospitals, pharmacies, primary care & diagnostic clinics. The group has capacity of 10,231 beds across 71 hospitals in India with a total of 8,858 beds owned in 44 hospitals; 278 beds in 11 cradles; 244 beds in 11 day-care/short surgical stay centres; 851 beds in five hospitals under O&M contracts. ICICI Securities has a 'buy' rating on Apollo with a target price of Rs 5,930 per share. "Apollo is undergoing optical transformational journey towards creating an omni-channel healthcare platform that could set the platform for tapping new-age investors enabling rapid scale up of the digital healthcare platform," the brokerage firm said in result update. The business normalisation in healthcare is expected to continue with further momentum due to lifting of travel restrictions, international patients. Also with strong healthcare pedigree & asset base, the company is on course to integrate all entities digitally to leverage its brand and physical presence. The new hospitals, ventures are turning profitable on the back of a judicious case mix besides better occupancy & ramp up at new hospitals and AHLL, it added. Shares of India (MSIL) were up 4 per cent at Rs 8,347 on the BSE in Wednesdays intra-day trade, surging 11 per cent in past two trading days on media reports that the company has received the state government's approval for setting up a third passenger vehicle manufacturing plant in Haryana in Sonipat district. The stock of car & utility vehicles maker were quoting higher for fourth straight trading day and were trading close to its 52-week high of Rs 8,400 touched on January 13, 2021. Maruti already has two manufacturing plants in Haryana with a combined annual capacity of around 1.5 million units, which combined with Suzuki's plant in Gujarat takes its effective annual capacity to around 2.25 million units. This is amid around 1.82 million units of sales volume that we expect for MSIL for FY23E, ICICI Securities said in a note. We are little surprised by the location of the new plant as it is far off from its existing belt in the state i.e. Gurugam, Manesar. We await official communication from the company on the same, the brokerage firm said. In October 2021 month, MSIL posted total sales of 138,335 units. Total sales in the month include domestic sales of 112,788 units, sales to other OEM of 4,225 units and its highest ever monthly exports of 21,322 units, the company said. While the shortage of electronic components continued to affect the production of vehicles during the month, the Company took all possible measures to minimise the impact. Accordingly, the Company sold more vehicles than the sales volume expected at the start of the month, the company said. Analysts at Prabhudas Lilladher believe that the market leader will likely benefit from shift to personal mobility and increasing demand of CNG vehicles. Going ahead, new product launches and its ability to pass on prices in competitive environment remains the key. MSIL should retain the pole position as it plans to launch new products to fill white-spaces and network expansion. In the next 2-3 years, new models could include new Brezza, Jimny UV, Above 4m UV and new MPV. The network has increased to over 3,000 touch points, and the expansion continues, analysts at Emkay Global Financial Services said in Q2 result update. The brokerage firm remain positive on MSIL due to expectations of a cyclical upturn, which generally lasts for at least three years. slumped on Wednesday, driving major benchmarks to their lowest closing levels since early October, after OPEC and the International Energy Agency warned of impending oversupply and rising COVID-19 cases in Europe increased the downside risks to demand recovery. futures fell $1.36, or 1.7%, to $81.05 a barrel by 12:18 p.m. EST (1718 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures settled at $78.36, down $2.40, a 3% decline. The declines took Brent to its lowest close since October 1 and U.S. crude to its lowest settlement since October 7. Traders said the market's recent action suggests funds are weighing a greater likelihood that supply will start to outpace demand in coming months, with sharp declines in near-term futures pointing to funds closing long positions. "It signals a movement towards balance which weave not seen for many months," said Tony Headrick, energy analyst at CHS Hedging. The global oil market has been focused on the swift rise in demand against a slow increase in supply from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, along with reluctance from big U.S. shale players to overspend on drilling. However, both the IEA and OPEC in recent week said more supply could be coming in the next several months. OPEC and its allies, known as OPEC+, have maintained an agreement to boost output by 400,000 bpd every month so as not to overwhelm the market with supply. On Tuesday, OPEC Secretary General Mohammad Barkindo said the group sees signs of an oil supply surplus building from next month adding its members and allies will have to be "very, very cautious." Other nations, including the United States, have called for OPEC+ to boost output more swiftly. The United States has considered announcing an emergency release of crude from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which contains more than 600 million barrels of oil. In what is perhaps a signal of that possibility, in the last two weeks the U.S. Energy Department has sold more than 6 million barrels of oil - part of previously approved sales. The United States currently has discretion to sell several million barrels from the SPR thanks to previous Congressional approval. J.P. Morgan analysts said Wednesday that the White House could speed up those sales rather than declare an emergency - calling it the "easiest of the options the White House has" to combat rising fuel prices. The IEA has already said that U.S. supply is expected to increase at a swifter pace in the second quarter of 2022, and U.S. rig counts have been rising, with private operators seeking to take advantage of higher crude prices. The IEA expects U.S. output will account for about 60% of its forecast of 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) for non-OPEC supply growth in 2022. U.S. inventories fell by 2.1 million barrels last week, the latest government data showed, running against analyst expectations for a build of 1.4 million barrels. Headrick noted, however, that the modest build in inventories at the key Cushing, Oklahoma hub of 213,000 barrels was a signal that the drawdowns of late may be coming to an end. New waves of COVID-19 cases in Europe have driven some governments to reimpose restrictions, including Austria, which has ordered a lockdown on unvaccinated individuals. The Biden administration on Wednesday asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate the growing gap between the cost of unfinished gas and what consumers are paying at the pump. Bharat Dynamics gained 2.35% to Rs 426.70 after the PSU defense company bagged an order of Rs 171 crore. In an exchange filing on Wednesday, Bharat Dynamics said it signed a contract for design, development, manufacture, supply and support Of CMDS worth Rs 171 crore. The order book position of the company as of 17 November 2021 stands at Rs 8991 crore. It received new orders of worth Rs 1,331 crore during the current financial year. Bharat Dynamics (BDL) is the only company in India involved in manufacturing various types of missiles and underwater weapons for supply to the Indian Armed Forces and friendly foreign countries. The company also handles launchers, test equipment, refurbishment / life extension of missiles and counter measures systems for domestic as well as international market. As of 30 September 2021, the Government of India held 74.93% stake in the company. The company reported a 64.8% rise in standalone net profit to Rs 43.25 crore on a 102.7% increase in net sales to Rs 486.54 crore in Q2 FY22 over Q2 FY21. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Bharat Heavy Electricals announced that a cooperation agreement was signed between the company and Zorya Mashprokt , Ukraine on 16 November 2021. The cooperation agreement aims to cooperate for establishing the local manufacture of the Marine GTs and RGs for requirement of the Indian Navy. In addition to above, the cooperation agreement also aims to cooperate for supporting Indian Navy in Maintenance & Repair of Marine GTs and RGs of ZM make in their fleet. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Mainland China share market rebounded on Wednesday, 17 November 2021, as investor sentiments boosted up on optimism surrounding US-China ties and reports that Beijing plans to let property companies resume issuance of asset-backed securities. At close of trade, the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index advanced 0.44%, or 15.58 points, to 3,537.37. The Shenzhen Composite Index, which tracks stocks on China's second exchange, added 1.1%, or 27.06 points, to 2,477.02. The blue-chip CSI300 index was edge up 0.05%, or 2.43 points, to 4,885.75. Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping held an hours-long virtual meeting on Tuesday. Although it appeared to yield no immediate outcomes, it gave the two leaders opportunity to nudge their relations away from icy confrontation. Trade disputes failed to appear as the top agenda, but investors still hoped further improvements in bilateral relations and chances of partial tariff removals. China plans to let property companies resume issuance of asset-backed securities, ending a three-month market freeze as authorities move to insulate higher-rated developers from an industrywide funding crunch. Investor focus turns to Wednesday's deadline for a Yango Group unit's dollar debt exchange offer. That's after the company warned that without more time it may not be able to repay existing bonds at maturity. China Evergrande Group Chairman Hui Ka Yan injected more than 7 billion yuan ($1.1 billion) in cash to boost the firm's liquidity CURRENCY NEWS: China's yuan climbed up against the U. S. dollar on Wednesday, despite weaker mid-point fixing, as heavy corporate demand for the local currency outweighed broad greenback strength and as an amicable meeting between U. S. and Chinese leaders broadly supported the investor mood. Prior to market opening, the People's Bank of China (PBOC) set the midpoint rate CNY=PBOC at 6.3935 per dollar, 11 pips weaker than the previous fix of 6.3924. In the spot market, the onshore yuan CNY=CFXS was changing hands at 6.3895 at midday, 22 pips firmer than the previous late session close. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The drug major announced the launch of Spirofy, India's first pneumotach based portable, wireless Spirometer. With this launch, Cipla intends to revolutionize obstructive airway disease (OAD) diagnosis, in line with its ambition to strengthen its position as the lung leader in India. Spirofy is India's first pneumotach based portable wireless Spirometer for diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) and asthma. The device ensures high result accuracy and individual patient safety using bacterial viral filters. Spirofy is entirely wireless with good battery backup, making it suitable for use in outdoor camps, remote areas with power shortages, or simply providing physicians' flexibility and ease of use. The device generates reports in real-time, which can be printed using a portable wireless thermal printer instantly, or a pdf version can be shared on the phone. Cipla will undertake training of physicians in the interpretation of spirometry results. Currently, COPD remains the 2nd most common cause of death in India after heart diseases, where India alone bears 32% of the global COPD burden. Umang Vohra (MD and Global CEO, Cipla) said, "Cipla has been steadfastly focused on addressing the world's growing respiratory disease burden, and with this launch, we see ourselves steadily advancing to combat chronic respiratory ailments like COPD. The Spirofy launch aims to help doctors across the country to improve lives of patients through accurate and affordable diagnosis." The drug major's consolidated net profit grew 7% year on year to Rs 711 crore on a 10% rise in total revenue from operations to Rs 5,520 crore in Q2 FY22 over Q2 FY21. Cipla is a global pharmaceutical company focused in India, South Africa, North America, and key regulated and emerging markets. Its strengths lies in the respiratory, anti-retroviral, urology, cardiology, anti-infective and CNS segments. Shares of Cipla were down 0.98% at Rs 912.05 on the BSE. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Infosys and MIT Technology Review, a world-renowned technology media brand and its custom publishing division Insights, announced the launch of 'The Cloud Hub', a forum offering insights and learning from successful cloud transformations to help global enterprises accelerate their cloud journey. Biocon Biologics, a subsidiary of Biocon, and Viatris Inc. announced the U.S. launch of interchangeable biosimilars SEMGLEE (insulin glargineyfgn) injection, a branded product, and Insulin Glargine (insulin glargine-yfgn) injection, an unbranded product, to help control high blood sugar in adult and pediatric patients with type 1 diabetes and adults with type 2 diabetes. Westlife Development said that McDonald's has partnered with ITC to add a differentiated fruit beverage, B Natural to the Happy Meal. The new Happy Meal is available across all McDonald's restaurants in West and South India. Home First Finance Company India said that a meeting of Committee of Directors of the company is scheduled to be held on 22 November 2021, to consider and approve the issuance of Secured, Rated, Listed, Redeemable, Taxable, Non-Convertible Debentures on private placement basis, in one or more tranches up to Rs 99 crore. Tourism Finance Corporation of India said that a meeting of the Resource Committee of the Directors of the company will be held on 22 November 2021, to consider the issuance of Non-Convertible Debentures to be issued on private placement basis. Grindwell Norton said that the company has made an investment of Rs.15 lakhs in Cleanwin Energy Three LLP towards Power Purchase. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Max India rose 1.13% to Rs 76 after the company's wholly-owned subsidiary, Antara, announced the sale of over 200 units at its second senior living community in Noida Sector - 150. The Residences for Seniors project was launched in early 2020 in Noida as an integral part of Antara's shift towards creating an ecosystem to address the lifecare, lifestyle and well-being needs of the seniors. The project is spread over 16,500 sq. meters, Phase-1 of Antara's Senior Living Community in Noida houses 340 apartments curated across three towers that cater to a wide spectrum of lifestyle needs. The residents can choose from two or three-bedroom units ranging from 137 sq. metres to 280 sq. metres constructed in three different layouts. These apartments are available on a 90-year direct lease under the NOIDA authority and have all-inclusive pricing between Rs 1.15 crore and Rs 2.35 crore. On a consolidated basis, Max India's net loss stood at Rs 0.56 crore in Q2 FY22 as compared to a net loss of Rs 17.30 crore in Q2 FY21. Net sales stood at Rs 82.83 crore in Q2 September 2021, registering a 187.7% jump from Rs 28.79 crore in Q2 September 2020. Max India is engaged in the business of investments and providing consultancy services to group companies. The company's segments are healthcare business, business investments, health insurance, senior living and others. Powered by Capital Market - Live News (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) At least six people were killed and four others injured in Bihar's Lakhisarai district on Tuesday when an SUV carrying them collided with an LPG cylinder-laden truck, a senior police officer said. Five of the six deceased were distant relatives of late Bollywood actor and all of them were residents of Jamui. "The accident occurred on the National Highway 333 when the SUV driver lost control over his vehicle and hit the truck coming from the opposite direction near Pipara village early on Tuesday. "The victims were returning to Jamui from Patna. Six people, including the driver, were killed in the accident," Superintendent of Police Sushil Kumar stated. According to villagers, the victims, including two women, were returning to Jamui after the cremation of Geeta Devi, the sister of Haryana Additional Director General of Police O P Singh. Singh is married to Sushant Singh's sister. The deceased have been identified as Laljit Singh, his two sons Nemani Singh and Ram Chandra Singh, daughter Baby Devi, niece Anita Devi and Preetam Kumar, the driver of the vehicle. Talking to PTI, Neeraj Singh Bablu, state environment minister and cousin of Sushant Singh Rajput, said, "Five of the six deceased were distant relatives of the late Bollywood actor. Laljit Singh was brother-in-law of OP Singh". The four occupants of the vehicle, who suffered serious injuries, are undergoing treatment at a local hospital, the officer said. A case has been registered and further investigation is underway, the SP added. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Centre on Wednesday proposed a slew of measures in the Supreme Court including a ban on entry of all trucks in the national capital except vehicles carrying essential goods, shutting of schools and 50 per cent attendance in offices of GNCTD to reduce in Delhi-NCR. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta told a bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana that a meeting of chief secretaries of Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and along with others was held on Tuesday. The issue regarding work from home for central government officers was considered but the total vehicles used for central government officers is not huge. So rather than implementing work from home we have issued an advisory for pooling and sharing of vehicles, Mehta told the bench also comprising Justices D Y Chandrachud and Surya Kant. The Centre suggested 50 per cent attendance in offices of government of national capital territory of (GNCTD). The hearing is currently underway. Delhi-NCR recorded its air quality in the very poor category on Wednesday morning and no major improvement is likely until Sunday, authorities said. (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) India will pitch for finding a permanent solution to the issue of public stock holding for purposes in the forthcoming meeting of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) at Geneva, starting from November 30, an official said. The official expressed hope that "something may come" up on public stockholding and domestic support, which are part of negotiations on the agriculture sector, in the 12th ministerial conference, which is the highest decision making body of the 164-member WTO. The four-day ministerial conference will begin from November 30. "Now that the 12th meeting is approaching, a number of submissions are being made at the WTO for advancing negotiations in agriculture. India along with the G33 (group of nations) has been engaging in achieving a permanent solution to the public stockholding issue," the government official said. The official added that the public stockholding (PSH) is must for India because it has a mandate, which goes back a long period of time and India will pitch for that. Finding a permanent solution to the public food stockpile issue is linked to the survival of 800 million hungry people across the globe. Under the global trade norms, a WTO member's food subsidy bill should not breach the limit of 10 per cent of the value of production based on the reference price of 1986-88. Apprehending that full implementation of the programme may result in breach of the WTO cap, India has been seeking amendments in the formula to calculate the food subsidy cap. As an interim measure, the WTO members at the Bali ministerial meeting in December 2013 had agreed to put in place a mechanism popularly called the Peace Clause and committed to negotiating an agreement for permanent solution at the 11th ministerial meeting at Buenos Aires. Under the Peace Clause, WTO members agreed to refrain from challenging any breach in the prescribed ceiling by a developing nation at the dispute settlement forum of the WTO. This clause will be there till a permanent solution is found to the food stockpiling issue. India has invoked the clause in 2018-19 (13 per cent) and 2019-20 (11 per cent) as it breached the subsidy cap for rice. The current discourse in agriculture negotiations at the WTO includes developed members seeking developing countries to take on additional commitments in terms of enhanced market access, reduction in policy space through reduced domestic support. India is also co-sponsoring a G33 proposal for a permanent solution on PSH for purposes at the WTO on September 15. The chair of the committee on agriculture-special session of the WTO has come up with a draft ministerial text on PSH for the 12th ministerial conference wherein two options have been proposed including to continue negotiations on PSH beyond the 12th meeting. India has not agreed to these options, the official said. The seven negotiating areas under agriculture are domestic support, market access, export competition, export restrictions, cotton, special safeguard mechanism, public stockholding for food security purposes and transparency. (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.) Nearly 50,000 state electrical customers still had no power Tuesday after days of heavy rain triggered mudslides and floods and forced the closure of the West Coast's main north-south highway near the Canadian border, officials said. The rains caused by an atmospheric river a huge plume of moisture extending over the Pacific and into and Oregon was easing and road crews managed to reopen southbound lanes of Interstate 5 near Bellingham, But the highway's northbound lanes were still closed in the area. At the height of the storm, about 158,000 electrical customers on Monday had no power and schools in the city of Bellingham were closed on Tuesday for the second day in a row. North of Bellingham, authorities said one person was still missing Tuesday after being seen in floodwaters clinging to a tree . And a motorist in Bellingham was injured when a tree fell on a vehicle.Evacuations were ordered in multiple areas as floodwaters swamped business districts and partially submerged cars in communities north of Seattle and winds gusted at speeds of 60 mph (96 kph), including one gust of 58 mph (93 kph) at Seattle-Tacoma Airport. Forecasters predicted drier conditions on Tuesday but the National Weather Service issued flood warnings for several rivers around western Washington. Gov. Jay Inslee declared a severe weather state of emergency in 14 counties and said the state Emergency Management Division, with support from the Washington National Guard, would coordinate the response. In the town of Hamilton about 80 miles (129 kilometers) northeast of Seattle, cars and trailers were packed into the parking lot outside the Red Cross evacuation site at Hamilton Baptist Church, where dozens of residents are waiting out the storm, the Skagit Valley Herald reported. Skagit County officials compared the flood to severe flooding in 2009, when the Skagit and Samish rivers overflowed and caused damage to homes, farms and infrastructure. As the water made its way down the swollen Skagit River, people were warned to expect flooding and evacuation orders for other communities. And just south of the Canadian border in the community of Sumas, Washington, officials said city hall was flooded in a soaking that reminded people of severe floods in 1990. Deputies evacuated stranded residents and the person who was still missing had been swept away by floodwaters after being seen holding on to the tree, said police from the small city of Everson in Facebook posting. The motorist injured in Bellingham was seriously hurt early Monday while traveling on Interstate 5. Bellingham's record rainfal on Sunday totaled 2.78 inches (7 centimeters), crushing the prior daily record from 1998 of 0.88 inches (2.2 centimeters), according to the National Weather Service. Another 1.89 inches (4.8 centimeters) poured down on Bellingham on Monday. West of Seattle on the Olympic Peninsula, several highways were partially closed and the U.S. Coast Guard helped local authorities evacuate about 10 people near the town of Forks. In nearby Quillayute, a daily record rainfall of 4.01 inches (10 centimeters) was set on Monday. (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.) American journalist Danny Fenster, who was freed after nearly six months in jail in military-ruled Myanmar, arrived Tuesday in the for an emotional reunion with his family. Fenster, who was sentenced last week to 11 years of hard labor, was handed over Monday to former U.S. diplomat Bill Richardson, who helped negotiate the release. He is one of more than 100 journalists, media officials or publishers who have been detained since the military ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February. It's been a long time coming, a moment I had been imagining so intensely for so long," a bearded and shaggy-haired Fenster said after landing in New York. "Surpasses everything I had imagined. Fenster's family awaited his arrival in the lobby of an airport hotel and rushed outside to greet him as they saw the SUV carrying him approach. His mother, Rose, embraced him in a long tight hug the moment he stepped out of the vehicle. It's over. There's nothing to be anxious about anymore, Fenster said later in an interview. Any bitter, ill will, regret, anger spilled out on the tarmac when I got on that plane. His wife, Julianna, who is still in Myanmar, is set to reunite with him in Detroit. Late Monday, as Fenster, 37, transited through Qatar, he told reporters that he was physically OK and had not been starved or beaten while in custody. While jailed, he had told his lawyer that he believed he had COVID-19, although prison authorities denied that. Fenster, the managing editor of online magazine Frontier Myanmar, was convicted Friday of spreading false or inflammatory information, contacting illegal organizations and violating visa regulations. Days before his conviction, he learned he had been charged with additional violations that put him at risk of a life sentence. It feels great to get Danny back home. It's worth the effort, worth everything we did, said Richardson, a former governor of New Mexico and past ambassador to the United Nations who helped negotiate the release through his foundation. Fenster's mother described the ordeal as a nightmare and the family expressed relief that it was over. It feels great, he's safe, that's all we want, his father, Buddy, said. Fenster in a knit hat that he said was a gift from another prisoner joked that the first thing he would do is get a shave and a haircut. He also said he hoped his plight would help focus world attention on the suffering of the people of Myanmar, where the army has responded brutally to peaceful protests that opposed the generals' seizure of power. Security forces have killed more than 1,200 civilians and arrested about 10,000 others, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners. The takeover and the ensuing crackdown have drawn condemnation and sanctions from the and Richardson is known for negotiating the freedom of Americans detained in countries with which Washington has poor relations and when he visited earlier this month, it raised hopes that he might win Fenster's release. But after that trip, he said his focus was on helping the Southeast Asian country manage the COVID-19 pandemic and speeding up the delivery of vaccines there and no mention of Fenster was made in his foundation's summary of the visit. In an interview with the AP on Tuesday, Richardson said U.S. officials had told him not to bring up Fester's case during his meeting with military leaders. But he acknowledged that he did at some point, when he sensed there was an opportunity to negotiate the release. Richardson said he made no promises in exchange for Fenster's freedom. And they didn't ask me for anything, he said. I saw we had progress on the humanitarian issue, and I zeroed in on Danny and Aye Moe, Richardson said, referring to a former worker at his foundation who was also detained then released. Fenster has been in detention since he was arrested at Yangon Airport on May 24. The exact allegations against him were never clear, but much of the prosecution's case appeared to hinge on proving that he was employed by another online news site that was ordered closed this year during the crackdown on the media that followed the military takeover. Fenster used to work for the site but left that job last year. A native of the Detroit area, Fenster has a master's degree in creative writing from Wayne State University and worked for a newspaper in Louisiana before moving to Southeast Asia, according to Deadline Detroit, a news website to which he occasionally contributed. His brother, Bryan, has said he was particularly interested in the plight of people from the Muslim Rohingya minority, hundreds of thousands of whom fled during a brutal counterinsurgency campaign by the army in 2017. The generals in were convinced that it wasn't worth it to hang on to Danny, U.S. Rep. Andy Levin of Michigan, who represents the Fenster family in Congress, told Detroit radio station WWJ. If they kept him and anything really happened to him, we would never forget it. We would never forgive them. (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.) Multiple social media apps such as Snapchat, and Alphabet's appeared to be coming back online after a brief global outage on Tuesday. Google said issues with its Cloud Networking, which counts Etsy, and Snap Inc as clients, were partially resolved shortly after thousands of users flagged it on outage tracking website downdetector.com. Google Cloud's dashboard earlier showed that services including cloud developer tools, cloud console and cloud engine were facing disruptions. had said it was aware of "some issues right now and are checking them" after more than 50,000 users reported issues on downdetector, but those disruptions have since been resolved, according to the website. "Many Snapchatters are having trouble using the app. Hang tight, we're working on a fix. In the meantime, we recommend staying logged in," support said earlier in a tweet. Fastly, the cloud company behind a major global internet outage in June, said it was seeing increased errors with origins in a "common cloud provider, unrelated to Fastly's edge cloud platform." Tuesday's brief disruption follows a six-hour widespread outage last month that crippled Meta Platforms Inc, formerly known as Facebook, after faulty configuration changes on the company's routers. Downdetector only tracks outages by collating status reports from a series of sources, including user-submitted errors on its platform. The outage might have affected a larger number of users. (Reporting by Nivedita Balu in Bengaluru; additional reporting by Tiyashi Datta and Akash Sriram; Editing by Devika Syamnath) (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.) Vice President M. on Wednesday called upon innovators and entrepreneurs to focus on solving the issues that the agricultural sector of the country is facing and create ideas to better the lives of farmers. Inaugurating the 24th edition of Karnataka's flagship three-day technology event ' Tech Summit-2021' themed 'Driving the Next' here, he said is at the forefront of India's knowledge wealth and is rightly called the knowledge capital of India. The Vice President said it has become necessary to transform IT and BT "by doing our duty to become mighty" in creating knowledge wealth for the country. He added that ultimately the aim of technology and innovation should be to bring happiness to the people and their lives. Naidu said there is a need to share and care when it comes to knowledge and ideas which is at the heart of India's philosophy. He said the summit should also focus on agriculture which is facing turbulence and the challenges that are being posed to mankind by climate change notwithstanding the ongoing pandemic that the world is undergoing. "We should come up with new ideas through innovation to encourage the growth of the knowledge economy and ensure that we reform and perform better to transform India into the new economy," the Vice President said. Naidu called upon private entrepreneurs to create jobs in the new economy even as government initiatives were crucial to its growth. He started his speech in Kannada and later switched over to English after uttering quite a few sentences in the local language. In the beginning, he extended condolences on the death of Kannada actor Puneeth Rajkumar, who died of a cardiac arrest on October 29. IT & BT, Science and Technology Minister C.N. Ashwathnarayan said that is the hub of future technologies and Karnataka is the leader in IT and BT. He said Karnataka is the first state to implement the National Education Policy and expressed confidence that the new policy will take the state to greater heights. Naidu also expressed happiness that technology is now reaching other cities of Karnataka. (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.) Gandhinagar (Gujarat) [India]/ Denver [Colorado], November 17 (ANI/PRNewswire): MiCoB, a disruptor in the construction industry that provides 3D Concrete Printing Solutions to military, residential, commercial, infrastructure, and architectural market segments in India has raised its first institutional capital from 3Lines Venture Capital. Lalit Jalan, 3Lines India Chairman and the ex-CEO of Reliance Infrastructure, will join the MiCoB Board of Directors. The construction industry has been stuck in its old ways of building homes, offices, bridges, and architectural artefacts from concrete for too long. There is a great need now to build at a greater speed, with higher quality, relocatable structures and at a competitive cost. "This is where MiCoB's uniquely innovative and software driven robotic arm comes into play. MiCoB's technology can print large scale structures with its capabilities of 3D slicing and 3D simulation in a shorter time frame than previously could be imagined by the builders," said Lalit Jalan. "MiCoB's proven innovation of its printable material with fiber-reinforced mixtures has the opportunity to disrupt a market size of greater than $20B USD in India alone," he further added. "MiCoB is very pleased to partner with 3Lines Venture Capital in its journey to build a hugely successful company in a fast growing construction industry in India where the need for speed in infrastructure development is insatiable," said Shashank Shekhar, co-Founder and the CEO of MiCoB. "This investment from 3Lines is a culmination of our mentoring relationship since we started MiCoB at IIT Gandhinagar during our graduate studies. We are very grateful for the trust 3Lines has reposed in MiCoB and its Founders," added Shashank. 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.) New Delhi [India], November 17 (ANI/SRV):CareerNaksha, a Vadodara based ed-tech startup, has expanded its presence by opening up a career center in Jamnagar to explore the potential in Tier 3 and Tier 4 cities and build its presence across Gujarat. The company has been delivering unbiased solutions based on students' strengths, personality, aptitude, interest, skills and knowledge. Employing integrated methods to help students meet their desired career options based on their strengths and weaknesses; CareerNaksha provides the best quality psychometric tests to understand students strengths and interests. Backed by an overwhelming response, CareerNaksha further plans to expand into Saurashtra and Kutch region. With an aim to help people make the most important decision of their lives, Nimish Gopal (US returned IITian & Serial Entrepreneur) and Maulin Shah (Ex Adani & L & T professional and Nirma, IIM A Alumni) took the leap of faith and created an astonishing platform three years ago- CareerNaksha - where students can get all the answers, moral support and guidance that show them the best path for their journey. The journey that started from Vadodara, Surat and Ahmedabad, Gujarat has seen its share of highs and lows but most importantly in the last three years, CareerNaksha has witnessed exponential growth MoM at the rate of 30-40%. Also, over the period of time, in the present digital era, the reach on digital platforms has crossed over 1 lakh with more than 1000 experts from various career options. (https://www.careernaksha.com) (https://www.youtube.com/careernaksha) (https://www.instagram.com/careernaksha) With all the growth that has been a great boost to the platform, CareerNaksha intends to expand further to become Gujarat's best career counselling platform and the most trusted one too. Nimish Gopal, Founder, CareerNaksha says, "Tier 3 and 4 cities have immense scope in terms of providing offline and online career counselling - they need more unbiased information and guidance for access to quality rich education. In an approach to cater to that demand, CareerNaksha is expanding in Saurashtra, Kutch, and North Gujarat and looking for best partners to join hands in the journey. About the expansion, one milestone has already been achieved recently by opening up a center in Jamnagar. As per our collective data based on the study and research by the team, Jamnagar did not have many options in terms of certified career counsellors, top quality psychometric tests, as well as students there, had no exposure to many career options present in the existing market. Now, since there is a career center by CareerNaksha in Jamnagar, students who had to migrate to other cities for guidance and exposure will get it all in the same city, even those who couldn't migrate will have the access to high-quality services and practices because everyone deserves to have the career that's best for them in the first place." With this step, the horizon for CareerNaksha is just getting wider as it plans to further expand its services in many other cities of Gujarat like Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Junagarh and Bhuj where people are not able to access good counselling and a one-stop platform for all career-related queries. CareerNaksha plans to reach out to the counsellors, psychologists, educationists and educational institutions owners to introduce various new models in the coming days. Along with the students, CareerNaksha has great plans for the people serving the same purpose in these regions. Career counselling, an attractively growing sector has exciting opportunities awaiting for people associated with it. Hence, CareerNaksha is helping them get certified on counselling platforms. Also utilizing the platform that offers services and products like top quality psychometric, GlobalVidhya, individual growth is not neglected while meeting the noble purpose of serving the society. CareerNaksha has done more than 15,000 personal counselling sessions in the last three years and continues to cater to thousands of students online as well as offline. The company aims to reach out to as many people in need as possible by providing affordable quality and unbiased career counselling for school/college students and early professionals in Tier 3 and 4 cities of Gujarat. CareerNaksha is a one-stop platform that addresses students' educational journey by providing services like high-quality psychometric tests, career counselling and development. The platform is available online as well as offline and in Hindi, Gujarati and other regional languages. It is an unbiased destination where various educationists, psychologists, counsellors meet and guide those in need. To know more, please visit (https://bit.ly/3Cpegsf) or Contact - nimish@careernaksha.com; 84691-49288 This story is provided by SRV. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/SRV) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], November 17 (ANI/PNN): Chai Sutta Bar, a brand known for its Divine Tea & Humble beginnings, spreads the warmth & holiness of Kulhad back-to-back with its newly arrived trio in the city of Mumbai within one month. The Trio was inaugurated on the 15th of October in Vasai, the 28th of October in Khoper khairane & the 13th of November in Talaopali Thane (W). Mumbai is one of the busiest and most lively places in the whole world. It is indeed one of the great achievements of Chai Sutta Bar to open its branch consecutively within one month. It was all possible because of the demand and the love people showered throughout the stretch, stated Anubhav Dubey on the launching day, Co-founder of Chai Sutta Bar. The newly arrived stores were welcomed with hoots & hooray in a closed event due to COVID guidelines. With the purpose of spreading the intoxicating icon "Kulhad Chai" over the world, the company decided to keep quality high while keeping costs low in order to keep wallets tight and hearts light with the aroma of Chai. The brand's soulful Tea has been delivered to over 100 cities and countries, including Dubai and Oman, to name a few. Chai's amazing blessing have left a sweet spot in their hearts who greeted the store with their welcoming warmth and shining grins. "Mumbai is not only the country's commercial hub but also one of the country's most densely populated cities. The city features a high concentration of office workers and young people who are enthusiastic about their careers. For the most part, a cup of Chai is wishful thinking; we believe in redefining the taste and culture of India by offering a cup of tea in Kulhad and spreading the delight of Chai. The initial Chai Sutta Bar outlet had a fantastic response and acceptance from Mumbai residents, so we decided to extend throughout the city and appeal to the widest possible audience. "On the occasion of the launch, Anubhav Dubey, co-founder of Chai Sutta Bar, said," With the passage of time, Kulhad's brilliant legacy faded, and "Chai" went out of favour. Under this concept, a modern variation of the chai bar opened in July 2016, serving Kadak tea on the bar table with no "sutta breaks." CSB is a low-cost tea shop that employs potters throughout the year and also hires orphans to help them feel independent and valued. Even in the midst of the pandemic, they were able to successfully distribute Safe Tea across the country, bringing hope and happiness into people's lives. We hope to grow enormously with our marvelous locations in Mumbai and celebrate chai with cheers & chuski. Chai Sutta Bar: Cuddle the Kulhad!!! Chai Sutta Bar is a rapidly growing Tea chain in India that was established back in 2016. Chai Sutta Bar envisions blending Kulhad's health benefits with the most go-to beverage, 'Chai' in India. Hailing from the commercial capital of Madhya Pradesh, it is well known for its uniqueness and world-class service. The brand has served several soulful Chai of Kulhad to over 100 cities along with countries like Dubai & Oman, to mention a few. The brand is owned by the dedicated duos, Anubhav & Anand, who, at the young age of 22, dreamt of serving a Wishful cup of chai in every corner of the world. Follow us (https://www.facebook.com/ChaiSuttaBarIndia) Facebook (https://www.instagram.com/chaisuttabarindia) Instagram (https://twitter.com/ChaiSuttaBarIN) Twitter (https://www.linkedin.com/company/chai-sutta-bar) LinkedIn Press Contact Information info@chaisuttabarindia.com Contact no: 99207 01012 Chai Sutta Bar India Pt. Ltd. (https://chaisuttabarindia.com) This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Chennai (Tamil Nadu) [India], November 17 (ANI/NewsVoir): The IIT Madras Alumni Association (IITMAA) is roping in experts from its member base of over 50,000 alumni and faculty to collaborate with the 'research knowledge clusters' across the country supported by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser (PSA) to the Government of India. As part of the collaboration with the Strategic Alliances Division of the Office of the PSA, IITMAA will take up various activities: Capacity-building initiatives to support researchers, academia, and the students from these knowledge clusters. The key projects include training sessions to hone their skills in scientific communication and research proposal-making. Promote game-based learning in schools and colleges. The project envisages the creation of a National Games Repository with thousands of quality games for education available to all educational institutions in India. Support, with alumni Subject Matter Experts, the Special Interest Groups on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and emerging technologies. During the 18-month long partnership, IITMAA has become a member of the Expert Consultation Group of Innovation and Science @ Bharat, a national innovation portal. The two organizations jointly surveyed the Public Attitude to Science and Technology and published a report 'STI in the Era of New Normal'. The Office of PSA has also supported several IIT Madras projects focused on COVID-19 care including instant medical infrastructure (mediCAB), very low cost and high-quality testing kits for the underprivileged, and others. Commenting about the collaboration with IITMAA, Prof. Vijay Raghavan, the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, said, "IITMAA has been an invaluable knowledge partner for us. In the past 18 months, its members actively supported us in capacity-building initiatives. IITMAA is helping us tap the knowledge, skills, and resources of its alumni as Subject Matter Experts. We look forward to working closely to strengthen our industry-academia initiatives that immensely benefit researchers, academia, and students of our knowledge clusters across the country." In her comments about the future projects planned with IITMAA, Dr. Sapna Poti, Director, Strategic Alliances, Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser, said, "The IITMAA ecosystem will be helping researchers of the higher education institutions in our network acquire skills for effectively presenting their R & D proposals both to technical experts and to business executives. The project on game-based learning will help students of schools and higher education institutions learn complex subjects in a fun way. We will also be collaborating in the areas of water & WASH and Women-in-STEM." Talking about the alumni support, Krishnan Narayanan, President, IITMAA, said, "We consider our association with the Office of the PSA a great honour and an opportunity for our alumni to give back to India. It aligns well with our "Mission Million Smiles" - of IITMAA being a powerful change agent in the country by taking up many STI projects that will create a positive impact in the society at large." Ananth Agasthya, IITM alumnus and formerly Executive Director of the HAL Management Academy, is anchoring the initiative to train researchers in scientific communication. The project on game-based learning will be implemented under the guidance of Prof. Preeti Aghalayam, IITM alumnus and Professor, IITM, and Kartic Vaidyanathan, IITM alumnus and Founder of a startup, LetUsPlayToLearn, in association with Prof L.S. Shashidhara, principal investigator to the O/o PSA Knowledge Clusters in Delhi and Pune. This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/NewsVoir) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], November 17 (ANI/PRNewswire): (https://www.infosys.com) Infosys, a global leader in next-generation digital services and consulting, and (https://www.technologyreview.com/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">MIT Technology Review, a world-renowned technology media brand and its custom publishing division Insights, today announced the launch of 'The Cloud Hub', a forum offering insights and learning from successful cloud transformations to help global enterprises accelerate their cloud journey. This collaboration will bring together success stories, expertise and experience from a number of leading global brands to demonstrate how value and competitive advantage can be created by adopting cloud technologies. The Cloud Hub aims to create a community of experts from the industry, including practitioners, providers and influencers, to debate key challenges and opportunities surrounding the biggest technology disruption that the world is witnessing. As per the Infosys' 2021 (https://www.infosys.com/services/cloud-cobalt/insights/cloud-radar-2021.html" rel="noopener" target="_blank">Cloud Radar Report, enterprises surveyed can add up to $414 billion in net new profits, annually, through effective cloud adoption. Yet, many companies are still on the journey to maximize cloud adoption to gain a competitive edge. The Cloud Hub will bring featured voices, including exclusive access to the Infosys Cobalt community of experts, to share success stories, strategies, and insights from leading cloud adopters on a variety of topics including hybrid cloud, data, AI, cloud apps, and security. Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau, CEO and publisher, MIT Technology Review, said, "Our custom content division, MIT Technology Review Insights, generates original research that helps executives make informed decisions about their companies' tech strategies and investments. We're excited to co-create The Cloud Hub in partnership with Infosys as we believe companies can benefit immensely from expert guidance as they find their way through the stunningly complex landscape of cloud and digital transformation." Ravi Kumar, President, Infosys, said, "While cloud-first companies forge ahead, several other enterprises struggle to capitalize on the full potential of the cloud. Infosys is actively seeking to remedy this with solutions powered by Infosys Cobalt. Creating The Cloud Hub in collaboration with MIT Technology Review Insights, is an Infosys Cobalt initiative adding muscle to the efforts we are already making to help our clients rejuvenate operations, drive innovation, and take pioneering strides towards realizing value in the cloud." For a quick overview of The Cloud Hub: From Cloud Chaos to Clarity, please click (https://videos.infosys.com/watch/1PkvFoUgh5c7dAHFhiTJMc) here. Click (https://videos.infosys.com/watch/XqgGeeUTiz7aTRhjHtoV3A) here to watch a conversation between Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau and Ravi Kumar. You can learn more about the Cloud Hub (https://www.technologyreview.com/supertopic/theCloudHub) here. 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.) Chennai (Tamil Nadu) [India], November 17 (ANI/NewsVoir): The Consulate General of Republic of Korea in Chennai expresses its delight in announcing the distribution of 4,000 COVID-19 preventive kits to Government School children, as the Tamil Nadu State Government has decided to reopen schools this month. The kits were distributed to the Tamil Nadu Education Minister Anbil Mahesh Poyyamozhi today at his office in Chennai. The initiative is supported by Venu Srinivasan, Goodwill Envoy for Culture and Diplomacy of the Republic of Korea in association with InKo Centre, across the four South Indian states as part of the Korean National Foundation Day celebrated last month. To advocate support towards the Indian community, the Korean Association in Chennai is also donating 70,000 masks and five oxygen generators to the Tamil Nadu Government. With an aim to protect and prevent the lingering virus from spreading and to reinforce the significance of good hygiene amongst teachers, parents, and school children. The kit consists of Korean Face masks, hand sanitisers, hand wash, colour pencils, Origami sheets and chocopie to brighten up their day. The Consulate celebrated the special day online last month wherein a video portraying the Indo-Korean culture themed "Over The Years" is currently being showcased. The National Foundation Day which marks the origin of Korea, constitutes an important annual reminder of the growth of a nation which rose from the ashes of war to become one of the most dynamic countries in the world today. Every year, Consul General of the Republic of Korea and Mr. Venu Srinivasan, as Goodwill Envoy for Culture and Diplomacy of the Republic of Korea, host an event to mark the occasion and to renew ties of goodwill and friendship with well-wishers who recognise and value the relationship between Korea and India. Korean Consulate General Kwon says, "I am honoured and pleased that the kids can be supported during this difficult time. I am also relieved to know that the COVID-19 situation has greatly improved in India after the second wave. The Korean community has engaged in several activities such as organising a Marina Beach clean-up campaign 6 six times since 2014, K-Pop World Festival India Grand Finale which was held for the first time in Chennai and MoUs signed between Ulsan Metropolitan City and Greater Chennai City." TVS Motor Company Chairman, Chairman InKo Centre and Goodwill Envoy for Culture and Diplomacy of the Republic of Korea, Venu Srinivasan says, "It is an honour and privilege, as Goodwill Envoy for Culture and Diplomacy of the Republic of Korea, to annually co-host the National Foundation Day of the Republic of Korea with the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea. Last year and again this year, due to the exigencies imposed by the pandemic, we have dispensed with the physical ceremony, opting for a unique community connect initiative instead. We aim, in cooperation with Education and Health Ministries of the states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, to reach out to Government schools and primary healthcare centres, to distribute masks, sanitisers and colourful stationery kits to young children. With the third wave looming and children identified as a particularly vulnerable group, we felt that reaching out empathetically to this group was of paramount importance. I would like to extend my best wishes for the sustained development of meaningful ties of friendship between Korea and India. I take this opportunity to wish that you all stay safe to overcome these difficult times and welcome a future that ensures good health, happiness and harmony, in ample measure." A special message from the Consul General, Young-seup Kwon and from Goodwill Envoy for Culture and Diplomacy of the Republic of Korea, Venu Srinivasan will be accessible at (https://www.inkocentre.org/NFD/index.html) along with a short film that provides a snapshot of the variety of cultural programmes presented at National Foundation Day events in the past. In addition, there will be links provided to select videos that will showcase the richness and range of Korean culture. This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/NewsVoir) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], November 17 (ANI/PNN): The makers of Banaras have unveiled the much-awaited poster of the film. Zaid Khan and Sonal Monterio are pairing up for Jayathirtha's Banaras. In the poster of the film Banaras, they both appear to be magical. With its picturesque locations like its ghats, temples, River Ganga and boat rides, the poster beautifully presented Banaras on it. Zaid and Sonal look magnificent in their ivory-gold outfits, which contrast beautifully with the poster's warm colours. Jayathirtha is the director of the film. The film will be released in five different languages, namely, Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Telegu and Malayalam. First of its kind, a debut film will be released in five different languages. The film will be released next year in February. Banaras is a Mysterious love story film that explains the beauty, Rich heritage, Culture of Banaras. Produced under the production of NK Productions house, Banaras is produced by Tilakraj Ballal, co-produced by Muzammil Ahmad Khan, story, screenplay and directed by Jayathirtha. B Ajaneesh Loknath has given the music, cinematography by Advaitha Gurumurty and choreography by Jayathirtha and A Harsh. The film will be shot in Varanasi, Bangalore, Mysore and Goa.Zaid Khan and Sonal Monterio are the protagonist. Sujay Shastry, Devaraj, Achyuth Kumar and Barkath Ali are in the various roles. On the poster release, Zaid Khan said, Banaras is a special film for me. The love story between Siddharth and Dani and the picturesque location of Banaras will glue the audience to their seats. I got the opportunity to explore the hidden gems of this city, and I am overwhelmed by its beauty and richness. I really want to thank my director and producers for having me on board. On the poster release of Banaras, the leading lady Sonal Monterio quoted, "in this film how the love story of Siddharth and Dani grows while exploring the city is very special and the director Jayathirtha has shown each and every aspect of the story gracefully. On working with debutant Zaid Khan, she said he is indeed a great actor. Being a debutant actor, he has picked up the character of Siddharth immediately. I am looking forward to the release of the film Producer Tilakraj Ballal quoted the film Banaras has all the essence of love, drama and picturesque locations. The director Jayathirtha has given his best. The debutant actor Zaid Khan and gorgeous Sonal Monterio are apt for the character, and they have done justice to it. Banaras (Motion Poster): (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdAx6Hrjtlg) This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Pune (Maharashtra) [India], November 17 (ANI/NewsVoir): With an aim to ensure quality access to STEM education and create India's next generation of talent, SKF India, today announced the launch of WeGyaan - a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) initiative for deserving students. To be launched in association with NGO partner, United Way Bengaluru, the WeGyan initiative plans to reach to at least 10,000 students annually, in government schools across Ahmedabad, Gurugram, Haridwar, Mysuru, Bengaluru, and Pune with the aim to encourage students to pursue education and careers in STEM subjects. With the core focus on building STEM learning, including setting-up infrastructure for STEM labs, and providing innovative science-based learning tools to help students strengthen the concepts in Science and Mathematics, the project will focus on other key components including holistic development, career guidance as well as physical and mental well-being. It will also build capacities of teachers and include exposure visits, mentoring and soft skills training. To motivate students and address absenteeism, the initiative will focus on building need-based WASH facilities in the school. Manish Bhatnagar, Managing Director, SKF India Ltd., said, "We strongly believe that supporting STEM learning and inspiring students to pursue STEM education and careers will help build India's future pipeline of skilled STEM workers, scientists, innovators and engineers. Our aim is to reach over 100,000 students by 2024, across multiple states, through a 3-year program thereby inspiring them to consider STEM career options. This initiative will further aid diversity in STEM fields by creating a world with equal opportunities for both girls and boys." Through the initiative, 35 government schools in rural and urban areas are provided with STEM infrastructure support as well as WASH training and intervention to reduce dropout rates of girl students. Through experiential science activities, using innovative tools and DIY models and other need-based interventions, WeGyaan aims to build critical-thinking, decision-making and problem-solving among students. This initiative will also include teachers training sessions for facilitating them to teach the STEM-related topics, as well as on-ground engagement with local communities and families on the importance of STEM education and related careers. "Stronger and educated women make a stronger nation and we feel gratified to be facilitating this project in collaboration with SKF India. The program helps advancement of underrepresented students who aspire to pursue careers in technical fields," said Rajesh Krishnan, Executive Director, United Way Bengaluru. SKF's mission is to be the undisputed leader in the bearing business. We do this by offering solutions that reduce friction and CO2 emissions, whilst at the same time increasing machine uptime and performance. Our products and services around the rotating shaft include bearings, seals, lubrication management, artificial intelligence and wireless condition monitoring. SKF is represented in more than 130 countries and has around 17,000 distributor locations worldwide. Annual sales in 2020 were SEK 74 852 million and the number of employees was 40,963. www.skf.com/in. UWBe, part of United Way Worldwide, is an NGO focused on social issues that seek immediate attention. The chapter catalyses unified efforts from corporates, civic bodies and citizen associations to bring about visible change. The organisation works in four key areas - Environment, Education, Healthcare and Livelihood. Currently, UWBe is implementing four flagship campaigns that serve important purposes: 'Wake the Lake' works to protect Bengaluru's lakes, 'One Billion Drops' aims at conserving rainwater through percolation pits, 'Born Learning' helps provide nutrition and education to very young children and 'Rural Rising' aims to develop and empower the rural communities. Besides, COVID relief work is another key area where the organisation is helping healthcare institutions, healthcare professionals and other organisations working towards COVID relief. For more information, please visit (https://www.uwbengaluru.org). This story is provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/NewsVoir) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh) [India], November 17 (ANI/PNN): IHCL's Taj Lakefront Bhopal wins award for 'Best Wedding Destination of Central India' at 16th Hospitality India Annual International Travel Awards. With a banquet capacity of 3862 sq. Mtrs (41,570sq. feet), the hotel can cater to the needs of all kinds of meetings, conferences, events, and weddings. The award only reaffirms the legacy of the Taj brand and establishes the presence of Taj Lakefront Bhopal as the leader in luxury weddings in Central India. The award event took place in New Delhi and saw the participation of a large number of prestigious hotels from around the country. On receiving the award, Kanika Hasrat, Area Director - Uttar Pradesh, MP & Uttarakhand and General Manager - Taj Lakefront Bhopal, said, "We are grateful to Hospitality India for this prestigious award. The Taj Lakefront Bhopal is indeed a gem in the heart of India. With its 875 sq. Mtrs (9418 sq. ft) pillar-less Raj Mahal Ballroom, the beautiful Vindhya Lawn, the Satpura Terrace and the opulent Sheesh Mahal; the hotel is indeed the ideal destination for a dream wedding. With elegant chandeliers, manicured Lawns, mesmerising views and culinary legacy of the Taj Chefs, we look forward to many more 'happily ever after." With 152 rooms that overlook the Upper Lake or the Van Vihar forests, the Taj Lakefront Bhopal is the ideal destination to discover the history, heritage, or Natural treasures of the state. The UNESCO world heritage sites of Sanchi and Bhimbetka, the temples of Bhojpur, Udaigiri caves and Satpura Tiger reserve are within close proximity. With the traditional Bhopali zardozi work, paisley prints of Bagh, terracotta art and bell metal craft of Tikamgarh adorning the interiors of the hotel - the hotel takes its design inspiration from local arts & crafts of Madhya Pradesh. Established in 1903, Taj is The Indian Hotels Company Limited's (IHCL) iconic brand for the world's most discerning travellers seeking authentic experiences in luxury and has been rated as the World's Strongest Hotel Brand and India's Strongest Hospitality Brand as per Brand Finance 2021. From world-renowned landmarks to modern business hotels, idyllic beach resorts, to authentic Grand Palaces, each Taj hotel offers an unrivalled fusion of warm Indian hospitality, world-class service and modern luxury. The unique portfolio comprises hotels across the globe, including presence in India, North America, United Kingdom, Africa, Middle East, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Bhutan, and Nepal. For more information, please visit (https://www.tajhotels.com/?utm_source=Taj_Press_Release & amp;utm_medium=Referral & amp;utm_campaign=GET_A_BOOST_OF_IMMUNITY_WITH_INNERgise) For more information, please contact: lakefront.bhopal@tajhotels.com This story is provided by PNN. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/PNN) DISCLAIMER (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former President Donald Trump had eliminated a loophole that exempted double-sided solar panels from import duties last year. Photo: Bloomberg (Bloomberg) A U.S. trade court has reinstated a tariff exemption on some imported solar panels, a decision that benefits domestic clean-energy developers. Former President Donald Trump last year eliminated a loophole that exempted double-sided solar panels from import duties, but that constituted an action outside the presidents delegated authority, U.S. Court of International Trade Judge Gary Katzmann said in a ruling Tuesday. As a result of the courts ruling, all of the companies that paid tariffs under the Trump era proclamation will receive refunds, according to the industry trade group Solar Energy Industries Association. The judges ruling is the second blow to domestic panel makers in the past week, after the U.S. Commerce Department rejected Wednesday a request from a group of anonymous manufacturers to extend a separate set of tariffs to cover equipment made in Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam. However, it will help U.S. developers that fought to restore the tariff exemption on so-called bifacial solar panels. This is a major surprise, Philip Shen, an analyst at Roth Capital Partners, said in a note Tuesday. Just like that, module vendors can import bifi modules into the U.S., and the industry can avoid the tariffs Trump imposed in 2018, First Solar Inc., the largest U.S. solar manufacturer, fell as much as 9.3% on Tuesday, the most in intraday trading since Sept. 20. China-based JinkoSolar Holding Co., gained as much as 5.8%. This is an unfortunate ruling that puts domestic solar manufacturers at risk of immediate and substantial harm, said a spokesperson for Hanwha Q Cells, a South Korean manufacturer of bifacial solar modules that owns a facility in Dalton, Georgia. This ruling doesnt help the U.S. solar industry. We want to support a sector, this sets it back, said Brian Lynch, head of solar business development at LG Electronics USA Inc. LGs facility in Huntville, Alabama makes bifacial solar modules. The judges decision comes months after the trade court ruled Trumps proclamation hadnt violated an earlier order, effectively allowing his administration to end the exclusion. In December, a Washington-based solar-trade group and some developers challenged the proclamation, contending the administration failed to follow the required procedures before acting. Trump originally approved four years of tariffs on solar equipment imports, starting at 30%. The administration later surprised many in the sector by granting an exclusion for bifacial panels. While they were considered niche products, the tariffs had encouraged some new solar manufacturing in the U.S., and module imports exempt from those duties posed a threat. The former presidents proclamation was an unlawful attempt to harshen his tariffs, Abigail Ross Hopper, CEO of the SEIA, said in a statement. The Office of the United States Trade Representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment. And, the International Trade Commission has no comment to offer. The case is Solar Energy Industries Association v. U.S., 20-3941, U.S. Court of International Trade (New York). Contact editor Michael Bellart (michaelbellart@caixin.com) Download our app to receive breaking news alerts and read the news on the go. Get our weekly free Must-Read newsletter. News at 4Cs Phi Theta Kappa (PTK) Honors Society at 4Cs to Host Toy and Gift Drive for Foster-Care Families Students in the Phi Theta Kappa (PTK) honors society at Cape Cod Community College will be helping foster families across the Cape and Islands have a happier holiday thanks to a community drive to support nonprofit organizations in the region. On Saturday, November 20 from 10:00 a.m. 4:00 p.m., members of the community are welcome to come to the Colleges West Barnstable campus to donate toys and gifts that will support Kind Hearts for Kids in Bourne and Cape Cod Foster Closet in Orleans. Community members are encouraged to come to the Grossman Commons building to drop off items that have been requested by children and their foster families, including: Gift cards to businesses such as Target, Old Navy, Dunkin Donuts, Amazon, Michaels, Rue21, and Starbucks Visa gift cards Fleece throw blankets Medium-sized duffel bags Artificial Christmas trees Lego toy sets Check donations made out to Kind Hearts for Kids and the Cape Cod Foster Closet Drop-offs are welcome at any time between 10:00 a.m. 4:00 p.m., with a designated area that will be marked outside of the Zammer Dining Hall on the first floor of the Grossman Commons building. For easiest access, community members are encouraged to park in Lot 9, then walk up to the entrance of Grossman Commons with the Cafeteria sign over the door on the left. Phi Theta Kappa is the renowned international honor society for two-year colleges, with a network of more than 3.5 million members around the world. Cape Cod Community Colleges chapter, Alpha Upsilon Mu, has been recognized as one of the premiere PTK organizations in the United States, winning multiple awards for academic and student accomplishments every year. For more information about PTK and the drive for Foster Families, please contact Rebecca Griffin, PTK Coordinator, at rgriffin@capecod.edu or call 774-330-4554. Photo: CTV News Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says the federal government will announce changes to COVID-19 prevention measures at the Canadian border "very soon." The government has faced mounting pressure for weeks to do away with a requirement for fully vaccinated travellers into Canada to provide a negative molecular COVID-19 test. For travellers making only a short jaunt over the border, the test can be completed in Canada before the trip takes place drawing even more ire from travellers and the tourism sector. The rule is part of an order in council that will expire on Sunday. Chief public health officer Dr. Theresa Tam has defended the test requirement in the past, but recently said that it needs to be reviewed. After meeting with fellow cabinet ministers Tuesday, Duclos says the government plans to make an announcement on the border in the coming days. We live in a democracy where our citizens can make informed decisions and choices for themselves and their families with regards to every aspect of their lives. I know that the effects of this pandemic have ridden upon (our) shoulders heavily. Messaging from the government has been changing daily, just as the ever present Covid-19 numbers go up and down like the Toronto Stock Exchange monitor. While there are questions still about how the approved vaccines work within us, and the side effects that do occur to many who have been vaccinated, the science has proven that those unvaccinated have a much greater chance of being infected. Yet many of our fellow citizens have not responded to the governments call to get vaccinated. Approximately 81% of Canadian's have received double doses of a vaccine. Herd immunity is approaching and can be achieved so long as those unvaccinated change their minds and step up. Our economy is opening up, making every effort to survive this unexpected assault by the pandemic. Other nations are suffering the pandemic of the unvaccinated too. Austria is locking down two provinces, Upper Austria and Salzburg due to their miserably low vaccination rates and the prolific infection rates. Their hospitals are full of the unvaccinated. (Its) health minister said health workers are required to be vaccinated too. This is just an example of what can happen here in Canada if our citizens who are unvaccinated continue denying our national health plans. There will be more sickness and death to come in the future with winter and the holiday season approaching. My friends, please get vaccinated, if not for yourself (for) your family, neighbours and community. Steven Kaszab, Bradford, Ont. Photo: The Canadian Press Protesters are seen guarding an area of a logging cut block called 'Heli Camp' in the Fairy Creek logging area near Port Renfrew, B.C. Monday, Oct. 4, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward A lawyer representing protesters opposed to old-growth logging on southern Vancouver Island told a British Columbia Court of Appeal hearing that there are limits to a company's economic and private rights. Malcolm Funt says B.C. forest company Teal Cedar Products Ltd. has the right to defend its economic interests, but others also have rights to lawful protest and freedom of expression and movement. Teal Cedar Products Ltd. is appealing a decision from a lower court judge who denied an extension of an injunction against protest blockades in the area for one year. Teal Cedar's lawyer Dean Dalke told the Appeal Court panel on Monday the company wants the court to uphold the rule of law at protest sites near Fairy Creek on Vancouver Island where more than 1,100 people have been arrested at ongoing protests. The injunction remains in place after another judge granted a temporary stay last month to allow Teal Cedar to appeal the B.C. Supreme Court decision. Funt faced several questions Tuesday from the Appeal Court judges about the lower court's reasons not to grant the injunction extension, especially the suggestion the court's reputation was damaged by police conduct during the arrests of protesters. Photo: The Canadian Press Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations Marc Miller responds to questions during a news conference in Ottawa on October 29, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller says all parties are at a "critical junction" in the discussions toward a resolution on the blockade set up at the Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline in British Columbia. Miller adds that it is an "alarming" and "tense" situation since 500 workers are currently behind the barricades. The blockade was erected Sunday by members of the Gidimt'en clan, one of five in the broader Wet'suwet'en Nation. A spokesperson for the Gidimt'en clan says the hereditary chiefs have never ceded nor surrendered the territory, and said that the Coastal GasLink workers were given eight hours notice to peacefully evacuate before the road to the work site was barricaded. Miller says those involved in the talks include the B.C. government, Coastal GasLink, and the Wet'suwet'en hereditary chiefs. On whether the situation might escalate to one akin to the scenario in early 2020, when the Wet'suwet'en and others in solidarity staged massive rail blockades across the country, Miller says "it depends" what happens. Asked whether the Wet'suwet'en people's rights and sovereignty have been violated, Miller says the federal government brought forward a framework that affirmed rights in title to the Wet'suwet'en in 2020, adding that there's still work to do on that front. Miller says there is a window in the next week or so for a resolution to be reached, but specified it will require "good minds" to come together and provide solutions that address the issues at play. "There are views that are diametrically opposed, but I don't preclude by that same stroke the ability to resolve that in a peaceful way," he said after a cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Photo: DriveBC Flooding overwhelms the Whatcom Road Interchange in the Fraser Valley, stranding motorists | DriveBC Business owners in B.C.s tourism sector are thankful that the so-called atmospheric river, which dumped up to 230 mm of rain in parts of the province November 13 through 15, came during its shoulder season. Summer tourists have long gone, while ski resorts are yet to open and holiday-season visits are more than a month away. Before the storm, which prompted flooding and evacuations in pockets of the province, including the entire 7,000-person town of Merritt, executives at the 210-room Kelowna Sandman Hotel & Suites were expecting to be 60% occupied, front desk manager-in-training Abhi Rawat told BIV. Were full, he said, adding that the hotel is providing evacuees with a government rate, and that the hotel would be compensated for those discounts by the B.C. governments emergency services department. A series of landslides and wash-outs closed all highways connecting the Lower Mainland to the Interior. Some motorists were stranded on Highway 1, between Sumas Way and Whatcom Road, in Abbotsford. People who were able to get out of that logjam provided business for hotels, such as the Abbotsford Hotel, on Clearbrook Road, just off the highway. Front desk clerk Raj Sidhu told BIV that guests occupied 40 of his hotels 42 rooms on November 15, with most of the reservations being last-minute online bookings. He said he thought many of those customers were motorists who had not intended to stay in a hotel overnight, and that on a standard mid-November night the hotel would see about 45% occupancy. Often, when there is rain on the coast, Interior mountains get snow. The atmospheric river, however, carried water and warmer air that drenched Big White Ski Resort, which had been planning to open on November 25. We lost about 30 cm of snow, Big White vice-president of sales and marketing Michael Ballingall told BIV. We had about a 50 cm base, and were down to about 22 cm. He said he is concerned that a section of the Coquihalla Highway, between Hope and Merritt, washed away. That's where all our groceries come from, for all our restaurants, he said. Our customers come down that road. People who come from overseas do ski safaris visiting Big White, Revelstoke, Kicking Horse, that's what they do. They rent a car in Vancouver, and do a little circuit. So we're fielding calls from people who are concerned [about the roads]. Damage to the Coquihalla Highway appears to be extensive, and government officials have yet to project a date when the highway could reopen. Some good news is that the Okanagans wine region should be able to weather the storm, Wine Growers British Columbia CEO Miles Prodan told BIV. One challenge could be that wineries have trouble delivering wine to customers. November, however, is as slow a time of year for wine tourists as it is for grape growing. Most fruit has been picked, he explained. Some wineries have left grapes on vines with the intention of making icewine, but this year had been shaping up to be a low-yield year for icewine, with only 80 tonnes of grapes registered to be left on vines, and only four wineries registered to pick those grapes and make the wine. In order to make icewine, wineries must register their intent with the BC Wine Authority, which is the regulatory authority for BC VQA. B.C.s hospitality sector is also unlikely to take a hit from the storm, according to BC Restaurant and Foodservices Association CEO Ian Tostenson. I think well be all right, apart from supply chain disruption in the Interior, he said. It's going to be a problem, but it was already was a problem, and is just going to be exasperated. This is a shoulder period for us. Photo: Canada Armed Forces Military assisting in the rescue of stranded motorists on Highway 7 The B.C. government has requested federal military support in dealing with the flooding situation. Canadian Air Force assets have already been involved in rescues over the past two days, including at Highway 7 in Agassiz where hundreds were trapped between two slides. Minister of Public Safety Mike Farnworth issued a statement Tuesday night on the heels of Abbotsfords urgent evacuations of the Sumas Prairie. The city has indicated that conditions within the Sumas Prairie have escalated and pose a significant risk to life due to the imminent failure of the Barrowtown Pump Station, Farnworth said. This evening, I have been in continual contact with Henry Braun, mayor of Abbotsford. Emergency Management BC has been working with Abbotsford Emergency Management staff and the Abbotsford Police Department. Farnworth said the province is supporting Abbotsford in any way possible, including offering emergency notification capabilities. I have also been in contact with Bill Blair, federal Minister of Emergency Preparedness, to request federal assistance on this incident and the flooding situation in general. This includes Canadian Armed Forces ground and air support. Farnworth echoed Abbotsford officials in asking residents to not stay behind for livestock or property. Premier John Horgan spoke with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Tuesday. A call readout states Trudeau pledged to support British Columbians with any federal resources required, from short-term assistance such as providing air support to long-term rebuilding efforts. Photo: The Canadian Press Economic Development, International Trade and Small Business and Export Promotion Minister Mary Ng Canada is launching free-trade talks with a major group of southeast Asian countries as it seeks to diversify from China and find new ways of coping with a snarled global supply chain. International Trade Minister Mary Ng announced the opening of formal trade talks late Tuesday with the Association of South East Asian Nations known as ASEAN after meeting with representatives of that 10-country bloc. Ng heralded the opening of the talks as a significant milestone in deepening Canada's economic relations with the Indo-Pacific region and driving economic growth as the world copes with supply-chain bottlenecks that have plagued global trade during the COVID-19 pandemic. Three weeks ago, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told a business forum that pursuing a trade deal with ASEAN countries would be a "win-win" that would be key to driving Canada's growth as it emerges from the pandemic. "Our government is committed to opening up and diversifying more markets for Canadian exporters and businesses to grow," Ng said in an interview. Ng met virtually Tuesday with ASEAN ministers and representatives of the Canada-ASEAN Business Council. The ministers agreed to a joint statement highlighting the potential for a free-trade agreement to help diversify supply chains, increase trade and investment, and reinforce Canada and ASEAN's shared commitment to open markets and rules-based trade. Canada already has preferred access to four of ASEAN's 10 countries Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam through the 11-country Pacific Rim trade group known as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). "We already have the CPTPP in the Asia-Pacific region. And this adds another 600 million new consumers," said Ng. She said the region is the third-largest consumer market in the world with a $5 trillion economy. A deal with ASEAN would open up access to three other large markets Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand. The pursuit of a trade deal with ASEAN has been long sought by the government, and the global pandemic has only heightened the need to forge deeper into Asian markets. An analysis by ASEAN and the federal government estimates that a free-trade deal between them could increase Canadian exports of goods and services to the region by 13.3 per cent. The early months of the pandemic exposed the overreliance on trade with China as Canada encountered problems gaining access to personal protective equipment and vaccines. In 2018, Canada launched public consultations that generated submissions from more than four dozen interested parties and individuals. "Overall, stakeholders expressed support for FTA exploratory discussions with ASEAN and highlighted the significant opportunities for Canadians and Canadian businesses in the ASEAN market notably with non-CPTPP economies (Indonesia, Philippines and Thailand) across a broad range of sectors, including agriculture, manufacturing and services, among others," said the report, by Global Affairs Canada. The agriculture sector provided the majority of input with 20 of the 49 submissions on the consultations, and their advice carried a familiar warning about an obstacle that has plagued past Canadian trade negotiations. "A small number of stakeholders, especially from the supply-managed agriculture sectors, are skeptical of the benefits of a possible ASEAN-Canada FTA. Contributors indicated that support for an agreement would depend on outcomes that provide a carve-out for supply-managed goods," said the report. Canada's supply-managed dairy, poultry and egg markets have proven to be major bones of contention during trade talks on the CPTPP, with the European Union and in the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement, where it sparked the wrath of former U.S. president Donald Trump. Canada's agriculture sector suffered when China imposed restrictions on Canadian canola, pork and beef imports during the dispute involving Chinese high-tech executive Meng Wanzhou, and Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. The men who became known as the two Michaels spent almost three years in Chinese prisons in apparent retaliation for Canadas arrest of Meng on a U.S. extradition warrant, while the punitive Chinese trade measures cost Canadian canola companies about $2 billion. "We've been clear as a government that we will protect supply-managed sectors, and we intend to fulfil that," said Ng. "But we're also looking at opportunities to look at market access in other sectors. We're looking at growth in the digital economy. We're looking at greater access to (financial) services." Photo: The Canadian Press The last time Polenli Combary spoke to her son on the phone she prayed for God to bless him. Shortly after, she called back but the line was dead. Her 34-year-old son was returning a truck used to move the family's belongings from their village in eastern Burkina Faso after jihadis forced everyone to leave. He disappeared in March. We will keep searching ... Im just praying to God to have him back, said Combary, 53, sitting despondently in the eastern city of Fada NGourma where she now lives. Islamic extremist violence is ravaging Burkina Faso, killing thousands and displacing more than 1 million people. And people are going missing. Reports of missing relatives quadrupled from 104 to 407 between 2019 and 2020, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which defines a missing person as someone whose whereabouts cannot be accounted for and requires state intervention. With the conflict, you have more sudden movements of people, you have more incidents which can lead to separation and disappearance," said Marina Fakhouri, head of protection with the ICRC in Burkina Faso. "Certainly we are concerned also by the number of families who are coming to us directly to signal that they have a missing relative and need support. People have previously gone missing in the West African nation due to migration, floods or shocks from climate change, but the magnitude has increased because of the violence, she said. Tracing people during a conflict and in a context of mass displacement is challenging, can cause tensions within families and communities and psychological and physical distress. One month after her son disappeared, Combarys husband died of a heart attack due to the shock, she said. While some families blame the jihadis for the disappearances of their loved ones, many others point to the security forces as the main perpetrators. During a trip to Fada NGourma in October and speaking to people in the Sahel province by phone, three families, including Combary's, told The Associated Press they suspect the army is responsible for their missing relatives. The military has been accused by rights groups of extrajudicial killings and targeting people deemed to be associated with the jihadis. About 70% of families reporting people missing allege it is linked to the security forces, said Daouda Diallo, executive secretary for the Collective Against Impunity and Stigmatization of Communities, a civil society group. Theres been a reduction of reported cases affiliated with the military since the end of last year, which Diallo attributes to a report by Human Rights Watch that accused the army of being involved in mass killings, said Diallo. But now the abuses are being committed by volunteer fighters, civilians armed by the state, he said. It is sad to see that the violence has been subcontracted to armed civilians or militia in the field, Diallo said. Photo: The Canadian Press Dairy farmers in flood-affected British Columbia are being asked to dump milk because mudslides and road washouts have made it impossible to transport. The B.C. Milk Marketing Board is advising producers in areas like Abbotsford, Chilliwack and the Southern Interior to dispose of their milk by dumping into manure piles. Mudslides and flooding have cut several key highways in the province. Many B.C. dairy producers have no road access at all to their farms right now. In other cases where milk can be picked up from the farm, there is nowhere for it to go. There are no roads available to enter the B.C. Lower Mainland for milk delivery, and only limited road access to Alberta. Photo: The Canadian Press Joe Biden and Justin Trudeau in 2016. As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau meets Thursday with U.S. President Joe Biden and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, observers say Canada has a lot to complain about. Here are some of the issues that have been chafing north of the border: Pipelines: In addition to Keystone XL, the Biden administration has shown little enthusiasm for Line 3 and Line 5, two key cross-border upgrade projects spearheaded by Calgary-based Enbridge Inc. that have been the targets of widespread protests and legal action in the U.S. Afghanistan: Canada received little advance warning of the American military's abrupt and chaotic pullout, despite the prominent, costly and bloody role it played over a decade-long deployment as part of the U.S.-led NATO mission in the war-racked country. Buy American: The president frequently uses strong protectionist language to assure working-class voters that infrastructure projects will rely heavily on U.S. contractors and suppliers, with stringent conditions for any foreign involvement. Electric vehicles: Canada's auto industry is up in arms over a proposed U.S. tax credit worth up to $12,500 to would-be EV buyers that critics, including foreign automakers, say is unfairly geared toward American-made vehicles built with union labour. Hydro-Quebec: A planned transmission line between Quebec and New England, billed as a clean-energy conduit that would have had a dramatic impact on carbon emissions, was rejected by voters in Maine in a referendum earlier this month. The Canada-U.S. border: The White House didn't open its land borders to fully vaccinated Canadian visitors until early November, three months after fully vaccinated U.S. citizens were allowed to drive into Canada. USMCA: In addition to the EV tax credit, which auto industry officials in Canada consider a violation of the terms of the new trilateral trade deal, Canada and the U.S. are girding for a protracted battle over access to the Canadian dairy market. The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the two powerful explosions in the centre of Uganda's capital during rush hour on Tuesday, reported The Wall Street Journal. At least three people were killed and 33 were injured in the bombings. It took place within about 550 yards and three minutes of each other in Kampala's heavily guarded business district, The Wall Street Journal quoted police spokesman Fred Enanga as saying. Three suspected suicide bombers also died in the blasts. Earlier on Tuesday, the chairperson of the AU Commission Moussa Faki Mahamat had condemned the twin bomb blasts in Uganda. "I condemn in the strongest terms. Our sincere condolences to the families of the victims and wishes for a full recovery to the injured," Moussa Faki Mahamat tweeted. (ANI) Also Read: Six dead, 33 injured in twin bomb blasts in Ugandan capital Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said that the Taliban would be invited to the third ministerial meeting of Afghanistan's neighbours. The meeting is expected to be held in China next year, local media reported. "Afghanistan's interim government will also be invited to the next meeting of Afghanistan's neighbours," Qureshi said at a meeting of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, reported Dawn. According to Dawn, Pakistan had worked out a new mechanism for consultations among Afghanistan's neighbours after the Taliban takeover. The format includes China, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, besides Russia. The inaugural meeting was held in Islamabad on September 8, while the second meeting was hosted by Iran on October 27, according to the newspaper. However, the Taliban was not invited to either of the meetings because the new regime lacked international recognition. The next meeting will take place in China. Although dates have not been finalised, it is likely to be held early next year, Dawn reported. Last week, Pakistan has hosted senior diplomats from the United States, China and Russia in Islamabad to discuss the situation in neighbouring Afghanistan, where a deepening humanitarian crisis has forced many Afghans to migrate to neighbouring countries since the Taliban takeover in August. (ANI) Also Read: Islamic State claims responsibility for Uganda bombings U.S. monkeypox cases are very rare. Monkeypox does not occur naturally in the United States, but cases have happened that were associated with international travel or importing animals from areas where the disease is more common. November 2021 Travel-Associated Case The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Maryland Department of Health confirmedexternal icon on November 16, 2021 a case of monkeypox in a U.S. resident who recently returned from Nigeria to the United States. CDC is supporting state and local health officials, airline and travel industry partners, and other stakeholders to identify people who had possible contact with the patient. Because it can take up to 21 days for symptoms to develop after infection, contacts are being asked to monitor their health for that amount of time. CDC will continue to collaborate with partners to ensure the success of this investigation to help prevent additional cases of monkeypox in the United States. July 2021 Travel-Associated Case CDC and the Texas Department of State Health Services confirmed on July 15, 2021 a case of human monkeypox in a U.S. citizen who traveled from Nigeria to the United States on two commercial flights. CDC supported state and local health officials to identify more than 200 people who had possible contact with the patient. Contacts were asked to monitor their health for 21 days. In early September, 21 days had passed without additional cases identified, and the monitoring period for the remaining contacts ended. Strong collaboration between CDC, state and local health departments, airline and airport partners, and other stakeholders involved in this investigation helped to prevent additional cases of monkeypox in the U.S. related to this case. 2003 Outbreak from Imported Mammals In 2003, forty-seven confirmed and probable casesexternal icon of monkeypox were reported from six statesIllinois, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, Ohio, and Wisconsin. All people infected with monkeypox in this outbreak became ill after having contact with pet prairie dogs. The pets were infected after being housed near imported small mammals from Ghana. This was the first time that human monkeypox was reported outside of Africa. What caused the 2003 U.S. outbreak? Investigators determined that a shipment of animals from Ghana, imported to Texas in April 2003, introduced monkeypox virus into the United States. The shipment contained approximately 800 small mammals representing nine different species, including six types of rodents. These rodents included rope squirrels, tree squirrels, African giant pouched rats, brush-tailed porcupines, dormice, and striped mice. CDC laboratory testing showed that two African giant pouched rats, nine dormice, and three rope squirrels were infected with monkeypox virus. After importation into the United States, some of the infected animals were housed near prairie dogs at the facilities of an Illinois animal vendor. These prairie dogs were sold as pets before they developed signs of infection. All people infected with monkeypox became ill after having contact with infected pet prairie dogs. A study conducted after the outbreak suggested that certain activities associated with animals were more likely to lead to monkeypox infection. These activities included touching a sick animal or receiving a bite or scratch that broke the skin. Another important factor was cleaning the cage or touching the bedding of a sick animal. No instances of monkeypox infection were attributed exclusively to person-to-person contact. How was the outbreak contained? CDC and the public health departments in the affected states, together with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and other agencies, participated in a variety of activities that prevented further spread of monkeypox. This included extensive laboratory testing; deployment of smallpox vaccine and treatments; development of guidance for patients, healthcare providers, veterinarians, and other animal handlers; tracking potentially infected animals; and investigation into possible human cases. Partners in the response issued an immediate embargo and prohibition on the importation, interstate transportation, sale, and release into the environment of certain species of rodents including prairie dogs. FDA later rescinded the part of the order that restricted the capture, sale, and interstate movement of prairie dogs or domestically-bred African rodents, but CDCs restriction on the importation of African rodents remains in place. This service applies to you if your subscription has not yet expired on our old site. You will have continued access until your subscription expires; then you will need to purchase an ongoing subscription through our new system. Please contact The Chanute Tribune office at 620-431-4100 if you have any questions In April 1917, the United States Congress declared war on Germany and, during the next nineteen months, more than four million American men would serve in the Great War, with 2.8 million serving in Europe. Emotions ran high among citizens as the civilian front activated in full support of the war to end all wars, responding to President Woodrow Wilsons appeal for unity that would make the world safe for democracy. At 11:11 am on 11 November, 1918, the guns fell silent as the belligerent nations signed an armistice, agreeing to a ceasing of all conflict. Representatives of the Allied nations meet with representatives of the German Empire in Paris and eventually hammered out the Versailles Treaty, identifying the terms of peace.In the months following the treaty agreement, France and Great Britain were reeling from tremendous casualties during their extended years of combat and the fact that many of their soldiers had been buried in cemeteries on foreign soil. To ease the pain of their citizens, both countries choose to honor all soldiers by creating memorials to an Unknown Warrior, each entombing an unidentified soldier in a special ceremony on Armistice Day 1920.Inspired by the British and French example, U. S. Congressman Hamilton Fish, Jr., NY Great War veteran, introduced a bill creating a similar memorial at Arlington National Cemetery - - the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. After approval by both houses and the signature of President Warren G. Harding in the spring of 1920, construction of the tomb began.On November 11, 1921, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated. The unknown soldier had been chosen from four U. S. unknowns who had been exhumed from four different cemeteries in France. Sgt. Edward F. Younger of the 50th Infantry, American Forces in Germany, was tasked with choosing the veteran who would be returned home for the ceremonial burial. Sgt. Younger identified his choice by placing a spray of white roses on one casket. He later said that he felt a draw to the second casket, as though he knew the soldier whose body was inside.The unknown came home via the USS Olympia, arriving at the Washington Navy Yard on November 9 and lying in state at the US Capitol on November 10. Almost 100,000 citizens filed past the flag-draped casket on that day.On Armistice Day, the nation observed two minutes of silence as the official state funeral began. The Great War Unknown Soldier was awarded the Medal of Honor and buried with honor at Arlington National Cemetery, with President Harding presiding. Congressional members, representatives of the military and thousands of citizens attended.On this centennial of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the citizens of the United States recognize all those who have served in our armed forces in the commemoration of Veterans Day. A special ceremony will occur at Arlington, remembering all those who lie in graves, names known only to God.The story of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier will continue . . .* * * Linda Moss Mines is the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Historian and Secretary of the Chattanooga Area Veterans Council. She can be reached at localhistorycounts@gmail.com A taxi driver for Mercury Cab said he had given a ride to a woman, and when she said she did not have the cash, he stopped at two different ATMs for her to get cash to pay him. The cab driver said when he arrived at the woman's destination, she gave him $10 to cover a $34 fare. The cab driver said that when he argued with her about this, she went into the house and returned with $20 in loose change, which he refused. The cab driver said she then left in a silver Chrysler 300. As police spoke with the cab driver, a man arrived to the address and said it was his house. Police explained why they were there, and he said the woman was his sister. He called her and then paid the cab driver $25 to cover the remaining fare. The cab driver said he no longer needed police assistance. * * * The security company for Speedway at 1330 East 3rd St. called police reporting that a man was stealing beer from the store but did not give any description. Upon arrival, police spoke with the clerk who said she caught a man stealing beer. She showed police the beer she had taken from him - four three-packs of Bud Light and one six-pack of Michelob Ultra beer. The clerk described the suspect as a tall black male, approximately 6'3", thin, wearing all black clothes and a mask. No one matching the description was found on the premises. The clerk said the suspect left with no stolen items, and was no longer present. * * * A man on Riverfront Parkway said someone stole the catalytic converter to his company vehicle, a Ford Excursion. There is no suspect information at this time. The total amount of loss is approximately $1,000. The man said the suspect(s) used a cutting device to remove the catalytic converter. He said the hotel he was staying at, Springhill Suites, asked him to park his vehicle on the roadway (Riverfront Parkway) rather than using the parking lot where it would have been kept in a secure lot. * * * A man at 301 East Martin Luther King Blvd. told police a man was drinking beer in front of Kankus and was irate when he was asked to leave. The caller said he wanted the man trespassed. He pointed out the man, who was standing down the street on the sidewalk. Police made contact with the man and identified him. Police told him he was trespassed from Kankus and if he returned he would be arrested. * * * A woman on Marylin Lane said her car, a 2014 Kia Soul, had damage on the front right fender that was not evident prior to this morning. She believes an unknown suspect, possibly her neighbor, might be responsible but she cannot prove this. Police witnessed what appeared to be scratch indentation damage. Police suggested to the woman that she might want to invest in some camera technology for future reference. At this time, there is no further case info to process. * * * Police responded to Brookmeade Circle where a man said he is in an ongoing court situation with his soon to be ex-wife. He said she has been sending text messages to herself, under the guise that it is himself. He said he has documentation to prove that it is she that is sending these messages. Police told the man he would need to take this documentation with him to court and that this would be addressed at his upcoming court date. * * * Officers were dispatched to check on the status of a woman on Esquire Drive, at the request of her brother. Upon arrival police spoke to the woman who said she was okay and that her brother may have had the incorrect phone number. The brother was given a call to relay that the woman was okay. He said he had not been able to make contact with her for the last couple of days and just wanted to make sure that she was okay. * * * A man on East 16th Street called police and said there was an unauthorized device accessing his email/phone accounts. He said that he is in the process of going through a divorce, and believes that either his separated wife or her new boyfriend are the ones accessing his email/phone. He said he found an IP address on Shanty Lake Road for the area of the device accessing his accounts and that the new boyfriend lives in the area that the IP address come from, although the address is not exact. The man wanted this incident documented for his records. * * * A woman on Ashford Villa Circle said she is having issues with a woman who is following her and taking pictures of her out and about. She wished to have documentation in case the situation worsens. She also had questions about what she could do legally. * * * A woman at Sir Goony's Family Fun Center at 5918 Brainerd Road said that at some point while she was within the business, the rear driver's side window of her vehicle had been shattered. It appeared as though a small projectile or other object struck the window, causing it to break. This did not appear to be consistent with a projectile from a firearm, but possible an airsoft or BB gun. At this time the party responsible for the damage is unknown, pending if the business has camera footage of the incident. * * * An officer observed a white sport bike with no tag turning south onto Central from Workman Road. The officer attempted to stop the motorist who then "flipped off" the officer and continued at a high rate of speed toward Burnt Mill Road/Tennessee Avenue. There was recently a report of a stolen white/blue sport bike from 20th Street. The officer was not able to get close enough to the vehicle to determine if this motorcycle was also blue. The vehicle seemed to have come from Fagan Street, which is an area that has previously held a "chop shop" of stolen motorcycles. The vehicle was BOLO'd to Adam team and Walker County. * * * An officer was patrolling the area of 4000 Hooker Road when she observed a black female (possibly 20's) with long rainbow braids getting out of the passenger side of a green Subaru Outback with a handicap tag. As the officer passed, she observed a young black male (roughly 12- 14-years-old) step out of the driver's seat and look back toward the police vehicle before fleeing through yards on foot. The officer returned to the vehicle to find it was confirmed as stolen in this incident. Officers attempted to locate the parties without success. Fingerprints were lifted from the vehicle and submitted to AFIS. The car owner arrived and took possession of the vehicle, confirming to the officer that a phone had been connected to the vehicle's Bluetooth system that did not belong to him. The phone was listed as "Kay's phone" and the number listed was which currently does not have coplink history. The vehicle was removed from NCIC. * * * While on patrol, an officer spotted a man who appeared to be urinating in the corner at 801 East. 11th St. The officer spoke with the man as he walked to the intersection of Peeples Street and East 11th Street. He said that he did urinate in the corner. He said because he is homeless and bad kidneys he has nowhere to use the restroom and he said since no one was around he could just go anywhere. The officer explained to him that this is not the case. Because he did not appear to expose himself to anyone in the area, the officer did not cite him. * * * Police were called to Jaycee Towers at 500 W Martin Luther King Blvd. on a report of a found phone. A man said he found the phone lying on the couch in the lobby of JC Towers. Other tenants stated that it was a certain woman's phone and that she leaves her belongings laid about. Police have had interaction with the woman and knew what apartment she lived in. A resident said that he would take it to her but asked police to wait in case she didn't answer the door. That tenant returned and said that she didn't answer the door. Police took the phone to the Chattanooga Police Property room for safe keeping. Police completed a release form also. * * * The manager of Party Foul at 2100 Hamilton Place Blvd. called police to report a disorder that occurred within the establishment. The two customers who were the cause of this report left before police arrived. * * * An anonymous caller reported a college party on East 4th Street that was growing and he was concerned about it. Upon arrival, police were met in the yard by a man who identified himself as one of the residents at the address. The officer spoke with the man and asked him to keep the party calm and quiet, and we would have no cause to shut the party down. The man agreed, and at the time the officer was speaking with him, the party was not excessively loud or disruptive, and the man said they would be done around 12:30 a.m. * * * A woman on Poplar Street said someone stole the tag off her vehicle. She identified the tag and it was entered into NCIC. * * * A woman on Broomsedge Trail told police over the phone someone recently illegally accessed her Facebook account from Texas and changed the password. Also, she received emails last week notifying her that someone had also hacked her email and changed the password and she later found out that the same thing was done with her Amazon account. Then she discovered that someone had emptied out her savings account with Volunteer Federal Bank, which is based in Tellico Plains, and she believes it was an online transaction. When she checked her account online, it had been closed. She still hasnt spoken with anyone at the bank because they are still closed at this time. She also checked with her ex-husband and he told her he has not emptied out the account. The total amount taken was $118. * * * A man at CJ's Automotive at 1073 Hooker Road said when he came to work he found a black 18-foot trailer abandoned at the entrance to his workplace. Police ran the VIN through NCIC and found that the trailer had been reported stolen out of Alabama. Hamilton County Dispatch reached out to the appropriate agency to have the trailer removed from the stolen status. The trailer was towed to United Wrecker Services. * * * A woman on Highland Circle said overnight someone entered her unlocked 2018 Chevrolet Suburban and stole several items. * * * A man on Mission Road told police various power tools, hand tools, and recreational sporting equipment were stolen from his yard and the area around his house. He did not know a specific time the offense took place. He did not have any working surveillance cameras on his property and police did not observe any on any neighboring structures. A detailed description of each item taken is listed in the property section of this report. * * * A woman on East 34th Street said she left her vehicle parked there and later discovered some damage on the driver's side front door, which consists of some light scuff marks and a small dent. She said it looks like there is some white paint in the scuff marks and she parks the vehicle in a shared driveway with other neighbors at her residence. She has checked her neighbors' vehicles and they don't have any damage, so she said she doesnt know what really happened. She said one of her neighbors told her they saw a vehicle turn around in the driveway one day but they didn't see if her vehicle was hit. Therefore, there is no proof of how the damage was done or if it was intentional. She said the repair shop could not give an estimate yet. * * * Police were dispatched to a suspicious vehicle at Sweet Melissa's Billiards at 1966 Northpoint Blvd. where a man was underneath a box truck. Upon arrival, police found a man in a gold Toyota Sienna, next to two Budget box trucks. Police identified the man who said he was sleeping in his car because he could not find a hotel, and that he was involved in a pool tournament at Sweet Melissa's. The man told police that he had a firearm in his glove box, at which point police instructed him to exit the vehicle. After further questioning, police determined that the man was not involved in criminal activity. Police told him he could not sleep in a private parking lot, and that he needed to find other arrangements. The man was instructed to vacate the premise and did so without incident. When Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed a bill that will allow partisan elections for county school board, it had little to do politics and a lot to do with wackos. School boards across the state have become infested in more than a few counties with stinkin thinkin and the conservative State Legislature quite rightfully wanted more transparency for the voters. Understand, there is nothing wrong with being a Republican or a Democrat because goodness only knows, there are zealots on both sides, and I think the more the voters know is helpful at a time when school boards are under the microscope. Man, there are varying degrees these days. The folks at the Pew Research Center have just issued a new report that identified four species in each party. And then there are those who dont care for politics who are labeled as Stressed Sideliners. What many really want to know is what kind of Republican is running, and what is the typology of a given Democrat.Man, there are varying degrees these days. The folks at the Pew Research Center have just issued a new report that identified four species in each party. And then there are those who dont care for politics who are labeled as Stressed Sideliners. pewresearch.org and take an easy quiz to discover your political leanings. Here is the gist of the different types of people today: As I read the Pew report, I can identify every typology in people I know and if you arent sure where you fall, please go toand take an easy quiz to discover your political leanings. Here is the gist of the different types of people today: * * * RED VS. BLUE: THE POLITICAL TYPOLOGY (as identified by the Pew Research Center, Washington D.C.) The four Democratic-oriented typology groups highlight the partys racial and ethnic diversity, as well as the unwieldy nature of the current Democratic coalition. They include two very different groups of liberal Democrats: PROGRESSIVE LEFT and ESTABLISHMENT LIBERALS. Progressive Left, the only majority White, non-Hispanic group of Democrats, have very liberal views on virtually every issue and support far-reaching changes to address racial injustice and expand the social safety net. Establishment Liberals, while just as liberal in many ways as Progressive Left, are far less persuaded of the need for sweeping change. Two other Democratic-aligned groups could not be more different from each other, both demographically and in their relationship to the party. DEMOCRATIC MAINSTAYS, the largest Democratic-oriented group, as well as the oldest on average, are unshakeable Democratic loyalists and have a moderate tilt on some issues. OUTSIDER LEFT, the youngest typology group, voted overwhelmingly for Joe Biden a year ago and are very liberal in most of their views, but they are deeply frustrated with the political system including the Democratic Party and its leaders. The four Republican-oriented groups include three groups of conservatives: FAITH & FLAG CONSERVATIVES are intensely conservative in all realms; they are far more likely than all other typology groups to say government policies should support religious values and that compromise in politics is just selling out on what you believe in. COMMITTED CONSERVATIVES also express conservative views across the board, but with a somewhat softer edge, particularly on issues of immigration and Americas place in the world. POPULIST RIGHT, who have less formal education than most other typology groups and are among the most likely to live in rural areas, are highly critical of both immigrants and major U.S. corporations. AMBIVALENT RIGHT, the youngest and least conservative GOP-aligned group, hold conservative views about the size of government, the economic system and issues of race and gender. But they are the only group on the political right in which majorities favor legal abortion and say marijuana should be legal for recreational and medical use. They are also distinct in their views about Donald Trump while a majority voted for him in 2020, most say they would prefer he not continue to be a major political figure. The only typology group without a clear partisan orientation STRESSED SIDELINERS also is the group with the lowest level of political engagement. Stressed Sideliners, who make up 15 percent of the public but constituted just 10 percent of voters in 2020, have a mix of conservative and liberal views but are largely defined by their minimal interest in politics. * * * Again, I think declaring party affiliation is great and for those who believe politics have no place in school board matters should think again. Anytime there is a contested race politics are at the forefront. I think it is healthy for any candidate to identify with a party and, if that person is hesitant to do so, they should be doubly-present to run for political office. Be proud of who you are! For Noel Durant, the new leader of The Trust For Public Lands Tennessee office, starting a new chapter is really about returning to his roots. Mr. Durant, a Chattanooga native and McCallie School alum (04) who has served in a variety of roles for The Trust For Public Land (TPL) since 2013, assumed the role of Tennessee State Director on November 1. An avid outdoorsman with a degree in Natural Resource Management from Clemson University, he was previously the offices Institutional Giving Manager and Program Director. Before returning to the Tennessee office of TPL in 2020, he led the Crested Butte Land Trust in Crested Butte, Colorado. My wife and I welcomed our first child last year, which made our decision to return to the Tennessee Valley very easy, Mr. Durant said. Im lucky to have had the experience of learning a lot in Colorado, about land and about leadership, but it was important to us that our son grow up in this incredible part of the country. After all, what is this work about if not creating and protecting public lands for future generations to enjoy? TPL has big plans for Tennessee in 2022, including the completion of the South Chickamauga Creek Greenway, the development of a new trail to connect Red Banks White Oak Park with Chattanoogas famed Stringers Ridge, and a significant expansion of Lockeland Springs Park in East Nashville. As Tennessee State director, Mr. Durant will be responsible for the timely completion of these and other projects, in addition to managing the offices operations staff and collaborating with the states Director of Philanthropy to secure financial support for the regions many efforts to protect land and create parks for people. Noel is the ideal person for this job, both because of his long history with TPL and his unique understanding of where our organization can go next, said Franklin Farrow, a longtime TPL volunteer and supporter of their work in Tennessee. The creation and protection of high-quality public space is essential to healing damage to our environment and divisions in our community. Noel knows how to do both, and The Trust For Public Land will be stronger because of his leadership moving forward. Thanksgiving travelers will not be delayed by construction on Tennessee roads during this holiday. TDOT will halt all lane closure activity on interstates and state highways in anticipation of higher traffic volumes across the state. All construction-related lane closures will be stopped beginning at noon on Wednesday, Nov. 24 through midnight on Sunday, Nov. 28.Thanksgiving is typically the most traveled holiday of the year, said TDOT Commissioner Joe Galbato. Halting road work during this time will provide maximum capacity on our highways and help alleviate congestion, especially during the predicted peak travel days of Wednesday and Sunday.TDOTs regional HELP Trucks will also be working throughout the holiday weekend to assist with incidents that may occur along the interstates.While all lane closure activity will be stopped, workers may be on-site in some construction zones. Long-term lane closures will also remain in place on some construction projects for motorists safety. Motorists are reminded to drive safely and obey the posted speeds, especially in work zones. Drivers convicted of speeding in work zones where workers are present face a fine of up to $500, plus court fees and possible increased insurance premiums.AAA projects more than 53.4 million Americans will travel this Thanksgiving, up 13 percent from 2020. In Tennessee, the expectation is 1.2 million travelers.Get the latest construction activity and live streaming SmartWay traffic cameras from your desktop or mobile device at www.TNSmartWay.com/Traffic. Travelers can also dial 511 from any landline or cellular phone for travel information or follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TN511 for statewide travel. As always, drivers are reminded to use all motorist information tools wisely and Know Before You Go! by checking travel conditions before leaving for your destination. Drivers should never tweet, text or talk on a cell phone while behind the wheel. Project Return, a Tennessee nonprofit dedicated to helping people successfully return to the community after incarceration and avoid recidivism, has opened an office in Chattanooga at 620 Lindsay St., Suite 100. The milestone was celebrated Wednesday with a reception featuring remarks from Project Return Chief Executive Officer Bettie Kirkland, Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly and Tennessee State Senator Bo Watson.Our mission is to provide necessary, impactful reentry services for our program participants who have chosen to improve their own lives and communities, said Ms.Kirkland. Our decision to expand our services to Chattanooga was inspired by the strong support we received from local leaders, including state legislators, the city and county mayors offices and the business community.Founded in Nashville in 1979, Project Return has helped thousands of men and women find employment and establish stable lives, all while maintaining its inclusive, productive relationships with its program participants, employment partners and supporters. In 2021, Project Return program participants have an 82 percent job acquisition rate and a 13 percent recidivism rate, compared to state and national averages exceeding 50 percent.The impact on families is just going to be fantastic. Were so, so glad that you [Project Return] are here and will help you in any way we can, said Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly. I should say to the employers who may be listening: What a great opportunity. We all know where we are with the labor shortages, and with Project Returns tried and true program, you have a labor pool and youre helping the community.Officials said, "Project Returns decision to expand to Chattanooga was made in part due to the areas growing local economy and the strong entrepreneurial identity of its business community. Project Return operates an employment-creating social enterprise known as PROe, which is a high-quality staffing company, offering participants their best first job after incarceration, while staffing the worksites of area employers with motivated workers."Local corporate supporters of Project Return Chattanooga include Chattanooga Gas and Unum. "Chattanooga Gas is committed to diversity, equity and inclusion, and we honor that commitment by investing in organizations that share our values," said Tiffany Callaway-Ferrell, vice president of Operations for Chattanooga Gas. "Project Return's efforts to help people successfully transition from prison to the workforce is exactly the kind of work the Chattanooga Gas Foundation is looking to support. This donation will help ensure that those who are returning from incarceration get the second chance they deserve to support their families and live a life of dignity."In addition to their Chattanooga expansion, Project Return also recently relocated their Nashville headquarters to 109 Lafayette St., celebrating the move in October with a reception where Nashville Mayor John Cooper recognized Project Returns contributions to the local community. "Both recent expansions mark important milestones as Project Returns continued successes attract greater numbers of supporters and prospective participants," officials said. Jennifer Bronson, J.D., has been named Chattanooga 2.0 executive director, Christy Gillenwater, president and CEO, Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce, announced on Wednesday. Ms. Bronson most recently served as chief of staff, Hamilton County Schools (HCS), where she worked with interim Superintendent Nakia Towns, Ed.D., and former Superintendent Bryan Johnson, Ed.D. Ms. Bronson led the school systems COVID-19 response. In July 2019, when she joined HCS, she launched a Student Success Planning pilot in partnership with Harvard Universitys Education Redesign Lab and the By All Means consortium. Jennifers wisdom, experience, and gravitas enable her to boldly lead Chattanooga 2.0, Ms. Gillenwater said. As a collective impact initiative, Chattanooga 2.0 relies on partners and individuals to share the work together. Jennifers ability to build partnerships and achieve goals will be critical to executing Chattanooga 2.0s strategic plan. Ms. Bronson began her career as a first- and fifth-grade teacher in Las Vegas, Nevada, where she went on to work in talent and leadership development as a project manager for Clark County Schools, the nation's fifth-largest school district. Throughout her work to close opportunity gaps on behalf of Hamilton County Schools students and families, Jennifer has proven her success and agility in aligning resources and leveraging the work of community partners, said Stacy Lightfoot, vice chancellor for Diversity and Engagement, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, and a search committee member. Jennifer is thoughtful, strategic and passionate about HCS students and families. I am confident she will continue building on the existing momentum of Chattanooga 2.0 and create the conditions that inspire transformation in our community, Ms. Lightfoot said. "Although we are sad she will no longer be a part of our school district, we are thrilled to have Ms. Bronson leading one of our key partner organizations," said Dr. Nakia Towns, interim Superintendent of Schools. "We welcome her ongoing support in ensuring all children thrive." Also an attorney, Ms. Bronson served as an assistant public defender in the Missouri State Public Defender office and is admitted to the State Bars of Wisconsin and Missouri. In addition, she worked with the Wisconsin State Public Defender Juvenile Unit and was a judicial intern in the Wisconsin State Supreme Court. Jennifer Bronsons experience as an educator, the impressive work she has done with Hamilton County Schools leading the Student Success Initiative Pilot, and her passion for serving all students make her an ideal choice for this important position leading Chattanooga 2.0., said Rebecca Ashford, Ed.D., president, Chattanooga State Community College. I am confident she will lead this collective impact organizations work to new levels of success benefitting Hamilton County students, families and our entire community, Dr. Ashford said. Ms. Bronson received her bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin Madison, and a master's degree in education from the University of Nevada - Las Vegas. She earned a juris doctor degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School, where she received the Wisconsin Idea Merit Scholarship, which is awarded to a student who seeks to improve the quality of life for citizens of the state. Chattanooga 2.0 is the cradle-to-career collaborative of Chattanooga-Hamilton County. Formed in 2015 with a goal to transform education and workforce development outcomes, Chattanooga 2.0 is a cross-sector partnership led by stakeholders representing community, business, nonprofit, public, and educational institutions. As the convening entity that brings partners together to align resources and strategic focus, Chattanooga 2.0 seeks to improve outcomes for students, including early childhood, K-12, and higher education learners. Business and community leaders founded the Chattanooga Chamber Foundation in 1969 to lead area economic development through a public-private partnership. The Chattanooga Chamber Foundation delivers economic, community and leadership development services. The Tennessee Valley Authority is seeking public input on proposed revisions to the 2000 Tellico Reservoir Land Management Plan in Blount, Loudon and Monroe counties. Based on a review of current use of TVA lands on Tellico Reservoir, TVA is proposing allocation changes to approximately 16 percent of lands on the reservoir and has prepared an environmental assessment of the proposed changes. TVA uses reservoir land management plans to guide land use approvals, private water use facility permitting, and resource management decisions on TVA-managed public land. TVA invites public input on the draft environmental assessment, draft reservoir land management plan, and the proposals potential to affect the environment or historic properties. The public can view the proposed plan and other information through Jan, 15, 2022 at www.tva.gov/landplanreview or by attending a virtual meeting at https://tvavirtual.com/tellico/. TVA is also hosting a webinar on Dec. 7, starting at 5 p.m. to discuss the project. Visit www.tva.gov/landplanreview to register for the webinar. A recording of the event will be available to view after it ends. The public may submit comments through Jan. 15, 2022, to Lesley Webb, TVA Senior Policy & Project Management Specialist, 2835-A East Wood Street, Paris, Tn. 38242; or by email to landplans@tva.gov. Due to COVID-19, TVA recommends submitting comments electronically for their timely review and consideration. Note that all comments received, including names and addresses, will become part of the administrative record and available for public inspection. The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency has developed the Fight CWD Incentive Program for the 2021-22 deer hunting season which contains new hunting incentives to support TWRAs chronic wasting disease (CWD) management effort. The TWRA is helping people who harvest CWD-positive deer in two new ways. Hunters who harvest a positive deer will receive a $75 voucher redeemable for processing deer on their next deer harvest at participating processors. Residents who harvest two or more CWD-positive deer during the 2021-22 season will receive an annual sportsmans license for 2022. If the hunter has a lifetime license, the annual license can be gifted to a person of his/her choice. Based on feedback from hunters, we have made improvements to the harvest incentive program this year, said Joy Sweaney, TWRA biologist. We are excited to be able to offer hunters free processing on their next harvest when a deer comes back positive for CWD, and hope it helps hunters to keep harvesting deer to help the fight against CWD. Hunters and landowners are the TWRAs greatest partners in the fight against CWD. The goals of hunter incentive programs are to motivate hunters to harvest more deer in CWD affected counties which reduces deer densities and helps prevent the spread of CWD. The TWRA will continue to strive to identify new ways to support deer hunting which is the number one tactic for keeping CWD in check. Hunter incentive programs may not be applicable to all CWD-affected counties. Those hunting in Unit CWD (Chester, Crockett, Fayette, Gibson, Hardeman, Haywood, Henderson, Madison, McNairy, Lauderdale, Shelby and Tipton counties) have access to CWD hunter programs. Those hunting in Henry and Weakley counties have access to the Fight CWD Incentive Program and the Replacement Buck Program, but not the Unit CWD Earn-a-Buck Program. Complete details on Fight CWD Incentive Program, Unit CWD Earn-a-Buck Program, Replacement Buck Program and Landowner Program may be found on the TWRA website, https://www.tn.gov/twra/hunting/cwd.html. Georgia waterfowl hunters will head to their favorite wetland locations when duck season opens this Saturday, according to the Georgia Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Resources Division.The waterfowl seasons and bag limits are basically the same this season as they were last season, said Kara Nitschke, migratory gamebird biologist. Atlantic Flyway breeding populations fared quite a bit better this summer than mid-continent and western birds. If we can get cold weather in the Great Lakes, New England and mid-Atlantic regions, southern hunters can expect a good number of wood ducks, ring-necks and teal.Duck season dates are Nov.20-28 and Dec. 12-Jan. 31. Full migratory bird hunting regulations can be found at https://georgiawildlife.com/hunting/waterfowl.Youth, active military and veterans can take advantage of two early Waterfowl Hunting Dates on Nov. 13-14. On these two days, youth age 16 or younger (or active military or veterans) may hunt specific migratory birds, such as ducks, Canada geese and mergansers. Youth must be accompanied by an adult of at least 18 years of age (only the youth may hunt).To hunt waterfowl in Georgia you will need a Georgia hunting license, a Georgia migratory bird license and a federal duck stamp (now available when you purchase your other recreational licenses). WRD has made your purchase decision even easier by the creation of the Waterfowl Hunter Package at www.GoOutdoorsGeorgia.com, which includes all you need (and includes a convenient plastic card).For more information on Georgia Hunting Regulations for waterfowl, visit https://georgiawildlife.com/hunting/waterfowl. Jesse Meester and Darcey Silva are two of the most polarizing personalities within the 90 Day Fiance franchise. Their toxic relationship was one viewers will remember because it seemed like the two were constantly fighting. Jesse appears in 90 Day: The Single Life Season 2 and diving back into the dating pool. Lets take a look back at their toxic relationship before The Single Life. Jesse and Darcey | discovery+ Who is Jesse Meester from The Single Life? 90 Day Fiance audiences first saw Jesse when he was in a relationship with Darcey. The two met on a global dating website, and eventually, Darcey packed up her things and headed to Amsterdam to visit Jesse. It was when Jesse moved into Darceys home in Connecticut that their relationship really went downhill. Their most memorable blowout involved how to cut a steak. Apparently, criticizing Jesses lack of knowledge on cutting the piece of meat on a bias was the key to crushing his manhood, and the 28-year-old model stormed out of the house in front of Darceys daughters. He came back to eat dinner and continued to antagonize the situation by acting like a toddler and refusing to speak to Darcey. It wasnt long after that the two called it quits. Who is Darcey Silva from the 90 Day Fiance franchise? Darcey is a staple in the 90 Day Fiance franchise appearing on the original series and some of the spinoffs. Audiences have watched her attempts at a couple of different relationships with men, including Jesse Meester and Tom Brooks. Neither resulted in marriage, but Darcey made a name for herself in reality TV. Now the Connecticut mom of two even has her own spinoff, Darcey and Stacey, featuring her and her twin sister. Darcey still isnt married and searching for love but wont appear on 90 Day: The Single Life Season 2. For now, it looks like shes just sticking with Darcey and Stacey. Is Jesse Meester dating Jeniffer Tarazona on 90 Day: The Single Life? Jeniffer Tarazona is another 90 Day Fiance franchise alum and also starring in The Single Life. However, fans arent sure that shes single. Fans recently discovered that Jeniffer had slid into Jesses DMs long before their appearance on the show, and fans are wondering how she qualifies as single. Jesse is one of the more well-known villains from the franchise but honestly seems smitten with the Colombian model. Whether or not things will work out for the two remains to be seen. Jeniffer has also been seen with DJ Diplo and even has another man in her life in The Single Life premiere. Jeniffers first appearance on 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way didnt win her many fans when she was in a relationship with Tim Malcolm. Her jealousy issues and constant berating of Tim annoyed several viewers, and not everyone is happy shes back on their television screens. For those interested in watching Jesse, Jeniffer, and more in their search for love, you can catch new episodes of 90 Day: The Single Life exclusively on discovery+. Fans of Bob Hearts Abishola have noticed how specific some of the CBS sitcoms events come across. Many have wondered if Bob Hearts Abishola is based on a true story. Actor Folake Olowofoyeku and writer Gina Yashere opened up about how they see their own lives mirrored in Abishola and the show as a whole. Folake Olowofoyeku as Abishola in Bob Hearts Abishola | Michael Yarish/CBS via Getty Images Bob Hearts Abishola is not based on a true story directly, but it does draw from real-life experiences Co-creator, writer, and actor Gina Yashere joined Chuck Lorre on the sitcom when the original writers realized that they did not have the experiences to write a show about Nigerians on their own. The show is mainly based on my life, Yashere told Essence Magazine in December 2020. Abishola is that single mother whose husband went back to Nigeria because there were no opportunities for him. That is my story. That is my mothers story. While Yashere plays Abisholas best friend Kemi, she pours a lot of her mother into the lead character. [My mother] was left in England raising us when my dad went back to Nigeria. So theres a lot of stuff in Abishola that is one hundred percent based on my actual life, and its kind of nice, bringing my story to screen but, also, bringing the culture to screen. However, although Yashere puts a lot of herself and her family into the scripts, the show stars several Nigerian actors. And some of the Bob Hearts Abishola cast feel like it could draw inspiration from a true story. Folake Olowofoyeku said the script seemed written for her In a show about immigrant life in America, among other things, Olowofoyeku agreed in an interview that the script jumped out at her, even if Bob Hearts Abishola was not based on a true story directly. It just seemed like it was written for me, the actor told CBS Mornings with Billy Gardell. [Abishola] was my mom. She was my aunt, a lot of my aunties that I grew up with back home in Nigeria. It just was seamless. Folake Olowofoyeku emigrated to America in 2001 on her 18th birthday. An interviewer asked if the show reflected her experience. I guess it is similar in that way, she said. [It feels] genuine, very authentic. Its extremely authentic, actually. Even if Bob Hearts Abishola does not directly come from a true story, it still carries the same impact. Yashere said basing Bob Hearts Abishola on real experiences helps it feel real Yashere wanted people to respond the same way Olowofoyeku responded to the character of Abishola. American TV often had very little diversity. Often when we see Africans on television, the accents are wrong; they arent specific about what part of Africa they are [from], Gina Yashere said to Essence Magazine. Its always based on stereotypes and old tropes, she continued. So its great to bring three-dimensional Nigerian characters to television that African people can watch and be proud of and go yes that is us. Even if Bob Hearts Abishola is not based on a true story, Yashere keeps bringing more Nigerian culture to CBS as season 3 continues. RELATED: Why Bob Hearts Abishola and The Neighborhood Wont Return With New Episodes Until After Thanksgiving Kate Middleton attracted a lot of press attention even before she married Prince William. When she was still a royal girlfriend, she often appeared in the tabloids due to her connection to the crown. In 2007, Kate reportedly lost her temper when dealing with a swarm of paparazzi. Newspapers subsequently decided to ban photos of her from publication. Kate Middleton | Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images Kate Middleton dealt with paparazzi before becoming a duchess Kate reportedly began dating William in 2003 when they were both students at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. The couple had some privacy from the media when they were still in school. However, after they graduated in 2005 and Kate moved to London, she started getting followed by paparazzi. Photographers often waited for Kate outside her home, and they also followed her as she went to and from work. Because Kate was only a girlfriend, she could not receive tax-funded security in the same way a royal wife could. As a result, William and other palace aides tried to help her by setting up a hotline she could call for assistance. She was obviously the subject of a lot of press interest and intrusion from the paparazzi, one source told writer Katie Nicholl in the book Kate: The Future Queen (via Stylecaster). William said we had a duty of care to her and her family and so we advised her on how to deal with the cameras. We told her to smile at the photographers so that there would be a better picture. She was given advice on how to manage the media, and we were there to support her if there was a crisis. Newspapers banned Kate Middletons paparazzi pictures after she seemed almost to lose her temper Kate Middleton photographed on her 25th birthday in 2007 | Lewis Whyld PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images RELATED: Prince William and Kate Middleton Probably Would Not Have Dated If It Wasnt for 1 Thing Prince Charles Did In January 2007, Kate celebrated her 25th birthday. On this day, however, she was met with a swarm of paparazzi. Author Kate Shoup described this in her book, Kate Middleton: From Commoner to Duchess of Cambridge. By the morning of her birthday, on January 9 2007, hundreds of photographers had mobbed her doorstop, all hoping for a pre-engagement photo, Shoup wrote, as reported by Express. Due to work, Kate emerged from her flat and made for her car, whereupon she was swarmed by the press. Shoup added, As noted by journalist Vicky Ward: It was the first and only time in her relationship with Prince William that the young woman seemed almost to lose her temper. Her usual smile was replaced by tightly closed lips, and her bluish-hazel eyes were stormy. Later that month, News International, which owned tabloid newspapers such as The Sun and News of the World, decided to stop printing paparazzi photos of Kate. We have imposed a ban on all News International publications printing paparazzi photos of Kate Middleton, a spokesperson for the group said, according to Reuters. Meanwhile, a spokesperson for William shared, What Prince William wants more than anything else is for the paparazzi to stop harassing her. Kate Middletons topless photos in 2012 were also barred from publication RELATED: Kate Middleton Doesnt Have a Vengeful Bone in Her Body, Royal Expert Says Amid Royal Rift In 2021, a year after joining the royal family, Kate dealt with another huge invasion of her privacy. While she and William were vacationing at a secluded chateau in France, a paparazzo took photos of Kate sunbathing topless. The paparazzo sold the photos to French tabloid newspaper Closer. The royal family took swift action to stop the photos from being circulated by suing the outlet. Their Royal Highnesses have been hugely saddened to learn that a French publication and a photographer have invaded their privacy in such a grotesque and totally unjustifiable manner, a statement released by St. James Palace read. It also added, Their Royal Highnesses had every expectation of privacy in the remote house. It is unthinkable that anyone should take such photographs, let alone publish them. Money Heist fans couldnt imagine anyone else but actor Itziar Ituno playing Inspector Raquel. The Netflix series starts with the investigator trying to locate the Professor (Alvaro Morte), the money heist mastermind. But, the two form a romantic bond, and Raquel becomes a member of the heist crew. However, Ituno almost turned down the role of the inspector. Heres why the actor joined the cast of Money Heist, also known as La Casa de Papel. Itziar Ituno didnt want to join Money Heist for one reason RELATED: Money Heist: Why Ursula Corbero Couldnt Stop Crying While Filming the Series Finale Before securing the role of Raquel Murillo on Money Heist, Itziar Ituno also played a cop on another Spanish drama. For instance, she booked her first leading role in the Basque soap opera Geonkale. For over a decade, she played a police officer named Nekane Beitia. So, when the script for Money Heist came across her desk, Ituno wasnt keen to take on the part. According to OSSA, the actor found the story of Money Heist so enticing. Also, its worth noting Ituno found inspiration for her character from the 1991 horror film The Silence of the Lambs. Ituno channeled Clarice Starling, a student from the FBI Academy, sent to interview serial killer, Dr. Hannibal Lecter. In the end, the actor auditioned for the role and ultimately got the part. Ituno names one characteristic she loves about Raquel Murillo Itziar Ituno | Tamara Arranz Ramos/Netflix RELATED: Money Heist: 4 Burning Questions That Need Answers in the Final Season In an exclusive interview with Identity Magazine, Itziar Ituno talked about playing Raquel in Money Heist. The 47-year-old actor revealed she admired Raquels endurance and willingness to be in touch with herself. I really like Raquels strength and find it very significant, she explained. Shes a genuine woman, in general and that shes also always in touch with her real self. Also, Ituno admires Raquels ability to remain true to herself, despite her surroundings. When the series started, Raquel wanted to take down the money heist group. As the show progressed, Raquel ultimately switched sides and joined The Professor in the Bank of Spain heist. Raquel has always been the same person. However, her perception of the world around her [and everything going on] is the one thing that [drastically] changed, she explained. What I like about her is that even though the world around her changed, she didnt. Shes always been the same person. Whats next for the gang in Money Heist Part 5 Vol. 2? In the last season of Money Heist, Raquel and the gang remain trapped in the Bank of Spain. Money Heist fans want to know how the story will end for the group. Will the money heist crew escape with the gold? Or, will they meet an untimely fate? Well, Money Heist creator Alex Pina weighs in on the gangs future. While he remained tight-lipped about the final installment, he did signal that the last part will focus on the emotional aspect of the characters. According to Digital Spy, Pina said in a statement, We decided to work in an extremely aggressive genre, putting The Gang on the ropes. In volume 2, we focus more on the emotional situation of the characters. It is a journey across their sentimental map that connects us directly to their departure. Money Heist Part 5 Vol. 2 premieres on Netflix on Dec. 3. 2021. TLCs Sister Wives has documented the lives of Kody Brown, his four wives (Robyn, Meri, Christine, and Janelle), and their 18 children as they attempt to make a polygamist lifestyle work in the American West. After 16 seasons over the past decade, the lives of this family are now in a period of upheaval. Christine Brown decided to leave Kody and the polygamist lifestyle behind. Meanwhile, Janelle Brown is taking a break from living in an RV. Keep reading for an update on the Brown familys current living situation. Why did Janelle Brown move into an RV? Christine Brown, Janelle Brown, Kody Brown, Robyn Brown, and Meri Brown Sister Wives | TLC As recapped by Us Weekly, Janelle announced her move into the RV, alongside her daughter, Savanah, on Instagram June 2021. She made the move out of necessity, explaining, The rental where I was living was sold and I chose an alternative path to trying to find another rental. Not only is the housing market in Flagstaff as crazy as where you are Im sure, [but] rentals are even harder to come by. Presenting my new summer adventure the RV life but camped on our property. The original plan for the Browns (all orchestrated by Kody of course) was that all of the wives would live in one house together on their Coyote Pass property, but all of the women turned that down in a desire to live separately in different homes. The move became a divisive topic for fans of the show. Janelle decided to dry-dock her RV, which means the vehicle had no hookups to provide running water or electricity. That can be a lot to handle for an expert RV resident, let alone someone like Janelle who had never lived in an RV before. Theres also the fact that her choice to live there instead of with one of the other wives may speak volumes about her relationship with them as well as Kody. Despite being slightly pushed into these living arrangements, Janelle certainly presented on social media as if she enjoyed living there. She regularly shared pictures from inside the mobile home and answered questions about daily life or the logistics of living in an RV, such as how to live off the grid or what to do with a septic tank. Where is Janelle living now? Janelle Brown and Kody Brown, Sister Wives | TLC As the winter months creeped closer and closer, Janelle Brown decided to exit the RV until the snow melts and the temperatures go back up. So long trailer! See you next spring, she wrote on her Instagram post on Nov. 7, 2021. Trailer is headed down to storage for the winter. We decided to find short-term housing in town instead of riding out the winter. As much as living in a home will make January and February easier, Janelle does plan to return to the RV at some point during the next season. Next year I should be able to plug into infrastructure (i.e. electric, sewer, water), she explained. I loved loved loved living out on the land and look forward to next spring. Janelles living situation switch-up comes in the wake of Christine leaving Kody and moving to Utah Sister Wives Season Premiere Sneak Peek: Christine Brown Says Her Marriage to Kody Is 'Sad' https://t.co/9Su6EEf1qd People (@people) November 16, 2021 Big changes are on the horizon for the Brown family. Christine Brown made waves by announcing that she was leaving Kody after 27 years. Her issues with the family patriarch were brewing for years, and the idea of living at Coyote Pass was the final straw. Christines openness about her difficulties both in the relationship and the aftermath of it has led to more questioning of Kodys treatment of her and the other wives. Christine eventually moved to Utah full time to be closer to her relatives, and fans continue to support her newfound independence. They also wonder if Janelle may soon join her in her $1.1 million duplex home. The two of them have traveled a lot together, and Janelles time in the RV could also be construed as her slowly leaving Kody on her own terms. For her part, Janelle has defended Kody in the past, but she also questions Kody more than the other wives. Whatever the future brings, well probably find out during season 16 of Sister Wives which premieres on Nov. 21. at 10 p.m. ET on TLC. RELATED: Sister Wives: Kody Brown Fell in Love at First Sight With Wife Robyn, but Her Alter-Ego She-Rah Got in the Way Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures made a massive deal out of the premiere of their second trailer for Spider-Man: No Way Home. They invited fans to a screening in LA, and it was all anyone could talk about on social media. The hype led people to believe that former Spider-Man actors Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield would appear in the new Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer. But they didnt. Now, fans believe that the actors may have been edited out of the video. Andrew Garfield | Photo by Gregg DeGuire/WireImage The new Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer features villains from Tobey Maguires and Andrew Garfields films Even though Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield didnt outright appear in the new Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer, many villains from their Spider-Man films did. Doctor Octopus, Green Goblin, Electro, Sandman, and Lizard all showed up to the party in the teaser. Doctor Octopus, played by Alfred Molina, was in Spider-Man 2 with Maguire. Green Goblin, played by Willem Dafoe, appeared throughout Maguires Spider-Man trilogy. Electro, played by Jamie Foxx, was the main villain in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 with Garfield. Sandman, initially played by Thomas Haden Church, was in Spider-Man 3 with Maguire. And, lastly, Lizard, originally played by Rhys Ifans, appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man with Garfield. Many fans believe that these five characters will band together with one other unknown villain to create the Sinister Six. And in the trailer, the villains are fighting Tom Hollands Peter Parker. However, some sleuthing fans caught a detail in the Spider-Man: No Way Home teaser that may prove a character was edited out. Fans believe Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield were cut out of Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer Per Total Film, fans noticed a difference between the trailer released by Sony Pictures and the one released in Brazil. When Peter takes on Lizard, Electro, and Sandman, an invisible force punches Lizard in the Brazilian version. But in the video released by Sony Pictures in the United States, Lizard does not recoil at the air. This alternate version of the Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer led fans to believe that either Tobey Maguire or Andrew Garfield were edited out of that scene. The theory is that Hollands Peter fights Lizard, Electro, and Sandman alongside Maguires Peter and Garfields Peter. It would be a three on three fight. Of course, there is no way to confirm this theory. But, undoubtedly, some editing has been done to this scene. It wouldnt be the first time Marvel has manipulated one of their trailers to throw off fans. Em 1 mes comecaremos a receber visitas de todos os universos. Assista agora ao novo trailer oficial de #HomemAranhaSemVoltaParaCasa, que estreia em 16 de dezembro exclusivamente nos cinemas. Pre-venda disponivel a partir de 29 de novembro! pic.twitter.com/Z0SqV7bhrQ Sony Pictures Brasil (@SonyPicturesBr) November 17, 2021 Tom Holland insists that the two former Spider-Man actors are not in the film During an interview with GQ, Tom Holland doubled down on dismissing the rumor that Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Holland said, No one believes me, but theyre not in the film. This isnt the first time Holland has denied the rumors. And he will probably have to continue to talk about them until the film releases. Garfield himself has stated that he is not in the movie. But Marvel fans, as persistent and hopeful as they are, still believe that the two former Spider-Man actors will reprise their roles as Peter Parker in the upcoming film. Spider-Man: No Way Home, which may or may not star Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, is exclusively in theaters on Dec. 17. RELATED: Spider-Man: No Way Home: Tom Holland Shares That the Marvel Film Contains One of the Coolest Scenes Hes Ever Acted in BTS RM loves Drake, Nas, and Halsey. Hes a self-proclaimed feminist, an advocate for the Black Lives Matter movement, and a supporter of the LGBTQ community, speaking out on several occasions. Heres what we know about BTS rapper, dancer, and songwriter. BTS performs on stage during the 2019 Billboard Music Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena | Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic for dcp BTS RM shared his love for the BTS ARMY during his United Nations speech Hes BTS leader, unofficial translator, and God of Destruction. RM is also one of the songwriters for this award-winning K-pop group, playing a role in creating tracks like Life Goes On and Boy With Luv. Of course, RM also raps on several BTS songs, including the sub-unit tracks All Night, Outro: Tear, and UGH. With Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V, and Jungkook, RM performed at the Grammy Awards and even earned a Grammy nomination for the bands all-English single, BTS. RM is also known for his activism, officially earning the label of a feminist and sharing his support for the LGBTQ community. When BTS first visited the United Nations to promote their Love Myself campaign with UNICEF, the rapper encouraged fans, regardless of gender identity, to speak themselves. I want to hear your voice. I want to hear your conviction, RM said. No matter where youre from, skin color, gender identity, just speak for yourself. Find your name and find your voice. RM posted about Troye Sivans Strawberries & Cigarettes from Love Simon RM also shares his support for members of the LGBTQ+ community. That includes Halsey, who appeared on the Map of the Soul: Persona track, Boy With Luv. The rapper mentioned one song created by Troye Sivan in conjunction with the Love, Simon official soundtrack. The rapper took to Twitter, posting a picture of the track and captioning it good, according to Twitters translation. The movie itself is a coming-of-age story of a high school student who discovers his budding crush on another classmate. Theres no word regarding if or when RM watched the 2018 release. In 2013, RM recommended the song Same Love by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. He shared that after learning the lyrics, this track became even more meaningful and twice as good, according to a translation. BTS RM shared his support for the Black Lives Matter movement The BTS members often openly share their support for causes and nonprofit organizations. In 2020, the K-pop group donated money to the Black Lives Matter movement, inspiring fans to do the same. In honor of the BTS members birthdays, ARMYs often pick charitable causes based on the idols interests. For RM, who loves bike riding and Namjooning, fans planted trees, creating a forest in Seoul, South Korea. RMs solo songs are available for streaming on music platforms like Spotify and Apple Music. Other productions featuring RM, including the Permission to Dance music video, is available for viewing on YouTube. RELATED: Rina Sawayama Shares She Wrote a Song With RM From BTS: I Dont Think Anything Happened to That Song Theoretically, it only takes 450 grams of this material to lift an elephant: "Aerographene" owes this ability to its unique structure at the nano level. Visually similar to a black foam, it actually consists of a finely-structured tubular network based on graphene with numerous cavities. This makes it extremely stable, conductive and almost as lightweight as air. An international research team led by materials scientists from Kiel University (CAU) has now taken a major step toward practical applications. They have succeeded in repeatedly heating and cooling aerographene and the air contained inside to very high temperatures in an extremely short period of time. This enables extremely powerful pumps, compressed air applications or sterilizing air filters in miniature. "Aerographene" can be heated up and cooled down very fast "When we first introduced these materials, they were the lightest class of materials in the world to date, with a density of just 0.2 milligrams per cubic centimeter. Because that's practically air, we called them aeromaterials", recalls Rainer Adelung. The professor for Functional Nanomaterials at CAU had developed the materials, which were first presented in 2012, together with colleagues from Hamburg University of Technology. The fascinating properties of aeromaterials generated worldwide interest and have been intensively researched since then, for example in the major European research initiative Graphene Flagship". This new study provides a contribution to how aeromaterials could get from basic research to application. The material scientists from Kiel, together with colleagues from Technische Universitat Dresden, University of Southern Denmark, University of Trento, Queen Mary University of London, has discovered further properties that enable innovations in pneumatics, robotics or air filter technology. "In our experiments, we have found that aeromaterials made from graphene and other conductive nanomaterials, can be electrically heated extremely quickly with up to several hundred degrees per millisecond due to their low density," explains Dr. Fabian Schutt from CAU, who led and conducted the experiments together with Dr. Florian Rasch. To do so, the materials scientists used the "aerographene" aeromaterial, which consists of just a few layers of carbon atoms and 99.9% air. When heated, this air contained inside the material is also heated extremely quickly and expands. In the case of very rapid heating, there is an expansion in volume and one speaks of an "explosion." "This means we are now able to use aerographene to start small controllable and repeatable explosions that do not require a chemical reaction," says Schutt, summarizing their findings. That's because almost as quickly as it heats up, aerographene cools down again as soon as the power supply is switched off. "It can hardly store any heat due to its extremely low heat capacity. Via its network structure it releases it very quickly back into the containing air," Schutt continues. The rapid heating and cooling of the material enables the researchers to start several explosions per second, one after the other. "This gives us extremely powerful compressed air at the push of a button, without the compressors and gas supplies that are otherwise required," Adelung explains. Material has already withstood more than 100,000 cycles - patent pending The scientists use this effect to develop new pumps that can be specifically adjusted as well as high-performance actuators in miniature format. "If you place the aeromaterial in a pressure cylinder and heat it with electricity, the generated air blast can be used to move objects up and down in a targeted manner and several times per second," explains Rasch, who recently completed his doctoral thesis on this subject. In their experiments, the two first authors, Schutt and Rasch, were able to show that even a small amount of aerographene objects that are many times heavier can be moved. For example, 10 milligrams of aerographene were enough to lift a two-kilogram weight in just a few milliseconds. So the actuators developed with aerographene have high power densities while maintaining large volume changes. "In contrast to chemical reactions, these small electrical explosions can be controlled very specifically and also are very clean. By changing the duration and strength of the current supply we can precisely control the frequency and strength of the air blasts," says Rasch. Thanks to the extreme conductivity of aeromaterials, they need only a small amount of electricity for this. In the experiments carried out in Kiel, the material has withstood 100,000 cycles so far, and a patent has already been filed. Can also be used as a self-cleaning air filter against bacteria As one example for applications, Adelung's research group is currently developing new air filter materials and systems based on aerographene in cooperation with the German aviation supplier Lufthansa Technik and funded by the Graphene Flagship. "Air currents can be guided very well through the open network structure of the material and can be heated strongly for a short time. In this way, bacteria and viruses, for example, can be filtered out of the air and killed," Adelung said. "This could allow these filter systems to function self-cleaning and work without expensive maintenance in the future." President Joe Biden signs an executive order to help improve public safety and justice for Native Americans during a Tribal Nations Summit during Native American Heritage Month, in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus, Monday, Nov. 15, 2021, in Washington. With the President from left are first lady Jill Biden, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, Attorney General Merrick Garland and Interior Secretary Deb Haaland. Recent news from Myanmar, beset by both civil conflict and the pandemic, is heart-breaking. According to my contacts in Yangon, COVID-19 is rife. The confirmed death toll has risen sharply to hundreds per day. Few are vaccinated. Almost a third of public hospitals are or have been closed. Relatives, friends, and aid providers risk being shot or detained as they queue to try to get oxygen cylinders to the sick under curfew. It seemed the Southeast Asian nation was inching toward a more democratic regime. In the November 2020 election, there was yet another landslide vote for the National League for Democracy (NLD) party. But the military junta, which rules Myanmar, was unable to contemplate more power-sharing. Citing election fraud, they declared a year-long state of emergency on February 1. The patience of the normally peace-loving people snapped and fury was unleashed. Ominously the militarys 77th light infantry division, which was at the forefront of brutally repelling the Rohingya Muslims back in 2017, was deployed to deal with the protesters in Yangon, Naypyidaw, and Mandalay. First with tear gas and rubber bullets, and then with live rounds and even air attacks, as shown by mobile phone footage, soldiers gunned down unarmed students, teachers, and even medical workers. More than 900 civilians have been killed by security forces and over 5,000 more detained or sentenced. In the plaintive words of one Burmese youth on the streets of Yangon: We were just learning to fly, and now they have broken our wings. What chance is there that the fledgling bird of Myanmar will fly again? Falling in love with Burma As a British teenager, I met a beautiful Burmese girl on the school bus. She and her family self-exiled in 1964, soon after Ne Wins military coup, to start a new life in England. They arrived at Heathrow as immigrants with 100 each in their pockets. I was blown away by the affections of April and by the warm hospitality of her parents, whose home was filled with the unfamiliar aromas of eastern cooking and stories of Burmas golden days. My fascination was fired for this far-off land. But this misty-eyed romanticism about Burma was largely untested until April and I made an extended visit in 199596, along with our four teenage daughters. For April, not a lot had changed since her familys hurried departure. For me, it was an arresting reality check. How did this country, with such a regal past, swathed in natural beauty and populated by a people of unmistakable poise and serenity, slide into repression and obscurity? How could the upbeat memories of Aprils parents be reconciled with Myanmars current malaise? I started to record the oral history and reminiscences of Aprils Burmese family who were eyewitnesses to momentous events in mid-20th century Burma. Then, between 2010 and 2018, April and I made seven successive visits to help teach at a small Bible college on the outskirts of Yangon, run by a couple from the Chin ethnic group. We took the opportunity to travel widely and talk to a range of young people. I began to unpeel the nations history, the mix of Buddhist faith and spirit worship, the warring interests of ethnic peoples (many with a strong Christin presence), the decimated education system, the unequal distribution of wealth, and the hidden human rights abuses labelled by Amnesty International as among the worst in the world. What emerged was a far more nuanced picture of Burma (renamed to Myanmar by the military in 1997) than the media stereotype. Unexpectedly, hope dawned in the form of inspiring and energetic young millennials who were dedicated to restoring devastated lives and communities. Drawing on this experience and research, I ask two questions. What factors have led to the current and long-standing malaise in Myanmar? And what signs of hope exist today for a radical shift in fortunes? Article continues below Five factors behind Myanmars malaise Many post-colonial nations have struggled with newly won independence and their attempts to pursue democracy. The case of Burma, which gained independence from the British in 1948, is one such example. However, five factors suggest that Myanmar is a unique case. First is the multiethnic nature of Myanmar. Within the national borders, there are at least 130 ethnic groups each with their own dialect or language, indigenous culture, and vested interests. Many, like the Karen, the Chin, the Kachin, and the Shan, have long maintained their own militias, fighting for basic human rights. The conflict between them and the dominant ethnic group, the Bamars, has continued unabated for 60 years. A second factor is the intransigence of the junta. It is one thing to impose military dominance on a country in chaos, but the generals that rule Myanmar have shown remarkable resilience in retaining their iron grip over their peoples for six decades. Government legislation and affairs of state have been systematically passed from one small cadre of generals to another. The cards have been shuffled, but always from the same pack. A third factor is the bullying nature of the military regime with frequent outbursts of extreme brutality. For long periods, the people of Myanmar have acquiesced. On the occasions when popular uprisings have occurred, they have been repulsed by intense ferocitymost notably student protests in 1990, the so-called Saffron Revolution in 2007 when monks led marches of civil unrest, and again since February this year. A fourth factor is benign Buddhist beliefs have infused the Burmese mindset for centuries. Characteristics like tolerance, conservatism, pacifism, and profound respect for others do not readily lend themselves to armed revolt against the political status quo. It would seem that a combination of Bamar socio-ethnic superiority and Buddhist deference to ones leaders lend multi-layered support to the continuing elitism of the generals in Myanmar. For example, on our visit in 1995, April and I had the opportunity to have a personal meeting with Aung San Suu Kyi who had just been released from house arrest. It was evident that Buddhism was the beating heart of her hopes for her country. Her view was that non-violence is the way to end dictatorships. A fifth factor to the juntas durability in Myanmar is the cloak of secrecy with which they surround their political and social activities. Psychological research tells us that a heavily armed regime and extreme paranoia go hand in hand. Three reasons for hope The United Nations World Food Program recently stated that the crisis in Myanmar will severely undermine the ability of the poorest and most vulnerable to put enough food on the family table. The UN Development Program has warned that the impact of the pandemic and the political crisis could cause as many as 25 million people to slide into poverty by next year. The situation looks bleak; however, there are glimmers of hope. 1) The genie is out of the bottle: Social media is widely used in Myanmar. Young people in particular are media savvyraised on Viber and Facebookand well informed about external trends and events. Provided the authorities dont interfere with internet access, this builds pressure from the bottom up as people get a taste for more egalitarian and democratic values. Since 2015 and the introduction of a civilian government, Myanmar has seen the growth of a new middle class, who have begun to enjoy a degree of freedom and economic opportunity unknown in the country for over half a century. Article continues below 2) Millennials are returning: There is a growing contingent of millennials who are operating outside of government circles. These are alumni who have benefitted from scholarships for tertiary education and training in other countries and have returned to work in health, law, telecommunications, education, human rights, media, and community development in more rural areas of Myanmar. For example, London-based Prospect Burma has funded 1,400 such graduates over the last 30 years, with a particular emphasis on education. Many have taken up influential roles which are gradually having a societal impact, bringing a questioning mindset and critical thinking to their activities. All refer to the importance of early experiences, in many cases harrowing, and the influence of family members in forging their Christian or Buddhist values. Along with the tireless work of international NGOs like World Vision that are relieving deprivation in mainly rural areas, these are cracks of light in a dark situation. 3) Internal leadership: Individuals within Myanmar to pray for include: Cardinal Charles Maung Bo, appointed by Pope Francis and an outspoken and respected critic concerning the violation of human rights in Rakhine and Kachin states; Anna Sui Hluan, the Chin-born and Yangon-raised wife of Myanmar vice president Henry Van Thio, is a linguist, researcher, Christian preacher, and social activist writing extensively about language, human rights, and female emancipation; Thinzar Shunlei Yi, a young activist raised (significantly) in a military family, has gathered a following around a vision for a more peaceful future in Myanmar by speaking out against hate speech and intolerance. Three priorities for prayer As Myanmar faces the ignominy of being classified as a failed state, I would suggest three ambitious priorities for any potential leadership, whether that comes from within and/or is brokered externally. These might also direct and fuel our prayers for our Christian brothers and sisters in Myanmar. 1) Peace and a stable economy: There is an urgent, short-term need for peace-building, economic recovery, and legislative accountability. Combined with this are longer-term systemic and attitudinal shifts needed in the realms of education and emancipation. It goes without saying that a cessation of civil war is an essential prerequisite to nation-building. Backed by China and Russian military hardware, the juntas weaponry far outweighs that of the protesters. A credible, trusted, and neutral party is required to mediate between opposing factions. The UN, while issuing economic sanctions, is unwilling or unable to fulfil this role and ASEAN shows no sign of brokering either. According to Thant Myint U, author of The Hidden History of Burma: Race, Capitalism, and the Crisis of Democracy in the 21st Century, the situation on the ground is likely to turn into a "withering stalemate" as the army seeks to take control of the streets while the civil disobedience campaign keeps much of the country ungovernable. 2) Educational uplift: Over the longer term, education is key, yet the system is in poor shape. Primary school children, especially in rural areas, lack good quality teachers, basic resources like classrooms, and often do not complete the four years of study to the age of 12. The Ministry of Educations own Strategic Plan for 201621 recognizes that most teaching still relies heavily on rote memorisation and didactic strategies that do not engage children, and therefore their learning outcomes are poor. According to Prospect Burma, young Burmese are starting at year zero, with an urgent need for English: language, literacy, and digital skills. Article continues below Only a relatively small proportionjust over 7 percent, or about 2 millionof the population aged 25 and over has graduated from university or a higher level of education. This is skewed heavily to those in Yangon. Investment in teacher training, educational infrastructure, and learning resources is foundational to Myanmars future. Tuition at tertiary and doctoral levels of study is needed to expose students to a different pedagogic style, encouraging a critical, analytic, questioning approach to learning. It will take 20 years or more for a new generation of returning millennials, trained in natural and social sciences, to bring societal shifts. As an example, according to doctoral student Phyu Pannu Khin, there are currently just four qualified clinical psychologists in Myanmar serving a population of 50 million people traumatized by decades of brutal dictatorship, with many in need of mental health services. From a deprived village background with no funds, she is supported by scholarships and aims to become the fifth. 3) Religious freedom: According to official government statistics, Buddhism is professed by 89 percent of the population, with Christians, Muslims, and animists making up the rest. Independent researchers estimate that the percentage of Christiansthe long-term fruit of missionary activity in the 19th centuryin Myanmar overall to be 58 percent, though this varies considerably across the ethnic groups. The first Karen conversion took place in 1828 and subsequently the faith spread rapidly and converts numbered about 12,000 within 25 years. Today, about 90 percent of Chin and Kachin are Christians, as are about 80 percent of Karenni and 40 percent of Karen. Most of the Naga people in Sagaing Division are also Christians. The majority of Buddhists in Myanmar adhere to the principles of peace and compassion with the long-standing monastic tradition of education instilling these moral values in young people. However, among the Bamar people-group, who dominate the Irrawaddy basin in lower Myanmar and constitute most of the government, there has been a rise of Buddhist nationalism which has fueled a visceral hatred of Muslims in particular and Christians to a lesser extent. Even Buddhists among the ethnic minoritiesthe Shan, Mon, and Rakhine in particularhave suffered at the hands of Burmanization. Buddhism has been so much entwined with Bamar culture, nationality and heritage that Burmese rulers have tended to use a nationalistic strain of Buddhism for their political purposes, distorting Buddhism from a peaceful religion into a politicized creed. Because religion and ethnicity are so intertwined, it is sometimes difficult to differentiate between religious and racial hatred or, especially in the case of the military, between religiously motivated violence and the wider conflict. It is clear however, that freedom of belief, which is a foundational human right in any democratic society, is under attack in Myanmar in various ways. In a thoroughly researched and far-reaching report published in 2019 called Burmas Identity Crisis, CSW document persistent discrimination against Christians in Chin, Kachin, Karen, and Karenni states. Although there has been some improvement since 2011, the restriction andin some casesdenial of human rights via legislation, hate speech, discrimination, intimidation, and violence all continue. The authors of the report list three principle drivers of religious intolerance towards Christians in Myanmar today. Firstly, a rise in Bamar Buddhist nationalism, driven principally by certain Buddhist monks and their preaching. Secondly, the military seeking to strengthen its power by exploiting ethnic and religious identity to stoke conflict. Thirdly, civilian politiciansof various partiesdo not share the Buddhist nationalist agenda but lack the political will or courage to confront it. In addition, various pieces of legislation such as the Citizenship Law (1982), the Peaceful Assembly Law (2012), and four Race and Religion Laws (2015), are used to discriminate against minorities. As the CSW report concludes: If Burma is to have any hope of moving forward, religious intolerance must be confronted. Perpetrators of crimes against humanity must be held accountable, preachers of hate must be countered and brought to justice. Article continues below How Christians can help from afar Faced with atrocities on the streets of Myanmar, its easy to feel paralyzed and helpless from afar. But there are things we, as a Christian community, can do. We can press for international agencies to bring to account key individuals within the military junta known to have ordered or been complicit with or perpetrated crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide. We can lobby our national politicians to urge the Myanmar government to reform all discriminatory and repressive laws which restrict freedom of religion or belief, freedom of expression, and freedom of peaceful assembly. This is no more than endorsing basic human rights and need not be seen as a partisan attempt to undermine those in power or foreign interference to help one group of Christians. Furthermore, we can call for consultation with civil and religious leaders in Myanmar to invest in practical initiatives to promote interfaith dialogue, harmony, and reconciliation at a grassroots level. Crucially, this would include reform of the education system and curriculum, to ensure that the nations young people are taught about other religions in an accurate and fair way that promotes mutual understanding. Of course, any such actions depend on cessation of violence and constructive dialogue. In recent months, the political crisis has deepened. Now many of the indigenous leaders who previously had the potential influence to facilitate such initiatives at the government level have been forced into hiding in the Karen hills and across the Thai border. The National Unity Government, formed of politicians ousted by the military coup in February, has declared a peoples defensive war but the outcome remains unclear. A more personal response is to donate to worthy causes in Myanmar. I would recommend supporting Burmese students through nonprofits such as Prospect Burma. As students courageously return to their home country, the ripples of influence will spread rapidly. Also Medical Action Myanmar is adept at getting funds to the places where it is most needed. Finally, petitioning Father God in prayer is perhaps the most precious and influential thing we can do. Matters shift in the heavenly realms when his people pray. Bring to him your heartfelt hopes and use the information in this article to bring your specific requests for people and events in Myanmar. Meditate on Psalm 46, which speaks of immense opposition and natural calamities yet assures us that God is even greater than these. He is faithful and sovereign over world events. Let us pray that the bird will indeed fly again. Chris Mabey is a chartered psychologist and emeritus professor at Middlesex University Business School. His latest book, Whispers of Hope: A Family Memoir of Myanmar, was published by Penguin Random House in July. Speaking Out is Christianity Todays guest opinion column and (unlike an editorial) does not necessarily represent the opinion of the publication. When a bomb went off in a Liverpool taxi on Sunday, it reignited controversy over the Christian conversions of UK asylum seekers. The suspect, Emad al-Swealmeen, died in the explosion, which has been designated a terrorist incident. The 32-year-old had become a Christian and participated in a Bible study program for asylum seekers. Leaders from two Liverpool congregations testified to his faith and his involvement, telling media they were shocked by the reports of the bombing. For years, the Home Officethe division of the British government overseeing immigrationhas questioned whether Middle Eastern refugees were gaming the system to strengthen their pleas to stay. Converts can use their new faith to serve as a sign of assimilation and to claim they will face persecution if they return to their Muslim-majority home countries. Swealmeen, according to reports, was born in Iraq and converted to Christianity from Islam the year after his 2014 asylum request was rejected. The Diocese of Liverpool said he was baptized in 2015 and confirmed in 2017. That year, he also participated in an Alpha course for asylum seekers at the Liverpool Cathedral and filed an appeal to stay in the country. A couple who volunteered with the course housed him for eight months with no issues and believed his conversion was sincere. During that time, we saw him really blossoming in regards to his Christian faith, Malcolm Hitchcott said in a BBC interview. He really had a passion about Jesus that I wish many Christians had, and he was ready to learn. He said Swealmeen read his Bible regularly and prayed with him and his wife each night. Swealmeen attended another congregation, Emmanuel Church, from 2017 to 2019. A lay leader there told the AP that Swealmeen was a committed Christian and would make cakes for church bake sales. Kate Hindley, wife of Emmanuels pastor, told media that he was very kind and open about his mental health problems. In the wake of the bombing, the Church of England and the Liverpool Cathedral have both released statements clarifying and defending their standards for sincere conversion. Anglican leaders and other Christian leaders in the UK have previously challenged the measures the Home Office has used to test whether a converts faith is genuine, including arbitrary Bible quizzes, calling them unfair and inaccurate. Still, critics say churches can be naive to accept the conversions of refugees from the Middle East. Home Secretary Priti Patel said Swealmeens case was a complete reflection of how dysfunctional, how broken, the system has been. A Church of England spokesman said while it is not the clergys role to assess asylum claims or security risks, the church is not aware of any evidence to suggest a widespread correlation between conversion to Christianity, or any other faith, and abuse of the asylum system. The Church of England welcomes all people and celebrates with those who choose to make a commitment to Christ, but of course there is also a need for discernmentto be wise as serpents and innocent as doves, church officials wrote in a 10-page document on supporting asylum seekers. Clergy must be confident that those seeking baptism fully understand what it signifies, as an unrepeatable sacramental act of initiation which ushers an individual into the Church. Liverpool Cathedrals spokesman said the church requires regular attendance as well as completion of a Christian basics course prior to conversion, and that it would take two years of close community involvement before leaders would consider supporting a candidates application for asylum. The cathedral has been actively involved in outreach and ministry to a wave of refugees who have come to the UK in recent years, welcoming over 200 as converts in a four-year span, The London Telegraph reported. By 2016, it had begun a weekly service in Persian for refugees from Iran. The cathedrals bishop, Cyril Ashton, posed for a picture with Swealmeen the day of his confirmation. His confirmation was one of hundreds I have conducted as a bishop so I have no specific recollection of the individual. The church takes confirmation seriously and I know that he would have been thoroughly prepared with an understanding of the Christian faith, he said to the BBC. It seems that sadly, despite this grounding, the bomber chose a different path for his life. The incident took place on the UKs Remembrance Day. Swealmeen took a taxi to Liverpool Womens Hospital and detonated an improvised explosive in the parking lot. The driver survived with injuries. Police have yet to determine a motive. New Orleans archdiocese to pay over $1M in Hurricane Katrina fraud settlement Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans has agreed to pay more than $1 million as part of a settlement over allegations of falsified Hurricane Katrina aid claims. The settlement came in response to allegations that the archdiocese had violated the False Claims Act by knowingly submitting false claims to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to repair facilities damaged by Katrina, a 2005 Category 5 storm that caused billions of dollars in damage. According to a U.S. Department of Justice statement on Monday, the settlement was given final approval by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana on Oct. 26. FEMA offers critical financial support when natural disasters strike, stated Acting Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton of the DOJs Civil Division. The Department of Justice is committed to ensuring that these taxpayer funds are properly spent to help disaster victims rebuild their communities. Last year, a lawsuit was filed accusing the archdiocese of signing certifications for FEMA funding from 2007 to 2013 that contained inaccurate damage descriptions and repair estimates prepared by AECOM, an architecture and engineering firm based in Los Angeles, California. Robert Romero, an AECOM Project Specialist, filed a whistleblower complaint under the False Claims Act against AECOM, the archdiocese, Dillard University, Xavier University of Louisiana and AECOM employee Randall Krause. Defendant Archdiocese of New Orleans, a FEMA Program applicant, knowingly, recklessly, and/or with willful blindness submitted and/or caused to be submitted to FEMA false and misleading documentation regarding the existence and extent of damage to its facilities, thereby increasing the amount of disaster relief funding that FEMA provided by at least $46 million, claimed the lawsuit. According to the complaint, the archdiocese received approximately $10 million of additional FEMA funding for a school building based on an inflated repair estimate and fraudulently received roughly $36.2 million of additional FEMA funding for two assisted-living facilities. The complaint claims it was misrepresented that Katrina caused catastrophic damage to the four upper floors of both buildings. Based on this fraudulent damage assessment, FEMA awarded both buildings full replacement funding, the complaint continued. But in fact, the upper floors suffered no flood damage and limited, if any, wind damage, and so the buildings should have qualified only for repair funding. The archdiocese released a statement in June 2020 denying any wrongdoing in the matter, arguing that it worked diligently and relied upon the knowledge and expertise of FEMA and their designated agencies and field representatives. Every dollar of FEMA funds received has gone back into the restoration of parish, school and other properties to serve the people of the Greater New Orleans community, the archdiocese stated, as reported by Nola.com. We deny the allegation that the Archdiocese of New Orleans knowingly conspired to submit false information. We have cooperated with the federal governments investigation and will continue to work with them as we resolve this claim. Whistleblower Romero received approximately $199,500 as a result of the settlement. "The claims alleged in the lawsuit, including those resolved by the Archdiocese of New Orleans, are allegations only, and there has been no determination of liability," the DOJ statement reiterates. 'Is Atheism Dead?': Inside Eric Metaxas' quest to unveil the remarkable evidence for God (podcast) Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Christian Post reporter Leah Klett joins Billy Hallowell to discuss author Eric Metaxas' new book, Is Atheism Dead?, and his quest to highlight the amazing evidence he has uncovered for belief and the Bible. SUBSCRIBE TO THE CHRISTIAN POST PODCAST ON EDIFI What Eric is arguing is that science, and archeology and history are all pointing to a divine Creator now more than ever, Klett explained. And all those things are becoming incompatible with atheism. Listen to this episode of The Christian Post Podcast below: Listen to more Christian podcasts today on the Edifi app and be sure to subscribe to the Christian Post Podcast on your favorite platforms: Edifi Anchor Breaker Google Podcasts Apple Podcasts Pocket Casts RadioPublic Spotify Anna Duggar gives birth to 7th child as husband, Josh, expected in court for child porn charges Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Anna Duggar, the wife of ex-reality star Josh Duggar, recently announced on social media that she gave birth to their seventh child three weeks ago in late October as her husband is due in court later this month as he faces child pornography charges. In an Instagram post this week, Anna Duggar released a picture of the infant with a caption that reads: Meet little Madyson Lily Duggar. She was born on Saturday, Oct. 23 at 2:39 a.m. The newborn weighed 7 pounds, 9 ounces and measured 20 inches long, according to her Instagram Story. Madyson Duggar joins siblings Mackynzie, 12; Michael, 10; Marcus, 8; Meredith, 6; Mason, 4; and Maryella, 1. In two weeks, the 33-year-old father and husband, Josh Duggar, will go on trial on Nov. 30. He faces two counts related to the receipt and possession of child pornography, each punishable by up to 20 years in prison and $250,000 fines. Josh Duggar is the eldest born child into a family of over 19 children from his ultra-conservative Baptist Christian parents: Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar. The Duggars all starred in the now-canceled reality television show 19 Kids and Counting. The familys reality show was removed from TLC network in 2015 after it was revealed that Josh Duggar had molested four of his sisters and a babysitter. His parents later confirmed that he had admitted to fondling and apologized. The show had 10 consecutive seasons since 2008 until its cancellation in May of 2015. Although his sisters never pressed charges, he is now potentially facing decades in prison for allegedly having over 200 images of child porn on his technological devices. It's been alleged that the children in the images range from the age of 18 months to 12 years old. This case is being prosecuted as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorneys Office stated. Led by U.S. Attorneys Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood [arrange] federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims, the U.S. Attorneys Office concluded. The evidence against Duggar involves two separate computers, one of which contained child pornography and another with collaborative evidence, Fox News reports, citing a government response to a motion over the summer to postpone the trial. On April 29, Duggar was arrested by federal agents in Arkansas. A day after the arrest, he was indicted on federal child porn charges. A virtual Zoom hearing was held in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas. Duggar pleaded not guilty. He is being represented by attorney Travis W. Story. Duggar will attend a Nov. 18 pre-trial conference while he awaits his Nov. 30 court date, Fox News reports. We appreciate your continued prayers for our family at this time. The accusations brought against Joshua today are very serious, wrote Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar in a statement released in April. It is our prayer that the truth, no matter what it is, will come to light, and that this will all be resolved in a timely manner. We love Josh and Anna and continue to pray for their family. In May 2015, Josh Duggar resigned from his lobbyist role at the socially conservative organization Family Research Council following the revelation that he sexually molested his sisters when he was younger. In August 2015, Josh Duggar confessed that he had cheated on his wife and is battling pornography addiction. At the time, he willingly entered a long-term rehabilitation facility for what he deemed a porn addiction, his parents confirmed. The week before, the then-27-year-old Josh Duggar issued an online apology in which he stated that he was the biggest hypocrite ever. His apology came after it was revealed that he had subscribed to extramarital affair website AshleyMadison.com after millions of customer records were hacked and publicized. Despite not specifying the rehabilitation center their son had checked into or how long he would be receiving help in 2015, the Duggar parents shared at the time they believed their son would have a long journey toward wholeness and recovery. We pray that in this he comes to complete repentance and sincere change, the Baptist couple said at the time. We are deeply grieved by his actions, which have brought great insult to the values and faith we hold dear. Liverpool bomber tried to 'game' asylum system with Christian conversion, official says Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Emad Al Swealmeen, a 32-year-old man who detonated an improvised explosive device, killing himself and injuring a driver in a taxicab outside Liverpool Womens Hospital on Sunday morning, tried to use his claim of Christian conversion to game the countrys asylum system, U.K. Home Office sources contend. Home Secretary Priti Patel told media while on a flight to Washington, D.C., that Swealmeen seemed to have exploited the merry-go-round that is the U.K.'s broken asylum system as he made various claims in an attempt to remain in the country. The case in Liverpool was a complete reflection of how dysfunctional, how broken, the system has been in the past, and why I want to bring changes forward," she was quoted as saying. Its a complete merry-go-round and it has been exploited. A whole sort of professional legal services industry has based itself on rights of appeal, going to the courts day-in day-out at the expense of the taxpayers through legal aid. That is effectively what we need to change. A Home Office source told The U.K. Times that Swalmeen tried to use his conversion to Christianity in his attempt to gain asylum, which is a common tactic used by Iranians and Iraqi asylum seekers to game the system. Applicants for asylum in the U.K. who can show they are committed Christians can argue that their conversion would put them at risk in their home country. Swealmeen arrived in the U.K. in 2014 and applied for asylum claiming he was from Syria. His application for asylum was denied the following year based on data showing he was from Jordan. He reportedly became depressed in 2019 when his claim to be from Syria on another asylum application was denied. Court records indicate that Swealmeen sought to convert to Christianity in 2015 and adopted a new name, Enzo Almeni, following the conversion, BBC reports. He was baptized in Liverpool Cathedral in 2015 and confirmed in 2017, though diocese officials say they lost contact with him in 2018. One tribunal decision in 2017 argued that the improbably large number of Iranians attending courses and services at Liverpool Cathedral meant it was unlikely they were all genuine converts. It was possible for an individual to feign conversion, the decision said. However, other asylum cases were approved after tribunals ruled the new faith of the applicant was genuine. Cyril Ashton, an assistant bishop of Liverpools Anglican Cathedral where Swealmeen was confirmed, told The Guardian that Swealmeens confirmation was one of hundreds I have conducted as a bishop, so I have no specific recollection of the individual. The church takes confirmation seriously and I know that he would have been thoroughly prepared with an understanding of the Christian faith. It seems that, sadly, despite this grounding, the bomber chose a different path for his life, Ashton said. A spokesperson for the Church of England also said in a BBC report that the denomination was not aware that converts could be abusing the asylum system. We are not aware of any evidence to suggest a widespread correlation between conversion to Christianity, or any other faith, and abuse of the asylum system, the spokesperson said. A Liverpool Cathedral spokesperson further noted that Liverpool Cathedral has developed robust processes for discerning whether someone might be expressing a genuine commitment to faith. These include requirements for regular attendance alongside taking part in a recognized Christian basics course. We would expect someone to be closely connected with the community for at least two years before we would consider supporting an application. Malcolm and Elizabeth Hitchcott, devout Christians and members of the Liverpool Cathedral who Swealmeen lived with after converting to Christianity, told ITV News that the bomber had previously struggled with his mental health. But they dont doubt his faith. He was very enquiring. He was, I thought at that time, certainly very genuine, and he took great delight in learning new things, Malcolm Hitchcott said. He further told The Guardian that Swealmeen talked endlessly and passionately about Jesus. He was impressed by the depth of his prayers and knowledge of the Bible. Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson confirmed to BBC Wednesday that Swealmeen indeed suffered from periods of mental illness, which will form part of the investigation. Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust, which provides mental health services, also told the news network that Swealmeen, who began renting a place in Liverpool seven months ago, received treatment in the past but was not being treated at the time of the explosion. A complex picture is emerging over the purchases of the component parts of the device, we know that Al Swealmeen rented the property from April this year and we believe relevant purchases have been made at least since that time, Jackson said. Religious freedom advocacy group unveils top 3 Christian persecutors of 2021 Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment WASHINGTON The religious freedom advocacy group International Christian Concern has named the Taliban, Kim Jong un and Nigeria as the top persecutors of Christians at its first Persecutor of the Year Awards event. ICC assigned the scathing Persecutor of the Year label to the top three violators of religious freedom at a press conference Tuesday that coincided with the release of its 150-page report highlighting 24 of the worst oppressors of Christians in a list that was compiled based on conversations with victims of religious persecution and experts on the subject matter. In a statement, ICC described the report as its most ambitious research project in the organizations history. 2021 is the first time ICC has held a Persecutor of the Year Awards ceremony and compiled a Persecutor of the Year Awards report. In the past, ICC issued an annual report called the Hall of Shame that shone a spotlight on the worlds most egregious violators of religious freedom. Speaking to The Christian Post, ICC President Jeff King referred to the Persecutor of the Year Awards as the evolution of the Hall of Shame, created to help the government and press understand very complex topics in a quick manner. After ICC Communications Director Mike Pritchard emphasized the organizations mission to bandage and build the Church in the most hostile places in the world, King unveiled the names on the Persecutors of the Year list that calls out specific countries, entities and individuals. ICC ranked Nigeria as the worst country for religious freedom in 2021. King, who has served as ICC's president since 2003, explained that the African nation has been engaged in a 20-year war against Christians, which he labeled genocide. Theres a one-sided war against Christians; there are two guerilla forces or factions fighting Christians, he added. The report elaborated on the unsafe environment Christians face in Nigeria: Nigeria is one of the deadliest places on Earth for Christians, as 50,000 to 70,000 have been killed since 2000. Nigeria is home to the infamous Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram, which has displaced millions of people and killed tens of thousands of others. Fulani militants killed more Christians in the past several years than Boko Haram and have displaced Christian farmers. In addition, conservative Islamic communities have allowed the forceful conversion and marriage of young Christian women and discriminated against Christians seeking employment. There are millions, literally millions, 3-plus million Christians displaced, King asserted, adding: Their homes have been stolen, their lands have been stolen, their farms have been stolen. King further lamented that there was no meaningful answer from the Nigerian government, specifically noting the lack of arrests of the perpetrators of crimes against Christians: The government never seems to respond. Theres really been no military retaliation. The religious freedom advocate concluded that the Nigerian government was complicit in the attacks against Christians. He also played a video from the Rev. Joseph John Hayeb, chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Kaduna State, who elaborated on the attacks against Christians in the epicenter of Christian persecution in the African nation: Kaduna State alone between the year 2000 and 2021, Kaduna State has lost over 35,000 people. You cannot talk about the story of the persecution of Christians in Nigeria without looking at the way colonial Muslims and missionaries deal with us, he added. We are asked not to preach in Muslim-dominated communities because they already have a system of government. Hayeb also pushed back on claims that the conflict in Nigeria is the result of tension between farmers and herders: That is pure genocide or pure terrorism or pure evil going in our land. This crime has government sponsorship. This crime has government backing. This crime has government approval. The group identified by ICC as the Persecutor of the Year was the Taliban. The report cited the Taliban going door-to-door to find out who is and isnt going to the mosque, searching the homes of Christians and making phone calls to Christians warning them that Were coming for you as the reasons for declaring the Taliban as Persecutor of the Year. King discussed the situation in Afghanistan further, suggesting that the United States pullout of Afghanistan that enabled the Taliban to take control of the country influenced ICCs decision to make the Taliban a Persecutor of the Year: There are probably about 10,000 Christians theyre all converts from Islam. And so when youre operating in a culture of radical, fundamentalist Islam, that means you have a bullseye on your back. Since the Taliban has retaken control of Afghanistan, he said, they have gone door-to-door asking, Do you know where the Christians are? In the past two weeks, King reported that the Taliban murdered a Christian, who was found with a Bible on his phone. King warned that these and many other Christians will be tortured and given a chance to turn back to Islam. If you dont, youre going to be tortured more to find out what other Christians you know and then youre killed. King also rejected the characterization of the Taliban as half-decent people who have reformed themselves, accusing them of implementing a stealth operation when it comes to torturing Christians: This is part of the Talibans work. Theyre not going to come out and say it. Theyre just not going to kill openly. So now, theyre going to become politicians. But theyre doing this kind of work in the background. ICC selected North Korean dictator Kim Jong un as its individual Persecutor of the Year. According to the report, The Kims have created a religious system modeled on the faith (God/Father/Son) with Kim Jong un playing the part of the Son that is to be worshiped. Any threat to the Son and over-arching religious system is mercilessly crushed. King referred to Kim Jong un as the top player in the persecution of Christians in North Korea, following in the footsteps of the previous North Korean dictators Kim Jong-Il and Kim Il-Sung: The Kim dynasties have tortured and killed millions of Christians over the decades. And I think we are familiar that its very common for the Kims or the regime put away three generations of one family when theyre identified as serious Christians. King estimated that around 30,000 Christians in North Korea have been sent to prison camps, while more than a million have been killed. Kim Seong Min, a North Korean defector, outlined the propaganda North Koreans are subject to in order to convince them that Christianity is the enemy of the state. Specifically, he reported that the Kim regime tells people that Christianity is used by the upper classes to oppress the lower classes. Va. school district reverses suspension of Christian teacher who opposed trans pronoun policy Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A Virginia school district that punished a Christian teacher for expressing his disagreement with a policy to require teachers to use the preferred pronouns of trans-identified students has agreed to lift the teachers suspension as part of a settlement. Byron Tanner Cross sued Loudon County Public Schools after he was suspended in May following a speech at a school board meeting in which he said that he could not in good conscience use the chosen pronouns of his students. In a settlement reached last week, school officials agreed to remove the suspension from his record in return for Cross dropping the lawsuit against the school board. Additionally, the school district agreed to send the Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented Cross, $20,000 in attorneys fees within 14 days of the settlement being reached. In a statement, ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer said that more litigation was still needed to challenge Loudon Countys gender identity anti-discrimination policy. While we are very pleased that Tanner will be able to keep serving his students in light of this settlement, the concerns expressed in our ongoing lawsuit challenging the districts policy remain, stated Langhofer. Public employees cannot be forced to contradict their core beliefs just to keep a job. Freedomof speech and religious exerciseincludes the freedom not to speak messages against our core beliefs. A teacher at Leesburg Elementary School, Cross was put on administrative leave in May after he expressed opposition to a proposed policy that has since passed requires teachers to use the preferred pronouns of students instead of pronouns that reflect their biological sex. My name is Tanner Cross, and I am speaking out of love for those who suffer with gender dysphoria, said Cross at the meeting. I love all of my students, but I will never lie to them regardless of the consequences. Im a teacher, but I serve God first and I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa because its against my religion. Cross sued the Loudon County School Board, with a judge granting him a temporary injunction against the suspension in June. LCPS respectfully disagrees with the Circuit Courts decision to issue the injunction, and it is appealing this ruling to the Supreme Court of Virginia, stated the school district in response to the June decision. Many students and parents at Leesburg Elementary have expressed fear, hurt and disappointment about coming to school. Addressing those concerns is paramount to the school divisions goal to provide a safe, welcoming and affirming learning environment for all students. In late August, the Virginia Supreme Court agreed to hear the lawsuit and issued an order to keep the injunction against the school board. As the Cross litigation was ongoing, the school board voted to approve Policy 8040, an anti-discrimination measure that Cross opposed. According to Policy 8040, school faculty and staff must use the chosen name and pronouns of a student who identifies as gender-expansive or transgender. School staff shall, at the request of a student or parent/legal guardian, when using a name or pronoun to address the student, use the name and pronoun that correspond to their consistently asserted gender identity, read the policy. The use of gender-neutral pronouns is appropriate. Inadvertent slips in the use of names or pronouns may occur; however, staff or students who intentionally and persistently refuse to respect a students gender identity by using the wrong name and gender pronoun are in violation of this policy. The policy also allows students to use the restroom or locker room that corresponds to their consistently asserted gender identity, advising school administrators to consider adding gender-inclusive or single-user restrooms for more privacy. ADF, a legal nonprofit specializing in religious freedom and free speech, represents multiple teachers suing Loudon County over policy 8040, arguing that the measure forces staff to communicate a message they believe is false. Whatever happened to Trump being restored to the White House? Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The purpose of this article is not to mock, ridicule, or insult. Nor am I here to gloat or say, I told you so. Instead, I want to make a simple, two-fold appeal: First, can we be realistic and recognize that Trump will not be restored to the White House by some kind of military act or miraculous event (other than simply running again in 2024)? Second, can we be mature enough to acknowledge our errors, learn from our mistakes, and move on? In short, can we make this a teachable moment? When I announced on radio on January 6th that Trump would not be returning to the White House (meaning, without being reelected in the future), the response from many was outrage. I was a traitor. I had given up the cause. I was like one of the ten Israelite spies who brought back an evil report (in contrast with Joshua and Caleb, who believed God's report). I was a Never Trumper. I was bought out by the Deep State. I was a Communist infiltrator. You get the drift. The truth be told, as a Trump voter in 2016 and 2020, I was privately hoping that the prophecies of his restoration to the White House were true and that the courts would find massive voter fraud, overturning the elections. But at a prayer retreat in Texas in early December, it became totally clear to me that this would not happen. I simply knew that I knew that this was the case, and I knew Joe Biden would be inaugurated on January 20th. After that, I was simply waiting for the right moment on my radio show to share this publicly, wanting to extend a safety net to the many whose faith would be shattered when Biden, rather than Trump, was installed as president. Unfortunately, even after January 20th, many remained in denial. Some set new dates (after guaranteeing that Biden would never serve as our president). "You watch and see what will happen in March. Make that April. Actually, August. I mean September." Others concocted convoluted, hyper-spiritual theories, allegedly received by divine revelation. "Actually, Trump is our president, enthroned by God in heaven. Biden has no real presidential authority." Still others said, "The prophets were right and Trump did win the election. That's why we need to continue to fight for him to be reinstated. We can never accept the steal, and Biden will never be our president." The fact is that, whether there was fraud or not, Joe Biden is our president, as recognized by our Congress and courts. As for Trump, he is not our president, and he is not going to be miraculously restored to the White House any time soon. (Again, this is apart from him potentially running in 2024.) Can we finally admit that this is the case and move on? Or will we be setting dates for the military to remove Biden in 2022 (or 2023), in keeping with yet another conspiratorial fantasy? I certainly hope we will not. All of us can make mistakes. All of us can be wrong about our prognostications. All of us can misjudge a situation. And all of us can have faulty "sources" that, in the end, mislead us rather than inform us. And sometimes, to be brutally honest, we just get conned. The problem is when we can't admit that and learn from our mistakes. The problem is when, as leaders in particular, we cannot acknowledge that our errors have led others into error. The problem is when we blameshift or even misdirect, being more concerned with rallying our base rather than admitting our guilt. In this regard, a typical tactic would be to attack the messenger, in this case, accusing me of being weak. Or a RINO (I'm actually a registered Independent who votes Republican, based on conservative principles rather than party affiliation). Or approving of abortion (as if recognizing Biden as president makes me guilty of shedding innocent blood). Or lacking in faith. Or being unspiritual. Or whatever. But that's the least of my concerns. In fact, it is not my concern at all, since I'm not writing this to gain popularity or support. To the contrary, at the risk of alienating some readers, my only concern is that those who were deceived or misled or misinformed would come to grips with reality, learn from their mistakes, and come out as better men and women for it. As for those leaders who misled or misinformed others, now would be a good time to say, "It looks like I was wrong, and I apologize for speaking falsely and getting your hopes up for nothing. I intend to learn from this and not repeat such errors." And how will the Lord respond? As the Word says, He opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. So, where the shoe fits, get low and receive grace. God also lifts up the humble. Solomon on how to deal with oppressive elites Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The Bible has several stories about ending evil, oppressive regimes. Pharaoh in the Exodus is the most well-known tale of God liberating slaves and judging a tyrant. But it is not the only one. After Solomon became unfaithful to the Lord, God allowed a tax revolt to remove most of Israel from the authority of Solomons heir, Rehoboam. Judges is all about God raising up leaders from the Israelite population to overthrow foreign rulers. Saul was chosen to be king because the people wanted a leader to fight against foreign powers ruling over the country. But there was virtually always a reckoning after these revolutions. The liberated Hebrew slaves were constantly complaining against Moses (keep in mind that complaining sometimes got to the point of threatening his life). Rehoboam, the popularly chosen king who led the majority of Israel to be independent of Solomons dynasty, was not a faithful king. And subsequent rulers of Israel were much worse. After the judges delivered them, the people returned to the behavior that led them to be conquered in the first place. Sometimes, the judges themselves were the source of the trouble (Gideon was a champion for the Israelites but he had a son who ended up causing mayhem; see Judges 8:22-9:57). While oppressive rulers are bad, overthrowing them doesnt always lead anywhere good. David, though anointed by God to replace Saul as king, refused to kill him or even try to overthrow him by force. He realized that ruling by regicide would set a precedent that would not be forgotten and would not bode well for a stable regime. Perhaps reflecting on Davids life, Proverbs 24:21 states, My son, fear the LORD and the king, and do not join with those who do otherwise (ESV). There are some translation debates about the latter part of the verse. The NASB says, Do not associate with those who are given to change and the NIV reads, and do not join with rebellious officials. Whatever the exact nuance of the second part of the proverb, the basic message is clear. It is even closely paraphrased by the Apostle Peter in his first letter: Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king. (2:17). So if God does sometime approve of overturning those in power, yet it so often ends badly, what should we do? As a matter of historical record, the Apostles and other evangelists founded churches that functioned as a new culture. And as that culture matured and spread, the entire political and social situation in the Mediterranean world was transformed. New people provided new leadership by replacing, converting, or otherwise influencing rulers. Which is what you would expect a religion to do that regards Proverbs as part of divine revelation. A servant who deals wisely will rule over a son who acts shamefully and will share the inheritance as one of the brothers (Proverbs 17:2 ESV). Whoever troubles his own household will inherit the wind, and the fool will be servant to the wise of heart (Proverbs 11:29 ESV). A rich man is wise in his own eyes, but a poor man who has understanding will find him out (Proverbs 28:11 ESV) Christians ended up inheriting Western civilization by learning and living (however imperfectly) Gods wisdom. Within three centuries they ended up in charge. So when dealing with oppressive elites, it might be better to think of God as searching for reliable replacements, rather than merely wanting to end the evil regime. If God is thinking long term, He is not going to overthrow a government just to see it replaced with a worse one. He wants a better government to take the place of the one he wants to overthrow. What that means is that God is going to look for an available group of people who can reliably govern. What kind of people will God look for? Will he choose people who think that the world needs them to be in control because they alone are right? Will he choose people who cant tolerate opposition? Will he choose people who respond to adversaries by lashing out? Will he choose people who long to destroy all their enemies? Look at it this way: Either the world is changed by God in his providence or he has left us alone to save ourselves. If the latter is true, then the qualities of a good ruler will be whatever are best suited to take power by any means necessary. Otherwise, he cannot ever gain power. But thats not the Christian view. If God gives authority to those he wants to have it, then other considerations should be important. If one wants to be put in power by God, one must develop the will and skill to use power in a way that God commends. Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master. Matthew 25:23 In that case, gaining more power is not your primary responsibility. Overthrowing oppressive rulers is not your responsibility. Your responsibility is learning to do well with what little power you already have. Most people, when they have little power or wealth of responsibility of significance, tell themselves that their habits and speech dont matter that much. But the Bible says differently. One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much." Luke 16:10 Wont God prefer people who are cheerful in adversity, humble about themselves, with a zeal for justice and an ability to extend mercy, be tolerant, and show prudence? Be the government you want to see in the world, by how you govern yourself and your own affairs. This week in Christian history: Episcopal diocese breaks away, St. Peters Basilica completed Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Throughout the extensive history of the Church, there have been numerous events of lasting significance. Each week brings anniversaries of impressive milestones, unforgettable tragedies, amazing triumphs, memorable births, notable deaths and everything in between. Some of the events drawn from over 2,000 years of history might be familiar, while other happenings might be previously unknown by most people. This week Nov. 14 through Nov. 20 marks the anniversary of a diocese leaving its denomination, the completion of one of the most iconic Catholic basilicas and the wedding of a legendary evangelist. 1 2 3 4 Next YouVersion Bible app amasses over 500M installs on devices worldwide Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment The popular Bible mobile app YouVersion has amassed over 500 million installs after starting as one of only 200 free apps in the iOS App Store in 2008. The milestone was announced on Wednesday in a verse of the day video from Craig Groeschel, the founding pastor of Life.Church, which created the app. He called the achievement a testimony to the goodness of God and the power of His word. As of today, the YouVersion Bible app is now on one-half of a billion devices around the world, he said. To celebrate this moment, our verse of the day is Hebrews 4:12, which says, For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Bobby Gruenewald, the founder of the app, told The Christian Post in an interview Thursday that before the platform was created, he was below average in the duration and frequency he would read the Bible. In the hopes of changing this, YouVersion was created as a website first, hoping that it would increase his desire and the desire of others to read the Bible more consistently and draw an audience of Bible readers. But, he said the website failed at first. Despite drawing a lot of attention, there wasnt a continued interest in those who used the website. Gruenewald said he and his team realized that the YouVersion website was unsuccessful because it was not a mobile-friendly platform. With the hope of potentially keeping a more expansive audience engaged, they launched the YouVersion app in July 2008 as the only Bible app available when the App Store first came into existence. During the first weekend after the app was released, the app brought 83,000 installs, a number Gruenewald didnt think would be hit until after a year of being launched. The entire ministry was about me getting to read the Bible more because I always wanted to read the Bible more, and I thought there were probably more people in my situation, Gruenewald stated. And, of course, we had no idea of what it would become. It started simple and as a small effort. Its extremely humbling to have reached 500 million downloads. Just the fact that God could do something so big through us, Gruenewald added. Its important that people understand that this is something God did, not us. We cant take credit for this. God did this through me, and its so crazy that God would use me. And theres a lot more that God will do and can do in future. When the YouVersion app first launched, the app was only available in two languages: English and Spanish. Now, there are over 1,750 languages in which the Bible can be read within the app. Since 2010, the app has allowed users to participate in Bible plans on different faith-based topics as well as read devotionals and Scripture commentaries. In 2017, the app began allowing users to select friends to be in community with through the platform. The app also offers a guided-prayer function that gives users guidance and support as they connect with Gods word. In 2020, the app launched the verse of the day, which allows users to view new interactive video content geared towards a different Scripture Verse daily. Gruenewald said the most rewarding part of his involvement with the app is witnessing the many lives that have changed through the platform. He said that his 10-year-old daughter recently downloaded the app and is working on a devotional plan with her friends. He said the feature in the app called streak, which counts the days the app is used, has increased his usage in the past few years. He currently has an over 1,560-day streak. The app changed how much I read the bible, which has impacted my family and how I lead them, the father of four children admitted to CP. I have heard numerous stories that have been reported about how the YouVersion app has helped people overcome severe depression, suicidal thoughts or saved their lives or restored their broken marriages and relationships. God spoke to them through the app. Their eternity is changed, he added. And its not the app, its the Bible that is transformative. Gruenewald said he has high hopes for the future of the app and would like to continue adding new content areas. He said what people have seen of YouVersion so far is simply the beginning of whats to come. We have been in a process of expanding the features of the app to focus more on intimacy with God, Gruenewald said. The Bible is not the only pathway to intimacy with God, but there is also prayer, worship, generosity and community. Over time, I have grown to think much more is possible, he continued. And when we started, I would have never thought this would be the outcome. Dennis Quaid announces gospel album, opens up about his path back to Christ Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Actor Dennis Quaid is gearing up to release a gospel album and shared why he returned to Christianity after becoming disillusioned by the Southern Baptist church of his upbringing. Quaid performed a solo, intimate evening concert on Wednesday in Chicagos City Winery. The iconic actor wanted people to just come and have a good time. It is just me. Its the first time Ive been doing music on stage by myself since I was 19 years old, he shared in an interview with The Chicago Sun-Times. For the past 20 years, Quaid has performed with his band The Sharks, but hes turned to making inspirational music in recent years. He told the newspaper that he is working on a gospel/inspirational album, due next year. Quaid said that his new album will feature spiritual songs I grew up with in church. Quaid is joined by Billy Ray Cyrus on the new song Fallen. Tanya Tucker, Kris Kristofferson and Brandi Carlisle are all featured on the remake of On My Way to Heaven. The I Can Only Imagine star released a single titled On My Way to Heaven in 2018 for the Christian films soundtrack. Ive always been spiritual. I grew up in a Southern Baptist church, became disillusioned with it as a teenager. I turned to Eastern religions and philosophies, he told The Chicago Sun-Times. I read the Bible twice, read the Koran, went to India nine times. Along the way, I came back to Christianity, and well, finding that its really the same all throughout the world, he added. Quaid noted that people are people with the same sort of yearnings. Were all spiritual beings whether we know it or not, he added. So thats what I speak to: ones relationship with God or non-relationship with God, he explained. The Hollywood actor grew up attending a Baptist church in Texas and recently said in a promotional video that he was baptized at age 9. As he grew older, he began to ask, Who [is] God? But the actor maintained that Jesus is the One for him. In a past interview with The Christian Post, this reporter asked Quaid for his thoughts on what Heaven will be like. Quaids song, On My Way to Heaven, written for his mother, revealed that he has thought about the afterlife. What do I imagine Heaven will be like? I think we all get a little taste of it here on Earth through prayer and meditation. Thats actually the good news thats given you feel it here on Earth. To imagine it? I dont know that takes other eyes, he said at the time. Alan Jackson's daughter shares God's faithfulness, 'tenderness' following tragic loss of husband Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment NASHVILLE For Mattie Jackson Selecman, September 2018 will be a month forever etched in her memory. It was a beautiful day in Florida, and Selecman and her husband of less than a year, Ben, had gathered with family and friends to celebrate Labor Day. What started as a fun-filled holiday turned tragic when Ben slipped and fell on a dock, suffering traumatic head injuries. He spent 12 days in the ICU, and it was a really chaotic couple of weeks, wondering what was going to happen while Ben went through brain swelling and multiple surgeries, Selecman recalled in an interview with The Christian Post. Just three weeks before their first anniversary, Ben died at age 28. To say that it was a shock feels like a massive understatement, Selecman, now 31, said. My marriage was taken so unexpectedly and suddenly. I was so young, just 28. To be honest, it was very clear to me very soon after his passing that this was not something that I was going to have the strength to handle by myself in a healthy way. The daughter of legendary country music star Alan Jackson and his wife, New York Times bestselling author Denise Jackson, Selecman grew up in the Church and attended Christian schools as a child, embracing a relationship with Jesus at a young age. I never didnt believe," she shared. "I always knew Christ my Savior; my faith impacted my whole world and worldview, and Im incredibly grateful for that." "But," she added, "its easy to have faith until you face something like this. What happens when everything is out of your control and theres nothing you can do? You have to choose will I trust God in this, or will I not? When something this severe happens, when tragedy happens, you really can't stay lukewarm, Selecman emphasized. People, I think, are either so angry with God that they turn away, whether permanently or temporarily, or they just dive all in. Trying to make sense of her pain, Selecman dove all in: I don't know how else to describe it, but especially in the beginning, I just craved Gods presence. I craved the Word of God. I craved praise music," she recalled. "I just wanted assurance that He was truly with me, every moment, and that the future that was so uncertain was in His hands. The scariest thing to think about was that my healing and my future were in my own hands because that was totally impossible. For the next several months, Selecman spent time journaling, in counseling and immersing herself in Gods Word and felt His presence like never before. He is so tender and so personal. He would send me tiny assurances that Ben was OK; that he was joyful and in Heaven, and in such a place of elation, she said. He was so incredibly tender; I started to feel like I was truly learning His heart. We became the kind of friends I think Jesus always wanted me to be with Him. It took being so desperate to find Him in all those tiny, tender places. About a year-and-a-half after her husbands death, Selecman felt God calling her back to her journals, written from a place of what she describes as just raw emotion," adding: "There was no motivation besides survival and trying to understand what was a very, very chaotic sort of traumatic feeling. While reading her journals, she felt God calling her to turn them into a book something that could bring healing and hope to others going through grief and pain. God kept opening door after door, and it became clear that He wanted me to share this, she said. I started to look at, how can we get this into a format that's really honest about my story and honest about who God is, and hopefully serve as an inspiration to others and give some practical and spiritual takeaways for people who've experienced loss and just let them see a little hope in my story as I found it. Now, Selecmam is documenting her journey of grief, healing and Gods faithfulness in her new book,Lemons on Friday: Trusting God Through My Greatest Heartbreak. She tackles questions relevant to anyone struggling with loss, including: How did I get here? Will this always hurt? Who am I now? How do I move forward? How do you grieve something like this? she said. If youre mad at Him, be honest with Him, express that. If you dont, you arent going to heal. I had plenty of angry moments, and I had to be honest about them and it was so freeing. But, what is being angry with Him going to get you in the end? It's just going to turn you bitter toward Him. And man, that's a dangerous place to be. God hates death; this isn't the way He designed it, Selecman added. I just always say if you're mad at God, look at the Jesus part of the Trinity, because Jesus wept at His friend's death. He could have stopped it in the same way God couldve stopped Bens. Just because He allows something doesn't mean He likes it for us. Throughout the grieving process, Selecman said two verses gave her tremendous hope: Lamentations 3:22-23 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning and Romans 8:28, And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. But knowing that Ben is in Heaven and that she will one day see him again is what allows her to have unfaltering faith and hope amid her grief. I sat in the front row of my husband's funeral and burial knowing that Jesus is the only thing that matters, knowing that Ben is with Him, knowing that Ben is elated for eternity in a way that I can't understand, she said. On my darkest days, the most powerful truth remind myself of is that the man I love more than anything got to go early. He won the lottery. That has helped me deal with all of the sorrow and all the aftermath that it leaves for me. I know where Im headed, and I know Ben is already there. Though dealing with a tough subject, Selecman wants her story to be one of hope; one that will bring comfort to others dealing with grief. She shared how already, shes had the opportunity to bring encouragement to those grieving through her nonprofit NaSHEville, which helps orphans, human trafficking victims and widows. Ben, she said, was an abundant and joyful person who celebrated every moment and she hopes to carry on his legacy by living a life of service to those around her. It doesnt take a miraculous or remarkable life on paper to really love your life and love the people in it, she reflected. "Ben did that so well. And its truthfully turned my focus more toward my relationships than what I want to accomplish because that's what life is all about. I hope that when people sit where I sat three years ago, no matter what theyre facing, no matter what question marks are ahead, there is always light. You are never fully going to stay in the darkness, Selecman added. God doesn't ask much of us. He asked us to take small steps. And He asks us to ask Him what we need. He is faithful; theres nothing that you can't survive with Jesus there. Lemons on Fridayis available for order now. John Hagee's Cornerstone Church criticized after Lets go Brandon chant erupts at event Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Cornerstone Church of San Antonio, Texas, a prominent evangelical congregation headed by Pastor John Hagee, has garnered controversy for hosting an event that featured a widely circulated video of a crowd shouting the anti-Biden chant, Lets go, Brandon. On Saturday evening, the Twitter account PatriotTakes posted a clip of a large gathering at Cornerstone in which a crowd was chanting Lets go, Brandon, a saying that has become a popular euphemism for F*** Joe Biden" in recent weeks. A later clip from the same event showed that the chant was being led from the stage, as a speaker with a microphone helped to lead the audience in the partisan chant. The footage was from a multiday event known as the Reawaken America Tour, which featured speakers such as former Trump National Security Advisor retired Gen. Michael Flynn and controversial radio personality Alex Jones. Cornerstone released a statement to multiple media outlets distancing themselves from the event and the viral video of the chant. This past week, Cornerstone Church facilities were used by an outside organization. Cornerstone Church is not associated with this organization and does not endorse their views, the church stated. Oklahoma Pastor Jeremy Coleman was quoted by News 4 San Antonio as denouncing the event, stating that churches should be places of unconditional love for your neighbor. I don't think that that kind of behavior, no matter where you fall on the political spectrum, has any place inside the church, Coleman said. You endorsed the organization to come in the doors. You knew that the people who were speaking at that event were extreme, so you knew what you were welcoming into the doors when you allowed it. Mark Tooley, president of the theologically conservative think tank the Institute on Religion & Democracy, also criticized Cornerstones decision to host the event. Cornerstone and its pastor John Hagee will need to disassociate themselves from The Reawaken America Tour and its vulgarity in their sanctuary, wrote Tooley. Whatever its association with the Reawaken America Tour, hopefully, Cornerstone Church will focus on truly reawakening America through Gospel proclamation and not through echoing or hosting vulgar political bromides. The Lets Go Brandon chant traces its origins to an incident at a NASCAR event in October when, while doing an interview with race winner Brandon Brown, NBC reporter Kelli Stavast claimed that the audience chanting F*** Joe Biden! was actually chanting Lets go, Brandon! From there, many anti-Biden crowds took to shouting Lets go, Brandon! as a euphemistic way of verbally attacking the president. The trend has taken on a life on social media as well. Robin Schumacher, an author and Christian apologist, penned a column for CP published Monday in which he denounced the Lets go, Brandon chant. Im still naturally drawn to satirical statements, and so when the Lets go Brandon meme became culturally popular, I instinctively wanted to get on board, wrote Schumacher. But something happened to me when I saw an advertisement for Lets go Brandon apparel and thought about buying it. Out of nowhere, a thought popped into my head: Honor the king (1 Pet. 2:17). And voila, theres that Holy Spirit convicting and sanctifying work I was talking about. Schumacher went on to note that while Im certainly no fan of our current presidents actions, Christians need to swap out Lets go, Brandon with Pray for Joe Biden. Franklin Graham released from Mayo Clinic after heart surgery: 'I felt Gods presence' Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Franklin Graham, a notable conservative evangelical leader, has been released from the Rochester, Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic, days after undergoing heart surgery. Graham, who serves as president of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritans Purse, posted an update on his recovery to his Facebook page on Tuesday. I wanted to let you know that I was released from Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, yesterday, after a specialized surgery last Monday to correct constrictive pericarditis, the 69-year-old preacher wrote. I couldnt be more grateful to my doctors and the Mayo Clinic team for their excellent care and expertise. The doctors say that I am doing really well and will be able to return to my normal activity and ministry schedule when Im fully recovered. Graham went on to explain in his post that while he will be recuperating for the next few weeks, he is feeling better every day. Thank you to everyone for your prayers I know what a difference prayer makes! I was never afraid. I felt Gods presence throughout the entire experience and give Him the glory, he added. On Nov. 8, Graham underwent heart surgery at the Mayo Clinic after developing constrictive pericarditis, which is an inflammation and hardening of the sac around the heart. In a statement shared with The Christian Post earlier this month, Samaritan's Purse explained that Grahams heart condition had developed within the past few months. Franklin had developed constrictive pericarditis, inflammation, and hardening of the sac around the heart that compresses the heart and prevents it from working properly. The surgery involved removing the pericardium, stated the organization. His doctors expect a full recovery and assured him that he should be able to return to his normal activity and ministry schedule. Mr. Graham said that he is looking forward to multiple opportunities across the globe in 2022 to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ and invite people to put their faith in Him. A son of the late evangelist Billy Graham, Franklin Graham has overseen and spoken at his share of evangelism events across the United States and abroad. From Sept. 19 to Oct. 2, for example, Graham held an eight-city evangelism campaign known as the God Loves You tour, in which approximately 56,000 people attended and around 5,000 indicated a decision to accept Jesus Christ. Record levels of pastors, more than half of mainline preachers seriously considering quitting: study Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment As more pastors report struggling with their overall well-being amid the COVID-19 pandemic, record numbers of them including more than half of preachers in mainline Protestant churches, are now seriously considering leaving full-time ministry a new study from Barna Group shows. The study, released Tuesday, was conducted Oct. 1228 and included 507 Protestant senior pastors. It found that nearly four out of 10 pastors, or 38% of them, said they are seriously considering leaving full-time ministry. This reflects a significant jump from the 29% of pastors who reported feeling this way in January. When the data is broken down further into mainline and non-mainline pastors, it reveals that 51% of mainline pastors are seriously considering leaving full-time ministry. Additionally, 34% of non-mainline pastors reported feeling this way about their jobs. Joe Jensen, Barnas vice president of church engagement, told The Christian Post that the growing number of pastors now looking to leave their full-time positions is cause for alarm. This particular stat, this is the highest weve ever seen it, Jensen said, pointing to the burnout he believes many pastors are experiencing in the wake of the pandemic. Weve been tracking this in our State of Pastors report that we did with Pepperdine University in 2016, 2017. We didnt have this exact stat but we were tracking burnout. [And] pastors were feeling burnout and the risk factors involved, Jensen said. He explained: 2021 is the highest weve seen it, which is why as a company, quite frankly, we are alarmed and we are concerned about the overall well-being of pastors. Were concerned with how this is impacting the overall health of the Church. I really believe that [at] the heart of every healthy church is a healthy pastor. So this is definitely, almost four out of 10 pastors in America seriously considering quitting full-time ministry in the last year ... cause for concern. Jensen said he believes the pandemic has had a significant impact on the well-being of pastors based on data they have gathered amid the pandemic. He specifically cited the spiritual, emotional, relational, financial and physical well-being of pastors a metric he calls the "five dimensions of flourishing." Weve been tracking the overall well-being and health of pastors for a long time at Barna, but weve especially been keeping track of just how the pandemic has impacted pastors personally and professionally. We have been paying attention quite closely to these five dimensions of flourishing, where were tracking their spiritual well-being their emotional well-being, their relational well-being, financial well-being and their physical well-being as well, Jensen said. Weve been doing pastor polls very consistently over the past 18 months since the pandemic started and in January when we asked that question about if theyre seriously considering quitting," he continued. "The 29% actually caused us to really perk up and pay attention because this question really is a culmination of a lot of the other questions." This one comes down to, how are they viewing their calling and their purpose in regards to all those other dimensions? It really kind of causes a pastor to focus on taking everything into account and looking at the future and saying, Is this something Im still called to do? Jensen said in 2020 when the pandemic shuttered many churches, many pastors were just in survival mode, trying to figure out how to get online when they werent, and how to connect with their people even when they werent there to connect with them. In 2021, as people began to emerge from lockdowns and churches have begun to open up, pastors are now struggling with the slow return of many of their congregants. As we went to 2021, especially as churches started to come back in person, we were starting to pay attention to, how did it impact their overall well-being when their people werent coming back? Like, they probably were expecting them to. And so 2021 has definitely had all these set of challenges for pastors, Jensen said. Recent research from Lifeway showed that while a majority of Protestant churches are now open for in-person services, foot traffic has been slow to return to the pews, particularly for black churches. Compared to data from January 2020, the Lifeway data showed that as of August, 13% of churches were attracting less than 50% of their pre-COVID-19 attendance. Some 35% of pastors reported attendance levels between 50% and 70% for the period, while another 30% reported attendance levels between 70% and 90%. Jensen was unable to provide a direct cause for the disparity between the number of mainline and non-mainline preachers who are considering quitting full-time ministry. However, he said there is anecdotal evidence suggesting differences in church culture could be the driver. A lot of the mainline pastors I talk to personally come from a liturgical tradition and the liturgical tradition the way that their whole ministry philosophy is centered on this in-person expression of ministry, Jensen said. I think that was severely disrupted, whereas a lot of non-mainline churches were a little bit more equipped. The midsized to larger churches didnt have as much a transition into digital as maybe the mainline [churches]. So I think the digital transition, but more specifically the fact that they didnt get to lead in a way where they could express, they didnt get to lead in a way where they were able to express how theyre rooted in in-person and body ministry, he explained. Also I think the fact that it was 51% of mainline versus 34% of non-mainline, thats a significant gap, and I would say whatever attributed to that, I think the bottom line is that the mainline [churches], they have a lot to figure out when it comes to their tradition, he added. When it comes to the general increase in pastors looking to quit their jobs, Jensen said the healthier pastors reported they were using the five dimensions of flourishing. They were less likely they were to say they were considering quitting full-time ministry. One thing we do at Barna, we dont make statements about causation from one stat to the other, but we do draw some correlation. So the correlation there would be if you look at all of those, so emotional well-being 27% of pastors who said they did not consider quitting rate their emotional well-being as excellent versus 7% of pastors who said they considered quitting, he said. Thats a considerable difference, that only 7% of those who considered quitting said, Oh yeah, Im doing great emotionally, or Im doing great relationally. And so those are the ones that stand out. Nearly half of pastors who did not consider leaving their jobs rate excellent across all five dimensions of flourishing compared to 14% of pastors who are seriously thinking about quitting, the data shows. I guess in summary I would say that overall health of a pastor, there is a correlation between their overall health and their sense of calling or purpose when it comes to their overall calling as a pastor, Jensen said. The current discontent among pastors about their jobs comes even as a Prudential study shows that 48% of U.S. adults, in general, are also rethinking the type of job they want post-pandemic. Jensen, who was a pastor for 20 years, says pastors should be seen as people just like anyone else. You asked the question, 'Should pastors kind of maybe be a little bit different than the general population?' And I would say, I was a pastor for 20 years, and I would say I had some of the same struggles as the people I was leading, he said. Pastors, the emotional mental strain of leading in this time, the uncertainty, the chaos, of just whats going on in culture, how there are so many pressures that theyre facing both publicly and privately. I think thats contributed to where a lot of pastors are at now, he said. When asked if the data reflected any generational disparities among pastors, Jensen said this isnt just an age thing. Before the pandemic, we were paying attention to the average age of pastors in America. [It] was in the mid to late 50s. Obviously, a couple of years later, that trend is going to continue to go up as far as average age. We are seeing though that in the data, a lot of younger pastors under the age of 45 are struggling as well, he said. And so this isnt just an age thing. The discontent forcing many pastors to rethink their calling also has serious implications for Church leadership, which Jensen notes injects some uncertainty about what the future of Church leadership will look like. Pastoral succession, its something that were paying close attention to because we are going to see, in the next two to five years, a big wave of pastors looking to pass the baton to the next generation of pastors, he said. We dont know how thats going to shake up yet, but we are confident that the pandemic has played a big role in how pastors are seeing their ability to pass on the pastorate to the next generation. You know the big question is, what [does] the next generation of pastors look like? Jensen also believes there are practical steps that the Church community, in general, can take to help their leaders flourish and steps pastors can take themselves. Just to get really practical, I think congregants, elders and deacons, whoever it is thats kind of surrounding these pastors within congregations, [should] encourage them to connect and have deep friendships, he said. A lot of pastors dont have deep friendships because their immediate community are the people that theyre shepherding, so its really hard for them to find meaningful friendships. I would encourage pastors to reach out to other pastors, the Barna expert advised. Jensen noted that pastors, in general, shy away from counseling and mentoring, but they need to understand that its OK to ask for help. Pastors traditionally dont feel comfortable for a number of different reasons to seek out counseling, to seek out mentoring. You know it needs to be OK within a Church community and the Church culture for a pastor to say, you know what? I need help. I need some counseling. Im struggling emotionally, he said. But to be quite frank, for whatever reason, a lot of pastors dont feel comfortable being vulnerable within a leadership context. I really think that churches need to communicate and say, Hey pastor, its OK not to be OK.'" He added, I think churches should provide counseling stipends for pastors and encourage them. Dont let financials, dont let the stigma of it get in the way of you getting the mental and emotional help that you need so you can lead more effectively from a healthier spot." He further noted that in addition to getting help, pastors and the Church community should also use the challenges that have emerged in ministry from the pandemic to rethink the way we measure success and flourishing in the Church. I think the disruption of the pandemic is a great opportunity for pastors to really first of all stop and look inside. These numbers, I think, can actually be a good thing to wake us up to the reality of what were really called to do as pastors. Is this something that Im really deeply called to? Is this just a job? Is this just a position? Or is it a deep calling at the core of my being? he asked. Id encourage pastors to lean into this moment and ask yourself these deeper questions. He also wants pastors to realize that you are not alone, adding: "There are other pastors who are experiencing the same exact thing. So if you are there and youre thinking, 'Is there something wrong with me? I feel less spiritual because Im questioning if this is something I want to do,' dont give in to that sentiment." You look all throughout Scripture, and you see leader after leader comes to those moments of doubt and hesitation, and God was there for all of them. For Moses, God was there and said, 'Ill give you everything you need'. For King David, almost all throughout the Psalms, we read where he was questioning if he could do this. If he could survive just all the pressures and all the conflicts and all of the adversaries and enemies, he continued. God reassured him of His presence. Jensen admits that because this has been the most complex time, at least in modern history, to be a pastor, new metrics of success are now needed. The pastoral position has always had its challenges through the ages now with just how, with social media, visible pastors are in so many different ways. There is an increased pressure to have it all together, to hold it all together. There is an increased pressure, especially in the last 20 years or so to be like a certain pastor, he said. The metric of success for pastors has been centered around things like the number of church members, how much money is being collected in tithes and offerings and how big the church campus is. And thats why were saying at Barna, its time for a new metric of success in the Church, where we start to measure pastors and give a different type of metric because I really think that has contributed to this, Jensen said. That pastors have been chasing this idea of what it means to be successful, and we dont measure up with that. And then you bring in all the complexities of leading in a pandemic and not being relationally engaged with the community and with close friends and the complexity of digital ministry and digital engagement. You bring all those things together, its definitely a recipe for confusion and uncertainty and self-doubt, he said. What we really need to start measuring are the things that truly matter, he said noting that in 2022 that will be the companys focus. And we really believe that what matters right now is our people actually growing as disciples of Jesus in all the areas of their life. John Hagee, Cornerstone Christian Schools file lawsuit to resume in-person classes in August Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Evangelist John Hagee and several parents of children who attend Cornerstone Christian Schools are suing Texas local and county officials to allow the schools to open in August despite a local health order prohibiting in-person classes until Sept. 7. Hagee, Cornerstone Christian Schools, Cornerstone Church and Global Evangelism Incorporated have been joined by parents in filing a lawsuit last week against Bexar County and San Antonio public officials over a directive issued by the local health department. According to the lawsuit, the directive issued by the San Antonio Metropolitan Health District to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 purports to impose restrictions on all public and private schools that provide pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade instruction. Although the directive instructs schools not to open for in-person instruction until Sept. 7, Cornerstone Christian Schools is scheduled to reopen for in-person instruction on Aug. 17. Plaintiffs contend that an order prohibiting in-person instruction infringes on the religious freedom enjoyed by private religious schools because it tries to force the schools to close for in-person instruction against their desires. Further, the parents a pediatric surgeon, a nurse and a Texas ranger allege that they "may be forced to quit their job if their kids in-person learning is not allowed until September. The plaintiffs asked the district court for a temporary restraining order against the local orders to allow for the school to have in-person classes with social distancing guidelines in place. Plaintiffs hold a sincere religious belief and seek to educate, and have their children educated, through the in-person instruction of Plaintiffs religious, educational institution to further those sincere beliefs, the legal filing reads. The Texas Health & Safety Code and the Directive impermissibly make Plaintiffs beliefs the object of their enforcement and, thus, are not facially neutral. Moreover, Defendants actions in enforcing the Directive are not generally applied. On July 17, the City of San Antonio Office of Emergency Management announced that all schools in Bexar County, private and public, would have remote learning until at least Sept. 7. We recognize the importance of re-opening schools, San Antonio Metro Health Medical Director Dr. Junda Woo, who is named as a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said in a statement. This directive considers the higher risk for spread of COVID-19 in schools due to their confined spaces, and the challenge for children in following social distancing and hygiene guidelines. Re-opening will happen in phases, based on COVID-19 metrics. The following week, Cornerstone Christian Schools posted a statement on Facebook explaining that they intend to give parents the option of having students attend classes online or in-person. We believe that parents should have the right to decide what is best for their families in the context of their childrens education, Cornerstone stated. Cornerstone added that the schools are implementing significant social distancing measures for in-person schooling and were blessed to have the classrooms, buildings, and overall space necessary to keep our kids safe while providing them the important educational, social and mental-health benefits associated with classroom instruction. Earlier this month, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sent an official letter addressed to religious private schools explaining that they are exempt from official shutdown orders. Even if the government may have a compelling interest in closing certain aspects of society to contain the spread of a virus, blanket government orders closing all religious private schools are not the least restrictive means of achieving that interest, wrote Paxton. Thus, as protected by the First Amendment and Texas law, religious private schools may continue to determine when it is safe for their communities to resume in-person instruction free from any government mandate or interference. Religious private schools therefore need not comply with local public health orders to the contrary. According to The San Antonio Express-News, city and county officials say they will continue asking private and religious schools to voluntarily comply with the health directive. I think what Dr. Woo has done is not an overreach, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff said Tuesday, according to the newspaper. All shes simply saying at this stage is wait until Sept. 7." I hope that we can work with the schools and get that worked out without having to continue the litigation," he added. "I think its in the best interests of the parents, the children and everybody here in the community. After declaring Jesus Christ the vaccine for COVID-19, John Hagees ministry clarifies statement Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Months after John Hagee, senior pastor of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, declared Jesus Christ as the vaccine for COVID-19 after he was hospitalized with the virus, his ministry has clarified that he believes in prayer and medicine and is taking the vaccine. "Pastor Hagee himself is taking the vaccine," Hagee Ministries spokesperson Ari Morgenstern told ABC News in a statement, adding that Hagee's comments, in which he said he had been taken out of context. "Pastor Hagee believes in both the power of prayer and modern medicine. These are not mutually exclusive." Hagees church did not immediately respond to a request for further comment from The Christian Post on Tuesday. As he recovered from a high publicized bout with COVID-19 last November, Hagee revealed to his flock that he spent 15 days in the hospital and credited the healing power of God for his recovery. Im sitting in this chair today to the testimonial of the healing power of Jesus Christ. I spent 15 days in the hospital with double pneumonia, and Im still supposed to be home gasping for air, he said. Im on this platform speaking of the glory of God for the healing power of God. I breathe under the authority of Christ every sickness and every disease and especially the COVID thing thats sweeping this nation. We have a vaccine; the name is Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God. Let Him sweep through this country and heal the righteous who dare to ask for it. Heal our church members. Restore them rapidly. Let the name of Jesus Christ be exalted because He is Lord over all, Hagee declared. According to ABC News, "Doctors say remarks like that make it more difficult to ensure that all communities are protected from the virus." "The challenges that we're seeing from the anti-vaxxer community, from religious communities, are also impacting equitable access to vaccines, which I think is a really important issue particularly in communities of color," Dr. Jay Bhatt, ABC News' medical contributor."The choice we're making is one of health, of one of safety, of one of helping us together do the things we need to get to a COVID-free world." Other religious leaders, including controversial Pastor Tony Spell of the 3,000-member Life Tabernacle Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, have encouraged their church members not to take the COVID-19 vaccine. "We're anti-vaccine," Spell told ABC News. "I'm their pastor; I'm willing to stand before God for every decision that I make in people's lives. Every decision. I'm willing to stand before God for them." He added: "How can you trust a government who in 1945 purposefully [conducted] the Tuskegee study?" In the Tuskegee trial conducted from 1932 through 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service studied the effects of untreated syphilis in black men in Macon County, Alabama. Men in the study were offered free medical care and burials, but not penicillin, which became the recommended drug for treatment of syphilis in the 1940s. Pastor John Hagee Dedicates State-of-the-Art Home to Expectant Mothers in Crisis: 'Help Is Mandated' Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Megachurch Pastor John Hagee of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, has officially dedicated a new state-of-the-art facility to expectant mothers in crisis so that they and their children can have a safe space to build a "strong foundation for a fulfilling life." John Hagee Ministries announced on Monday that building work on the Sanctuary of Hope, set to open in May, has nearly been completed a year after the Christian ministry first broke ground on the facility. "I'm very proud that we are able to so quickly begin offering these services just a little more than one year after we first started building the main facility. Christians are mandated to help their neighbors in need; the Sanctuary of Hope will do just that by providing women in crisis with an opportunity to build prosperous, loving lives," Hagee said, revealing that the facility is a life-long dream of his. While the building will first house 24 expectant mothers and 24 additional mothers with their newborn children, in the long-term it is looking to care for a total of 300 residents at a time. Besides providing a home, the sanctuary will also offer on-site medical care, parental training, counseling, educational opportunities and job placement assistance, all free of charge. Hagee's son, Matt, executive pastor of Cornerstone Church, explained that SOH is more than just a home for a mother in crisis, but that it's about "helping her in every aspect of her life, and helping her child in every aspect of their life." John and Matt Hagee broke ground on the facility in Bulverde in February 2017, noting that the aim is also to help save the lives of unborn babies. "This facility will not save every mother and every child from poverty, but as my Jewish friends have taught me, if you save one life it is as if you saved an entire world. We are going to do what we can for everyone we can," Hagee said in a statement shared with The Christian Post at the time. SOH also inspired a Zach Smith ballad released last year, titled "I Chose Me," performed by Sandy Hagee Parker of the southern gospel acclaimed group The Hagees. "This song was a definite departure for me," Smith said. "To write about the pain without portraying a 'happily ever after' closure makes for a very somber writing session. Trying to encapsulate the first-person perspective of a woman in this situation was a challenge I was honored to accept. "The Sanctuary of Hope exists to prevent women from walking down this dark path of pain and regret, so that in and of itself is the happy ending of the song. This doesn't have to happen. There is help. There is hope, a Sanctuary of Hope." Several ministries in Texas have focused part of their outreach efforts on expectant mothers in need, and were instrumental in helping those affected by the hurricanes and tropical storms that slammed into the U.S. last year. Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, was one megachurch that helped house people in the wake of Hurricane Harvey in August and September. Meredith Phillips, who operates a Christian housing ministry for pregnant mothers called LifeHouse, said that Lakewood and its pastor, Joel Osteen, provided vital help to Texans, including expectant women, without a home. "They had created a shelter on one floor and were offering services on another floor," Phillips said at the time. "There were so many volunteers that came, they were turning away volunteers, but I came in because I wanted to offer LifeHouse as a resource to any displaced pregnant women." Woman, 69, found murdered inside church where family worshiped for 4 generations Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Evelyn Player, a 69-year-old retiree, was found stabbed to death Tuesday morning inside the Southern Baptist Church in East Baltimore, Maryland, where she volunteered and her family worshiped for four generations. At a press conference Tuesday, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott called Players death inside the independent multi-campus church an unspeakable, cowardly murder. He described her as a dedicated member and staff member of Southern Baptist Church and her killer as cowardice scum. This is not OK. None of us should be OK. Her family is four generations strong at Southern. ... Solving this unfathomable, unthinkable cowardly act is now priority No. 1 for the Baltimore Police Department, said Scott. The visibly upset mayor said that while he is confident the police will absolutely close this case, members of the Baltimore community should be doing what they can to bring Players killer to justice. I dont care if this person is your son, your husband, your boyfriend, your daughter, your uncle, your aunt. You should turn this person in because if were OK with someone this cowardly murdering someone that could be your grandmother, that could be someone elses grandmother, then what are we willing to stand up for? Scott asked. We cannot continue to allow folks to do that in a church not outside the church, not walking down the street, in a church. Think about how brazen it is. Think about the lack of care in life that someone has to do [that to a] a senior in a church. Thats what we all should be thinking about today. Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael S. Harrison said Player entered the church at around 6 a.m. Tuesday and unlocked the doors, as usual, to allow contractors renovating the church to enter. Somewhere around 6:50, we know she was found inside of the bathroom there in her work area dead, where she had been attacked, Harrison said. I am with the mayor. If somebody saw something, heard something or knows something, please call us right away. Church administrator Diane Lashley told The Baltimore Sun that another church employee found Players body and called police around 7:20 a.m. When contacted by The Christian Post on Wednesday, Lashley said she could not immediately speak about the situation. Players daughter, Alethea Finch, told the publication her mother was a devoted member of Southern Baptist Church and a retired office worker at the medical publishing company Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Who would want to hurt my mother? Finch asked through tears. How could someone hurt someone in such a sacred place? My hearts broken into a million pieces. I dont understand why this happened. Friends and neighbors described Player as a beautiful person, according to CBS Baltimore, and also expressed shock that she was killed inside the church. A murder in a church? Why? That is supposed to be a safe space. Why? said neighbor Delise Lynch. She was a beautiful person, one friend, who asked to remain anonymous, said. This is devastating to know something like this could happen to just a lovely person. Its just devastating. House Republicans condemn Finland's prosecution of Christian MP over beliefs on sexuality Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Six members of Congress have condemned Finland for prosecuting a Christian politician who is facing six years in prison for sharing her biblical beliefs on sexuality and marriage, voicing their concern with the top federal religious freedom advisory committee. Led by Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, the Republican House members sent a letter to Nadine Maenza, the chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, on Wednesday. They condemned the prosecutions of Parliament Member Paivi Rasanen and Evangelical Lutheran Mission Bishop Juhana Pohjola, which they argue to be infringements on religious freedom. Rasanen has been charged with three counts of ethnic agitation over statements expressing her beliefs about human sexuality and marriage. Pohjola, the bishop-elect of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland, has been charged with one count of ethnic agitation for publishing Rasanens booklet. The lawmakers urged the bipartisan panel that advises Congress and federal government on international religious freedom issues to consider these prosecutions when recommending which countries the U.S. State Department should place on a special watch list of countries that engage in religious freedom violations. The Finnish government is currently prosecuting well-known Christians for publicly supporting long-standing Christian doctrine, the letter reads. Rasanen publicly voiced her opinion on marriage in a 2004 booklet on sexual ethics, describing marriage as between one man and one woman. She also expressed her views on a 2019 radio show and tweeted church leadership on the matter. The House members argue that the prosecutions are specific examples of the Finnish governments violation of freedom of religion. These criminal prosecutions raise serious questions regarding the extent of Finlands commitment to protecting freedom of religion for its citizens, as agreed to with its participation in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and other multi-lateral organizations, the letter reads. Prosecutors in Finland determined that Rasanens previous statements disparage and discriminate against LGBT individuals and foment intolerance and defamation. The mother of five maintains that her expressions are legal and should not be censored. I cannot accept that voicing my religious beliefs could mean imprisonment, said Rasanen in a statement previously issued by ADF International, a legal organization representing her. I do not consider myself guilty of threatening, slandering or insulting anyone. My statements were all based on the Bibles teachings on marriage and sexuality. Signatories of Wednesdays letter include Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga, a pastor and former first vice president of the Georgia Baptist Convention; Doug Lamborn, R-Colo.; Paul Gosar, R-Ariz.; Michael Cloud, R-Texas; R-Fla. The Republican lawmakers say punishing citizens for remarks made on social media and a booklet that has been in the public eye for more than 17 years is a clear abuse of government power. These actions by the Finnish government will undoubtedly have a chilling effect on free speech in Finland and the West, the letter says. At the center of religious liberty is the freedom for individuals to live in accordance to their conscience and beliefs. True religious liberty both protects an individuals right both to hold beliefs that are unpopular with the prevailing cultural winds of the world, but also their right to live out authentically and profess the truths they hold dear without fear of government interference, the lawmakers add. Those rights are fundamental and unalienable to the whole human race, and it is critical to the flourishing of both the human soul and civil society. In his address this week at an Alliance Defending Freedom freedom office in Washington, D.C., Pohjola warned that his prosecution illustrates that the Gospel of Christ is at stake because of postmodernism and cancel culture. He believes hate speech laws have been unfairly used against him. When postmodernism first swept over Western countries, its basic core was denial of absolute truth. The only truth was that you must allow everyone to have his or her own subjective truth, Pohjola said. This hyper-individualism continues, but it has now a different tone. If you are against LGBTQ+ ideology, so-called diversity, equality and inclusiveness, you are not only considered to be old-fashioned but rejected as morally evil. This is what the prosecutor general understands her duty to be, to protect fragile citizens and victims from the intolerant and hateful Christians. In May, professors from Ivy League institutions like Harvard University, Yale University and Princeton University were among legal scholars to urge USCIRF to pressure the State Department to sanction Finlands prosecutor general for prosecuting Pohjola and Rasanen. No reasonable balance of the goods of public order, civil equality, and religious liberty can ever support this suppression of the right to believe and express ones beliefs. The prosecutions are straightforward acts of oppression, they wrote. To uphold the internationally recognized rights of freedom of expression and religious liberty, the United States must now respond to the abuses in Finland as it has recently responded to other violations of religious liberty in non-western nations. This summer, the International Lutheran Council issued a statement calling the prosecutions egregious. Defense attorney apologizes for black pastor comment in Ahmaud Arbery trial Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment An attorney for one of three white men standing trial for the 2020 killing of 25-year-old unarmed black man Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia has issued an apology in court after expressing concern with the presence of prominent black pastors like Al Sharpton in the courtroom. After national blowback over his comments last week, attorney Kevin Gough on Friday apologized in the Glynn County courthouse in coastal Brunswick to anyone who might have inadvertently been offended. On Thursday, Gough told the court that he believed the presence of Sharpton and potentially other high-profile African American activist pastors in the courtroom could sway the jury. Sharpton had been invited to the hearing by Arberys family. Obviously, theres only so many pastors they can have, Gough said. If their pastor is Al Sharpton right now, thats fine, but then thats it. We dont want any more black pastors coming in here or other Jesse Jackson, whoever was in here earlier this week sitting with the victims family trying to influence a jury in this case. Sharpton called Goughs comments arrogant insensitivity. The arrogant insensitivity of attorney Kevin Gough in asking a judge to bar me or any minister of the familys choice underscores the disregard for the value of the human life lost and the grieving of a family in need [of] spiritual and community support, Sharpton said in a statement. This objection was clearly pointed at me and a disregard to the fact that a mother [and] father sitting in a courtroom with three men that murdered their son do not deserve the right to have someone present to give spiritual strength to bear this pain. This is pouring salt into their wounds. I respect the defense attorney doing his job, but this is beyond defending your client. It is insulting the family of the victim. In court on Friday, Gough said he was asked to address some comments the other day. I will let the court note that if my statements yesterday were overly broad, I will follow up with a more specific motion on Monday, putting those concerns in the proper context, he said, according to First Coast News. And my apologies to anyone who might have inadvertently been offended. Prominent civil rights attorney Ben Crump vowed that about 100 black pastors would come to pray with the family this week. Goughs client, William Roddie Bryan Jr, is being tried for Arberys murder. Arbery was shot while jogging in Glynn County in February 2020. Gregory McMichael, 65, and Travis McMichael, 35, are also being tried for the murder. Im guessing he [Sharpton] was there [at the back of the courtroom on Wednesday] at the invitation of the victims family in this case. I have nothing personal against Mr. Sharpton, Gough told the judge before raising concern about the presence of high profile members of the African American community in the courtroom. If were going to start a precedent that started yesterday, were going to bring high profile members of the African American community in the courtroom to sit with the family during the trial in the presence of the jury. I believe thats intimidating, and its an attempt to pressure could be consciously or unconsciously an attempt to pressure or influence the jury, Gough argued. To my knowledge, Rev. Sharpton has no church in Glynn County. He never has. Georgia Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley didnt object to Sharpton being in the courtroom as long as his rules were followed. News of Arberys killing made headlines last May after Lee Merritt, the familys attorney, shared a graphic video of the shooting. In the video filmed by a witness, Arbery was chased by men in a pickup truck as he ran through a neighborhood. As the witness gets closer, Arbery briefly disappears off camera, and a gunshot is fired. Gregory McMichael appears to stand in the pickup truck bed, holding a shotgun. Two more shots ring out as Arbery appears back in the frame before falling to the ground. Arbery was unarmed and dead when police arrived at the scene. Email Whatsapp Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Earlier this month, the U.S. State Department made a minor change to its annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Although the media largely ignored the move, the change adds to the ongoing shift in U.S. human rights advocacy taking place during the Biden administration. Its consequences could be far-reaching. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reinstated an Obama-era addition to the State Department human rights report reporting on foreign countries laws and programs regarding abortion and contraception. The new addendum to the 2020 report released in March now features sub-sections on reproductive rights in the individual evaluations of every member country of the United Nations. The term reproductive rights is code for abortion, and its use in official U.S. human rights reports is inappropriate. A right to abortion is nowhere to be found in international human rights law; meanwhile, the right to life certainly is. Now, American allies like Poland known for being a great protector of human rights and champion of freedom will receive a slap on the wrist at the hands of the State Departments report for having pro-life protections. This is occurring even as authoritarian regimes like North Korea and China continue conducting forced abortions on vulnerable women, constituting a grave human rights abuse. You might be thinking: how much harm can an annual State Department report that most Americans dont even know about really do? As it turns out, a lot. State Department reports set the tone for U.S. human rights advocacy and are frequently referenced by NGOs and international bodies. The topics that the United States chooses to cover in these reports conveys to the rest of the world what the United States considers human rights and what type of human rights issues our foreign policy will prioritize. These reports could also help guide discussions that U.S. diplomats have with their counterparts regarding human rights. When announcing the reporting change, State Department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters, We reaffirm our full commitment to promote and protect the sexual and reproductive health of all individuals, recognizing the essential and transformative role they play in gender equality and women and girls empowerment around the world. This is a false and damaging narrative for women. Instead of leveling the playing field, legalized abortion pressures women into viewing their children as enemies of their success. Abortion is not necessary to ensure equality having equal protections and rights under the law are. Rather than monitoring (and by doing so, implicitly promoting) access to abortion around the world, the State Department should re-focus its efforts on addressing the truly pressing human rights abuses that are unique to women and girls. Currently, the forced marriages of young women from religious minority communities are all too common in Pakistan. Uyghur women in Xinjiang are being forcibly sterilized and undergoing devastating forced abortions. And Afghan girls are being sold by starving parents and barred from going to school. These are some of the serious human rights crises that women and girls are facing around the world today, and the State Department should be paying closer attention and taking action. On his popular daily podcast, Albert Mohler, president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, criticized the State Departments inclusion of reproductive rights in its reports, saying, It is a morally grotesque corruption of the idea of human rights And its unhinged from any kind of understanding of the origin of rights coming from outside human beings ourselves. By their very nature, human rights preexist the state. They are not granted by governments; governments merely choose whether or not they will respect them. This preexistence is why diverse governments representing vastly different cultures can agree to the UNs Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). It is also why the United States and other free countries can confidently advocate for human rights around the world. Its not an imposition on cultural differences to stand up for human rights. Rather, its an acknowledgment of the human dignity of each person. We advocate for human rights around the world because we aim to protect rights that every person already has by virtue of their humanity. The rights recognized by the UDHR include freedom of thought, conscience, and religion; freedom of opinion and expression; and the right to life, liberty and security of person. The right to end the life of a preborn child through abortion clearly doesnt belong in this list. The profound importance of human rights makes the promotion of new rights invented by activists or politicians inappropriate and damaging. The United States must preserve the integrity of human rights advocacy in its annual reports and all other aspects of its foreign policy. We can start by making sure the State Departments annual reports monitor what they purport to monitor human rights. Originally published at the Family Research Council. Email Whatsapp Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Do you believe that all of us have blind spots of some kind? That all of us are shaped, for better or worse, by our own upbringing and environment? That we sometimes see things through an imperfect lens? And can you point to many blind spots among those whose beliefs and ideologies you reject? whiteIf so, perhaps we can explore some of our own blind spots here, and in this case, by we I mean we who are white Americans. The truth be told, all of us, of all colors and backgrounds, are much more inclined to see the blind spots of others, pointing out their biased thinking, their convoluted logic, their limited knowledge, and their faulty arguments. But how often do we examine our own points of view through that same lens of critical thinking? A few years ago, after months of race-related discussion on my radio show, I put forth a simple thesis: White Americans often do not see racism when it is there. Black Americans often do see racism when it is not there. Some, of course, found this thesis offensive. Many others, however, heartily agreed. I suggest we test it out here. As white Americans, when we watch the video of the tragic death of George Floyd, do we see this as race-related? For many of us, the answer is no, even if we see it as an act of unjustified police brutality, worthy of conviction under the law (as the court ultimately ruled). As for black Americans watching this video, this was yet another example of white brutality against an unarmed black man. In response, we say, But look at the facts. Look at the statistics. Only a dozen or so unarmed black men are killed by the police every year. You need to stop listening to the race-baiters. In response, our black friends say, How many times have you been racially profiled? And do you need to have the talk with your boys when they become teenagers, urging them to respond to police officers with the utmost respect lest they be shot? Or do you think we are just imagining the corporate pain that we feel? To be clear, and to reiterate what I have written and said elsewhere, I oppose the dangerous, anti-white curriculum that is popping up in schools across our nation. And I will continue to call out the false white supremacist accusations that are being hurled against us white conservatives by the hour. At the same time, I must ask if we really want our children to know the painful truth of American history, one that is often more sordid than we would like to admit. I was reminded of this when reading the new book by Charles Love called Race Crazy: BLM, 1619, and the Progressive Racism Movement. Love is a conservative black American who has appeared on Fox News and who is an opponent of CRT in our childrens schools. So, he is the opposite of a radical, race-baiting progressive. Yet, when discussing one of the essays in The 1619 Project, he affirms some of the horrible realities of our past treatment of black Americans as pointed out by journalist Trymaine Lee, realities that still affect many black Americans today. (I remind you again that one of the purposes of Loves book is to expose the dangerous biases in The 1619 Project, but here, there are facts he needed to affirm.) For example, Lee points out that, on average, whites have 7 times the wealth of blacks in America. Love then writes (agreeing with Lee), For the first seventy-five years post-slavery, this was nearly entirely the fault of the government, either by racist laws or by negligence taking no action as whites robbed, killed, and terrorized blacks. To illustrate this reality, Lee shares the story of Elmore Boling, a wealthy black businessman in Alabama who was murdered in 1947 by white men angered by his success. White creditors then took his money, leaving his family and descendants bereft of his wealth. Yet 1947 is not that long ago, and the effects of Bolings murder and financial rape are still felt by his grandchildren today. Love then writes this: Armed white people stormed prosperous majority-black Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1898 to murder dozens of black people, force 2,000 others off their property, and overthrow the city government. In the Red Summer of 1919, at least 240 black people were murdered across the country. And in 1921, in one of the bloodiest racial attacks in United States history, Greenwood, a prosperous black neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was burned and looted. It is estimated that as many as 300 black people were murdered, and 10,000 were rendered homeless. Thirty-five square blocks were destroyed. No one was ever convicted in any of acts of racist violence. These were obvious acts of terrorism, but the government also played an active role in suppressing economic opportunities for blacks. . . . I can assure you that I never learned any of this as a child in school (at least, to the best of my memory). Does this mean that white children today should be made to feel guilty about the past? Absolutely not! Unless, of course, they are racists themselves, in which case they should be ashamed. Does this mean that white kids should be identified as the oppressor class? No, no, no. Does this even mean that white Americans should be paying out reparations to black Americans? Love himself writes, I want to clearly state that I believe reparations were the proper response to slavery; I just believe the clock has run out on the payment. Thus, we need to address the remaining inequities in more practical ways today. Then what is the point of me sharing all this? It is simply that our black friends want us to listen and learn. They want us to understand their perspective. They want us to address our own blind spots. They want us to know our history better than many of us do, not just praising past American exceptionalism but also grieving over past American racism. As one black caller said to me on the air one day, I dont want you to do anything about the pain we have experienced. I just want you to listen. It is the least that we can do. Gunmen kill 2 of 66 kidnapped Baptist church members in Nigeria; 3 injured Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Armed bandits in Nigerias Kaduna State have killed two of the more than 60 worshipers of Emmanuel Baptist Church whom they had kidnapped during a church service about two weeks ago, a local Christian leader has confirmed. The bandits opened fire on five of their victims and killed two people while three others were seriously injured and are currently in the hospital, Rev. Joseph Hayab, Kaduna chapters chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, said in a statement, as quoted by the PUNCH news outlet. The gunmen stormed Emmanuel Baptist Church in Kakau Daji area in southern Kaduna on Oct. 31, the international Christian persecution watchdog Open Doors reported at the time, adding that the telecom networks were down at the time of the attack. The church was unable to call for help, whilst the bandits have reportedly asked for a higher ransom because they had to travel farther for network service to contact the victims relations. The lives of the abducted Christians are in danger and require urgent intervention of government and security agencies, Rev. Hayab said. The insecurity in Kaduna State has continued to grow beyond our imagination and is threatening the peace of the nation. Haya earlier told the anti-communist global news outlet Epoch Times that the Baptist church is the worst-hit church in this state. More than 140 students were abducted in July as they were scheduled to take their final exams at Bethel Baptist High School in the Chikun local government area in Kaduna. The abductors promised the parents that their children would not starve if they provided rice, beans, palm oil, salt and stock cubes. They said a ransom demand would follow, Reuters reported at the time. Terrorist groups with a foothold in Nigeria have carried out mass kidnappings in recent years, including kidnapping over 200 girls from a school in Chibok in 2014. Dede Laugesen, the executive director of Save the Persecuted Christians, told The Christian Post in an earlier interview that terrorists will often kidnap boys and brainwash them to become jihadis. Many Nigerians have raised concerns about what they perceive as the governments inaction in holding terrorists accountable for the rising number of murders and kidnappings. In an earlier interview with CP, Emeka Umeagbalai of the Anambra-based International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law said kidnappings of Christians happen for various reasons. Some terrorists, like Boko Haram, the Islamic State West Africa Province and radicalized members of the Fulani herding communities are motivated by money, while others are inspired by Islamic radicalism. Security analysts say kidnapping for ransom is becoming a lucrative industry in Nigeria. And weapons are becoming readily available to militants in Nigeria thanks to war-torn Libya. CAN has appealed to well-meaning individuals, organizations, those in authority, especially the Federal Government and the international community, to come to our rescue. The evil we are experiencing is more than what an ordinary person in Kaduna and Nigeria can handle. CAN is appealing to all Christians and people of our state to be united in fighting this evil and be watchful, Rev. Haya added. In Kaduna and across Nigerias farm-rich Middle Belt, there has been an increasing trend of attacks in recent years on predominantly Christian farming communities. Some pinpoint the beginning of the trend to have started around 2015 as estimates suggest that thousands have been killed as Fulani radicals have been accused of invading countless communities. Despite calls for government action to thwart the violence, the government has long attributed attacks and reprisals as part of decades-old farmer-herder clashes, a defense some human rights advocates say ignores the religious components of the violence. That is a distorted representation of whats really happening. In fact, there is a farmer-herder aspect to the violence, Epoch Times Africa Desk Editor Doug Burton told The Christian Post this week. But that discounts the fact that the preponderance of the attacks are sectarian in nature. Critics have warned that the governments lack of action in the Middle Belt could lead to a religious genocide similar to those seen in Darfur or Rwanda. However, the Nigerian government has pushed back on such claims. Christian persecution watchdog group Open Doors USA ranks Nigeria at No. 9 on its 2021 World Watch List of countries where Christians face the most severe persecution. Nigeria is also recognized as a country of particular concern by the U.S. State Department for tolerating or engaging in severe violations of religious freedom. Journalist arrested, charged after reporting on attacks against Christians in Nigeria Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment A Nigerian journalist faces prolonged detention allegedly for his reporting about attacks against predominantly Christian communities in Nigeria and the governments response. Luka Binniyat, a Nigerian Roman Catholic journalist and father who writes for the anti-communist Epoch Times, was arrested last week. On Tuesday, Binniyat was arraigned at the Barnawa Magistrates Court in Kaduna state. He was charged with cyberstalking, a charge that critics say is often used in the African country to silence the media. On Nov. 4, Binniyat informed Epoch Times Africa Desk Editor Doug Burton that he was arrested and urged the editor to contact all relevant persons. Burton elaborated on the circumstances leading up to Binniyats arrest and the dangers he faces in an interview with The Christian Post. Burton attributed Binniyats arrest to an Oct. 29 article he wrote titled In Nigeria, Police Decry Massacres as Wicked But Make No Arrests. The article is part of The Epoch Times coverage of the deadly persecution of Christian farming communities in the African country that human rights advocates say have escalated to near genocidal levels in recent years as thousands have been killed. In the article, Binniyat pushed back on Kadunas Commissioner of Internal Security and Home Affairs Samuel Aruwans characterization of an attack on Christian farmers in the state as a clash. The Nigerian government has long refuted claims by human rights activists that a religious genocide is taking place in Nigerias Middle Belt states, where radicals from the Fulani herding community have been accused of invading countless Christian farming communities. The government has long attributed attacks and reprisals as being part of decades-old farmer-herder clashes. In his article, Binniyat included a quote from a Nigerian senator, who accused the Kaduna government of using Samuel Aruwan, a Christian, to cause confusion to cover up the genocide going on in Christian Southern Kaduna by describing the measure as a clash as opposed to a targeted act of violence against Christians. What he [Binniyat] did there is he showed that the commissioner was projecting a false narrative, Burton explained. For this reason, I think the authorities, though they knew they would get pushback for prosecuting a dissident journalist, they decided they had to do it because they want to shut his voice down. Burton told CP that the journalist was accused of cyberstalking Aruwan. Cyberstalking is a federal offense. The magistrate ruled that he does not have authority to try the charge of cyberstalking because its a federal charge, its a federal statute. So the case will have to be transferred to a federal court. And so, therefore, in the meantime, he cant get bail because the magistrate doesnt have authority to give him bail since he doesnt have authority over this crime. Sources Burton spoke to believe that the prosecution is using a legal technicality to keep Luka in jail. By having his charges presented first in a lower court, a district court where he was charged, they expected him to be charged with defamation and injurious falsehood, Burton said. These are statutes in the criminal code in Nigeria and can be tried at the lower court level. But the charge of cyberstalking is a federal charge that has to be issued by a higher court, he continued. And so by doing that deliberately, the prosecution knew that bail couldnt be given, and that is the whole idea. On Monday morning, Binniyat texted that he felt like his life was in danger, Burton said. Additionally, Binniyat said he had been held for five days in a very cramped and dingy cell that he described as uncomfortable. Binniyat further alleged that he hadnt gotten much sleep. He texted to another person, another journalist I know named John Shiklam. And Shiklam said he feared for his life, Burton detailed. Based on conversations with other people who have faced detention for cyberstalking in Nigeria, Burton estimates that Binniyat could spend about five months in prison. Burton specifically cited the case of Stephen Kefas, who wrote something on Facebook that embarrassed a government official. The government official claimed he was being cyberstalked and feared he could be attacked because of what Kefas wrote. Burton indicated that prolonged detention could have an impact on Binniyats physical health. The folks who have to spend time in custody, they have to endure pretty harsh conditions and they get sick, he warned. Kefas contracted Hepatitis C while in prison, and members of the Adara tribe who spent time in prison caught malaria, typhoid and/or dysentery, Burton stressed. Based on what I have learned with my many conversations with Steven Kefas, the conditions in prison are not only uncomfortable, but theyre dangerous and toxic, he stated. The Adara elders were in a common cell with other criminals. They had no toilet. They have a sewer trench that goes through the middle of the cell, which serves as their toilet. Apparently, the prisoners dont have proper protection from mosquitoes because many of them come out with malaria. Based on a conversation Burton had International Committee on Nigeria Executive Director Kyle Abts, who has delivered rations to prisoners in the past, the prisons and jails dont provide food and water for the prisoners. All their food and water has to be brought to them by their relatives, he said. Those without relatives or anyone to bring them food and water can beg for charitable donations from other prisoners. Because Binniyat is not wealthy, Burton predicted he will need assistance in his legal proceedings. His legal bills will have to be paid by his friends. That would be the Southern Kaduna Peoples Union, SKPU, and also he will be getting some financial aid probably from the International Committee on Nigeria, Burton detailed. His friends and allies are planning some kind of a legal defense fund, but its not clear who will take the lead. Binniyats arrest for cyberstalking is not the first time the journalist has faced legal headwinds for his reporting. Burton recalled that Binniyat was previously imprisoned in 2017 for breach of the peace. Binniyat had previously served as the bureau chief of Vanguard Newspapers until 2017. Then after he was imprisoned, I dont think he got hired by any newspaper group because, the way it was explained to me, hes considered a controversial reporter, he said. So I started working with him in March this year, maybe May of this year. And I encouraged him to compile reports for The Epoch Times. I worked with him as his editor. And so hes published some very timely and factual reports about kidnappings and mass murders this year. Burton maintained that the central claim made by Aruwan highlighted in Binniyats Oct. 29 story, that the attacks on Christian farming communities in Nigeria are simply clashes between farmers and herders, is widely held and promoted by Nigerian government officials. That is a distorted representation of whats really happening. In fact, there is a farmer-herder aspect to the violence, the editor added. But that discounts the fact that the preponderance of the attacks are sectarian in nature. 1 2 Next Myanmar military shells Catholic cathedral for second time in 5 months Email Print Img No-img Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Comment Myanmars security forces reportedly shelled a Catholic cathedral in the northeastern Shan state for the second time in five months as they continue to fight local militias, targeting Catholic churches and convents and displacing more than 10,000 people. The military fired heavy artillery targeting Sacred Heart of Jesus Cathedral in the Diocese of Pekhon last Tuesday, days after shelling the convent of the Sisters of Zetaman, which is housed in a Marian shrine, Catholic News Service reported. The shelling damaged the windows and pews but no casualties have been reported. Security forces intensified their offensive against the combined forces of the Karenni army and Karenni Peoples Defense Force on Nov. 2 and over 10,000 people have been displaced from Pekhon township. It was intense fighting, so the majority of people have fled from their homes to safe areas, a Catholic social worker told Union of Catholic Asia News. The source added that the church is not able to respond to the needs of the displaced due to the fighting, which has also caused aid workers to flee. The cathedral was also hit by artillery fire in June. Christians make up just over 7% of the majority-Buddhist nation. Formerly known as Burma, the country is home to the worlds longest civil war, which began in 1948. Myanmars ethnic minorities, including Christians, live in the various conflict zones across the countrys borders with Thailand, China and India. Hundreds of thousands of civilians, many of them Christians, have been displaced due to the escalation of conflicts in the zones since the military coup on Feb. 1. Militias in those areas have been morally supporting pro-democracy protesters since the coup, which has led to the use of heavy weapons by the Myanmar army. Thousands of civilians in the conflict zones have sought shelter in churches when their villages are under attack. The Diocese of Pekhon and the Diocese of Loikaw in the Kayah state have been among the most impacted areas since by increasing fighting since May, UCA News notes. Last month, Burmese security forces fired heavy artillery into a town in the predominantly Christian Chin state, setting at least 100 homes and two churches on fire. The U.S. State Department released a statement condemning the gross violations of human rights. The attack was in retaliation after a Chin militia shot and killed a Burmese soldier who was breaking into houses and looting properties, the U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern reported the anti-junta Chinland Defense Force as saying. Nearly 10,000 residents of the town of Thantlang fled the area as the fire raged on, ICC reported at the time. The presence of the Buddhist nationalist military makes civilians and militias in conflict-ridden states nervous. The military has been accused of damaging places of worship and civilians homes, raping girls and women, abducting civilians to be used for forced labor and shooting civilians to death. From June to May, at least eight churches were damaged in 30 days in the Kayah and Shan states. According to Radio Free Asia, five civilians sheltering inside the churches were killed. In May, four civilians were reportedly killed and around eight others were injured when security forces fired artillery shells at a Catholic church in the Kayah state. In September, a beloved youth pastor, Cung Biak Hum of Thantlang Centennial Baptist Church, was shot dead as he tried to help one of his congregants save their burning home after it was set ablaze by the military during an attack on civilians in Chin state. Information on his Facebook page showed that he was married with two sons. He was also reportedly pursuing a masters of divinity degree at MIT Yangon. United Nations Special Rapporteur on Myanmar, Tom Andrews, highlighted the pastors murder in a tweet at the time, calling on the international community to pay closer attention to the living hell civilians have faced since the February coup brought back full military rule following years of quasi-democracy. Myanmar is ranked No. 18 on Open Doors USAs 2021 World Watch List of 50 countries where Christians face the most severe persecution. The persecution level in Myanmar is very high due to Buddhist nationalism. Burma is recognized by the U.S. State Department as a country of particular concern for egregious violations of religious liberty. home World Family of 12-y-o Christian girl held captive by Muslim man in Pakistan fear she's being forced into Islamic marriage The family of a 12-year-old Christian girl from Pakistans Punjab province who was abducted by a Muslim man earlier this month fears she's been forcefully converted to Islam and married to her abductor, just as many other girls have been in the past. The girl, identified as Meerab Abbas, has been missing since Nov. 2, although police later arrested two suspects, Asia News reported, adding that she lived with her mother, Farzana, a 45-year-old widow who works as a domestic worker in the Sahiwal area. Meerab was allegedly abducted by 22-year-old man, identified as Muhammad Daud, a native of Balochistan province. The girls family believes the abductor took her to Balochistan to force her to convert to Islam and marry Daud. A relative of the mother, Cecil George, was quoted as saying that Farzanas mental health has deteriorated since her daughters abduction and she's has been admitted to a hospital. Mareeb is only 12 years old, and she cannot marry, Zahid Augustine, a pastor in Sahiwal, was quoted as saying. The perpetrators commit these crimes in the name of religion. We just want justice. A 2014 report by The Movement for Solidarity and Peace Pakistan estimated that hundreds of women and girls from Pakistan's Hindu and Christian communities are abducted, forcibly married and converted to Islam every year. Many victims are minors taken from their families, sexually assaulted, married to an assailant, and held in captivity justified by falsified marriage and conversion documents, the U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern says. Violence, threats, and grooming tactics are used to compel victims to make statements in court supporting their captors. Religion is often injected into cases of sexual assault to place religious minority victims at a disadvantage, ICC previously reported, adding that perpetrators play upon religious biases to cover up and justify their crimes by introducing an element of religion. In September, a court in Punjab province refused to give the custody of a 14-year-old Christian girl, who was allegedly kidnapped, forced to marry and convert to Islam, back to her parents, ruling that mental capacity gives more weight than age in child conversion cases. The court rejected the petition filed by Gulzar Masih, a Roman Catholic rickshaw driver from Faisalabad city, seeking the regain custody of his daughter, Chashman, from her alleged abductor, Muhammad Usman, Morning Star News reported at the time. The judge, Tariq Nadeem, said in his ruling that Islamic jurists look at mental capacity and not a child's age for conversion to Islam. "It is a matter of faith. Hazrat Ali was only 10 when he accepted Islam," he said, referring to the fourth caliph of Islam. International watchdog group Open Doors USA, which monitors persecution in over 60 countries, ranks Pakistan No. 5 on its 2021 World Watch List of countries where Christians face the most severe persecution. Pakistan is also listed by the U.S. State Department as a "country of particular concern" for tolerating in or engaging in egregious violations of religious freedom. Originally published in The Christian Post. home World Iranian authorities order pastor back to prison to serve 5-year sentence after temporary reprieve Iranian authorities have ordered a pastor from the Church of Iran denomination to return to prison to begin serving a five-year sentence for sectarian activities, indicating that Christian persecution might be intensifying after a brief respite due to the spread of COVID-19 that led authorities to temporarily release many people from prison. Pastor Amin Khaki is now in prison in Karaj, the capital of Alborz Province near Tehran, after last Wednesdays summon, the U.K.-based group Christian Solidarity Worldwide reported. Pastor Khaki, along with two other Iranian Christians, Milad Goudarzi and Alireza Nourmohammadi, stood trial in Karaj in June. They were charged under a new amendment to the Iranian Penal Code known as Article 500-bis, which deals with sectarian activities. CSW said the three men were not allowed to be represented by their lawyer during the trial. They were each sentenced to five years in prison after being convicted of engaging in propaganda against the Islamic regime. Khaki has also been arrested, charged and convicted previously. CSW said, adding that the three are appealing the verdict. CSWs founder and President Mervyn Thomas said Irans actions send yet another negative message to religious minorities in Iran, and essentially amounts to a criminalization of Christianity. Demanding that the three be released, Thomas said, We refute the charges leveled against Pastor Khaki and his colleagues. In a separate case last week, Iranian authorities also summoned Christian converts Sasan Khosravi and Habib Heydari to return to Bushehr Central Prison to serve the remainder of their one-year sentences for propagating against the Islamic Republic by promoting Christianity, Article 18 reported. The two, who started their sentences in February, had been on furlough since March. Governed by Islamic law, Iran ranks as the ninth worst country in the world for Christian persecution by Open Doors USA as the regime has relentlessly persecuted Muslim converts to Christianity. Last February, Iranian Christian Dabrina Bet Tamraz spoke at a Family Research Council panel discussion on religious freedom in Iran. Today, there is not a free church. There is no free evangelical church, nor free Pentecostal, she said. The only churches that are allowed to function are orthodox or Catholic churches with restrictions. They are not allowed to have books in Farsi. They are not even allowed to, nowadays, print books in our own language. Any Christian literature or Bible even in our own language is not permitted. They are not even allowed to speak to a Farsi person near the church. Tamraz was among several persecuted believers from across the globe who met with President Donald Trump during the 2019 U.S. State Department Ministerial on International Religious Freedom. Together with the Revolutionary Guard, they are arresting all attendees. They raid Christian gatherings at home, restaurants, everywhere that they meet, Tamraz said. They arrest them and confiscate their belongings, their houses. Most of these Christians are subjected to intensive and often abusive interrogations. They are often tortured physically and mentally. Despite the persecution, Tamraz and other panelists agreed that the underground church in Iran is one of the fastest-growing church movements in the world. According to Open Doors USA, there are an estimated 800,000 Christians in Iran, almost double the persecution watchdogs estimate of 450,000 in 2016. Originally published in The Christian Post. English nobility, Russian aristocrats they all wanted to own these objects: the Harry Woolf Collection of Faberge masterpieces The breathtaking range of Harry Woolf's collection of Faberge pieces, from animal figures and photograph frames to perfume bottles and brooches, makes it a staple of exhibitions worldwide and perhaps the finest of its kind ever to come to Christies The special relationship between Harry Woolf and Faberge dates back to the 1970s. Woolf, then Chairman of the successful London-based pharmacy chain, Underwoods, was visiting his newly retired father and found him whiling away his days in front of some pretty average television shows. I determined there and then to find a hobby, said Woolf, so that my mind would be more satisfactorily occupied at a similar age. He duly met a string of London dealers, who worked in spheres as diverse as early clocks and contemporary art. None sparked much interest. Then, one night, a guest at a dinner party at his house in Hampstead posed the fateful question: Why not Faberge? Harry was immediately attracted. In part because the jewellery house like his paternal grandparents had been Russian; and in part because of the stunning workmanship on an object he was shown. He soon started researching Faberge and consulting experts before embarking on a passionate collecting mission that lasted the best part of 50 years. Woolf passed away at the end of 2019 and, just five days beforehand, was still buying pieces. On 29 November, a selection of his Faberge works is being offered in A Selection of Faberge Masterpieces from the Harry Woolf Collection at Christies in London. Woolf was a generous lender to Faberge exhibitions around the world the quality of his pieces ensuring that that generosity was frequently called upon. The range in the collection is breathtaking, including as it does examples of all the renowned fields of Faberge craftsmanship: from animal figures and photograph frames to perfume bottles, flower studies and brooches. It is a collection that surpasses all the prestigious examples previously sold at Christies: the Kazan (1997) and di Portanova (2000) collections, to name but two. With specific regard to the animal figures, only the British Royal Collection can be considered comparable. The House of Faberge was issued a royal warrant by Emperor Alexander III in the mid-1880s, and its objects were soon must-haves among Europes elite, routinely serving as diplomatic gifts. One of the highlights of the Woolf collection is a standing rabbit (below), carved in agate and set with rose-cut diamond eyes. Its first owner was Emily Yznaga del Valle, a society belle in Edwardian England and sister of the Duchess of Manchester. Other highlights include an intricate, trompe l'oeil study of a wild strawberry plant in a vase of water; and a stunning mosaic brooch conceived by Alma Pihl, one of Faberges two female designers. (Works by the other, Anna Ringe, a silver specialist, feature in the sale too.) Theres also an eye-catchingly enamelled, gem-set gold bonbonniere (sweet box) in the form of a doges hat. Sign up today Christies Online Magazine delivers our best features, videos, and auction news to your inbox every week Subscribe War or peace? What happened when aristocratic Leo Tolstoy met radical upstart Maxim Gorky In a previously unknown letter to a friend, the revolutionary young writer describes the day he was entertained by the worlds greatest novelist as well as being photographed with him, above at his estate, Yasnaya Polyana, in October 1900 When Leo Tolstoy met Maxim Gorky at the formers country estate of Yasnaya Polyana in 1900, it was more than just the meeting of two great writers. It represented the coming together of two different Russias and two different centuries. Tolstoy was in his seventies, Gorky just 32, and their relationship at the time might best be described as uneasy. Speaking of Gorky to their mutual friend and fellow writer, Anton Chekhov, Tolstoy said, He has a nose like a ducks bill and only unfortunate and bad-tempered people have those. Chekhov assumed that such cattiness was rooted in professional jealousy. Thanks to the popularity of short stories such as Chelkash and Old Izergil, the radical upstart Gorky was suddenly achieving sales figures rivalled only by the august Tolstoy. There was, however, more to the duos relationship than Chekhov thought as revealed by a letter coming to Exiles and Idealists, an online sale of Russian manuscripts at Christies. It was written by Gorky after his aforementioned meeting with Tolstoy in 1900 and was unknown to scholars before this auction. Born in the city of Nizhny Novgorod in 1868, Alexei Maximovich Peshkov adopted the literary pseudonym of Gorky (meaning bitter) to reflect his anger at the plight of Russias poor. He knew all about poverty, having lost both parents by the age of 11 and been forced to quit school and take any job he could find. He is 73 years old, and he jumps over ditches like a baby goat, fights like a devil with his fists, and is thinking and thinking all the time Gorky on Tolstoy He worked as a rag-picker, a mess boy and a watchman on a building site, to name but three jobs indulging in petty theft, too, whenever the opportunity arose. If there was an upside to his unceasing labour, it was that he was away a lot from the house of his grandparents. They had become his guardians, and Alexeis grandfather used to beat him brutally. Aged 19, Alexei attempted to take his own life, surviving only because the bullet somehow missed his heart. Reading books provided a certain amount of therapy thereafter, and before long his own literary efforts were being published in provincial newspapers. According to his biographer, Henri Troyat, Gorkys main aim as a writer was to denounce the flaws of society. He saw Tsarist Russia as a shameful place, riddled with deprivation and decadence and he was the first Russian author to tackle the lives of the lower classes with anything like first-hand authenticity. Maxim Gorky (Alexei Maximovich Peshkov, 1868-1936), Early photograph inscribed to Leonid Andreev, 1898. Estimate 2,500-3,500. Offered in Exiles and Idealists: A Private Collection of Russian Literary Manuscripts, 17 November-1 December 2021, Online By the turn of the century, he had also become a friend of Lenins and was giving funds regularly to the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party the revolutionary Marxist collective from which the Bolsheviks would later emerge. The contrast with Tolstoys background couldnt be more marked. Born in 1828, into an aristocratic family that traced its roots back centuries, he was the son of a princess and a count. Before he got married in his mid-thirties, his early adulthood had been one of dissolution, filled with drinking, gambling and womanising. The characters of Tolstoys novels such as his masterpieces, War and Peace and Anna Karenina chiefly came from the same upper echelons of society as he did. All of which puts the meeting between Gorky and Tolstoy at Yasnaya Polyana into context. It marks a fascinating fault-line in their countrys history: Tolstoy, aristocratic chronicler of the imperialist Russia of the 19th century, coming face to face with the would-be revolutionary, Gorky, a writer of humble roots and lowly subjects, who would align with the Communist Russia of the 20th century. The year was portentous, too: right on the cusp of the two eras in question. The pair had seen each other twice before in January and May 1900, both times in Moscow. The meeting described in Gorkys letter (penned to his friend, the painter Viktor Vasnetsov) took place in October and was their third. I just recently visited Lev Nikolayevich [Tolstoy], he writes. I spent the entire day with him. A great man! He is 73 years old, and he jumps over ditches like a baby goat, fights like a devil with his fists, and is thinking and thinking all the time. Generally speaking, its much more pleasant to look at Lev Nikolayevich than to listen to him Maxim Gorky Its unclear who if anyone specific Tolstoy was fighting, but the general point is that, despite his advanced years, he was still very physically and mentally active. Gorky goes on to say that Tolstoy handles God in a casual and easy manner, and defines him rather loosely. God, he states, is that which I desire. By the end of the 19th century, Tolstoy regarded the Orthodox churchs view of Christianity as false. In the early 1890s, he even wrote his own version of the Gospels, according to which Jesus wasnt the son of God but a wise man who had arrived at a true account of life. Maxim Gorky (pseudonym of Alexei Maximovich Peshkov, 1868-1936), Gorky meets Tolstoy, 1900. Estimate: 10,000-15,000. Offered in Exiles and Idealists: A Private Collection of Russian Literary Manuscripts, 17 November-1 December 2021, Online Tolstoy increasingly gave up fiction at this time to write polemical works on religion such as A Confession, What I Believe and The Kingdom of God Is Within You. (In 1901, the church would excommunicate him.) Gorky then writes that generally speaking, its much more pleasant to look at Lev Nikolayevich than to listen to him. But he concedes that his inextinguishable formation of ideas though quite erroneous at times is still very lively and brave: as alluring as a spring of water. Gorky adds that when [Tolstoy] starts to speak about his craft and literature, I could listen endlessly! He imparted to me the summary of the novel he is planning to write Father Sergius is the title. He not only talks about it, but literally sculpts it, paints it for you! It is all so wonderful! You can love [Tolstoy] to the point of madness and at the same time dislike him very, very much Maxim Gorky This is a curious passage, as Father Sergius was actually a short story that Tolstoy had completed (albeit not published) in 1898. Did he pass it off as a work in progress to pretend to his young rival that he was capable of composing a story pretty much on the spot? Gorky signs off his letter, saying you know, you can love [Tolstoy] to the point of madness and at the same time dislike him very, very much. Yet its the love rather than the dislike that comes across in this correspondence, above all. It turns out that these two sentries of different Russias had more in common than was suspected. They would meet again on many occasions before Tolstoys death in 1910. In his letter to Vasnetsov, Gorky doesnt quite say so explicitly, but it seems that he admired Tolstoys originality of thought, even if he didnt agree with much of its content. As mentioned above, the 1880s and 1890s had seen the senior writer develop an idiosyncratic form of Christianity, and this affected his entire outlook on life. His 1897 book, What Is Art?, offers a fine example. Here, Tolstoy dismissed a huge swathe of the Western cultural canon from Shakespeare to Wagner, as well as pretty much all of his own oeuvre. He argued that art should be judged not on aesthetics, but by how directly and authentically it communicates emotion. A two-page fragment from Tolstoys manuscript for this book (above left) will feature in the forthcoming sale. It comprises about half of chapter nine, in which he advances the theory that art became increasingly impoverished as it ceased to be religious and its range of emotions duly narrowed. The sale will also include a fragment of Tolstoys original manuscript draft for the novella Hadji Murad (above right), his final work of fiction, which was published posthumously in 1912. It tells the tale of the eponymous Chechen chief who, for reasons of personal revenge, forms an uneasy alliance with his Russian foes against his own people. (The fragment captures the storys tense finale.) Sign up today Christies Online Magazine delivers our best features, videos, and auction news to your inbox every week Subscribe For Immediate Release Chicago, IL November 16, 2021 Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Westport Fuel Systems Inc. WPRT, Adient plc ADNT, Lithia Motors LAD, Sonic Automotive SAH, and Daimler AG DDAIF. Here are highlights from Mondays Analyst Blog: Auto Stock Roundup: Q3 Earnings, Collaborations, Etc. Last week, automotive equipment providers Westport Fuel Systems Inc. and Adient plc reported quarterly numbers. While Adient reported narrower-than-expected loss for fourth-quarter fiscal 2021, Westport disappointed investors by posting third-quarter 2021 loss against the consensus estimate of break-even. Meanwhile, auto retailers Lithia Motors and Sonic Automotive acquired dealerships in a bid to enhance their brand portfolio and widen reach. Daimler AG also made headlines as it collaborated with Total Energies and Visa to step up its decarbonization goals and digital payment services, respectively. China Association of Automobile Manufacturers unveiled the October vehicle sales data in the worlds largest car market, which once again made it evident that chip shortage has been wreaking havoc in the auto industry. Vehicle sales in the country declined 9.4% year over year to 2.33 million units, tumbling for the sixth consecutive month. Nonetheless, electric vehicles in China managed to sustain the momentum, with sales of new energy vehicles skyrocketing 135% to 383,000 units in October. Recap of Last Weeks Important News 1. Westport posted third-quarter 2021 loss per share of 3 cents. The Zacks Consensus Estimate was pegged at break-even. The bottom line also deteriorated from earnings of 1 cent per share recorded in the year-ago period. The underperformance for the quarter under review can be attributed to higher operating expenses and unfavorable forex translations. Westport registered consolidated revenues of $74.3 million for the third quarter, rising 14% year over year. Yet, the top line missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $87 million. Westport had cash and cash equivalents of $142 million as of Sep 30, 2021, up from $64.3 million at 2020-end. Long-term debt decreased to $33.3 million at the end of third-quarter 2021 from $45.7 million as of Dec 30, 2020. Over the trailing four quarters, Westport topped the Zacks Consensus Estimate for earnings twice, missed once and matched on another occasion. The consensus mark for 2021 and 2022 earnings implies year-over-year growth of 220% and a decline of 85.8%, respectively. Shares of WPRT have tanked 44.4% year to date. The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell). You can see the complete list of todays Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. 2. Lithia forayed into the North America powersports market with the acquisition of Pfaff Harley-Davidson in Toronto. This acquisition marks Lithias first motorcycle dealership and is in sync with the auto retailers proven success strategy of acquiring strong, high-performing franchises. The buyout will bring Lithias total annualized revenues acquired in 2021 to $6.3 billion, keeping the company well ahead of its schedule of network expansion. The firm remains on track to achieve its ambitious five-year plan to yield $50 billion in revenues and $50 in earnings per share by 2025. The consensus mark for Lithia's 2021 earnings and sales implies year-over-year growth of 106.8% and 73.3%, respectively. Shares of LAD are up 10.3% year to date. The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). 3. Sonic announced the acquisition of Cook Volkswagen in Maryland, representing the firms fourth acquisition of the year. The latest buyout marks Sonics 89th franchised location and fourth Volkswagen dealership. The move aligns with the companys strategy to enter new markets and attain $25 billion in revenues by 2025. Sonic has been back on the buyback mode this year as the company believes to have shored up the balance sheet to tap on to growth opportunities. The consensus mark for Sonic's 2021 earnings and sales implies year-over-year growth of 96.8% and 26.7%, respectively. Shares of SAH have edged up 32.2% year to date. The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #3. 4. Daimler inked a deal with TotalEnergies for decarbonization of the road freight in the European Union. Per the agreement, the companies will jointly build an ecosystem for hydrogen-fueled heavy-duty trucks. Daimler intends to supply hydrogen trucks to customers in the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg and France by 2025. In a separate release, the Germany-based auto giant also announced that Daimler Mobility has teamed up with Visa to incorporate in-car payment features in vehicles. Effective spring 2022, customers of Daimlers Mercedes-Benz will be able to make payments using a fingerprint sensor in the car. The company will initially roll out this payment solution for customers in the United Kingdom and Germany. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Daimler's 2021 earnings and sales implies year-over-year growth of 273.1% and 12%, respectively. Shares of DDAIF have rallied 43.1% year to date. The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #3. 5. Adient reported an adjusted loss per share of 24 cents for fiscal fourth-quarter 2021, narrower than the Zacks Consensus Estimate of a loss of 65 cents. The bottom line, however, compared unfavorably with the year-ago earnings of $1.15 per share. For the reported quarter, Adient generated net sales of $2,771 million, down from $3,597 million recorded in the prior-year period. The top line also missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $3,013.2 million. Adient had cash and cash equivalents of $1,521 million as of Sep 30, 2021 compared with $1,692 million on Sep 30, 2020. Long-term debt amounted to $3,512 million for the reported quarter, down from $4,097 billion on Sep 30, 2020. The firm expects fiscal 2022 revenues of $14.8 billion, indicating an increase from $13.7 billion recorded in fiscal 2021. Over the trailing four quarters, Adient topped the Zacks Consensus Estimate for earnings thrice, with the average negative surprise of 131.1%. The consensus mark for fiscal 2022 and 2023 earnings implies year-over-year growth of 74% and 32.7%, respectively. Shares of ADNT have increased 35.8% year to date. The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #5. Media Contact Zacks Investment Research 800-767-3771 ext. 9339 support@zacks.com https://www.zacks.com Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This material is being provided for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes investment, legal, accounting or tax advice, or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a security. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. It should not be assumed that any investments in securities, companies, sectors or markets identified and described were or will be profitable. All information is current as of the date of herein and is subject to change without notice. Any views or opinions expressed may not reflect those of the firm as a whole. Zacks Investment Research does not engage in investment banking, market making or asset management activities of any securities. These returns are from hypothetical portfolios consisting of stocks with Zacks Rank = 1 that were rebalanced monthly with zero transaction costs. These are not the returns of actual portfolios of stocks. The S&P 500 is an unmanaged index. Visit https://www.zacks.com/performancefor information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release. Zacks' Top Picks to Cash in on Artificial Intelligence In 2021, this world-changing technology is projected to generate $327.5 billion in revenue. Now Shark Tank star and billionaire investor Mark Cuban says AI will create "the world's first trillionaires." Zacks' urgent special report reveals 3 AI picks investors need to know about today. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Daimler AG (DDAIF): Free Stock Analysis Report Westport Fuel Systems Inc. (WPRT): Free Stock Analysis Report Sonic Automotive, Inc. (SAH): Free Stock Analysis Report Lithia Motors, Inc. (LAD): Free Stock Analysis Report Adient (ADNT): Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Zacks Investment Research Copyright 2021 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved NEW YORK (AP) Netflix on Tuesday rolled out a new website that measures its most-viewed films and series by the amount of hours users spend watching them. The results? People are watching Squid Game and the new action-adventure film Red Notice maybe even more than you would have guessed. According to the streaming service's new metric, Rawson Marshall Thurber's Red Notice, starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds, has been watched for 148.7 million hours globally since it debuted Nov. 12 on Netflix. In the past week, the most popular series was season three of Narcos: Mexico, with 50.3 million hours viewed. The first season of Squid Game ranks as Netflix's most-watched show or film ever, with 1.6 billion hours viewed. Every Tuesday, Netflix will update the site Top10 on Netflix with the top 10 series and films on the streaming service. Until now, Netflix has been selective in sharing viewership data. It has occasionally shared views for hits, and it logs a top 10 list, without data, on the service, itself. Though the hours-viewed metric replaces Netflix's previous views, which could count just a few minutes of a movie or series. Other major streaming services, like Amazon Prime Video and Disney+, don't regularly release viewership data. Netflix's metrics still don't say how many people actually watched something on the service, and it doesn't include films or series that fall outside of its top 10. But it's the most transparent measurement so far embraced by Netflix. This is an important step forward for Netflix, the creators we work with and our members, Pablo Perez De Rosso, a vice president for content strategy at Netflix, wrote in a blog post Tuesday. People want to understand what success means in a streaming world, and these lists offer the clearest answer to that question in our industry. Netflix will publish both English and non-English rankings, and top-10 lists for more than 90 countries. The company said that it has hired the accounting firm EY to audit its figures. At its current rate, Red Notice which received largely poor reviews from critics could become Netflix's most popular film ever. That title currently is held by the 2018 Sandra Bullock thriller Bird Box, with 282 million hours viewed. Click here to read the full article. Rapper Young Dolph, best known for his 2020 album Rich Slave and collaborations with his fellow Memphis rapper and cousin Key Glock, has died in a shooting in Memphis, Tenn. He was 36. All of us at APA are shocked and deeply saddened by the sudden and tragic loss of our dear friend and client, Young Dolph, an APA representative said in a statement to Variety. The world has lost an icon, a great man and beloved artist who has been taken too soon. His dedication, drive, hard work and loyalty to all those around him always came first and he will be deeply missed. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family at this most difficult time. The shooting took place at Makedas Homemade Cookies in South Memphis on Wednesday afternoon, local station FOX News 13 reported. The owner of the store told the outlet that Young Dolph walked in to buy cookies when someone drove up, shot and killed him around 1 p.m. Young Dolph, whose real name was Adolph Robert Thornton, Jr., was born in Chicago but moved to Memphis at a young age. He was the cousin of rapper Juice Wrld, who died at 21 of a drug overdose at Chicagos Midway International Airport on December 8, 2019. Making his studio album debut, Young Dolph released King of Memphis in 2016, which reached No. 49 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. He dropped seven albums from 2016 to 2021, the most recent being Dum and Dummer 2 with Key Glock, which peaked at No. 8. He was signed to Paper Route Empire, and his most successful album was 2020s Rich Slave, which debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard 200 and was his highest-charting release. From 2008 to 2017, he dropped more than a dozen mixtapes and EPs. In September 2017, Young Dolph was shot outside a retail store in Hollywood and hospitalized in critical condition. He spent two weeks in the hospital recovering from three gunshot wounds. Released prior to the shooting, his April 2017 album Bulletproof secretly spelled out a message through the track listings (100 Shots, In Charlotte, But Im Bulletproof, So Fukem, Thats How I Feel). Young Dolph was well known in the Memphis area and donated turkeys around Thanksgiving time, donated to Hamilton High School, which he attended, and spoke to students. He was in Memphis participating in local charity work for Thanksgiving at the time of the shooting. In 2018, he made headlines for donating $20,000 to two baristas at Duke University who were fired for playing his song Get Paid. He also flew the two out to see his performance at the Rolling Loud music festival. Following the news of his death, tributes for Young Dolph poured in on social media from fans and fellow artists. R. I.P. to my friend Dolph this broke my heart Gucci Mane (@gucci1017) November 17, 2021 Tracking shots of a solitary figure striding across a Western plain, seen from within the darkened interiors of a home, bookend Jane Campion's The Power of the Dog." As the man walks, with wrinkled foothills behind him, the camera glides through the house. He goes into and out of view with each window. The man is Phil Burbank (Benedict Cumberbatch), a rough-hewn Montana rancher with a menacing arrogance and a cocky, upright posture. The first time we see him this way, through the windows, it's an early signal that The Power of the Dog will pulsate with friction between within and without, that its masterful vision of the West will play out in a juxtaposition of rugged exteriors and murkier, more mysterious interiors. The Power of the Dog" is Campion's first film since her luminous 2009 John Keats drama Bright Star"; in the interim she made the series Top of the Lake," the vivid New Zealand mystery. Even without stepping on a film set in 12 years, though, appreciation for Campion has grown. Her films, including her 1993 masterwork The Piano," have only gained admirers for the way they capture assertive inner lives piercing social structures and male hegemony. In Campion's formally composed films, lyricism claws its way through. Adapted by Campion from Thomas Savages 1967 novel, The Power of the Dog is less a return to form for Campion than a big-screen reminder of her virtuosity. The film, which Netflix opened in theaters Wednesday, isn't the Western you might think it is though it does reside on the frontier. (Campion shot New Zealand for 1920s Montana, and its foreign, craggy mountain contours only enhance the feeling that this is not your traditional Old West.) There is Jonny Greenwood's disquieting score, for starters. And the foreboding, oversized ranch house, a hulking wooden pile on dry grasslands, is also a hint that something more gothic is at play here. There lives Phil and brother George (Jesse Plemons), a study in opposites. George is finely dressed, humble and decorous; Phil, while a studied intellect, seems to never take off his chaps. He revels in the outdoor life of the range. I stink, and I like it, he says. Phil is confident he holds a greater understanding of farm life, masculinity and something more existential. He sees something in the folds of the looming mountain range that his men struggle to identify. One asks if there's something there. Not if you can't see it, there ain't," Phil replies. But just what Phil can and can't see is at the heart of The Power of the Dog, a film that, like the novel, takes its name from a Psalm. The full line goes: Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog. Dogs, seen in Biblical times as unclean scavengers, were a kind of stand-in for the devil. But whose soul is in jeopardy in The Power of the Dog? It would seem very much that Rose Gordon (Kirsten Dunst, brilliant) is the one in the crosshairs. She's a widow running a boarding house whom George falls for and quickly marries. (Their romance, which Campion allows one sweeping shot of as they embrace with a cathedral of mountain peaks all around, has a special sweetness in that it's a real-life one, too.) When George brings her home, Phil isn't shy about his unhappiness in the intrusion of a woman into his manly realm. Though his brother has long ago learned to avoid or ignore Phil's fearsome glare, Rose begins to wilt under the pressure and starts drinking heavily. A psychodrama sets in, only where the movie goes from here isn't as obvious as you might think. The three's-a-crowd tension doesn't subside, but Campion's film steadily gravitates to a fourth character: Rose's teenage son, Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee). He comes to the ranch only in the movie's second act, introducing an entirely different, maybe modern presence to the drama. Peter is a slender beanpole who dresses in black and white and gasp sneakers, and crafts fragile flowers out of paper. Phil, who conceals his homosexuality, takes Peter under his wing, an almost unfathomable development poised somewhere between horror (that Phil's hard lessons will only set up the seemingly delicate Peter for slaughter) and tenderness. Cumberbatch, so alive to his character's contradictions, and Smit-McPhee, with a bracingly singular demeanor and a sly strength, artfully play both possibilities. Against a grand backdrop, The Power of the Dog fluctuates with evolving power dynamics that seem to almost seize the movie, itself. Campion's film can feel unbalanced, with its primary characters often paired or isolated but seldom all together despite the chamber piece set-up. (George especially fades from view.) And as richly drawn as the movie is, the ending comes almost too quick. The Power of the Dog may in the end be more a twisty psychological thriller than a transcendent frontier epic. But the film's shape-shifting transformation is also part of its ruthless finesse. "The Power of the Dog, a Netflix release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for brief sexual content/full nudity. Running time: 126 minutes. Three and a half stars out of four. ___ Follow AP Film Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jakecoyleAP Ghostbusters: Afterlife" the direct cinematic follow-up to the 1984 classic is haunted, of course. But not in a good way. Director and co-writer Jason Reitman's sequel leans so hard into his dad's original that it sometimes seems like a checklist of the megahit's touchstones, from the Ecto-1 tricked-out Cadillac, to Stay-Puft marshmallows, appearances from the surviving Ghostbusters and even the same Ray Parker Jr. theme song. It has taken Ivan Reitman's original which had the feel of an anarchic Saturday Night Live skit taken as far as it could go too seriously. It fetishizes the ghost-trapping equipment and limps along until the original actors arrive one cynically resurrected to wring some sort of emotion it hasn't earned. The film is set several decades after the events in Ghostbusters, trading in the urban for the rural and ignoring any other sequels. It focuses on a struggling single mother Callie (Carrie Coon, treading water) and her two kids, the very, very teenage son Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and her precocious science whiz daughter Phoebe (Mckenna Grace, also on the soundtrack with the appropriately titled Haunted House). After Callies estranged father dies, the family pack up for his dilapidated farm in Summerville, Oklahoma, where the kids realize their grandfather was famed Ghostbuster Egon Spengler (the late Harold Ramis), who abandoned their mom for reasons unknown and hasn't been forgiven. Take a little advice, mom tells the kids, Don't go chasing ghosts. Eerie things happen for the first hour and it's appropriate that Wolfhard of Stranger Things fame is here, mixing that show's vibe with an early Steven Spielberg suburban-stressed-out-parents-and-their-quirky-kids movie feel. (The family's motto: Don't be yourself!) Chess pieces move on their own, flashlights get used a lot and proton packs get played with. The amount of acting talent wasted in this film is astounding, from a Slimer-esque critter named Muncher voiced by Josh Gad (bravo, eating noises!) and Logan Kim playing an intensely weird podcaster, to acting greats J.K. Simmons and Tracey Letts (Coon's real-life playwright-acting husband). A mom love interest is offered by Paul Rudd as a studly teacher, but 2021s Sexiest Man Alive is unable to create comedic sparks due to so much slime. Ghostbusters: Afterlife meanders along like an after-school special kids, did you know science can be cool? until the inevitable: Original stars Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Ernie Hudson arrive in the final 10 minutes to save the day (curiously also appearing, but sidelined, are OGs Annie Potts and Sigourney Weaver). And then comes the breaking point: Ramis heroically reappears thanks to supernatural computer work, a moment that can seem either incredibly crass or honorifically crass. What the hell is going on? asks one character and she's right. Poorly edited, the film's musical queues must often signal to the viewer what they should be feeling. Poorly explained, the plot relies on the audience already knowing about the first film and especially the same villains Gozer, the Gatekeeper and the Keymaster. Come on, at least update the baddies. Once viewers realize this is merely a greatest hits compilation, they can settle in and anticipate the reappearance of lines like Are you a god? and Who you gonna call? After all, this is not a movie that can stand alone. It is more like half a movie, standing in the shadow of its parent. It is a film made to sell us more lunchboxes. Ghostbusters: Afterlife, a Sony Pictures release that hits theaters exclusively Friday is rated PG-13 for supernatural action and some suggestive references. Running time: 124 minutes. One star out of four. ___ MPAA Definition of PG-13: Parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13. ___ Online: https://www.sonypictures.com/movies/ghostbustersafterlife ___ Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits Exxon Mobil Corporation XOM initiated the process to divest its natural gas properties in the Barnett shale field in northeast Texas, per a report by Reuters. The move is part of ExxonMobil's plans to restructure its portfolio to focus on more productive assets. About three years ago, the company set a target to make $15 billion from asset divestments to reduce debt. XOM offered several U.S. and international assets for sale as fuel prices recovered from the pandemic-induced crisis. The Barnett shale assets could be valued at $400-$500 million. The properties involve 2,700 wells, covering about 182,000 acres in north Texas. In the first half of 2021, production from the properties reached 227 million cubic feet per day, which has declined by almost 50% since 2016. ExxonMobil plans to continue operating the assets during the marketing process. So far, there are no agreements on the sale. XOM expects to secure bids in December and aims to close a potential sale transaction in January 2022. ExxonMobil is also planning to divest assets in Africa, Asia and Europe. XOM intends to focus its efforts on production ventures in Guyana, offshore Brazil and the Permian Basin. ExxonMobil incurred a significant $22.4 billion loss in 2020. A large portion of the loss came from $19.3 billion in write-downs in the last few months of the year as ExxonMobil marked down the value of the natural gas fields acquired when gas prices were significantly higher. In August 2021, ExxonMobil launched the sale of its shale gas properties in the United States to reduce debt and discard unwanted assets. The sale included 4,104 non-operated and 844 operated wells in the Fayetteville shale in Arkansas. The assets were part of the natural gas projects, which reported lower production capacity and reduced market value. Company Profile & Price Performance Headquartered in Irving, TX, ExxonMobil is one of the leading integrated energy companies in the world. Shares of ExxonMobil have underperformed the industry in the past three months. The XOM stock has gained 21.1% compared with the industry's 19% growth. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Zacks Rank & Other Stocks to Consider ExxonMobil currently has a Zack Rank #2 (Buy). Some other top-ranked players in the energy space are Diamondback Energy, Inc. FANG, currently sporting a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), and SM Energy Company SM and Continental Resources, Inc. CLR, carrying a Zacks Rank #2. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank stocks here. Midland, TX-based Diamondback is an independent oil and gas exploration and production company. FANG primarily focuses on the Permian basin, with around 414,000 net acres. The upstream operator focuses on growth through a combination of acquisitions and active drilling in America's hottest and lowest-cost shale region. As of 2020-end, Diamondback held 1,316 million barrels of oil equivalent in proved reserves. In the past year, shares of Diamondback have increased 198% compared with the Zacks Exploration and Production Industry's growth of 148.3%. FANGis expected to see an earnings growth of 268.1% in 2021. The company has also witnessed 10 upward revisions in the past 30 days. Diamondback's board of directors recently declared a quarterly dividend of 50 cents per share for the third quarter, indicating an 11.1% hike in its quarterly payout from the previous level of 45 cents. SM Energy is one of the most attractive players in the exploration and production space, which engages in the exploration, exploitation, development, acquisition and production of natural gas and crude oil in North America. SM's operations focus on the Permian basin, and the South Texas and Gulf Coast region. SM has total 443,188 net acres under its possession, of which 33.5% is developed. In the past year, shares of SM Energy have increased 1000.1% compared with the industry's growth of 148.3%. SM's earnings for 2021 are expected to surge 695.7% year over year. SM currently has a Zacks Style Score of A for Growth and B for Momentum. The upstream energy player beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate thrice in the last four quarters and missed once, ending with an earnings surprise of 126.3%, on average. Oklahoma City, OK-based Continental Resources is an explorer and producer of oil and natural gas. CLR operates resources across the east, south and north areas in the United States. Continental Resources' strategic water assets add huge value to its operations in Bakken and Oklahoma. As of Dec 31, 2020, CLR's estimated proved reserves were 1,103.8 MMBoe. In the past year, shares of Continental Resources' have increased 223.4% compared with the industry's growth of 148.3%. CLR's earnings for 2021 are expected to surge 484.6% year over year. CLR currently has a Zacks Style Score of B for Value and A for Growth. Notably, CLR's board of directors increased its quarterly dividend payment to 20 cents per share from 15 cents in the previous quarter. Continental Resources also resumed its existing stock repurchase program. CLRalready executed $65 million of share repurchases in the September-end quarter, while $618 million of the share-repurchase capacity remains available. Zacks Top Picks to Cash in on Artificial Intelligence This world-changing technology is projected to generate $100s of billions by 2025. From self-driving cars to consumer data analysis, people are relying on machines more than we ever have before. Now is the time to capitalize on the 4th Industrial Revolution. Zacks urgent special report reveals 6 AI picks investors need to know about today. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Exxon Mobil Corporation (XOM): Free Stock Analysis Report SM Energy Company (SM): Free Stock Analysis Report Continental Resources, Inc. (CLR): Free Stock Analysis Report Diamondback Energy, Inc. (FANG): Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Zacks Investment Research Copyright 2021 Entrepreneur.com Inc., All rights reserved BIG RAPIDS Each year, on Nov. 11, the United States has honored those living Americans who have served their country, while honoring the memories of the many soldiers that never got a chance to come home. This day of remembrance signed into action by President Dwight Eisenhower is known as Veterans Day, and has been observed since 1954. Before then, the annual holiday was referred to as Armistice Day, a day to honor the many fallen soldiers who lost their lives fighting in Europe during World War I. At the time, WWI was commonly known as The Great War, and perhaps more ironically The war to end all wars. As the next few years went by, more American lives were lost in battles overseas, which prompted Eisenhower to update the tradition to be more inclusive and respectful to veterans of a younger generation. Today, Veterans Day is observed in small towns and big cities across the nation, highlighted by jovial parades, coupled with equally somber moments of silence for those killed or missing in action. Whats often not seen during the annual day of patriotic remembrance is the plethora of hand-to-hand, one-on-one interactions and support shared between veterans who share a common, sometimes painful, bond. A prime example of this lifetime bond is the one that is shared between local U.S. Army veterans Russ Nehmer and Bruce Reges. Five years ago with the help of East Side Veterans Group and Lowes, Reges was able to get Nehmer a much-needed snowblower for the upcoming winter. During his tour of duty in Afghanistan, an explosion threw Nehmer into the ring mount of a nearby armored vehicle, causing severe and lasting damage to his back. He couldn't shovel as well as he wanted and he didnt have a snowblower, Reges said. Reges promptly went to Lowes in Big Rapids and managed to get his friend a new snowblower with a $100 discount. That particular machine sifted through its last drift of snow last winter, resulting in a return trip to Lowes for a replacement blower. There was just one problem: the warranty for the snowblower had expired the previous winter, once again leaving Nehmar sans a snowblower. With the winter fast-approaching, Reges, the East Side Veterans Group and Lowes in Big Rapids had another meeting of the minds. I went over to the store and said: This is something I bought and set up five years ago, bought an extended warranty, and now youre saying youre not going to cover it, Reges said. I said: Look, do you know who were talking about here? This guy got hurt doing what 90% of us dont do, and he needs help. With all parties at long last on the same page, Lowes got to work and fulfilled their end of the deal, until they realized the snowblowers transmission was damaged beyond repair. After holding a managerial meeting, Lowes came forward and decided they would supply Nehmer with a brand new snowblower and cover half of the cost. Half is a pretty darn good discount snowblowers are not cheap, Reges said. The new snowblower gifted to Nehmer is a self-propelled, self-starting Craftsman model for just under $900. Reges, with the help of some of his fellow members at the East Side Veterans Group, have stepped up to cover the remaining cost of the snowblower. I went over and paid for it the other day, but Ive already gotten $190 from the group, and theyre not all done giving, Reges said. (Lowes) doesn't have to do that, but they did. Theyve always supported veterans. On Tuesday, Nov. 9, Nehmer made his way to the Big Rapids Lowes, where he met his new Craftsman snowblower for the first time, just ahead of another Michigan winter. Nehmer and Reges are combat veterans who have served tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan respectively. Nehmer is currently a Reed City council member, as well as a member of the veterans group. The East Side Veterans Group is a collection of local veterans who meet twice monthly at the Wild Rose Cafe in downtown Big Rapids. Its just where we get together and help each other out doing things sometimes, and just seeing how were doing, Reges said. No politics we dont want to get into any of that nonsense. No trauma, because its not a trauma group. NEW ORLEANS (AP) Energy companies including Shell, BP, Chevron and ExxonMobil offered a combined $192 million for drilling rights on federal oil and gas reserves in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, as the first government lease auction under President Joe Biden laid bare the hurdles he faces to reach climate goals dependent on deep cuts in fossil fuel emissions. The auction came after attorneys general from Republican states successfully sued in federal court to lift a suspension on federal oil and gas sales that Biden imposed when he took office. Companies offered bids on 308 tracts totaling nearly 2,700 square miles (6,950 square kilometers) during a virtual auction hosted by the Interior Department's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. It marked the largest total acreage and second-highest bid total from a government auction since Gulf-wide bidding resumed in 2017. Driving the heightened interest are a rebound in oil prices and uncertainty about the future of the government leasing program after Biden campaigned on pledges to end drilling on federally owned lands and waters, which includes the Gulf, industry analysts said. Prices are higher now than they've been since 2018," said Rene Santos with S&P Global Platts. The other thing is this fear that the Biden administration is here for another three years. They're certainly not going to accelerate the number of lease sales and they could potentially have fewer sales. It will take years to develop the leases before companies start pumping crude. That means they could keep producing long past 2030, when scientists say the world needs to be well on the way to cutting greenhouse gas emissions to avoid catastrophic climate change. Yet even as Biden has tried to cajole other world leaders into strengthening international efforts against global warming, including at this months climate talks in Scotland, hes had difficulty gaining ground on climate issues at home. The administration last week proposed another round of oil and gas lease sales in 2022, in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado and other western states. Interior Department officials proceeded despite concluding that burning the fuels could lead to billions of dollars in potential future climate damages. Emissions from burning and extracting fossil fuels from public lands and waters account for about a quarter of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The thing that is really bedeviling people right now is this conflict between the short term and long term when it comes to energy policy, said Jim Krane, an energy studies fellow at Rice University in Houston. We still need this energy system that is basically causing climate change, even as were fighting climate change. Wednesday's livestreamed auction invited energy companies to bid on drilling leases across 136,000 square miles (352,000 square kilometers) about twice the area of Florida. Federal officials estimated prior to the sale that it could lead to the production of up to 1.1 billion barrels of oil and 4.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Shell, the largest leaseholder in the Gulf, said the leases that the company successfully bid on could offer development opportunities near existing platforms or new areas. Regardless of today's outcome, the need absolutely continues for continued competitive leases in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, said Shell spokesperson Cindy Babski. Environmental reviews of the sale conducted under former President Donald Trump and affirmed under Biden reached an unlikely conclusion: Extracting and burning the fuel would result in fewer greenhouse gases than leaving it. Similar claims in two other cases, in Alaska, were rejected by federal courts after challenges from environmentalists. Climate scientist Peter Erickson's work was cited by judges in one of the cases, and he said the Interior Department's analysis had a glaring omission: It excluded greenhouse gas increases in foreign countries that result from having more Gulf oil enter the market. The math is extremely simple on this kind of stuff," said Erickson, a senior scientist with the Stockholm Environment Institute, a nonprofit research group. If new leases expand the global oil supply, that has a proportional effect on emissions from burning oil. Therefore, giving out these leases in the Gulf of Mexico would be increasing global emissions. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management recently changed its emissions modeling methods, citing Ericksons work. Officials said it was too late to use that approach for Wednesday's auction. For upcoming sales, spokesperson Melissa Schwartz said Interior is conducting a more comprehensive emissions review than any prior administration. It's also appealing the court order that forced the resumption of sales. Erik Milito, president of the National Ocean Industries Association, said he was uncertain that using the new approach would have changed the governments conclusions, since drilling for oil in other parts of the world is less efficient and hauling imports also adds to carbon costs. The continued use of the old analysis rankles drilling opponents, who say Biden isn't following through on his climate pledges. We're talking about transitioning away from a fossil fuel economy and they are selling a giant carbon bomb of a lease sale, said attorney Drew Caputo with Earthjustice, which has a pending federal lawsuit against the Gulf sale. Some Democrats also objected to the sale. House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raul Grijalva of Arizona said Biden needs to do better after promising to lead on climate issues but continuing a fossil fuel program with a long history of mismanagement. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for about 15% of total U.S. crude production and 5% of its natural gas. __ Brown reported from Billings, Montana. ___ Follow Matthew Brown on Twitter: @MatthewBrownAP WASHINGTON (AP) The House voted Wednesday to censure Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona for posting an animated video that depicted him killing Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with a sword, an extraordinary rebuke that highlighted the political strains testing Washington and the country. Calling the video a clear threat to a lawmakers life, Democrats argued Gosars conduct would not be tolerated in any other workplace and shouldnt be in Congress. The vote to censure Gosar and also remove him from his House committee assignments was approved by a vote of 223-207, almost entirely along party lines, with Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois the only Republicans voting in favor. Gosar had deleted the tweet days ago amid the criticism, but he retweeted the video late Wednesday shortly after the vote. He showed no emotion as he stood in the well of the House after the vote, flanked by roughly a dozen Republicans as Speaker Nancy Pelosi read the censure resolution and announced his penalty. He shook hands, hugged and patted other members of the GOP conference on the back before leaving the chamber. Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called the censure an abuse of power by Democrats to distract from national problems. He said of the censure, a new standard will continue to be applied in the future, a signal of potential ramifications for Democratic members should Republicans retake a majority. But Democrats said there was nothing political about it. These actions demand a response. We cannot have members joking about murdering each other," said Pelosi. This is both an endangerment of our elected officials and an insult to the institution. Ocasio-Cortez herself said in an impassioned speech, When we incite violence with depictions against our colleagues, that trickles down to violence in this country. And that is where we must draw the line. Unrepentant during tense floor debate, Gosar rejected what he called the mischaracterization that the cartoon was dangerous or threatening. It was not. I do not espouse violence toward anyone. I never have. It was not my purpose to make anyone upset," Gosar said. He compared himself to Alexander Hamilton, the nation's first Treasury secretary, celebrated in recent years in a Broadway musical, whose censure vote in Congress was defeated: If I must join Alexander Hamilton, the first person attempted to be censured by this House, so be it, it is done. The decision to censure Gosar, one of the strongest punishments the House can dole out, was just the fourth in nearly 40 years and just the latest example of the raw tensions that have roiled Congress since the 2020 election and the violent Capitol insurrection that followed. Democrats spoke not only of the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection, but also the violent attacks that have escalated on both parties, including the 2017 shooting of Republican lawmakers practicing for a congressional baseball game and the 2011 shooting of former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords as she met with constituents at an event outside a Tucson grocery store. Republicans largely dismissed Gosar's video as nothing more than a cartoon, a routine form of political expression and hardly the most important issue facing Congress. Yet threats against lawmakers are higher than ever, the chief of the U.S. Capitol Police told the Associated Press in an interview earlier this year. The censure of Gosar was born out of Democratic frustration. Over the past week, as outrage over the video grew, House GOP leaders declined to publicly rebuke Gosar, who has a lengthy history of incendiary remarks. Instead, they largely ignored his actions and urged their members to vote against the resolution censuring him. Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida said, I would just suggest we have better things to do on the floor of the House of Representatives than be the hall monitors for Twitter. The resolution will remove Gosar from two committees: Natural Resources and the Oversight and Reform panel, on which Ocasio-Cortez also serves, limiting his ability to shape legislation and deliver for constituents. It states that depictions of violence can foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials, citing the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol as an example. Gosar is the 24th House member to be censured. Though it carries no practical effect, except to provide a historic footnote that marks a lawmakers career, it is the strongest punishment the House can issue short of expulsion, which requires a two-thirds vote. Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel, the former chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, was the last to receive the rebuke in 2010 for financial misconduct. It would also be second time this year the House has initiated the removal of a GOP lawmaker from an assigned committee, the first being Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. Gosar, a six-term congressman, posted the video over a week ago with a note saying, Any anime fans out there? The roughly 90-second video was an altered version of a Japanese anime clip, interspersed with shots of Border Patrol officers and migrants at the southern U.S. border. During one roughly 10-second section, animated characters whose faces had been replaced with Gosar, Greene and Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., were shown fighting other animated characters. Gosars character is seen striking another one made to look like Ocasio-Cortez in the neck with a sword. The video also shows him attacking President Joe Biden. Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., whose receipt of repeated death threats has required her to spend thousands on security, said Gosar has not apologized to her. She singled out McCarthy for not condemning Gosar. What is so hard about saying this is wrong? Ocasio-Cortez said. This is not about me. This is not about Representative Gosar. But this is about what we are willing to accept. This is not the first brush with controversy for Gosar, who was first elected in 2010s tea party wave. He has been repeatedly criticized by his own siblings, six of whom appeared in campaign ads supporting his Democratic opponent in 2018. Earlier this year Gosar looked to form an America First Caucus with other hardline Republican House members that aimed to promote Anglo-Saxon political traditions while warning that mass immigration was putting the unique identity of the U.S. at risk. Hes made appearances at fringe right-wing events, including a gathering in Florida last February hosted by Nick Fuentes, an internet personality who has promoted white supremacist beliefs. He has also portrayed a woman shot by Capitol police during the attack on the Capitol as a martyr, claiming she was executed. And he falsely suggested that a 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, was instigated by the left and backed by billionaire George Soros, a major funder of liberal causes who has become the focus of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. ___ Associated Press writers Alan Fram and Farnoush Amiri contributed to this report. A Woodlands physician has agreed to pay half a million dollars in a federal case where he is accused of making false claims to obtain Medicare funds and of lying about felony charges against him on alleged prescription fraud to net a Paycheck Protection Program loan. Dr. Emad Bishai, 49, of Spring, an anesthesiologist and pain management physician at Woodlands Pain Institute, agreed to a $523,331 sum in the settlement, according to a Monday press release from the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Southern District of Texas. Bishai is facing nine felony charges related to him prescribing opioid medicines, according to Montgomery County district clerk records. Some of the crimes Bishai allegedly committed resulted in the overdose deaths of four patients, according to records previously obtained by The Courier. From July 12, 2017 to May 10, 2019, Bishai billed federal programs for an invasive procedure requiring an operating room costing Medicare thousands, but which the doctor nor his medical staff actually performed, according to the press release. Bishai billed Medicare and TRICARE, a military medical program, for the surgical implantation of neurostimulator electrodes. Patients instead received devices used for electroacupuncture, which is a procedure only requiring needles inserted into patients ears with the neurostimulator taped behind them with an adhesive, the press release explained. In addition to the settlement, Bishai and Woodlands Pain Institute have agreed to being excluded for seven years from participating in any federal health care programs, the news release noted. Bishai also allegedly made false statements in May 2020 when applying to the pandemic relief program PPP for Woodlands Pain Institute. The application asked whether the applicant, or anyone owning more than 20 percent equity, was subject to any formal criminal charges, the press release detailed. Bishai, who holds 100 percent ownership of Woodlands Pain Institute, checked the box marked No and initialed his name beneath the question despite felony charges against him in Montgomery County, the press release added. County records show eight of the nine charges he is facing were filed Nov. 4, 2019, which would have been six months before his PPP application. As a result of his fraudulent application, Bishai received a loan to which he was not entitled, read a statement from the Southern District of Texas. The Department of Health and Human Services criminal investigations office probed the case with the assistance of Qlarant, a contractor for Medicare. Assistant U.S. Attorney Brad Gray managed the case, the press release mentioned. The claims resolved by the settlement are allegations only and there has been no determination of liability, the Southern District of Texas added in its press release, which also mentioned the federal court has resolved similar cases through settlements with a Katy anesthesiologist, a Houston pain doctor, a Rockport chiropractor, a Houston chiropractor and a Laredo pain doctor. Bishai was one of four physicians charged in a data-driven investigation into drug diversion by the Montgomery County District Attorneys Office. In partnership with Sam Houston State University, the project was funded by a nearly $360,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice. The doctors formal charges for his opioid prescriptions are five counts of the third-degree felony offense of practicing medicine in violation of subtitle and four counts of the state jail felony offense of prescribing controlled substance other than medical purpose, court records show. Bishai was first indicted in summer 2020, according to an article from The Courier at the time. He was indicted on his ninth charge the following month, according to court documents. Bishai prescribed over 39,758 separate prescriptions for controlled substances between Jan. 23, 2016 and Dec. 31, 2018, including over 12,000 prescriptions for hydrocodone, over 2,000 prescriptions for morphine, 12,000 prescriptions for oxycodone, and over 800 prescriptions for Fentanyl, charging documents state. The attorney for Bishai told The Courier in the Aug. 7, 2020 article that his clients Texas medical license was suspended after the charges were made but were later reinstated by the Texas Medical Board. Court records show Bishai has yet to face trial in the opioid presciption case. Mike Holley, first assistant DA at the District Attorneys Office, on Tuesday said Bishais settlement does not affect the countys case against him as it remains independent. A number listed online for Bishais practice did not respond to a request for comment. His new criminal defense attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment. jose.gonzalez@chron.com twitter.com/jrgzztx FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) Economic development projects in 10 eastern Kentucky counties will split more than $9 million in funding from the Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization Program, officials said. Funding for the projects was announced Monday by Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and U.S. Rep. Harold Hal Rogers. BOSTON (AP) An airman from Massachusetts who was shot down over Romania during World War II has been accounted for, the military said Wednesday. U.S. Army Air Forces Staff Sgt. Charles G. McMackin, 26, was accounted for in August 2020, according to a statement from the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, but the announcement was not made until Wednesday because his family was only recently briefed on the situation. The agency said McMackin was from Boston, but according to news clippings from the time of his death, he was from Revere, just north of Boston. McMackin was the bombardier on a B-24 Liberator that participated in Operation Tidal Wave on Aug. 1, 1943, a massive bombing mission against the oil fields and refineries at Ploiesti, Romania, considered crucial to the Nazi war effort, according to the the agency. His plane crashed as a result of enemy anti-aircraft fire, and his remains were not identified following the war. Remains of American personnel that could not be identified were buried in a cemetery in Romania and later moved to a cemetery in Belgium. The remains were exhumed in 2017 and sent to Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, for examination and identification. McMackins remains were identified using dental and anthropological analysis, as well as mitochondrial DNA analysis. McMackin will be buried April 14 in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. ___ This story has been corrected to reflect that the remains were identified in August 2020, not August 2021, and that McMackin was from Revere, not Boston, according to news clippings from the time of this death. Where to buy hot Christmas toys at the cheapest prices Find the best toys this holiday season without breaking the banktheyre all under $50! ANKARA, Turkey (AP) Turkey is acquiring a new drilling ship to search for natural gas in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, the countrys president announced Wednesday, amid unresolved tensions with Greece and Cyprus over Ankara's offshore energy exploration. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told legislators from his ruling party that Turkey is expanding its fleet of drilling vessels to four, describing the new ship as a high-tech vessel. NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) Tennessee authorities say a fisherman has died after a Clinch River boating incident involving a railroad bridge. The Tennessee Wildlife Agency says it is still investigating the death of 75-year-old Timothy Clark Byrn of White Springs, Florida, in a single vessel incident Monday morning in Claiborne County. The agency says a Norfolk Southern worker found Byrns body in the water near the railroad bridge and called 911. Wildlife officer Michael Cavins says it appears the boat hit an old concrete railroad bridge support that was exposed about 1 foot (0.3 meter) out of the water and marked with a buoy. Cavins say the boat hit another support, then capsized and ejected Byrn, who was not wearing a life vest. BUFFALO, Mo. (AP) Two men were charged with first-degree murder Wednesday after human remains found at a southwest Missouri home were identified as a missing woman who was photographed partially nude inside a cage, authorities said. James Phelps and Timothy Norton were also charged with abandonment of a corpse after DNA tests positively identified the remains found at Phelps' home near Lebanon as 33-year-old Cassidy Rainwater, Dallas County officials said. Nortons lawyer, Brenden Twibell, told the Springfield News-Leader the charges were expected and Norton will plead not guilty. Phelps' lawyer did not return a phone call seeking comment. Norton and Phelps were also charged with abandoning a corpse in addition to the first-degree murder and kidnapping charges. Norton is set to appear in court next Tuesday, and Phelps this Friday. Phelps and Norton have been jailed on a kidnapping charge since mid-September, when photos of Rainwater partially nude and in a cage were found on Phelps' phone, authorities said. Dallas County Sheriff Scott Rice said Wednesday in a Facebook post that the seven photos also showed Rainwater's body on a gantry crane, which is commonly used for deer processing, where she was disemboweled and dismembered before her body was placed in a bathtub. Some remains were found in a freezer, he said. Rice said Norton told investigators Phelps asked him to help kill Rainwater while she was staying at Phelps' home. He said he held Rainwater down while Phelps put a plastic bag over her head and strangled her, according to Rice. Sheriff's deputies were contacted in August by a woman who said Rainwater hadn't been seen since July and Phelps was the last person she was seen with. In September, Phelps twice told investigators that Rainwater was staying with him while she got on her feet, but he said he hadn't seen her since she left about a month ago and that she was going to Colorado, Rice said. On Sept. 16, the FBI provided the photos of Rainwater to Dallas County detectives, who arrested Phelps. Norton was arrested on Sept. 20 after speaking to authorities. Investigators searched Phelps' home for seven days and found the gantry device, cage and items in the freezer that appeared to be human remains, Rice said. Those items were dated July 24. Digital evidence found at the scene revealed messages between Phelps and Norton planning Rainwater's death, the sheriff said. Some skeletal remains believed to be Rainwater were located on the adjacent property, authorities said. On Oct. 4, a fire that investigators have ruled an arson destroyed Phelps' home. Officials investigating the fire found two explosive devices made with mortar tubes and balloon covers, with tripwires attached, near the home. Investigators have no evidence to indicate that any other victims are associated with Phelps and Norton, the sheriff said. HELENA, Mont. (AP) Democratic State Rep. Laurie Bishop bowed out of the race for Montanas new U.S. House seat on Thursday, a week after the congressional district boundaries were finalized, leaving her hometown of Livingston outside of the district in which she was running. Bishop had launched her candidacy in July, becoming the first Democrat to enter the race for the states newly announced western U.S. House district. At the time, she said she would run in the district that includes liberal college town Missoula even if Livingston was not placed in the same district. COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) A South Carolina city is paying $650,000 to a Black man who was stomped in the head by a white police officer upset that the man could not quickly lie flat on his stomach because of rods and pins in his leg. Orangeburg officials also have apologized to Clarence Gailyard and are reviewing the police department's use of force policies, City Administrator Sidney Evering said in a statement released by Gailyard's lawyer Justin Bamberg. The city's insurance will cover the payment. Gailyard was walking with a stick wrapped in shiny tape on July 26 when someone mistook the reflective object for a gun and called 911, investigators said. Orangeburg Public Safety Officer David Lance Dukes ordered Gailyard to the ground and when the 58-year-old didn't immediately drop, the officer stomped on his head and neck, causing his forehead to hit the concrete of the parking lot, according to police body camera video. Gailyard said he moved slowly and often walks with a cane because of pins and rods in his leg from being hit by a vehicle while riding a bicycle. He also said he was carrying the stick to protect himself from potential dog attacks. The city's statement said most officers do their difficult jobs well a second officer tried to calm the situation and told a supervisor who came to the scene later that Dukes lied about his actions but swift, fair action must be taken when officers do wrong. When an officer falls short of these expectations and conducts themselves in ways unbecoming to their department and the City, that officer must and will be held accountable, Evering said. Dukes, 38, was fired two days after the incident and charged with felony first-degree assault and battery a few days after that. His lawyer has said the former officer is fully cooperating with state police in what he called a difficult and unfortunate situation. Gailyard's lawyer said he appreciated how quickly Orangeburg worked to both help Gailyard and change the culture of a police department which had seen three years of increasing use-of-force case where 75% of the 13,000 residents are Black. The police chief retired shortly after the incident and the department's interim chief is reviewing use of force rules. The force is also creating a group of citizens to oversee how officers treat people, the city said. Ive handled numerous cases involving police violence previously and rarely have I seen a city swiftly accept responsibility and also work to ensure that this never happens to another person, Bamberg said. Gailyard is happy to put what happened behind him, Bamberg said. Gailyard spoke to reporters a few weeks after he was hurt. Every time I look in the mirror, I see the scar on my forehead, and its not OK. The only thing I want the community to do is change, Gailyard said. ___ Follow Jeffrey Collins on Twitter at https://twitter.com/JSCollinsAP. VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) The Canadian Pacific coast province of British Columbia declared a state of emergency Wednesday following floods and mudslides caused by extremely heavy rainfall, and officials said they expected to find more dead. Every major route between the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, where Canada's third largest city of Vancouver is, and the interior of the province has been cut by washouts, flooding or landslides following record-breaking rain across southern British Columbia between Saturday and Monday. The body of a woman was recovered from one of the mudslides late Monday. Torrential rains have led to terrible flooding that has disrupted the lives and taken lives of people across B.C. I want people to know that the federal government has been engaging with the local authorities, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in Washington. We're sending resources like the Canadian Armed Forces to support people but also we'll be there for the cleanup and the rebuilding after impacts of these extreme weather events. The federal government said it was sending the air force to assist with evacuations and to support supply lines. Military helicopters already helped evacuate about 300 people from one highway where people were trapped in their cars Sunday night following a mudslide, We expect to confirm even more fatalities in the coming days, British Columbia Premier John Horgan said. Horgan called it a once in a 500 years event. He said the state of emergency will include travel restrictions so the transport of essential goods medical and emergency services will reach the communities that need them. He asked people not to hoard goods. These are very challenging times. I've been at this dais for two years now talking about challenging times we have faced unprecedented challenges with public health, wildfires, heat domes and now debilitating floods that we have never seen before, Horgan said. Horgan said over the past six months there have been drought conditions in Merritt, where the river was at its lowest point in living memory and where people had to be evacuated because of wildfires in temperatures that were unprecedented. And now, he said, much of the community is under water. We need to start preparing for a future that includes more events like this, Horgan said. The weather events are all connected and can be attributed to climate change, said John Clague, a professor in the Earth Sciences Department at Simon Fraser University. Scientists are now saying these particular events, theyre becoming more frequent, exacerbated or ramped up by climate change, he said. The record temperatures in the summer set the stage for the wildfires, said Clague. The fires burned the ground in a way that prevents water from seeping into the soil. He said that resulted in the water from the torrential rains pouring more quickly into steams and rivers, causing floods. The total number of people and vehicles unaccounted for had not yet been confirmed near the town of Lillooet. Investigators had received reports of two other people who were missing but added that other motorists might have been buried in a slide on Highway 99. Chelsey Hughes said she was thankful to have survived the slide that slammed into her car before it landed in a swamp as she was driving along the highway. Hughes was heading home Sunday when she saw a tree starting to fall as a slide shoved her car about a mile off the road and down an embankment. Then the car stopped moving and I was just shocked. I was afraid to move because I didnt know if I was injured, she said after spending about five hours shivering on top of her car without a jacket next to another vehicle with four university students sharing one jacket atop their vehicle. When Hughes finally connected with a 911 dispatcher, he helped her monitor one students condition after he had an asthma attack before they finally saw the lights of rescuers. They spent an hour hiking out, she said of the traumatic events that unfolded Sunday night before nine of them were taken to hospital. She said she has been thinking about the family of a woman who died. I think that could have been any one of us, and theres nothing that you can do. When we got hit by that landslide, we just had to surrender," she said. Agriculture Minister Lana Popham said thousands of animals had died and the province was rushing to get veterinarians to other animals that are in danger. ``I can also tell you that many farmers attempted to move animals and then had to walk away because the roads were disappearing beneath them, she said. A trade expert said the loss of major transportation routes will hurt the movement of goods both in and out Canadas largest port in Vancouver. Vancouver really has an outsized role to play in our Pacific trade, said Werner Antweiler, an associate professor at the UBC Sauder School of Business. Commodities will be impacted in a much more significant way because its coming by rail or coming by big trucks. ___ Associated Press writer Jim Morris reported this story in Vancouver and AP writer Rob Gillies reported from Toronto. NEW YORK (AP) Visitors to the latest chic hotel to open in New York's theater district can easily walk to any Broadway show or they can stay inside and celebrate them. The Civilian a 203-room hotel with bars, lounges and a bistro is packed with hundreds of pieces of Broadway art, including sketches, set models, costume pieces, photographs and artifacts that show theater past and present. I think people dont realize that this neighborhood is just like a walking history of so much, said award-winning architect and theater designer David Rockwell during a tour of the hotel he helped craft. So I think it deserves to have a place thats dedicated to that. The 27-story building at 305 W. 48th Street, between 8th and 9th avenues is from Sixty Collective hotelier Jason Pomeranc, who says the goal is to immerse visitors in a theatrical experience. The Civilian opens Nov. 24. Nearly every inch of the Civilian has been designed with a theatrical flourish, from the marquee-inspired lighting, dramatic curtains, stage-like elements to the raw industrial materials of backstage life. On display are set models of shows like Hadestown designed by Rachel Hauck and Slave Play by Clint Ramos and sketches from Chicago designed by William Ivy Long. The hotel plans to cycle new items in every year or so. Wallcoverings throughout the guestroom floors and elevators are taken from abstracted details from costume designs by Isabel and Ruben Toledo ("After Midnight") and William Ivey Long ("Beetlejuice" and Hairspray). Creators hope this is a chance for the talent offstage to shine. Im always amazed when I work on a project and theres a moment in the show when you realize 25 people touch that moment to make it work. So, in some ways, this is a chance to be exposed to all of those different people, said Rockwell. One wall area displays art from 20 artists and students who offered works inspired by a quote Its a city of strangers/Some come to work/Some to play from the musical Company. A piano lent by Rockwell himself will become the focus of impromptu performances, the hotel's creators hope. There's also a private library finished in royal blue hues and marquee lightbulbs where visitors can find replica guns and a crown from "Hamilton," the original set model for Company as well red boots from Kinky Boots and a pink shrug from Cabaret. "This really feels like a dressing room, says Rockwell. Upstairs, the guest rooms a two-person Cozy or a 4-person Spacious have one of two color schemes deep blue or wine-maroon hand-painted details, four-poster beds, upholstered benches and framed costume and set sketches. High design meets homey. On the beds are pillows with abstracted patterns by costume designers Jeff Mahshie and David Zinn. Luggage fits under the bed, and bathrooms with glazed porcelain sinks have heated floors. Even though the rooms are more petite than what weve done in the past, I dont believe that the guest should have to sacrifice anything on a visual or textual experience, whether its the rich velvets from the fabrics or the tile in the bathroom or the quality of sheets and linens and pillows, says Pomeranc. The quality level should not diminish because of the room size. Visitors enter through a lobby that feels like a stage door and into a vestibule with an abstract interpretation of marquee lighting imbedded into the ceiling. A bank of theater seats rescued from an upstate theater sit along a brick wall and visitors climb a set of metal spiral stairs past a curtain to the second-floor bar, lounge and library. Does it feel like youre stepping into kind of the fly loft you always wanted to get in? asks Rockwell and, to be sure, there's a strong The Phantom of the Opera feel. There are photos throughout, starting in the lobby with black-and-white photos by Little Fang, the husband-and-wife team known for their opening-night portraits. Each floor will have framed art in the hallways clustered around a theme. The fourth floor, for example, is dedicated to rehearsal shots, with photos of Michael Bennett at Dreamgirls and the cast of Miss Saigon. In the restaurant are 41 round, custom sconces featuring sketches of the Broadway theaters by set designers including Derek McLane, Es Devlin, Scott Pask, Tony Walton, Mimi Lien and Rockwell. A roof deck to open in the spring will have an enclosed lounge and bar. Pomeranc hopes to create a series of different types of public space experiences, from turning the lounge from a place where people can work and communicate during the day to a music-filled space in the evening to relax. It really speaks to the journey of the guest thats looking for an authentically New York experience, he said. Partial proceeds from the Civilian will be donated to the American Theatre Wing, which also has supplied the hotel with images from its photo archives. Wing President and CEO Heather Hitchens says a watering hole for the theater community is deeply needed. A place for theater people to gather that also showcases and celebrates the work of those who don't always get the attention they deserve is a welcome addition, she says. ___ Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits Health departments in west-central Illinois are adding clinics for children to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination against COVID-19 as the state steps up efforts for mass inoculation of those in the age group. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized on Oct. 29 the emergency use of a lower-dose vaccine for children ages 5 to 11. Previously, it was available only to those 12 or older. The vaccination is not required for students at present, and parents must give consent for children to be vaccinated. In Morgan County, there will be a clinic today at 559 N. Westgate Ave., northwest of Jacksonville Memorial Hospital. Sign-ups are available at the Morgan County Health Department website at morganhd.com. Vaccinations are available at Greene County Health Department in Carrollton from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 6:30 p.m. today and from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 3 p.m. Friday and Nov. 24. No appointment is necessary but can be arranged if needed. Macoupin County health officials have been going to schools across the county this week for a series of vaccination clinics. They will be at North Mac from 2 to 4 p.m. today, Brighton North Primary School from 2 to 4 p.m. Thursday and Staunton School from 2 to 6 p.m. Friday. Health department representatives plan to return to the schools in December for required second doses, starting at Carlinville on Dec. 3. The pediatric vaccine requires two doses, three weeks apart. In Jersey County, there will be a children's vaccine clinic from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday at the health department. No appointment is necessary for the drive-through clinic. The Illinois chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics on Tuesday launched the program Illinois Vaccinates Against COVID-19 to expand vaccinations across the state. The agency has been given a $5 million contract through the Illinois Department of Public Health to incorporate vaccinations into routine patient care workflows in primary care settings, urgent care centers and when being discharged from a hospital. The group will be targeting all age groups, chapter President Mary Dobbins said. It will partner with community organizations as part of the program. Making these vaccines a part of routine care makes sense and we are ready for this step," Dobbins said. "We have all been through so much during this pandemic, especially our children. We are pleased to be able to start looking ahead. In approving use of the lower-dose vaccine, the FDA said testing in about 3,100 children ages 5 to 11 showed no serious side effects. The vaccine was found to be 90.7% effective in preventing coronavirus in the age group, according to the FDA. Common side effects in clinical trials included injection site pain, redness and swelling, fatigue, headache, muscle or joint pain, chills, fever, swollen lymph nodes, nausea and decreased appetite. More children reported side effects after the second dose, according to the FDA, but side effects generally were mild to moderate and most went away within a day or two. About 39% of the COVID-19 cases involving those under age 18 and in children ages 5 through 11, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. BEIJING (AP) China and the U.S. have agreed to ease restrictions on each other's journalists amid a slight relaxation of tensions between the two sides. The official China Daily newspaper on Wednesday said the agreement was reached ahead of Tuesdays virtual summit between Chinese leader Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden. The agreement represents a degree of progress on an issue that has long aggravated relations, but details remain to be ironed out. COVID-19 travel restrictions and long-standing obstacles faced by foreign media within China are also factors standing in the way of a major breakthrough in media relations. Under the agreement, the U.S. will issue one-year multiple-entry visas to Chinese journalists and will immediately initiate a process to address duration of status issues, China Daily said. China will reciprocate by granting equal treatment to U.S. journalists once the U.S. policies take effect, and both sides will issue media visas for new applicants based on relevant laws and regulations," the report said. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian gave no information on a timeline for implementation, but called the agreement a hard-won achievement that is in the interest of both sides and should be cherished." We hope that the U.S. will keep its promise to put the relevant measures and policies in place as soon as possible and work with China to create favorable conditions for both (nations') media to continue to work and live in each others countries," Zhao said at a daily briefing. In a statement to The Associated Press late Tuesday, the State Department said China had committed to issuing visas for a group of U.S. reporters provided they are eligible under all applicable laws and regulations." We will also continue issuing visas to (Chinese) journalists who are otherwise eligible for the visa under U.S. law," the statement said. China also committed to increase the length for which U.S. journalist visas are valid from the current 90 days to one year. On a reciprocal basis, we are committing to increase validity of U.S. visas issued to PRC journalists to one year as well," the State Department statement said, referring to the People's Republic of China. Not mentioned in either statement were press conditions in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory of Hong Kong, where both local and international media have come under increasing pressure. The Economist said last week that Hong Kong refused a visa renewal for its correspondent Sue-Lin Wong. Authorities have not explained the rejection. Limits on journalists have fueled tensions between the two countries for more than a year after the U.S. cut 20 visas issued to Chinese state media journalists and required those remaining to register as foreign agents, among other changes. China responded by expelling journalists working for U.S. outlets and severely restricting conditions for those continuing to work in the country. The new agreement was the result of more than a year of difficult negotiations over the treatment of media outlets in both countries," China Daily said. It is hoped that more good news is ahead for the two countries media outlets through further China-U.S. cooperation," the newspaper added. The State Department said it has remained in close consultation with the affected outlets, as well as other outlets facing personnel shortages due to PRC government policy decisions, and we are gratified their correspondents will be able to return to the PRC to continue their important work. We welcome this progress but see it simply as initial steps." The State Department also said it would continue to work toward expanded access and better conditions for U.S. and foreign media in China, where they face considerable obstacles ranging from questioning by police, harassment preventing them from doing their work, personal threats and lawsuits brought by people they interview. We will continue to advocate for media freedom as a reflection of our democratic values," the State Department told the AP. Asked about Wong's case, Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said the issuing of visas is at the autonomy and the discretion of any government. Lam added that the authorities do not comment on individual cases but will continue to facilitate the operation of overseas media based in Hong Kong in a legitimate manner according to the citys mini-constitution, known as the Basic Law. The city's Foreign Correspondents Club said it was deeply concerned over the denial of Wongs employment visa. We again call on the government to provide concrete assurances that applications for employment visas and visa extensions will be handled in a timely manner with clearly-stated requirements and procedures, and that the visa process for journalists will not be politicized or weaponized, the club said in a statement last week. Wong is the latest in a string of journalists in Hong Kong to be denied visas. In 2018, Hong Kong authorities refused to renew the work visa of Financial Times senior editor Victor Mallet after he chaired a lunchtime talk at the Foreign Correspondents Club with the leader of a now-banned pro-Hong Kong independence party. Authorities did not say why Mallets application was rejected. In 2020, Hong Kong did not renew a work visa for Chris Buckley, a New York Times reporter who had been working in Hong Kong after being expelled from China, as well as for Irish journalist Aaron Mc Nicholas, who was then an incoming editor for the independent media outlet Hong Kong Free Press. ___ Associated Press reporter Zen Soo in Hong Kong contributed to this report. Courtesy photo /Webb County Webb County staff members prepared over 50 bags containing all the necessary fixings for a Thanksgiving dinner. The bags contained the turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing and vegetables. EDWARDSVILLE - In mid-September, Ameren Illinois announced a mid-year rate hike due to the rising costs of purchased power used in its residential rates. The City of Edwardsvilles municipal aggregation electricity purchasing program, however, is unaffected by this increase. Customers are protected by the fixed-price contract which charges lower rates through May 2022. Amerens new rate for the period October 2021 through May 2022 is 5.407 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh), while your communitys rate is 4.390 cents per kWh, based on contract terms specific to your community The rate difference will produce savings of approximately $7 per month for residential customers. Participants in the program will have saved $100 on average since January 2020 Your communitys municipal aggregation program provides its participants a hedge against the rising costs of energy in the marketplace Participation in the aggregation program, offered to both residential and small commercial customers, is voluntary. There is no cost to enroll or to leave the program An opt-out letter providing pricing and contract terms and conditions is sent to newly eligible accounts (i.e., new residents moving into or within the community, those accounts coming off third-party supply with another supplier) SAN DIEGO (AP) San Diego has agreed to a nearly $24 million settlement with a cyclist paralyzed seven years ago when a car driven by an intoxicated driver collided with him on a blind turn. The City Council approved the payout to Juan Carlos Vinolo in September and was scheduled to finalize the deal Tuesday, the Union-Tribune reported. For Woodlands resident David Olowokere, one of Nigeria's sons, having a master's degree in engineering just wasn't enough for his people back home. So he got a doctorate. His wife, Shalewa Olowokere, a civil engineer, didn't stop at a bachelor's, either. She went for her master's. The same obsession with education runs in the Udeh household in Sugar Land. Foluke Udeh and her husband, Nduka, both have master's degrees. Anything less, she reckons, would have amounted to failure. "If you see an average Nigerian family, everybody has a college degree these days," said Udeh, 32, a physical therapist at Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center. "But a post-graduate degree, that's like pride for the family." Nigerian immigrants have the highest levels of education in this city and the nation, surpassing whites and Asians, according to Census data bolstered by an analysis of 13 annual Houston-area surveys conducted by Rice University. Although they make up a tiny portion of the U.S. population, a whopping 17 percent of all Nigerians in this country held master's degrees while 4 percent had a doctorate, according to the 2006 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. In addition, 37 percent had bachelor's degrees. In comparison To put those numbers in perspective, 8 percent of the white population in the U.S. had master's degrees, according to the Census survey. And 1 percent held doctorates. About 19 percent of white residents had bachelor's degrees. Asians come closer to the Nigerians with 12 percent holding master's degrees and 3 percent having doctorates. The Nigerian numbers are "strikingly high," said Roderick Harrison, demographer at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank that specializes in researching black issues. "There is no doubt that these are highly educated professionals who are probably working in the petrochemical, medical and business sectors in Houston." Harrison analyzed the census data for the Houston Chronicle. Stephen Klineberg, a sociologist at Rice University who conducts the annual Houston Area Survey, suspects the percentage of Nigerian immigrants with post-graduate degrees is higher than Census data shows. Of all the Nigerian immigrants he reached in his random phone surveys 1994 through 2007 45 households total Klineberg said 40 percent of the Nigerians said they had post-graduate degrees. "These are higher levels of educational attainment than were found in any other ... community," Klineberg said. There are more than 12,000 Nigerians in Houston, according to the latest Census data, a figure sociologists and Nigerian community leaders say is a gross undercount. They believe the number to be closer to 100,000. Staying in school The reasons Nigerians have more post-graduate degrees than any other racial or ethnic group are largely due to Nigerian society's emphasis on mandatory and free education. Once immigrating to this country, practical matters of immigration laws get in the way. The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 made it easier for Africans to enter the U.S., but mostly as students or highly skilled professionals not through family sponsorships, Klineberg said. So many Africans pursue higher levels of education as an unintended consequence of navigating the tricky minefield of immigration, said Amadu Jacky Kaba, an associate professor at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J., who has done research on African immigrants in the U.S. "In a way, it's a Catch-22 because of immigration laws you are forced to remain in school, but then the funny thing is you end up getting your doctorate at the age of 29," Kaba said. "If you stay in school, immigration will leave you alone." Although Kaba, who teaches Africana Studies, is not from Nigeria (he is Liberian), he said he, too, found himself pursuing a master's and then a doctorate to remain in this country legally. But not all Africans have to go this route. Some say their motivation is driven by their desire to overcome being a double minority: black and African. Take Oluyinka Olutoye, 41, associate professor of pediatric surgery at Baylor College of Medicine. He came to this country already as a medical doctor but decided to pursue his doctorate in anatomy to help set himself apart. "Being black, you are already at a disadvantage," said Olutoye, whose wife, Toyin Olutoye, is an anesthesiologist at Baylor. "You really need to excel far above if you want to be considered for anything in this country." Family expectations All this talk of education creates high expectations for children of Nigerian immigrants. The eldest child of David Olowokere, chairman of the engineering technologies department at Texas Southern University, for example, is already working on her master's degree in public health in Atlanta; the middle child is pursuing a bachelor's in pre-medicine. His youngest, a son, attends The Woodlands High School. He already has aspirations to go into engineering, just like his parents, Olowokere beams. "The goal is for them to do as good as us if not better," he said. Oluyinka Olutoye put it another way. "The typical saying in a Nigerian household is that the best inheritance that a parent can give you is not jewelry or cash or material things, it is a good education," he said. "It is expected." leslie.casimir@chron.com WCBS-TV NEWS PHOTO VIA THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/AP NEW YORK (AP) Manhattan's district attorney announced Wednesday that he would ask a court to vacate the convictions of two of the three men convicted of murdering civil rights leader Malcom X in 1965. Here is a timeline of key dates related to the assassination and the prosecution of the men originally said to be his killers: March 9, 1964: Once a leading spokesman for Elijah Muhammads Nation of Islam, Malcolm X announces that he is breaking with Muhammads Black Muslim group and organizing his own. Feb. 14, 1965: A firebomb tossed through a window explodes in Malcom X's living room in Queens, hours before dawn. He flees the burning house with his wife and four children. Feb. 21, 1965: Three gunmen kill Malcom X as he begins a speech at the Audubon Ballroom in Manhattan. He is 39. Mujahid Abdul Halim, then known as Talmadge Hayer or Thomas Hagan, 23, is arrested at the scene after being shot in the leg by a bodyguard. Feb. 26, 1965: Muhammad Aziz, 26, then known as Norman 3X Butler, is arrested in the assassination. March 3, 1965: Kahlil Islam, 30, then known as Thomas 15X Johnson, is arrested in the killing. Both he and Aziz insist they are innocent and offer alibis. Feb. 28, 1966: Halim admits during the trial that he took part in the killing but insists that his two co-defendants weren't involved. March 11, 1966: Halim, Islam and Aziz are convicted of murder. April 14, 1966: All three defendants are sentenced to life in prison. December 6, 1977: Halim files an affidavit stating that his two co-defendants are innocent, naming four other co-conspirators. June 1985: Aziz is released on parole. 1987: Islam is released on parole. Nov. 1992: Halim's request for early release from a New York prison is turned down. March 1998: Aziz is appointed to help run the Harlem mosque where Malcolm X once preached. August 2009: Kahlil Islam dies, 22 years after his release from prison. March 3, 2010: The state of New York grants Halim's parole on his 17th try. April 27, 2010: Halim is freed. April, 2011: Historian Manning Marable publishes Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, a biography that concludes Aziz and Islam are innocent and brings new attention to claims that some of the actual killers were still at large. It wins a Pulitzer Prize. Feb. 7, 2020: Netflix begins streaming episodes of Who Killed Malcolm X? The six-part documentary examines the assassination and evidence that members of Halim's Nation of Islam mosque in Newark, N.J., were behind the killing. The Manhattan district attorney's office says it will consider reopening the investigation. Nov. 17, 2021: Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. announces that his office will ask a court to exonerate Islam and Aziz. Lawyers for the men say a nearly two-year-long investigation found that authorities withheld evidence favorable to the defense during the trial. SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) A Sioux Falls dentist accused of choking his wife in a domestic abuse case has given up his dental practice. Cale Slack made his first court appearance Tuesday on a felony aggravated assault charge and four misdemeanor assault charges. SALEM, Ore. (AP) A philanthropist filed papers with the Oregon Secretary of State on Tuesday to decriminalize sex work in the state in an attempt to put the issue before voters in the 2022 election. Sex worker rights are human rights, and the denial of those rights enables human trafficking, said chief petitioner Aaron Boonshoft, who filed the prospective petition for the Sex Worker Rights Act. Beginning in the early-1990s, Henrik Fisker built a reputation as one of the most talented automotive designers of the era. Before setting out on his own, his pencil was the force behind cars like the BMW Z8, the first generation X5 and the Aston Martin DB9 and V8 Vantage. His independent ventures continued to bring fascinating designs if not necessarily enormous business success. Now more than three decades into his career, Fisker is trying again with the debut of the production version of the Fisker Ocean electric crossover. The current iteration of Fisker Inc. was born in 2016, several years after the collapse of Fisker Automotive and the plug-in hybrid Karma grand touring sedan, a project that lives on as the Chinese-owned Karma Automotive. Fisker Inc. made a splash with at the 2018 Consumer Electronics Show with the Emotion electric sedanan overly ambitious effort that may or may not materialize. In 2020, Fisker returned to CES with the Ocean. Unlike the high-dollar Emotion, the five-passenger Ocean is targeted at the mass market with an attainable price point. As Henrik Fisker and every entrepreneur in the last 130 years that has ever tried to launch a car company knows, the design concept is the easy part. Turning it into a real product is something else entirely. Henrik Fiskers Emotion concept debuted at the 2018 Consumer Electronic Show and was targeted the high end of the EV market. DAVID MC AFP via Getty Images Bringing the Ocean to Market The original 2020 Ocean concept was built around Volkswagens MEB platform, the same architecture used for the VW ID.4 and other EVs coming from the German automaker. Fisker tried to make a deal with VW to use MEB in production, but that never came to fruition. Instead, Fisker formed a partnership with Magna International, the Canadian automotive supplier that has almost every modern vehicle part in its portfolio. The companys Magna Steyr subsidiary in Austria has been assembling complete vehicles for automakers including Mercedes-Benz, Stellantis, BMW, Jaguar Land Rover and others for decades. That facility in Graz, Austria is already building pre-production prototypes of the Ocean and is expected to be producing two Oceans per day by March. Volume production is scheduled to start November 2022. Magna had already developed an EV reference platform to demonstrate the various components it could provide as well as its ability to help engineer and produce the vehicles. Starting from there, Fisker and Magna developed what has been dubbed the Fisker FM29 platform, which is now about 90% proprietary to Fisker. Magna set aside production capacity for up to 50,000 Oceans per year from its Austrian plant with about half allocated to North America and the rest to Europe. The interior of the Ocean has a vertical screen that can swivel into a landscape position called Hollywood mode that lets passengers consume media while charging. Sam Abuelsamid Innovative Modes Measuring 188 inches, the Ocean is roughly the same size as the Tesla Model Y and Ford Mustang Mach-E, but its wheelbase stretches is a bit longer at 115-inches. Unlike those rivals, the Fisker keeps a long-roof, wagon-like profile that aids rear stowage and enables the sliding sunroof. The Ocean offers a California mode, where all four door windows, the rear quarter windows and tailgate window lower while the roof slides back Fisker claims the sunroof has the largest aperture in the industry. With everything open, the feel is not unlike a topless Jeep Wrangler. The Ocean offers other west coast-themed modes, including a large 17.1-inch vertical central touchscreen that rotates 90 degrees into Hollywood mode for watching videos while charging. Unlike Tesla and Ford, Fisker believes that some controls, especially its climate system, are better with physical buttons that can be felt without looking at them. Temperature control sits at the base of the screen when its in portrait mode and stays even when the screen rotates. The center console of the Ocean floats leaving room under both it and the seats for rear seat passengers to extend their legs and feet. Six-foot-tall CEO Henrik Fisker demonstrated the ample rear seat leg and headroom. One place owners wont find space is under the front of the Ocean. There is no frunk (front trunk) and what would traditionally be called the hood is fixed as on the BMW iX. Service personnel can open it, but with the front motor and power electronics there, there isnt much room for storage. A fixed hood allowed Fisker to avoid using seals, latches and liners, which keep the base price down. The Fisker Ocean will be offered in both single- and dual-motor forms with varying range and horsepower. Sam Abuelsamid The Oceans Electric Powertrain The base Ocean Sport has a single 275-horsepower unit driving the front wheels. Using a front motor allows the Ocean to maximize regenerative braking for extra range and improves poor weather traction. All Oceans will have batteries supplied by CATL, although the Sport will use lower-cost lithium-iron phosphate batteries like what Tesla uses for its standard range models. Fisker hasnt released capacity specifics but says the Ocean Sport will have a 250-mile range. The Ultra, Extreme and Ocean One models will have dual motors and a battery with a nickel-manganese-cobalt chemistry, a costlier option but with greater energy density that increases range to 340 miles for the Ultra and 350 miles for the Extreme. The Ultra will deliver 540 horsepower and a zero-to-60 mph time of 3.9 seconds; the Extreme and One have 550 horsepower and a 3.6-second sprint to 60 mph. The Ocean carries a solar panel on its roof for added re-charging capabilities. Sam Abuelsamid High-Tech Features The optional SolarSky roof panel on the Extreme and Ocean One models can supposedly add up to 2,000 miles per year of driving range to the battery under optimal conditions. In sunny regions like California, 1,500 miles per year is said to be more typical, but even that is optimistic for most drivers. For those that park the Ocean in a garage, the solar roof is unlikely to be a useful option. Fisker and Magna have a suite of advanced driver-assistance systems for the Ocean that include the first use of Magnas new Icon imaging radar sensor. This high-resolution radar provides a signal similar to a lidar point cloud for improved object tracking and recognition although its not as high resolution as typical lidars. Details on the specific functionality of the system will be provided closer to launch, but the Ocean does have support for over-the-air updates and should get better over time. Fisker is making extensive use of recycled materials in the interior including fabrics, old fishing nets and repurposed rubber. The optional 20-inch aero wheels also include inserts made from recycled carbon fiber. Fiskers high-end Karma plug-in hybrid grand touring sedan, seen here in 2009, lives on as the Karma Revero, now a product of the Chinese-owned Karma Automotive. Alex Kwanten A New Company with Experience Fisker has made some interesting business choices to manage costs. Previously, Fisker went after the premium market, but the volume there often isnt enough to generate the cash flow needed to develop mass-market products. It typically costs $1 billion or to bring a vehicle to market. Initially, Tesla also targeted the high end of the market hoping to use that to fund development of more affordable models. Despite success with the Model S and X, Tesla still had to go back to the capital markets numerous times over the years to fund its ongoing operations. By partnering with Magna, which already has enormous economies of scale, Fisker can keep its capital costs down in the early years while launching affordable models that it hopes will generate volume. Unlike Teslas physical storefronts, Fisker will rely solely on sales through its app. Distribution centers will sit on the outskirts of expensive urban areas and home delivery will also be available. A partnership with Cox Automotive will provide servicing needs. Cox already has several business units that do work with dealerships and a used vehicle servicing and refurbishment unit for its auction business. Henrik Fisker next to the 2023 Fisker Ocean unveiling in Los Angeles. Sam Abuelsamid 2023 Fisker Ocean Pricing The goal is to make even the base Ocean Sport profitable at its $37,499 starting price. The dual motor Ocean Ultra starts at $49,999, while the Extreme and Ocean One costs $68,999. The first 5,000 units will all be Ocean One models. Fiskers Flexee lease is aimed at making the Ocean more accessible to younger customers. With a $3,000 down payment and $379 per month for the Ocean Sport, buyers will not be locked into any long terms. An owner can return the Ocean at any time after three months with no impact on their credit, although they lose the down payment. Fiskers reservation list for the Ocean is open and requires a $250 deposit; deliveries will likely begin around the beginning of 2023. With the help of partners like Magna and CATL and some innovative sales approaches, Henrik Fisker might extend his reputation as a great designer to a successful automotive startup. This article, Fisker Launches 2023 Ocean Electric Crossover, 25,000 Headed To U.S. Next Year, originally appeared on Forbes Advisor. ATHENS, Greece (AP) Some 20,000 people marched peacefully through Athens on Wednesday to mark the anniversary of a bloody anti-dictatorship uprising in 1973, police said. More than 5,000 police were deployed to keep order, as violence involving anarchist demonstrators has often marred the annual march to the U.S. Embassy. The event went ahead despite restrictions related to the pandemic, and most of the marchers wore masks. After the march, minor clashes briefly broke out in another part of town when some youths threw stones at police and set fire to dumpsters. A similar demonstration was held in Greece's second-largest city of Thessaloniki, with about 14,000 participants. The march ended peacefully, but afterwards youths threw petrol bombs at police who responded with tear gas and a water cannon. No injuries were reported, and police said at least 20 suspected rioters were detained. In 1973, student-led pro-democracy protests at the Athens Polytechnic were crushed by police and troops sent by the military regime. Officers opened fire on unarmed demonstrators and bystanders near the Polytechnic, and an army tank smashed in the gates of the university complex behind which many students were gathered. At least 20 are thought to have been killed, though the precise death toll of the November 1973 events remains unknown. But the uprising was followed by a putsch within the military regime ruling Greece since 1967, which brought even more hardline officers into power. Democracy was restored only in July 1974, after the dictatorship collapsed in the face of a Turkish invasion of Cyprus provoked by the junta's own machinations aiming to unite the island, whose majority is Greek-speaking, with Greece. Mostly left-wing demonstrators have marched to the U.S. Embassy every year since 1974 because Washington was seen as supportive of Greece's far-right military regime. In a tweet Wednesday, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said the uprising reinforced the countrys daily commitment to a secure democracy. PARIS (AP) A far-right TV pundit who is expected to run for the French presidency goes on trial Wednesday for allegedly inciting racial hatred with his comments on unaccompanied migrant children. Eric Zemmour, who has two prior hate speech convictions, is being tried on charges of public insult and incitement to hatred or violence against a group of people due to their ethnic, national, racial or religious origin. The essayist and commentator on former political talk shows is widely expected to soon announce his candidacy in France's April presidential election. Adopting an attitude much like former former U.S. President Donald Trump, Zemmour is finding fervent audiences for his anti-Islam, anti-immigration invective in the early stages of the race. Zemmour previously was convicted of incitement to racial hatred after justifying discrimination against Black and Arab people in 2010, and of incitement to religious hatred for anti-Islam comments in 2016. He was respectively sentenced to pays court costs and a 5,000-euro ($5,660) fine. The trial opening Wednesday focuses on September 2020 comments he made on French news broadcaster CNews about children who migrate to France without parents or guardians. If found guilty, he faces a sentence of up to one year in prison and a 45,000-euro ($51,000) fine. Theyre thieves, theyre murderers, theyre rapists. Thats all they are. We must send them back, Zemmour said. These people cost us money." Zemmour was not present Wednesday at the Paris court. In a statement, he denounced an attempt to intimidate (him) from prosecutors and anti-racist groups. He maintained his comments and said he won't attend the trial because the political debate doesn't take place in courts. The verdict is expected to be delivered at a later date. The head of the managing board of Canal +, CNews parent company, Jean-Christophe Thiery, is also on trial in the case, as the person legally in charge of the television show. The French media watchdog, the Superior Audiovisual Council, imposed a 200,000-euro fine in March on CNews for broadcasting comments inciting hatred. Civil plaintiffs in the case include several local councils representing divisions handling child care and anti-racism groups including SOS Racisme, the Human Rights League and the International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism. We refuse for these comments to be trivialized and to target foreign non-accompanied minors who come to seek protection in France, as well as all those who work to help them, said the departmental council of Seine-Saint-Denis, north of Paris. Zemmours lawyer, Olivier Pardo, argued in favor of nullifying the charges and suggested the trial is politically motivated, noting that the local councils represented at the Paris court are headed by a leftist majority. Zemmour is also set to go on trial on charges of racial insult after he told another TV pundit, Hapsatou Sy, that her first name was an insult to France. Sy has filed a formal complaint. No trial date has been set. Zemmour has repeatedly said he wants to ban parents from giving children foreign names, similar to an 1803 law restricting choice to typical French names, mostly of Christian origin. Zemmour has also been tried in several other cases, where he was acquitted. A Paris court in February acquitted Zemmour on a charge of contesting crimes against humanity illegal in France for arguing in a 2019 television debate that Marshal Philippe Petain, head of Vichys collaborationist government during World War II, saved Frances Jews from the Holocaust. In its verdict, the court said Zemmours comments negated Petains role in the extermination. But in acquitting Zemmour, it said hed spoken in the heat of the moment. Yet Zemmour in recent weeks has repeated similar comments and lawyers contesting his acquittal plan to cite that point as evidence when their appeal is heard in January. ___ Follow all AP stories on global migration at https://apnews.com/hub/migration. BOISE, Idaho (AP) The Idaho Legislature on Wednesday wrapped up its longest ever session, one dominated by COVID-19 that entered into numerous speeches, new laws and some lawmakers. The Legislature took a five-month break before returning Monday for three days that saw a final spasm of three dozen pieces of legislation. The bills mainly centered around COVID-19 vaccines and mask mandates. But the only one to make it through both chambers was a non-binding declaration stating opposition to President Joe Bidens vaccine requirements for federal workers and contractors and vaccine requirements for large employers and health care employers. Idaho is involved in three lawsuits against the requirements, and Biden on Wednesday suspended the requirements for large employers, which had been put on hold by a federal court. The House approved seven bills in all, but a Senate committee held hearings on only three of them on Wednesday before voting to kill them, effectively ending the session at 311 days. I think everybody is just trying to figure out a very complicated situation, said Republican Senate Pro Tempore Chuck Winder after the committee hearing. Trying to protect the rights of all the individuals, and its not an easy thing to do. Typically, the part-time Idaho Legislature meets for about three months starting in January. But the 2021 session stretched into May and included a two-week recess due to a COVID-19 outbreak among lawmakers in the House. After lawmakers returned to Boise, the House chose not to formally adjourn in May so it could return and deal with millions of dollars in federal pandemic relief money if needed. Republican House Speaker Scott Bedke then summoned House members to the Statehouse this week to deal Bidens vaccine requirements. The Senate, though it did adjourn in May, also showed up. Normally, only the governor can summon the part-time Legislature back to the Statehouse after adjourning. The Idaho attorney generals office said the Legislature reconvening was likely legal, but was unprecedented and a court could decide otherwise, making any laws passed null. However, no laws were passed in the last three days. Winder and Bedke said versions of the vaccine legislation killed by the Senate committee on Wednesday could return when the Legislature meets for its 2022 regular session in January. We think some of these concepts are important, but the testimony we heard was they need some amendments, said Winder, who is a member of the committee that killed the bills. Bedke said the two chambers would need to increase cooperation, "and that's how we'll solve these types of issues, including property tax, education policy and set the budgets. Plus there's that little matter of $1.4 billion surplus. Lawmakers will return on Jan. 10 for the 2022 regular session, and the state's record budget surplus will be a key focus. Democratic House Minority Leader Ilana Rubel said she was happy the session had wrapped up. "I think the best we could hope for out of this session was to get out of it without damaging legislation passed, and so, all in all, I think we largely accomplished it, she said. Of the bills killed by the Senate committee Wednesday morning, one involved making it easier for Idaho residents to get worker compensation if they become ill after taking an employee-mandated vaccine. Another bill would have prohibited questioning the sincerity of people claiming religious exemptions from vaccinations. The third bill would have prevented employers from asking employees whether they have received the COVID-19 vaccine. Lawmakers opposed to the legislation said Idaho already has laws the three bills involved, and that even if passed, the remedy would remain in the courts, not the Legislature. The lawmakers also noted Idaho is involved in three federal lawsuits against Bidens vaccine requirements, and legislation is premature until those cases are decided. Republican Rep. Brent Crane, chairman of the House State Affairs Committee, supported the three bills and testified in the Senate committee. After the meeting, he said he appreciated the Senate panel holding a public hearing on the bills with testimony that went over three hours. I also thought it was very productive," he said. "For the businesses sitting in here to realize the Legislature is serious about protecting First Amendment rights. Stop doing what you're doing and punishing people because of their religious beliefs. I think that message was sent loud and clear by the Senate State Affairs Committee today even though they didn't advance the legislation." Lawmakers have said that workers are losing their jobs for refusing to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The House on Monday censured Rep. Priscilla Giddings, a Republican from White Bird who publicized the name of a 19-year-old intern who reported she was raped by another legislator. Giddings was also stripped of a committee assignment for the 2022 session. WASHINGTON (AP) Hackers linked to the Iranian government have been targeting a broad range of victims inside the United States, including by deploying ransomware, according to an advisory issued Wednesday by American, British and Australian officials. The advisory says that in recent months, Iran has exploited computer vulnerabilities exposed by hackers before they can be fixed and targeted entities in the transportation, health care and public health sectors. The attackers leveraged the initial hack for additional operations, such as data exfiltration, ransomware and extortion, according to the advisory. The group has used the same Microsoft Exchange vulnerability in Australia, officials say. The warning is notable because even though ransomware attacks remain prevalent in the U.S., most of the significant ones in the past year have been attributed to Russia-based criminal hacker gangs rather than Iranian hackers. Government officials aren't the only ones noticing the Iranian activity: Tech giant Microsoft announced Tuesday that it had seen six different groups in Iran deploying ransomware since last year. Microsoft said one of the groups spends significant time and energy trying to build rapport with their intended victims before targeting them with spear-phishing campaigns. The group uses fake conference invitations or interview requests and frequently masquerade as officials at think tanks in Washington, D.C., as a cover, Microsoft said. Once rapport is built and a malicious link is sent, the Iranians are extra pushy at trying to get their victims to click on it, said James Elliott, a member of the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center. These guys are the biggest pain in the rear. Every two hours theyre sending an email, Elliott said at the Cyberwarcon cybersecurity conference Tuesday. Earlier this year Facebook announced it had found Iranian hackers using sophisticated fake online personas to build trust with targets and get them to click on malicious links and often posed as recruiters of defense and aerospace companies. Researchers at the Crowdstrike cybersecurity firm said they and competitors began seeing this type of Iranian activity last year. The Iranian ransomware attacks, unlike those sponsored by North Koreas government, are not designed to generate revenue so much as for espionage, to sow disinformation, to harass and embarrass foes Israel, chief among them and to essentially wear down their targets, Crowdstrike researchers said at the Cyberwarcon event. While these operations will use ransom notes and dedicated leak sites demanding hard cryptocurrency, were really not seeing any viable effort at actual currency generation, Crowdstrike global threat analysis director Katie Blankenship said. Crowdstrike considers Iran to be the trendsetter in this novel low form of cyberattack, which typically involves paralyzing a network with ransomware, stealing information and then leaking it online. The researchers call the method lock and leak. It is less visible, less costly and provides more room for deniability, Blankenship said. ___ Suderman reported from Richmond, Virginia, and Bajak from Boston. Jacob Chansley, the spear-carrying Jan. 6 rioter whose horned fur hat, bare chest and face paint made him one of the more recognizable figures in the assault on the Capitol, was sentenced Wednesday to 41 months in prison. Chansley, who pleaded guilty to a felony charge of obstructing an official proceeding, was among the first rioters to enter the building. He has acknowledged using a bullhorn to rile up the mob, offering thanks in a prayer while in the Senate for having the chance to get rid of traitors and scratching out a threatening note to Vice President Mike Pence saying, Its Only A Matter of Time. Justice Is Coming!" Though he isnt accused of violence, prosecutors say Chansley, of Arizona, was the public face of the Capitol riot who went into the attack with a weapon, ignored repeated police orders to leave the building and gloated about his actions in the days immediately after the attack. Before he was sentenced, Chansley told U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth it was wrong for him to enter the Capitol and that he accepts responsibility for his actions. He emphasized he wasnt an insurrectionist and is troubled with the way he was portrayed in news stories in the aftermath of the riot. I have no excuse, Chansley said. No excuses whatsoever. My behavior is indefensible. The judge said Chansleys remorse appeared to be genuine but noted the seriousness of his actions in the Capitol. What you did was terrible, Lamberth said. You made yourself the center of the riot." The image of Chansley holding a flagpole topped with a spear tip and looking as if he were howling was one of the most striking to emerge from the riot. He previously called himself the QAnon Shaman but has since repudiated the QAnon movement, which is centered on the baseless belief that former President Donald Trump was fighting a cabal of Satan-worshipping, child sex trafficking cannibals. He is among 650 people charged in the riot that forced lawmakers into hiding as they were meeting to certify President Joe Bidens Electoral College victory. More than 120 defendants have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanor charges of demonstrating in the Capitol that carry a maximum of six months in prison. Chansley and Scott Fairlamb, a New Jersey gym owner sentenced last week for punching a police officer during the attack, have received the longest prison sentences out of the 38 Capitol riot defendants who been punished so far. Chansley, who has been in jail for 10 months, sought to be sentenced to time served. His lawyer, Albert Watkins, said his client has longstanding mental health problems that were worsened by being held in solitary confinement due to COVID-19 protocols and is in dire need of mental health treatment. In the year before the Capitol riot, Chansley appeared in costume at pro-Trump events, protests over face mask requirements and at a gathering of Trump supporters in November 2020 outside an election office in downtown Phoenix where votes from the presidential race were being counted. His attorney has said Chansley was horrendously smitten by Trump and believed like other rioters that Trump had called him to the Capitol, but later felt betrayed after Trump refused to grant him and others who participated in the insurrection a pardon. Watkins has said Chansley had been under pressure from family members not to plead guilty because they believed Trump would be reinstated as president and pardon him. After spending his first month in jail, Chansley said he reevaluated his life, felt regret for having stormed the building and apologized for causing fear in others. He twice quit eating while in jail and lost 20 pounds (9 kilograms) until he was given organic food. The judge had previously rejected Chansleys claims that the six-foot flagpole he carried during the riot wasnt a weapon and that the metal spear tip was an ornament, saying the sharpened six-inch point could have been used to stab people from a distance. _____ Billeaud reported from Phoenix. BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) Louisiana's health department recommended Wednesday that anyone 18 and older get a coronavirus vaccine booster if they've already been immunized, saying that would strengthen protection against COVID-19 as other parts of the country see upticks in the illness. The new guidance from the Department of Health suggests adults who completed a two-dose Pfizer or Moderna vaccine series get a booster if their last shot was six or more months ago, along with adults who received the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine two or more months ago. We have made significant progress in slowing the spread of COVID-19 in our state, which is why as we head into the holiday season it is critical that Louisianans get a booster shot as soon as they become eligible in order to protect themselves and their loved ones against the possibility of another surge, Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, said in a statement announcing the change. People eligible can choose which vaccine they want for a booster dose and can get a different shot from the one they previously received, according to the health department. Previous guidance from the health department had recommended booster doses for everyone 18 and older who got the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. But for those who received the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, the agency only had been suggesting boosters for everyone 65 and older and for those 18 and older who have certain underlying medical conditions or who live or work in settings that place them at higher risk to COVID-19. The new, broadened recommendations come as Louisiana emerged from its fourth and worst surge of the coronavirus illness and is now seeing its lowest number of new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations since the earliest days of the pandemic. Fewer than 200 people in the state were hospitalized Wednesday with COVID-19, the lowest number since March 2020 and well below the states peak of more than 3,000 in August, according to state data. The percentage of coronavirus tests coming back positive for COVID-19 has fallen below 2% statewide. Still, Edwards noted on his monthly radio show that Louisiana hasn't had a single day without a COVID-19 death reported since March 2020. While our COVID-19 trends are much better than they have been, the virus remains active statewide and that means there is still risk involved when people gather together," Dr. Joe Kanter, the state's chief public health officer, said in a statement. Kanter said with the holidays approaching, boosters or vaccines for those not yet immunized will offer protection for people seeking to celebrate together. But Louisiana continues to struggle to persuade people to get the coronavirus vaccine and remains among states with the lowest immunization rates. About 48% of Louisianas total residents more than 2.2 million people are fully vaccinated, according to health department data. Nearly 343,000 people in Louisiana have received booster doses so far. ___ Follow APs coverage of the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. Follow Melinda Deslatte on Twitter at http://twitter.com/melindadeslatte. NEW YORK (AP) A man was sentenced to eight years in prison Wednesday for setting fire to a car last year in what authorities said was an attempt to intimidate a potential witness in R. Kelly's sex trafficking trial. Michael Williams, 38, of Valdosta, Georgia, was sentenced in federal court in Brooklyn. CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) A New Jersey man is going to prison for his role in conspiring with a hate group to threaten and intimidate properties owned by Black people and Jews throughout the country. A federal judge on Tuesday sentenced Richard Tobin, 20, to one year and one day in prison. Tobin had pleaded guilty to conspiring against rights stemming from vandalized synagogues in Racine, Wisconsin, and Hancock, Michigan. PINSON, Ala. (AP) A man working his first shift at a manufacturing plant near Birmingham was shot to death by a fellow employee early Wednesday, authorities said. Deputies found the body of a man who had been shot multiple times when they responded to a call shortly after midnight, said a statement by the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department. ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) A Maryland congressman says a complaint has been filed against him with a board of medical examiners for prescribing ivermectin for COVID-19. Republican Rep. Andy Harris said in a Monday discussion about vaccine mandates by the conservative House Freedom Caucus that a complaint has been made against him, The Baltimore Sun reported. 3 1 of 3 Christian Rojas Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Karim Torres/AP Show More Show Less 3 of 3 MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexico will deploy a battalion of National Guard troops to its Mayan Riviera in the wake of a spate of shootings that have put the crown jewel of the countrys tourism industry on edge. Defense Secretary Luis Cresencio Sandoval, speaking Wednesday in Cancun, said that 1,445 guard members will be sent to Quintana Roo states Caribbean coast to reinforce the regions security. The deployment will include the establishment of a base in the beach town of Tulum, where two foreign tourists were killed and three wounded Oct. 20 in the crossfire between drug dealers. LANSING, Mich. (AP) The federal government on Wednesday corrected Michigan's unemployment rate upward by 1.7 percentage points, above the U.S. average, citing an outlier in statistical modeling last winter amid sharp job swings during the coronavirus pandemic. The September jobless figure, now 6.3%, had been 4.6%. The October number, also newly released Wednesday, dipped to 6.1% higher than the national rate of 4.6%. The problem stems from inputs into a model for the Detroit-Warren-Dearborn metropolitan area for January, which produced some distortions in benchmarking factors used for Michigan, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. State officials said they notified the agency of the issue in May. Michigan's unemployment rate had dropped substantially last January, from 8.2% to 5.7%, to below the U.S. average. Scott Powell, director of the state's Bureau of Labor Market Information and Strategic Initiatives, said it was a red flag" that the agency continued to notice in subsequent months. The Michigan estimate was lower than what was basically appropriate, he said. Revisions to unemployment data are not unusual, but one of this magnitude is. The U.S. government will increase the state's monthly jobless rates for January through August at the end of the year and release them in March. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat up for reelection in 2022, this year had been touting that Michigans unemployment was below the national average and on a steady decline since spring 2020, when she issued stay-at-home orders to control COVID-19. The unemployment rate comes from a survey of households, which is supplemented with other information in a regression model. Due to the pandemic, the federal agency began reviewing states' surveys monthly for unusual movements rather than yearly and, in January, adjusted the Detroit area for an outlier a way to preserve a shift that the model otherwise would have discounted. But it did not adjust Michigan as a whole because the jobless change did not exceed reliability criteria. What we noticed in the first couple of months of 2021 is that the estimates we were getting from the BLS model, the published data that everyone sees, was not tracking with the raw data from the household survey, said Bruce Weaver, an economic manager with the state Department of Technology, Management and Budget. "In May, we contacted BLS in writing and pointed that out. They started looking into it and eventually identified the specific problem that they're adjusting for this month. Michigan's overall workforce total was unchanged over October. There was a 38,000 boost in payroll jobs, however, the second-highest of 2021. ___ Follow David Eggert at https://twitter.com/DavidEggert00 RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) Another lawsuit challenging North Carolina's latest round of redistricting has been filed, this time by a conservation group, university mathematicians and voters who accuse Republican mapmakers of illegal partisan and racial gerrymandering. The litigation, spearheaded by the North Carolina League of Conservation Voters, opposes both the state's congressional and General Assembly districts. That's in contrast to two previously filed lawsuits, one of which focuses on the congressional plan and the other on procedures in forming state House and Senate districts. The plaintiffs in part accuse Republican legislators of violating the state constitution by parceling out portions of the state's large urban counties into districts that appear to favor GOP congressional candidates. General Assembly lines also appear to group Black voters excessively in some districts while fracturing Black voting blocs across others in a method to dilute their electoral power, according to the lawsuit filed late Tuesday in Wake County Superior Court. The result, the plaintiffs say, likely will help Republicans retain their majorities in both the House and Senate and hold at least nine of the state's U.S. House seats in 2022, even as North Carolina is considered closely divided when it comes to statewide elections. North Carolina gained a 14th congressional seat due to population growth measured by the 2020 census. Republicans currently hold an 8-5 seat advantage. The maps frustrate the League's efforts to build a pro-environment majority, and undermine NCLCVs ability to hold legislators accountable, the lawsuit says. Republican legislators have repeatedly defended the new boundaries approved this month as lawful, and in keeping with state courts that signed off on approved lines that were drawn without the examination of race-based data or election results. The mathematicians and others who sued endorse alternative plans they say are based on computer algorithms that follow state law and traditional, neutral" redistricting principles. They would give Democrats the chance to be more competitive and hold seat majorities, according to the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs, who also include former longtime Democratic Rep. Mickey Michaux of Durham, do not seek to favor any political party or incumbent, the lawsuit reads. Rather, they support fair maps drawn with advanced science and technology that preserve every North Carolinians right to vote in free elections on equal terms and that do not discriminate against voters based on race or party. The lawsuit asks the judges hearing the case to order their remedial plans be used in the 2022 elections if lawmakers cant redraw lawful maps quickly, and suggests the March 8 primaries could be delayed. Candidate filing is set to begin Dec. 6. GOP legislators agreed this year to prohibit the use of election or racial data when drawing boundaries. Republicans also cited earlier federal court findings they say show there wasn't sufficient evidence to declare North Carolina has racially polarized voting, so special attention to racial data wasn't required. While the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that federal courts cannot overturn maps on the basis of extreme partisanship, state courts aren't subject to the decision. Later that year, orders by North Carolina state judges finding excessive partisanship violated the state constitution led to the redrawing of both legislative and congressional maps for use in the 2020 elections. A lawsuit by the North Carolina NAACP, Common Cause and four individuals filed Oct. 29, before the new boundaries were drawn, challenged the legislators refusal to consider racial data before considering proposals for General Assembly districts. And a Nov. 5 filing by a group of voters who challenged the constitutionality of congressional maps approved in 2016 contests the latest congressional maps. RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) With the legislative year nearing an end, North Carolina Republicans on Wednesday advanced a string of measures that voting rights groups fear would prevent lawfully cast ballots from being counted and discourage participation in the 2022 election. The bills the GOP moved through the House rules committee are unlikely to become law, as they would almost assuredly lack the support of Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper and enough Democratic state lawmakers to override a possible veto. Among the measures Republicans are pursuing is a plan to prevent the counting of absentee ballots that arrive at county elections offices after polls close on Election Day. Sen. Warren Daniel, a Burke County Republican and bill sponsor, said the extra time the state offered for ballot collecting in 2020 as part of its effort to make mail-in voting more accessible during the pandemic unnecessarily lengthened the vote counting process and undermined voters' confidence in the results because it took several days after the election for then-President Donald Trump to be declared North Carolina's winner but the overall national loser to Democrat Joe Biden. Everybody knows when Election Day is. Its when the votes are all in, and vote counting begins," said state Daniel said. "Every day that passes after that creates the possibility of distrust in the process. Ideally, wed like to have a winner on Election Night. In 2020, the state extended the grace period for mail-in ballots to nine days due to the pandemic and U.S. Postal Service delays. Existing state law allows for ballot envelopes postmarked by Election Day to count if received within three days of the election. More than 11,600 ballots were received during the first three days after the 2020 a number Republicans expect to drop in a midterm election year. Daniel said he believes his bill would not determine election results. Caroline Fry, interim advocacy director of Democracy NC, a prominent voting rights group, told lawmakers she feels the bill comes as the latest effort in a "national strategy to silence voters, particularly Black voters. Democrats dislike the plan, as well as proposals the committee approved to have state elections officials collect citizenship data through the court systems jury selection process and ban private money from being used to support election operations. We have got to come together, and this is not the way to do it," said Democratic Rep. Billy Richardson of Cumberland County. "I hope we dont pass this, and I hope we dont pass the rest of these bills. Id just wish wed come together, and this is not helping. Republicans are again seeking to require courts to share citizenship data with state elections officials if a potential juror says they are unable to participate because they are not U.S. residents. The move renews an effort that failed in 2019 when Cooper vetoed the plan. The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina believes the measure poses privacy concerns and could embolden anti-immigrant vigilantes. Additionally, legislators are looking to pass a bill that would prevent private money from flowing to state and county elections boards. A $400 million donation from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, allowed county elections offices across the country to hire more poll workers, buy equipment to process mail-in ballot and purchase personal protective equipment to prevent the spread of COVID-19. But the grants drew the ire of conservative lawmakers across the United States who questioned the motives of wealthy, liberal-leaning individuals, prompting several GOP-controlled states to enact bans on such contributions. When partisan groups are sending private dollars to counties that otherwise exclusively run elections, it erodes the confidence in the outcome," said Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus. Senate Republicans voted in June along party lines to approve the measures limiting mail-in ballot counting and banning private money to fund election operations. The proposals now head to the House floor, as does the House bill requiring courts share citizenship information to the North Carolina State Board of Elections. ___ Follow Anderson on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BryanRAnderson. ___ Anderson 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. SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) New Mexicos governor named three new advisers Wednesday who will help guide policy on water, broadband and other infrastructure projects. Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham called the announcements a celebration of the $1 trillion federal infrastructure bill signed by President Joe Biden on Monday. New Mexico has one of the worst reviews in terms of the potential for failing dams in the country," Lujan Grisham said. The money coming from the federal government thats been made available in a number of ways means that we can fix all of those dams, 200 of them. Former Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez will serve as the state's new infrastructure adviser to prioritize an estimated $3.7 billion in federal funding for roads, bridges and other projects in New Mexico. The governor also acknowledged a New Mexico Supreme Court ruling issued Wednesday that will require her to work more closely with the Legislature to allocate federal pandemic relief. The decision could have implications for federal infrastructure spending. Lujan Grisham also named a new top water official to replace State Engineer John D'Antonio, who will be stepping down next month. In submitting his resignation, D'Antonio cited a persistent lack of funding for his agency and unfunded mandates. Mike Hamman, who is currently the chief engineer and CEO of the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, will take over the state role beginning in January. Hamman also has served as an area manager for the U.S Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water projects across the West. Im up for the task the governor has laid at my feet," said Hamman, who will spearhead the state's response to deepening drought and an ongoing legal battle with Texas over management of the Rio Grande. The governor also named former Illinois Office of Broadband Director Matt Schmit as an adviser to the newly created state broadband office. Lujan Grisham said he will move to the state soon to advise the office, which has been charged with centralizing New Mexicos sprawling efforts to increase high-speed internet coverage. ___ 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. ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) With a legal battle over management of the Rio Grande before the U.S. Supreme Court and more hot and dry weather in the forecast, New Mexicos top water official said Wednesday that lawmakers have to provide enough funding to protect one of New Mexicos most precious commodities. State Engineer John DAntonio told members of a key legislative panel that the Office of the State Engineer is lacking resources and is short dozens of staff. He said the shortfall equates to 140,000 lost staff hours per year at a time when the agency is processing nearly 90,000 water right transactions and is involved in negotiations that range from settlements with Indigenous nations to water-sharing contracts with other western states. Complicating matters is the changing climate and the potential for more evaporation and more wildfires, he said. The impacts really threaten the communities, the irrigators, the businesses that depend on New Mexicos water, D'Antonio told members of the Legislative Finance Committee. DAntonio recently cited the lack of resources as a reason for his decision to step down from the post next month. He previously served as the state engineer during former Gov. Bill Richardson's administration and was appointed to the office in 2019 by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. New Mexico has been grappling with drought for the past 20 years, with rivers seeing record low flows this year. That includes the Rio Grande. In the pending Supreme Court case, Texas argues that groundwater pumping in southern New Mexico is reducing the river's flow and cutting into how much water makes it across the border. New Mexico argues that it has been shorted on its share of the river. D'Antonio said Wednesday that the administration directed his office to submit a flat budget for the next fiscal year, hoping that federal recovery funds could fill some of the gaps. He told lawmakers that New Mexico's water problems are not going away and that long-term funding solutions are needed rather that one-time cash infusions if the state hopes to protect its interests. We've got to level that playing field for us to be effective. Water is a technical issue. It's a legal issue, he said, explaining that permanent funding would help to absolve the agency from some of the political pressures that happen with changes in the governor's office. Officials with the Office of the State Engineer also pointed to new duties resulting from New Mexico's move to legalize recreational marijuana and encourage the expansion of the cannabis industry. Along with that comes the need for water managers to evaluate applications for water rights and ensure the state's limited sources are protected. Rolf Schmidt-Petersen, director of the Interstate Stream Commission, also briefed the committee on the severity of the ongoing drought. He said New Mexico likely experiences more drought and variability than any other state in the West. It's important to recognize that up front. We're not just very dry; we're drier than everybody else and even the state of Nevada, he said. We have less surface water than the state of Nevada. Schmidt-Petersen said the 50-year plan that the stream commission and D'Antonio's office has been working on aims to develop recommendations that will help with decision making in the future as supplies shrink. He pointed to a graphic that showed a bullseye over the northwestern part of the state where temperatures are expected to see the largest increases. He said this will have cascading effects. You have the same amount of precipitation but you have more water being evaporated or transpired into the air. You have impacts across your entire landscape, he said. When asked whether this dry year would be considered one of New Mexico's wetter years five decades from now, D'Antonio said he hoped that wouldn't be the case but noted that trends are pointing to warmer temperatures and more variable precipitation. Existing New Mexico laws that allow for active management of water rights on a real-time basis will be key along with boosting infrastructure for water storage, D'Antonio said. HARWICH, Mass. (AP) A Massachusetts police officer was injured during a firearms training exercise Wednesday morning when they accidentally fired a round into their own right leg, police say. Officers from several municipal departments were participating in the training at an outdoor firing range in Harwich when the officer was injured at about 10:30 a.m., Harwich police said in a Facebook post. GREENFIELD, Mass. (AP) A photographer known for his images of nude adolescents has pleaded guilty to engaging in sexual misconduct with a 14-year-old student in the mid-1970s while he was a teacher and dorm parent at a private boarding school in Massachusetts, prosecutors said. Former Northfield Mount Hermon teacher John Jock" Sturges, 74, was sentenced to three years of probation this week after pleading guilty in Franklin Superior Court to a charge of an unnatural and lascivious act on a child under 16, according to a statement Tuesday from the Northwestern district attorney's office. Sturges, who now lives in Seattle, was ordered by the judge to undergo sex offender treatment and stay away from the victim. Sturges was 28 and a photography instructor at the school when he met the girl in 1975, prosecutors said. The victim first went to Sturges when she was lonely, homesick and had not made many friends, prosecutor Frederic Bartmon said in court, according to The Recorder of Greenfield. They bonded over photography, and he started bringing her on shoots, he said. Sturges persuaded her to pose for topless and nude photographs, and they had sex in his darkroom and in the woods, the prosecutor said. The judge asked Sturges if he agreed with Bartmons account, and Sturges said he was comfortable with it, but added that my memory, at 74, is not as good as I would like it to be, The Recorder reported. The victim, who appeared at Monday's hearing via video, spoke of the effect her relationship with Sturges had on her. For a long time, many decades, I refused to believe that what I thought I wanted when I was 14 turned out to be a protracted form of sexual abuse and exploitation, she said in an impact statement. In the aftermath of my time at Northfield Mount Hermon, I fell apart. I had a complete nervous breakdown, suffered from extreme depersonalization and anxiety, to a point where I was not able to function at school or society." Sturges was originally charged in 2017 with statutory rape but pleaded to lesser charges. Sturges' photos have appeared in galleries around the world, and several books of his work have been published though many see his images as little more than child pornography. Federal authorities in California investigated him for child pornography in 1990, but a grand jury refused to indict him, The Los Angeles Times reported. Sturges defended his work. They're simply a celebration of beauty, he said of his photos in an interview with The Associated Press in 1997 when the Christian group Focus on the Family was campaigning to have his books banned in Pennsylvania. We commend the survivor for her courage in coming forward and exposing the defendants misconduct, said Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan. Fortunately, the passage of time did not prevent the Commonwealth from holding the defendant accountable for his crimes, and achieving some measure of justice in this case. BEAVER ISLAND, Mich. (AP) A pilot who was among four people who died after a plane crash on a Michigan island has been identified as a history teacher. William Julian, 55, was flying the plane for Island Airways, which takes travelers between Beaver Island and Michigan's northern Lower Peninsula. Julian was airlifted Saturday to a hospital by the U.S. Coast Guard but died, the Charlevoix County sheriff's office said. HARRISONBURG, Va. (AP) Several elementary school students were hurt when a school bus and a train crashed in Rockingham County on Wednesday afternoon, authorities said. The crash happened around 3:30 p.m. at the intersection of East Side Highway and Island Ford Road in the Harrisonburg area, police said in a news release. PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) Night after night, hundreds of people marched the streets of Oregon's largest city, demanding racial justice after the murder of George Floyd by a white officer. Among the rallying cries were defund the police a call for elected officials to reallocate some law enforcement funding elsewhere. In June 2020, the Portland City Council and the mayor answered by cutting millions from the police budget. Now, a year and a half later, officials partially restored the cut funds. On Wednesday, the Portland City Council unanimously passed a fall budget bump that included increasing the current $230 million police budget by an additional $5.2 million. The added police spending is occurring amid a year of a record number of homicides, the city's greatest police staffing shortage in decades and reform recommendations made by the U.S. Department of Justice. Many Portlanders no longer feel safe, Mayor Ted Wheeler said. And it is our duty, as leaders of this city, to take action and deliver better results within our crisis response system. Portland isnt the only liberal city doing an about-face on police spending. From New York City to Los Angeles in cities that had some of the largest Black Lives Matter protests, and some with an extensive history of police brutality police departments are seeing their finances partially restored in response to rising homicides, an officer exodus and political pressures. In recent mayoral elections, some winning candidates have pledged to bolster public safety budgets. In Minneapolis, where Floyd was killed, voters rejected a proposal to replace the police department with a new Department of Public Safety. Although the three-word call to action was the jumping-off point for communities to talk about how they want to be policed, experts say the goals of defund the police are debatable. To some it means abolishing police departments, for others it is about cutting law enforcement budgets and to others it is about reform and accountability. The defund-the-police movement spearheaded an opportunity for historically disenfranchised and historically under-resourced communities to express their continued discontent with policing, said Howard Henderson, the Center for Justice Research director at Texas Southern University. For months, beginning in late May 2020, Portland one of the whitest cities in America was roiled by near-nightly Black Lives Matter protests. At the time, officials including Wheeler were criticized for what many described as an overly aggressive police force. During the height of protests, officers reported more than 6,000 uses of force. The U.S. Department of Justice rebuked the bureau for its abnormally high reliance on violent tactics. Portland police have a history of being combative. In 2014, the city and Department of Justice reached a settlement agreement following a federal investigation that found Portland officers used excessive force against people with mental illness. Some of the police spending that passed on Wednesday including $2.7 million for body-worn cameras and hiring staff to assess the police department's crowd control tactics were created in order to meet the Justice Department's reform requirements. During last year's protests, Portlanders called for $50 million to be cut from the department budget, with the money going to community-driven initiatives. The City Council responded by cutting $15 million. An additional $12 million was cut due to pandemic-caused economic shortfalls. As a result, school resource officers, transit police and a gun violence reduction team which was found to disproportionately target Black Portland residents during traffic stops, according to an audit in March 2018 were disbanded. Similar action was taken elsewhere. In the wake of protests, the Los Angeles City Council cut $150 million from the police budget, promising to put that money into other social services. Likewise, in New York City lawmakers approved a shift of $1 billion from policing to education and social services. At the time the NYPD budget was around $6 billion, with several billion dollars more in shared city expenses such as pensions. However, since the cut, concerns about crime led to about $200 million in restored funding. Henderson says some of the loudest voices of the defund movement weren't people in neighborhoods most riddled by crime. The folks who live in these high-crime communities . they dont want to get rid of police altogether," Henderson said. "What they want to do is get rid of bad policing, In Portland, gun violence has disproportionately impacted communities of color. Family members of homicide victims and advocates who work with young gang members have questioned the cuts and asked for greater police presence, along with accountability and increased social services. In the November elections, questions about when and where police are needed were at the forefront. In Seattle, mayoral candidates who wanted to defund police stumbled. In New York City former police captain Eric Adams, who has not embraced calls to defund the police, was elected mayor. In Minneapolis, Police Chief Medaria Arradondo has proposed a $192 million budget for 2022, which would restore funding to what it was before Floyds death. The proposed budget, which will be voted on in December, includes funds to replace around 300 who have quit since last year. Similarly in Portland, the police department is 128 officers short of authorized strength. The added police spending includes signing bonuses for new officers, funding a retire-rehire program and bolstering recruitment with the goal to hire 200 additional sworn officers and 100 unarmed community safety officers by 2024 which some advocates see as a meaningful reform win and a compromise to defunding police. Nationally, homicides increased by nearly 30% from 2019 to 2020, based on FBI data. However, in Portland, deadly violence has increased at a faster rate than nearly all major cities, with an 83% increase in homicides in 2020. Aaron Chalfin, a University of Pennsylvania criminologist who has studied four decades of police budgets in major cities, says 54% of the times that cities hired more officers, homicide numbers decreased. Many factors are at play in the fluctuation of crime rates, including the number of officers and police department budgets. Other factors include financial and mental health struggles caused by the pandemic, the economy, programs for young people and even the amount of street lighting. There are "a million things that drive crime up and down, Chalfin said. Across the country, officials have used the defund the police movement to discuss policing alternatives. In Portland, it paved the way for City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty the first Black woman elected to City Council and key architect of police reform plans to create Portland Street Response. The unarmed policing alternative comprised of a paramedic, a mental health crisis responder and peer support specialists respond to non-emergency calls for people experiencing a crisis. Henderson said that because of defund the police, a valuable national conversation was started. At the end of the day was it the best phrase? Maybe it was? Maybe it wasnt? Henderson said. But at least were talking about it." ___ Sara Cline is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. MADISON, Wis. (AP) At one point, the 18-year-old murder defendant stood behind the seated, black-robed judge and peered over him to review evidence. At another, on Veterans Day, the judge led the jury and others in the courtroom in applause for veterans just as a defense witness who had served in the Army was about to testify. And as the case neared its conclusion, the judge permitted the defendant to draw numbers from a raffle drum to determine which jurors would serve as alternates creating the appearance, however small, that the defendant was helping to administer his own trial. As Kyle Rittenhouses trial has played out in the Kenosha courtroom of Circuit Judge Bruce Schroeder, moments of apparent deference to the defendant have struck many observers as curiously different from how murder proceedings often unfold. Schroeder addressed some of these observations Wednesday, saying people should have confidence in the outcome of the trial. He called some coverage of the case frightening. Schroeder, the longest-serving circuit judge in Wisconsin, said he's been letting defendants draw jury alternates' numbers for an estimated 20 years. He explained Wednesday that he started doing it after the trial of a Black man when there was only one Black person on the jury and that person was dismissed after the court clerk drew the juror as an alternate. Schroeder said that while there was nothing wrong with the way the alternate was picked, the optics looked bad. Since then he said he's had an almost universal policy of having defendants draw alternates. Legal experts said that might be unconventional, but not necessarily wrong. Schroeder said he hasn't had any complaints in this case, and suggested that those who were dissatisfied were trying to undermine the results of the trial. But if the judge had led jurors in clapping as a prosecution witness took the stand, making that witness seem more laudable or credible, it would surely be grounds for defense attorneys to appeal a conviction, noted Robert Weisberg, faculty co-director of the Criminal Justice Center at the Stanford Law School. Prosecutors, however, can't appeal a not guilty verdict. If nothing else, the discussion about the judge's conduct has underlined the importance of how the judicial system is perceived especially in a high-profile case where the outcome can exacerbate societal tensions around issues like race, guns, protests, vigilantism, and law and order. Our hope is that the court system and our judges, while human, will uphold this role of a neutral arbiter so that everybody gets a fair trial the defendant and the people and that we can arrive at a decision that we can all agree on was legitimate, said Mary D. Fan, a former federal prosecutor who teaches at the University of Washington Law School. When people have doubts about that impartiality," Fan said, "it undermines our trust in the justice of the verdict. Rittenhouse, a former police youth cadet who faces life in prison if convicted on the most serious charge against him, used an AR-style semi-automatic rifle to kill two men and wound a third during a night of protests against racial injustice in the summer of 2020. Rittenhouse is white, as were those he shot. The killings followed the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man, during a domestic disturbance in Kenosha. Rittenhouse testified he acted in self-defense. Prosecutors argue he went to the protest looking for a reason to shoot. Its primarily the defendant, not prosecutors, whose rights are protected under the law, and judges must guard them carefully. Schroeder has done so appropriately in some instances, legal experts said, such as when he scolded prosecutor Thomas Binger for asking Rittenhouse why he had not discussed the shootings before taking the witness stand. Defendants have a right to remain silent. But judges should not be so solicitous of a defendant that it raises questions about the fairness of the trial. Balancing that can be tricky, especially where a jurist's decisions are under such national scrutiny. Siding too closely with a defendant could lead to a wrongful acquittal or inflame societal tensions, while an obvious alignment with prosecutors could lead to a tainted and ultimately overturned conviction. The judge should be as close to invisible as possible, Weisberg said. Schroeder has been anything but. He laughs often, tosses trivia questions at jurors, has talked about his difficulty with technology and made an attention-getting comment suggesting that he hoped the Asian food coming for lunch wasn't stuck at backlogged West Coast ports. He has often sparred with the prosecution. The 75-year-old Schroeder, on the bench since 1983, isnt known for leniency toward defendants. In 2018, he ordered a woman convicted of shoplifting to tell the manager of any store she entered that she was on supervision for theft. Schroeder told the woman that embarrassment does have a valuable place in deterring criminality. A state appeals court overturned the sentence. Some of his pretrial rulings in the Rittenhouse case have also drawn attention. He ruled that prosecutors couldnt argue that Rittenhouse was affiliated with the Proud Boys or that he attacked a woman months before the shootings. Nor would he allow the people Rittenhouse shot to be referred to as victims." Facts about a defendant's background are often excluded from trial if they're not relevant to the charges at hand, and victims could be considered a prejudicial term when a defendant is claiming self-defense. On Wednesday, Schroeder said: How would you like to be put on trial for a crime? ... Is it so difficult to just use the term complaining witness, instead of prejudging ... whether theres a victim and whether there was a crime committed? Other rulings were more unusual. Awaiting the trial, Rittenhouse had been out of custody on bail. When he moved and failed to update his address an apparent violation prosecutors sought to have him re-arrested, with his bail increased. During a testy hearing earlier this year, the judge refused and wouldn't share the defendants new address with prosecutors, noting defense arguments that Rittenhouse was in hiding because of threats. I hope youre not suggesting sharing this with our office would lead to further violence, Binger said at the time. I have never heard of a situation where the information has been withheld from my office. Questions about the optics of Rittenhouse's case date to the moments after the shootings. Video quickly emerged of Rittenhouse walking by police with his hands up and his rifle strapped to his chest while witnesses identified him as the shooter. Police did not immediately arrest him, and he later turned himself in. An officer testified that he did not hear witnesses yelling that Rittenhouse was the shooter, but in the days afterward many people questioned whether a Black gunman would have received such hands-off treatment. Aspects of the trial have been similarly noteworthy. At one point, Rittenhouse stood behind Schroeder as they reviewed evidence a moment that occurred outside the presence of the jury, but which nevertheless was captured in news images and appeared striking for having a murder defendant so close to a judge. Phil Turner, a former federal prosecutor who now works as an attorney in Chicago, said he didn't believe Schroeder had unduly sided with Rittenhouse. He noted the behavior of judges varies widely in a system where they win their seats through electoral politics, not necessarily legal merit. Lawyers, he suggested, simply must adjust to each courtroom. You learn the music the judge is playing, he said, and then you dance to it. ___ Johnson reported from Seattle. Forliti reported from Minneapolis. ___ Find APs full coverage of the Rittenhouse trial: https://apnews.com/hub/kyle-rittenhouse (The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Wendy Whitman Cobb, US Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies (THE CONVERSATION) On Nov. 15, 2021, U.S. officials announced that they had detected a dangerous new debris field in orbit near Earth. Later in the day, it was confirmed that Russia had destroyed one of its old satellites in a test of an anti-satellite weapon. Wendy Whitman Cobb is a space security researcher. She explains what these weapons are and why the debris they create is a problem now and in the future. What do we know? Russia launched an anti-satellite test that destroyed one of its older satellites. The satellite broke up and created thousands of pieces of debris in orbit, ranging in size from tiny specks up to pieces a few feet across. This space junk will linger in orbit for years, potentially colliding with other satellites as well as the International Space Station. The space station crew has already had to shelter in place as they passed near the debris cloud. Whats an anti-satellite weapon? Anti-satellite weapons, commonly referred to as ASATs, are any weapon that can temporarily impair or permanently destroy an orbiting satellite. The one that Russia just tested is known as a direct ascent kinetic anti-satellite weapon. These are usually launched from the ground or from the wings of an airplane and destroy satellites by running into them at high speeds. A similar weapon type, called co-orbital anti-satellite weapons, are first launched into orbit and then change direction to collide with the targeted satellite from space. A third type, non-kinetic anti-satellite weapons, use technology like lasers to disrupt satellites without physically colliding with them. Space agencies have been developing and testing anti-satellite weapons since the 1960s. To date, the U.S., Russia, China and India have demonstrated the ability to attack satellites in orbit that support services like GPS, communications and weather forecasting. Why is debris a problem? Regardless of the cause, space debris is a serious problem. Larger pieces are easier to track and avoid but its difficult to track pieces smaller than 4 inches (10 centimeters). Even small debris can still pose a major threat though. Space debris is often traveling faster than 17,000 mph around the Earth. At that speed, pieces of debris could destroy any spacecraft or satellite it collided with. In the 1980s, a Soviet satellite broke up as a result of a suspected debris strike. More worrisome is the danger debris poses to crewed space missions. In July 2021, one of the International Space Stations robotic arms was struck by a piece of debris that put a 0.2-inch (0.5 cm) hole clean through a part of the arm. While the damage did not need to be fixed, officials characterized it as a lucky strike if it had struck a different part of the station, the situation could have been a lot worse. Space debris is also a significant threat to people on Earth. Satellites play a vital role in the global economy through GPS, communications and weather data. If services such as these were disrupted, there would be significant economic cost. One study found that a GPS outage could cost the U.S. up to $1 billion a day. There are currently thousands of pieces of space junk circling the Earth, with sources as varied as old rocket bodies, dead satellites, debris from previous collisions and tests, and lost items from astronauts. The problem like with the environment is that there is little incentive for individual countries to avoid generating debris or clean it up. The amount of space debris has only increased over time. For years, scientists have been warning about the possibility of a collision cascade. As the amount of debris increases, the chance of collisions between it and other satellites and debris also goes up. More collisions might then leave certain orbits completely unusable. While this could take decades to play out, events like the Russian test will only make such an outcome more likely. [Too busy to read another daily email? Get one of The Conversations curated weekly newsletters.] What to do now? In the short term, little can be done to mitigate this new cloud of space debris, but anyone with anything in space is on high alert to avoid it. The U.S. government and commercial companies are tracking the new debris, and the crew on the International Space Station have been ordered to keep certain modules closed off as they continue to pass through the debris cloud. As the new debris spreads out and the pieces are tracked, station controllers will have a better understanding of the danger posed to the crew. In the long run, experts recommend working on global solutions to remove debris. This includes taking measures to prevent debris in the first place and removing debris that is already in space. Several governmental and international organizations have proposed ways to prevent new debris, but these are informal and not legally binding. Remediation is a tougher challenge. Technology to remove debris has not yet been fully developed, but even still, its deployment is a sensitive subject. The same technology that might be used to remove a piece of space junk could also be used for attacking a satellite. This dual-use technology poses challenges, as it can raise suspicions that countries are testing anti-satellite weapons under the cover of debris removal. Despite the difficulties, there is growing international recognition that space debris is a dangerous problem. A consortium of private companies recently created the Net Zero Space charter to reduce debris, and the U.S. Space Force is looking for ways to combat the problem as well. While the world still does not yet have a full understanding of Russias actions, this event is a wake-up call on the importance of efforts to reduce pollution in Earths orbit. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/russian-anti-satellite-weapon-test-what-happened-and-what-are-the-risks-172016. MADISON, Wis. (AP) The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to consider whether the state Department of Natural Resources policy boards leader can continue to hold his seat months after his term expired. Fred Prehn, a Wausau dentist, was appointed by former Republican Gov. Scott Walker in 2015. Although his term ended May 1, he has refused to step down, denying Democratic Gov. Tony Evers appointee Sandra Naas a seat and maintaining a 4-3 majority for Republican appointees. JERUSALEM (AP) For nearly 10 years, Monim Haroon has only known one home: Israel. Like thousands of Sudanese migrants, he lives and works without legal status, fearing that a return to his native land would be a death sentence. Israel's normalization of ties with Sudan, announced last year, had raised fears among the migrants that they would lose their migrant status and be forced to return. Now, weeks after a military coup derailed Sudan's transition to democracy, they dread being forcibly returned to a country under the full control of generals blamed for past atrocities. I am not against normalization," said Haroon. "But the normalization should be through the civilian Sudanese government, not the military powers that now control Sudan. The asylum-seekers' plight points to one of the less savory aspects of the so-called Abraham Accords, a series of deals reached between Israel and four Arab countries last year. The U.S.-brokered agreements with Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco widely hailed as a breakthrough in Mideast diplomacy were struck with unelected Arab leaders with little tolerance for dissent who were richly rewarded by the Trump administration. Sudan's military leaders, the driving force behind the agreement, secured the country's removal from the U.S. list of terrorism sponsors, unlocking vital international aid and commerce. But then last month, Sudan's top military leader, Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, disbanded the transitional government and ordered the arrest of civilian leaders, quashing hopes of a democratic transition after the 2019 overthrow of longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir. The coup, which has been condemned by the United States and other Western nations, has left Israel in a potentially awkward situation. Israel has been silent on the coup and its aftermath, indicating it intends to maintain normalized ties. A report on the Israeli news site Walla that an Israeli delegation had secretly visited Sudan to meet with the coup leaders deepened migrant fears that they could soon be deported. The Israeli Foreign Ministry and Sudanese officials did not respond to requests for comment. Sudanese and Eritrean migrants began arriving in Israel in 2005, with many of the Sudanese fleeing persecution in the western Darfur region and the country's south. Seeking safety and opportunity in Israel, they made often dangerous journeys across Egypt's rugged Sinai Peninsula. Israel initially did little to stop the influx, but as more migrants arrived, the authorities began detaining thousands in remote desert prisons. And in 2013, Israel completed construction of a fenced barrier along its border with Egypt that mostly halted the migration. The migrants' presence has sparked a backlash among many Israelis who associate them with the crime and poverty in south Tel Aviv, where most of them settled. Right-wing governments in recent years have made various attempts to expel them. Ayelet Shaked, a prominent right-wing politician, has described Sudanese migrants as infiltrators and said they should be sent back since ties have been normalized. She is now the interior minister in Israel's new government, a position that oversees immigration policies. We are worried because she has always been against asylum-seekers, Haroon said. The Interior Ministry said the status of Sudanese migrants has not changed following the coup but declined to answer further questions. Israel has resolved only a small fraction of the thousands of Eritrean and Sudanese asylum claims, deeming the vast majority to be economic migrants. Under international law, Israel cannot deport migrants back to countries where their life or basic freedoms are seriously threatened. Sudan's incarcerated former president al-Bashir was charged with genocide by the International Criminal Court for mass killings that took place in Darfur during the 2000s. The region remains unstable, with deadly tribal clashes still common. Since the October coup, at least 23 Sudanese protesters have been killed in confrontations between pro-democracy demonstrators and military forces. Although Israel does not send migrants back, consecutive decrees have purposefully made life unbearable for African refugees, said Sigal Rozen, public policy director at the Israeli Hotline for Refugees and Migrants, an advocacy group that assists the Africans. Most of the estimated 28,000 Sudanese and Eritrean migrants work in menial jobs and struggle to make ends meet. Their numbers have dwindled by half since the 2000s, with most traveling onward to third countries, considering it unsafe to return home. In 2012, Israel ordered the deportation of over 1,000 migrants back to South Sudan after it gained independence, arguing that it was safe for them to go home. Those who voluntarily returned were given a cash incentive of about $1,000. The move was criticized by rights groups following South Sudans descent into civil war in 2013. Stuck in Israeli legislative limbo, most African migrants are barred from basic social rights such as sick pay and driving licenses and are also subject to financial penalties. Among the most controversial of these was the Deposit Law, which limited asylum seekers to accessing only 80% of their salaries while they remained in Israel. The law, which returned the remainder of their salaries only if they left the country, was later reversed in 2020. In April, Israel's Supreme Court ordered the Interior Ministry to resolve thousands of the unanswered Sudanese asylum claims by the end of the year or grant them temporary residency. Sudan was noticeably absent from anniversary commemorations of the Abraham Accords earlier this fall. As Israel and the other three nations trumpeted high-level visits and opened embassies, there has been little on the Sudan front beyond a surprise meeting between Israeli and Sudanese officials in the UAE weeks before the coup. Sudan also said in September that it would seize the assets of companies linked to Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that rules Gaza. Haim Koren, former Israeli ambassador to Egypt and South Sudan, attributed the delays to concerns by Sudanese officials over whether Israel's new government and the Biden administration would follow through on the promises of the normalization agreement. Both have expressed strong support for deepening and expanding the Abraham Accords. There remain areas that still require negotiation, but I expect full relations to be established, said Koren. Maybe not today, but it will happen. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, frozen turkey inventories are 24% below their three-year average volumes and stocks are lower partly because production of turkeys is down compared to the average year. This news comes before Thanksgiving, when an estimated 46 million turkeys are eaten and nearly nine in 10 Americans eat turkey on the holiday. The inventory is low thanks to the national supply chain problems and labor shortages plaguing multiple industries, including agriculture. It will be harder to find a turkey this year and likely more expensive once found. That's especially the case for smaller birds, according to ABC 7 Chicago. US Department of Agriculture "I dont like the word 'shortage' in this scenario. Its not like we forgot to start raising turkeys," Trey Malone, an agricultural economist at Michigan State University, told Vox. "Whats really happening is that you have these disruptions along the supply chain. Its not because theres no turkeys, its that the turkeys are in the wrong places at the wrong time." The USDA said seasonal build-up was less pronounced than usual and stock volumes appear to have peaked before starting an earlier-than-normal decline. At the end of August, 428.1 million pounds of turkey meat were in cold storage, the USDA estimated, a 19% decrease from the same month in 2020 and a decline of about 7 million pounds from the end of July. At 474.2 million pounds, August 2021 was mostly unchanged from the same time in 2020 but below the 3-year average in part because of elevated feed costs. Additionally, August placement of turkey chicks, down about 4% from the 3-year average, have dampened expectations for both turkey production and stocks, the USDA reported. August marks the latest date by which a turkey chick can mature in order to be harvested by Thanksgiving. With people gathering in smaller groups last year, people wanted smaller turkeys which made smaller turkeys harder to come by. This year, farmers had to guess what consumer demand would look like during the spread of the delta variant in July, and the market remains uncertain, Vox reported. Turkey processors are now facing labor shortages that is holding processing up, and any and all disruptions could cause risks in getting turkeys from the farm to the table on time. According to the USDA's Turkey Report, whole frozen turkeys already cost about 26 cents a pound more in 2021 from 2020 and wholesale prices for frozen whole-hen turkeys was the highest monthly average in September since the report began in 2006. Prices have fallen in October, but they're still high. Even more turkey meat was lost in October when Butterball, one of the main turkey producers in the country, recalled more than 14,000 pounds of ground turkey product that may have been exposed to extraneous materials, specifically blue plastic. Additionally, the Consumer Price Index shows the cost of food was up 5.3% over the past year in October and the index for meats, poultry, fish and eggs which would include turkey was up 11.9% and fruits and vegetables were up 3%. Everything on the Thanksgiving table is likely to be more expensive this year. TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) A Tucson man has been sentenced to three years in prison for financially exploiting vulnerable adults. The Arizona Attorney Generals Office said Tuesday that Hector Andres Aleman pleaded guilty to attempted fraudulent schemes and artifices. UNITED NATIONS (AP) The U.N. special envoy for Somalia urged the countrys political leaders to redouble efforts to ensure that the entire Federal Parliament is elected before the end of the year so that presidential elections can be held as soon as possible. James Swan told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday that progress in the electoral process has been slow and uneven and elections for the vast majority of seats in the Federal Parliament havent started. In addition, he said, electoral security preparations need to be accelerated and a list needs to be published of the 30% of seats reserved for women in the lower House of the People. He welcomed the completion of elections for the 54 senators in the Upper House of parliament, including 14 women representing 26% of the chamber -- an increase from 2016 but still below the 30% target. He said it is also encouraging that elections for the 275 seats in the House of the People have started, with two members chosen and elections for an additional 11 seats announced to begin this week. But Swan stressed: Although progress is being made, the efforts of Somalias political leaders will need to be redoubled in the coming weeks to bring the elections for the Federal Parliament to a successful conclusion, so that presidential elections can then be held as soon as possible. The completion of these elections is more important than ever, so that all efforts can return to the key governance, security, and development priorities in Somalia, he said. The ongoing delays in the electoral process continue to stall progress in other critical areas and hamper the achievement of national priorities beyond the elections," Swan warned, including reforming the constitution and justice sector, and advancing the development agenda and financial reforms. Three decades of chaos, from warlords to al-Qaida affiliate al-Shabab and the emergence of an Islamic State-linked group, have ripped apart the country that only in the past few years has begun trying to rebuild and find its footing. The pressure on President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed to hold elections has intensified since scheduled elections on Feb. 8 failed to take place because of the lack of agreement on how the vote should be carried out. Talks between the federal government and regional leaders that began in March broke down in early April. At the presidents request, the lower house of parliament then adopted a special law that extended the terms of current office holders for two years and abandoned a Sept. 17, 2020 agreement on indirect elections, reverting instead to a one-person, one-vote model. Those decisions sparked widespread opposition, leading to the mobilization of militias, exposing divisions within Somali security forces, and resulting in violent clashes on April 25. After the clashes, President Mohamed on May 1 asked the lower house of parliament to reverse its actions that included extending his mandate for two years. He also asked lawmakers to back the agreement the federal government reached with regional states last Sept. 17 on a way forward for the vote, and he asked Prime Minister Mohammed Hussein Roble to lead the election preparations and the related security measures. This led to a May 27 agreement on holding indirect elections this year. But the process was further delayed after the president suspended the prime ministers power to hire and fire officials in mid-September, the latest action in their increasingly divisive relationship. Swan told the council that tensions between the president and the prime minister in August and September over two issues, the appointment of senior security officials and the handling of an investigation into the disappearance of an intelligence agent, have now eased. The U.N. special representative called for all parties to swiftly conclude parliamentary elections and for the full respect of fundamental rights during the campaign and electoral periods, including peaceful assembly, and the freedom of movement, association, and expression. He warned that the security situation in Somalia continues to be volatile with the al-Shabab extremist group remaining a serious threat. He pointed to its continuing use of improvised explosive devices and increasing use of suicide bombers. So far in 2021, Swan said, the U.N. Assistance Mission in Somalia has documented 964 civilians killed or injured as a result of armed conflict, with al-Shabab responsible for almost two-thirds of civilian casualties. He said humanitarian organizations estimate that 7.7 million Somalis will require assistance in 2022, and he expressed grave concern that the 2021 U.N. humanitarian plan is only 51% funded. Some 1.2 million children under the age of five are likely to be acutely malnourished in 2022 without immediate treatment, Swan warned. He said some 2.9 million people are estimated to be internally displaced throughout the country, one of the highest numbers in the world. WASHINGTON (AP) Pressed to address gaping inequality in global COVID-19 vaccines, the Biden administration took steps Wednesday to make billions of dollars available to drugmakers to scale up domestic production to share with the world and prepare for the next pandemic. Under the new initiative, the government's Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority is soliciting pharmaceutical companies with proven ability to make the more-effective mRNA vaccines to bid for U.S. investment in scaling up their manufacturing. Pfizer and Moderna produce the two U.S.-approved mRNA shots. The White House hopes the move will build capacity to produce an additional 1 billion shots per year. The initiative comes as the Biden White House has faced growing pressure at home and abroad over inequity in the global vaccine supply as the U.S. moves toward approving booster shots for all adults while vulnerable people in poorer nations wait for their first dose of protection. According to an analysis by the ONE Campaign, an international aid and advocacy organization, only 4.7% of people living in low-income countries have received a first dose. Wealthy nations administered more than 173 million booster shots, while lower-income countries have administered about 32 million first shots. The Biden administration believes increasing capacity of COVID-19 shots will help ease a global shortage of doses, particularly in lower- and middle-income nations, stopping preventable death and limiting the development of potentially new, more dangerous variants of the virus. The goal of this program is to expand existing capacity by an additional billion doses per year, with production starting by the second half of 2022, White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients said. On Wednesday, Zients announced that the U.S. has now donated 250 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines globally the most of any nation with a goal of sharing more than 1.1 billion shots by the end of 2022. There are no firm agreements yet with Moderna or Pfizer to take up the U.S. on the investment, but the Biden administration hopes that the enhanced manufacturing capacity, through support for the company's facilities, equipment, staff or training, will by mid-2022 allow more COVID-19 doses to be shared overseas as well as help prepare for the next public health emergency. The administration is prioritizing the mRNA vaccines, which have proven to be more effective against preventing serious illness and death from COVID-19 than the Johnson & Johnson viral vector vaccine, which uses a harmless virus that carries genetic material to stimulate the immune system. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are made with a piece of genetic code called messenger RNA that tells the body to make harmless copies of the spike protein so its trained to recognize the virus. Robbie Silverman, senior advocacy manager at Oxfam America, welcomed Bidens plan to invest into vaccine manufacturing capacity but said it was nowhere near sufficient. What the world really needs is distributed regional manufacturing capacity of vaccines, and it sounds like this investment is focused on building U.S. capacity, he said. We desperately need the companies who have a monopoly over the COVID vaccines to transfer their technology, and we need the U.S. government to use its leverage." Silverman estimated that without companies transferring their knowledge of how to make COVID-19 vaccines, it would take manufacturers elsewhere double the time needed to start making doses, noting that billions of vaccines against other diseases are routinely made in developing countries. Silverman said that while the U.S. should have negotiated more provisions about vaccine equity when it was securing its own supply, it was not too late to act. He said the U.S. should support the proposed waiver that was drafted by India and South Africa at the World Trade Organization, calling for patents on COVID-19 vaccines and treatments to be suspended. And he said the U.S. could invoke the Defense Production Act to target critical ingredients for COVID-19 shots. The U.S. government has lots of tools at its disposal to push pharmaceutical companies, he said, noting that it had invested billions of dollars into creating Modernas COVID-19 vaccine. The U.S. needs to make sure these companies, which they funded, are prioritizing public health rather than profits. Ava Alkon, a senior policy and research officer at Doctors Without Borders, said that the billion doses that might be produced with the U.S. investment were still far from the figure needed to immunize the world. The World Health Organization has estimated that 11 billion doses are needed. Alkon said that since any manufacturers newly drafted into making COVID-19 doses would not be able to produce any supplies for several months, a more immediate solution is needed. We believe that the U.S. can distribute many more doses than it already has on an ongoing basis, she said, calling for the U.S. to be more transparent about how many extra doses it has. She said some estimates suggest the U.S. could have at least 500 million surplus vaccines by the end of the year. In a statement, Moderna said it hadnt yet reviewed the Biden administrations proposal, but that it looked forward to discussing it with the administration and understanding whether there is a role that we could play in supporting the governments efforts to address pandemic preparedness. Pfizer declined comment. The New York Times first reported on the new initiative. ___ AP writers Maria Cheng in London and Lauran Neergaard in Washington contributed. LONDON (AP) The World Health Organization says coronavirus deaths in Europe rose 5% in the last week, making it the only region in the world where COVID-19 deaths increased. The U.N. health agency said confirmed cases jumped 6% globally, driven by increases in the Americas, Europe and Asia. In its weekly report on the pandemic issued late Tuesday, WHO said COVID-19 deaths in all regions other than Europe remained stable or declined, and totaled 50,000 worldwide last week. Of the 3.3 million new infections reported, 2.1 million came from Europe. It was the seventh consecutive week that COVID-19 cases continued to mount across the 61 countries and territories that WHO counts in its European region, which stretches through Russia to Central Asia. While about 60% of people in Western Europe are fully immunized against COVID-19, only about half as many are vaccinated in the eastern part of the continent, where officials are struggling to overcome widespread vaccine hesitancy. WHO said infections have been falling in Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia since July. Within Europe, WHO said the highest numbers of new cases were in Russia, Germany and Britain. It noted that deaths jumped by 67% in Norway and by 38% in Slovakia. The health agency previously described Europe as the epicenter of the ongoing pandemic and warned that there could be 500,000 more deaths by February if urgent actions arent taken on the continent. In the last week, Austria has put tight restrictions on the movement of unvaccinated people, the Netherlands and some other European countries have reintroduced lockdown measures to try to slow infections, and the U.K. decided to roll out booster doses to everyone over 40. ___ Follow all AP stories on the pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic. BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) A Wyoming pipeline company agreed to a $2 million settlement for damages caused by a 2015 crude oil spill that fouled a section of the Yellowstone River in eastern Montana and contaminated a city's water supply, officials said Wednesday. The agreement with Bridger Pipeline LLC includes a restoration plan that could include projects to restore aquatic habitat and improve recreational sites along the Yellowstone River corridor, Montana U.S. Attorney Leif Johnson said. HOUSTON (AP) Calls for an independent investigation into what led to 10 deaths at the Astroworld music festival went unheeded Monday, as Houston-area officials instead chose to direct a county administrator to conduct a review with other governmental entities. County Judge Lina Hidalgo the top elected official in Harris County, which includes Houston had proposed a third-party probe of the planning and execution of the festival founded and headlined by rap superstar Travis Scott. The Harris County administrator instead will work with other city and county entities to review security, fire and other safety plans at the county-owned NRG Park, where the festival was held. I hope that it comes back with actionable lessons, Hidalgo said. I hope it doesnt result in something vague or forgotten. Other members of Harris County's governing body, known as a commissioner's court, were concerned Hidalgo's investigation could lead to legal liabilities for the county. Dozens of lawsuits have already been filed over injuries and deaths at the Nov. 5 concert. Houston police are conducting a separate criminal investigation into what happened at the festival. No one has been charged. The police department, along with the city fire department, played key roles in crowd control and other safety measures at the show. Experts in crowd safety say an investigation by neutral outsiders into the tragedy could help avoid potential conflicts of interest and promote transparency. Police have said they are reviewing surveillance video provided by concert promoter Live Nation, as well as dozens of clips of the show shared on social media. Investigators also planned to speak with Live Nation representatives, Scott and concertgoers. Over 300 people were treated on site for injuries at the show, and at least 25 were hospitalized. Many unanswered questions center on the actions of event organizers. A 56-page event operations plan for the Astroworld music festival included protocols for dangerous scenarios including an active shooter, bomb or terrorist threats, and severe weather. But it did not include information on what to do in the event of a crowd surge. The 10 people who died included a 9-year-old boy. The oldest was 27. Reports on individual causes of death are pending. ___ For more AP stories on Astroworld: https://apnews.com/hub/astroworld-festival-deaths Houston-born rapper Travis Scott was once the posterboy for major brand endorsements. From Nike to McDonalds and Sony, Scott has collaborated with some of the largest multinational companies in the world. But in the wake of the tragedy at the Astroworld music festival in Houston on Nov. 5, 10 concert-goers are dead, hundreds more injured, lawsuits are pending and brands once close to Scott are distancing themselves from the "Sicko Mode" rapper with others keeping quiet on next moves. Nike, which has partnered with Scott on a number of projects over the years, announced Monday that it is pausing its latest shoe collaboration with the musician. "Out of respect for everyone impacted by the tragic events at the Astroworld Festival, we are postponing the launch of the Air Max 1 x Cactus Jack," the brand said in a statement shared via its SNKRS app and the Nike website. The statement, released Monday, follows the death of 9-year-old Ezra Blount, the youngest victim to succumb to injuries related to the concert. Nike has had numerous successful, sold-out footwear collaborations with Scott since first partnering up with the rapper in 2017. Its latest sneaker offering was expected to drop in late 2021, but a new date was not announced. Other brands associated with the Texas native have likewise taken measures to insulate themselves from Scott, who was named alongside Drake, Apple Music and Astroworld promoter Live Nation on Tuesday in a $750 million lawsuit filed by Houston lawyer Tony Buzbee. Epic Games-owned Fortnite has quietly removed its Scott-themed emote, a customized dance move, from its platform following the deadly concert, according to IGN. Scott was previously the star of Fortnite's first major concert event in April 2020, earning the rap star $20 million, according to Forbes. Mega64, a film and production company, announced the day after the concert that it had terminated its upcoming project featuring Scott. In an emailed statement, General Mills, which previously partnered with Scott for a custom Reese's Puffs cereal box in 2019, said they have no new plans for future promotions involving the 30-year-old hip hop star. "The news coming out of Astroworld was indeed tragic," the statement said. "We extend our sympathies to the families of the victims, the injured parties and other fans who were impacted by the unfortunate events. Reese's Puff partnered with Travis Scott on a custom cereal box in 2019. We have no new plans to partner with him." Women's fashion periodical W Magazine is also scrambling to pull an upcoming edition featuring Scott and girlfriend Kylie Jenner on the cover, according to Page Six. The issue, which includes an interview with the celebrity couple, was shot and printed prior to Astroworld and has not yet shipped. "W editors have cleared any planned coverage of Travis and Kylie from their website, but the magazine was already printed, and now they are trying to stop the delivery trucks," a source told Page Six. "In light of what happened at Astroworld, the interview and cover lines seem inappropriate, to say the least." Despite the ensuing fallout, Scott announced a new partnership with therapy app BetterHelp, just three days after Astroworld, offering a free, one-month trial of mental health services for concertgoers traumatized by the experience. It is unclear whether Scott's upcoming spring/summer menswear collection with fashion label Christian Dior, dubbed the Cactus Jack Dior line, will be seen through, but experts say the line, inspired by Scott's home state of Texas, has already been manufactured and will be shipped to stores by January, according to Rolling Stone. "It is an apocalyptic marketing turn for that brand when you double down on this icon to Gen Z that now has effectively detonated in your face," Eric Schiffer, chairman of Reputation Management Consultants, told Rolling Stone. Other major sponsors and partners with Scott, like beer giant Anheuser-Busch, McDonalds, Sony Playstation, Byredo, and Mattel have been quiet in the wake of the Astroworld tragedy and did not respond to requests for comment by the time of this writing. We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on! Go to form How to write a Canadian resume The "dos" and "don'ts" of writing a Canadian-style resume. Shelby Thevenot Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif Sans Font Size A A This is not another article telling you to spell-check your resumebut do spell-check your resume. Were going to cover the not-so-obvious tips for getting your foot in the door to your Canadian dream job. The resume is only one step to finding a job in Canadaand it is not even the first. Before you sit down to type up your professional background, do some research on Canadas job market, and identify the companies that you would like to apply for. The Canadian government website offers some tools that can help you in your job search. For this article, we are going to focus on optimizing your resume for Canadian employers. Keep in mind, employers will have their own preferences, and there are different best practices for every industry. We hope to give you a general idea of what you can include on a Canadian resume and what is best left out. Discover if Youre Eligible for Canadian Immigration 5 donts of Canadian resume writing Dont include a photo Unlike some countries, in Canada it is not necessary to include a photo with your CV unless youre an actor or a model. In general, the only information you need on your CV is what is relevant to the job posting. Dont overshare You do not need to include most personal information on your CV. At this point, the only personal information the employer needs is your name, and how to contact you. They do not need to know your age, what country you are from, your race, your religion, your marital status, or anything about your family. In fact, if asked these questions in an interview it might be illegal under Canadas human rights laws. Also, your CV is not the place to disclose your Social Insurance Number (SIN). Employers do not need that until you are already hired for the job. Your SIN card is a sensitive document, and you should only share it when it is legally required. Again, all you need to include in your CV is your relevant skills, experience, and basic contact information like name, phone number, and email. Mailing address is not always necessary, especially if you are searching for a job in a different city. If you want to demonstrate that you are within a commutable distance from the place of employment, then you may want to include it, but most job seekers find it just takes up precious space on the page. Dont write too much In terms of length, one page is ideal but having two is fine. You want the person reviewing your application to see only your best, most relevant, and recent experience. If you are just starting your career and you do not have a lot of experience, you can include items that may be less relevant to the posting. In general, just keep your resume short and sweet. You want it to be skimmable. Recruiters should be able to get an idea of your experience without feeling like they have to read a novel. Dont include references If your employer wants references they will ask for them. A good practice is to ensure your reference knows that you are naming them and giving out their contact information. Talking to your reference beforehand also helps you determine if this person really is going to give you a glowing review or not. Dont use an inappropriate email address Recruiters do pay attention to these details, and they might judge you based on whatever email address you thought was funny in high school. Using an email address that contains your name does not signal any red flags. 5 dos of Canadian resume writing Do tailor your application to the job posting It takes longer, but you will often get better results if you tailor each resume to the position you are looking for rather than the spray and pray method where you send out a bunch of generic resumes. Not sure what order you should present your experience? Which skills to include and which to leave out? Are you between word choices? Look at the job posting. This is your first clue into exactly what the recruiter is looking for, and the language they want to see in your application. The posting will list the job qualifications and then the nice-to-haves. Include your necessary skills front and centre on the first page of your resume, then put your assets after that. Do quantify your achievements Try to quantify your achievements with numbers, if you can. For example, if you were a manager, mention how many people you were responsible for overseeing. If you worked in sales, how many products did you sell? How much profit did you ring in every month? Listing your specific achievements, in numbers that an employer can understand, will highlight your skills better than a generic statement. Saying you have a good work ethic means nothing. Demonstrating that you grew traffic to your companys website by 20% over one year, for example, shows a recruiter that you know what you are doing. Do write in third person Write in third-person format, so no I, me, or my. Keep your sentences short and clear. For your work experience, include the name and location of your company, and list a few of your responsibilities. Include the years you worked at the company, or if you worked for less than a year you can include the number of months. There is no need to explain gaps in employment on the resume. It will come up in the interview if the recruiter even asks. For your education, list the school, program, credential, and dates. Depending on the position you are applying for, you can include your GPA as well, but it is usually not necessary. You can include your awards here, or in a separate awards section. Do include unpaid work experience You can include things like your volunteer experience, as long as it prepared you for the duties you will be performing at the job you are applying for. Do include a cover letter Even if they do not ask for it, even if they are going to skip it and head straight to your resume, it is always good to include a cover letter. A cover letter is meant to embellish the resume, and show the recruiter why you are the best fit for their job opening. We could write a separate article about cover letters and we probably will. But here we will give you a general idea of how to write a cover letter. Your cover letter should contain the companys contact information, as well as your contact information. It should be no more than a couple of paragraphs, and it should not take up a whole page. You can write in the first person here. Your goal is to connect with the recruiter. Use their name only if you are 100% sure you have the correct name of the person who will be reviewing your application. If you do know their name, use it, but note that there is usually no need to include a prefix. These days, starting a letter with Sir or Madame is usually inappropriate, unless you know for certain that the recruiter reading your letter prefers that. The first paragraph should introduce who you are and why you want this job. Be sure to name the position you are applying for. In the subsequent paragraphs, you will want to demonstrate why you are the best candidate for the position, referring to your previous relevant experience. You can go above and beyond by showing them how your involvement will solve their problems, and make them a better company. Conclude by thanking them, and letting them know that you will be following up. Bonus tips for your Canadian job hunt You are dealing with more barriers than the average Canadian-born job-searcher, however, there are immigrant support services, and employment services that can help you in your journey. Immigration Canada has a list of free services on their website, but these are by no means an exhaustive list of everything thats out there. You can also check your provincial, or territorial websites, or search for employment services in your city. As much as possible, try to ask people you know if they have any connections or know of any job openings. Linked-In estimates at least 85% of jobs are found through networking. If you are in Canada and you do not know a lot of people, try industry networking events in your area, which can be found online through events websites, like Eventbrite, or on social media, like Facebook events or groups. Also, if you think you are underqualified for a position that interests you, apply anyway. In the best-case scenario, you get the job and learn to become the candidate that they are looking for, or else you just do not get the job. You have nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Discover if Youre Eligible for Canadian Immigration CIC News All Rights Reserved. Visit CanadaVisa.com to discover your Canadian immigration options. Wilkes-Barre, PA (18701) Today Partly cloudy this evening followed by some light rain after midnight. Low 38F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%.. Tonight Partly cloudy this evening followed by some light rain after midnight. Low 38F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 70%. In some other media climate, the Washington Posts decision to correct and remove chunks of its coverage of the Steele dossier last week would have been seismic. Six months into the tenure of Executive Editor Sally Buzbee the Post has admitted publicly that key reporting on one of the biggest stories of the Trump years was wrong. At issue was the 35-page dossier, first published by BuzzFeed News in January 2017, which aired murky intelligence gathering that showed nefarious links between Donald Trump and Russia. A federal indictment and two investigations into the dossier have severely undermined it, and the Post was forced to acknowledge that a man it named as a source for the document was, in fact, not. As a result, portions of two Post stories about the dossier and a video were removed, and an editors note was attached noting, in one case, that reporting in the story had been contradicted by a federal indictment and undermined by further reporting by The Washington Post. The Post also published a news story about its decision. Its rare for a publication to make wholesale changes after publication and to republish the edited story, especially more than four years afterward, Paul Farhi wrote. But the collapse of the dossiers credibility goes beyond the Post, to Mother Jones and the Wall Street Journal, to ABC and CNN, among others. And to Ben Smith, whose decision to publish the document in its entirety while editor of BuzzFeed News kicked off the whole mess. Smith is now the scoop-machine media columnist for the Times, putting that newspaper at the center of a bit of Trump weirdness its reporters had previously managed to avoid. Sign up for CJR 's daily email The Post was just the first out of the gate; others will almost certainly follow. Implicated, too, is the rest of the media commentariat, who until recently have kept relatively quiet about these failures. While the afterlife of the dossier has been chronicled by a few media folksincluding Erik Wemple of the Post and writers Marcy Wheeler, Matt Taibbi, and Aaron Mateit has, until very recently, been largely shrugged off outside of the conservative press. For decades, Ive followed media screw-up scrums, the pile-ons that tend to follow the embarrassments of big-name reporters and newsrooms. (Even more so since the rise of social media.) One could imagine the unraveling of the initial credulous hysteria around the dossier among them. A media, desperate for the fall of Trump, buying into a document that was never designed to meet the standards of good journalism. But it has, until the last few days,escaped that level of hand-wringing, perhaps due to tribalism. When news of the dossier broke, media Twitter broke out with its performative gasps. It felt like the dossier was expressing what an awful lot of reporters felt in their bones to be true. Few of those mainstream reporters want to join the chorus, led by Sean Hannity and his conservative colleagues, that has long been sayingcorrectlythat the dossier was overblown. (Even CJR has its own mini-role in this drama. Shortly after Smith published the dossier in BuzzFeed, CJR backed his decision. The decision to publish, we wrote, would not have been appropriate for The New Yorker or the Times, but was right for BuzzFeed and its audience.) Wemple, whose log of stories about the dossier is the definitive compilation of whats been wrong with the reporting, believes its unraveling was hidden by a dizzying news cycle. One of the documents most damning to the dossiers veracity was released in December 2019, in a report by the Justice Departments inspector general. As that was happening, Congress, and the press, was deeply enmeshed in the impeachment process, and the unraveling of the dossier was lost in the noise. Its part of the medias failure to walk and chew gum at the same time, Wemple told me in a phone call this week. Now, a moment of reckoning is upon us. Axios published a piece over the weekend calling the dossier the medias epic fail. Bill Grueskin, a Columbia Journalism School colleague who has written frequently for CJR, wrote an op-ed in the Times asking How did so much of the media get the Steele dossier so wrong? It seems reasonable to ask whether, knowing what we know now, the dossier should have been published at all. I think the answer, in hindsight, has to be no. So far, Smith hasnt recanted his decision. He even smells some hypocrisy in the fact that mainstream news organizations are now dancing on the dossiers carcass; he told me that these same outlets used the fact that BuzzFeed published to feed their own, endless loop of commentary about the document while enabling them to keep their distance from the thing. Legacy outlets could tut-tut at the digital hordes while benefiting from their looser publishing standards. To me, the dossier is a useful stand-in for the medias coverage of Trump in general. While there was an enormous amount of impressive investigative work around Trump and his many misdeeds, there was also, especially on cable news, a lot of nonsense and misdirection. Like Trump himself, we tacked to the extremes. When the right place to be, as always, is in the messy space in between. Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Kyle Pope is the editor in chief and publisher of the Columbia Journalism Review. Programming Note: In place of our regular Media Today newsletter, CJR is pleased to share the Journalism Crisis ProjectLauren Harriss weekly newsletter about the challenges facing the local journalism industry and how they might be overcome. The Media Today will return tomorrow. Over the past year and a half, congressional officials have drafted a series of bills to address the beleaguered state of local media across the US. Thus far, only one piece of proposed legislation, the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, has made any significant progress. This summer, when bipartisan support for the act began to coalesce, Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan wrote that congressional support cant happen soon enough. Members of West Virginia Universitys NewStart programincluding Jim Iovino, the programs director, and Crystal Good, founder and publisher of Black by God, both of whom have spoken to CJR about the importance of small-market journalismwrote a letter calling the act a game-changer for small-town USA. Recently, one provision from this acta tax credit to pay a portion of local reporters salarieshas been included as part of the Build Back Better Bill, which Democrats hope to pass by the end of the year. Local news organizations that would benefit are urging their readers and elected officials to support the measure, as are many industry leaders. Early this month, the tax-credit provision was removed from the bill; in response, some local outlets ran false front pages or altered layouts in protest. The measure was then reinstated. Yesterday, the Long Beach Business Journal, in California, ran a blank print edition and homepage to represent a future we never want to see happen, publisher David Sommers wrote on Twitter. A bipartisan-supported local news tax credit in the Build Back Better legislation would help newsrooms nationwide. The possibility of tax credits for local reporters salaries is something to celebrate, given the financial challenges facing most traditional local, for-profit newsrooms. Still, the Build Back Better bill includes only one provision from the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, excluding the originals tax credits for advertisers and for local news subscribers. And given the acts narrow focus on certain kinds of newsrooms, its only the very tip of the local-news iceberg. Its easy to criticize the legislation for not going far enoughit rarely does, in a system built on haggling at best and partisan obstruction at worst. But the passage of a tax credit to support local reporters salaries is a significant but preliminary step forward on the long road to healthy local information systems in the US. In September, I talked to people working in community news organizations, most of them non-profit, about the limitations of the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, which is, at its core, designed to prop up the traditional profit-based local news system. Such an intervention, they said, can only go so far. The salary tax credit is more applicable to nonprofit newsrooms than the acts other provisions, but it still fails to more fully recognize the complex ways in which local information networks function in the 21st century. Congresss imagination is limited when it comes to information systemsas its clumsy hearings with social-media platform executives have demonstrated; such systems change quickly, and theyre complicated. When it comes to the topic of information access in local communities, the same may be said for media watchers and critics from time to time. (Ive been immersed in reporting on local news for more than a year, and Im frequently checking myself in terms of the way I think about information deserts.) Its difficult to measure something as complicated as a communitys access to information, not least because every community is made up of communities, plural, and those are made up of individuals who approach information in a host of different ways. Access is complicated too. Not all barriers to information access are economic or even physical; sometimes, those barriers are cultural or psychological or even self-imposed. People have a diverse array of information needsfrom investigations that hold local officials to account to civic knowledge that helps us navigate our daily lives, from beautiful stories that connect us to one another to practical information that tells us when to put out our trash or how to register for a COVID shot. Sign up for CJR 's daily email A news desert map is an illustration that helps us understand the crisis, but it can limit the ways we think about how communities exist and communicate. In the absence of professional journalismin so-called news deserts across the countrycritical information systems are left to the algorithmic biases of a few social media giants, wrote Darryl Holliday, co-founder of City Bureau, in an essay for CJR. Dig further, though, and youll find block club newsletters, school newspapers, library workshops, public access broadcasts, grassroots community teach-ins, and barbershop conversations that are for and of communities. Part of the solution lies in thinking more fully about the nature of local information and who is a partner in producing it. Its inaccurate to think of traditional journalism as the only source of critical local knowledge. In all communities, many forms of information work in concert. Information networks require knowledge gathering and production, but they also require connection, communication, and collaboration. A few weeks ago, I talked with Holliday about the journalism industrys reluctance to see news consumers as information producers, too. To Hollidays mind, at the hyper-local level, healthy information systems not only existtheyre available as partners in the work of rebuilding larger local information systems, including local journalism. Such partnerships require thinking expansively about all the ways information works on the local level. How do we reinforce the pipelines, the networks between these communities so that they are better able to do what theyre already doing? he asked. Our contemporary information infrastructure, and our select access to it, provides many of us with a tangled morass of content; it also erodes some of the better functions of the traditional press. Our local information systemsnewspapers, sure, but also the myriad other ways news travels between peoplehold potential solutions, and partners to help journalists secure them. Congress should be expansive in its approach to local journalism; the same goes for media watchers. More on local journalism and community information: Sounding the alarm in Seattle: This week, the Seattle Times launched a new website dedicated to explaining the financial crisis facing local for-profit journalism. The site includes invitations to subscribe to the Times, a newsletter, and a link to donate to the papers investigative journalism fund. With a cornucopia of reports, news stories, commentary, and other information, the site will hopefully be a resource for educators and those looking to learn more about the importance of the local press, the challenges it faces and whats being done to save it, editor Brier Dudley wrote in an announcement. This week, the launched a new website dedicated to explaining the financial crisis facing local for-profit journalism. The site includes invitations to subscribe to the a newsletter, and a link to donate to the papers investigative journalism fund. With a cornucopia of reports, news stories, commentary, and other information, the site will hopefully be a resource for educators and those looking to learn more about the importance of the local press, the challenges it faces and whats being done to save it, editor Brier Dudley wrote in an announcement. Big plans in Salt Lake City: The Salt Lake Tribune , which last year became the first US metro daily to transition to a nonprofit model, announced that they will add more reporting staff and one more day of print publication, bringing weekly print editions back up to two days a week. We celebrate 150 years this year and we are healthy, executive editor Lauren Gustus writes. We are sustainable in 2021, and we have no plans to return to a previously precarious position. The , which last year became the first US metro daily to transition to a nonprofit model, announced that they will add more reporting staff and one more day of print publication, bringing weekly print editions back up to two days a week. We celebrate 150 years this year and we are healthy, executive editor Lauren Gustus writes. We are sustainable in 2021, and we have no plans to return to a previously precarious position. Community engagement in Long Beach: In August, the Long Beach Post concluded its first year employing a community editorial board made up of residents from across the citycreated after the paper heard concerns from readers that the newsroom did not reflect the diversity of its surrounding community. The group met virtually each week, discussing potential coverage areas in addition to writing a few editorials per month; participants made $100 per meeting. For The American Press Institute, the Posts community engagement editor Stephanie Rivera considers where the effort succeeded and where it fell short. Other related links: Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Lauren Harris is a freelance journalist. She writes CJR's weekly newsletter for the Journalism Crisis Project. Follow her on Twitter @LHarrisWrites. HELSINKI (AP) The Estonian and Swedish accident investigation boards said Tuesday that a research expedition earlier this year to the wreck of a ferry that sank in the Baltic Sea 27 years ago hasnt provided new evidence contradicting the official accident investigation report. In one of Europes deadliest peacetime maritime disasters, the M/S Estonia sank in heavy seas on Sept. 28, 1994, killing 852 people, most of them Swedes and Estonians. The ferry was en route from Estonias capital, Tallinn, to Stockholm when it sank about 30 minutes after an initial distress call. Only 137 people on board survived. The fate of the vessel has sparked several conspiracy theories, including that it might have collided with a submarine or that it allegedly carried sensitive military cargo. The 1997 official joint investigation by Estonia, Finland and Sweden concluded that the ferry sank when its bow door locks failed in a storm. That separated the bow door from the vessel, opening up the ramp to the car deck and causing extensive flooding of the decks. However others had questioned this amid increasing evidence that there was a large hole in the ferry. Presenting the preliminary results of a dive by underwater robots in July, Rene Arikas, head of the Estonian Safety Investigation Bureau, said that the dive revealed that the wreck does have a hole, about 22 meters long and 4 meters high. The wreck is resting on a slope on the seabed and its original position has changed over the years due to changes in the seabed, making the hole and other damage more visible, he said. Despite this, he stressed during a news conference in Tallinn that researchers have no evidence proving the official report on the sinking to be incorrect. New underwater surveys are scheduled in March-April when visibility is considered the best, Arikas said. Jonas Backstrand, deputy director general of Swedens Accident Investigation Board, said researchers were surprised to find the seabed to be substantially rocky, and this could well be the reason for the hole. We dont know how this damage (to the vessel) occurred, Backstrand said, but it was likely when the vessel fell onto the rocky seabed. More investigation is needed, he said. A separate, privately funded expedition commissioned by relatives of the victims of the M/S Estonia conducted a dive in September. Initial results of that dive are expected to be published early next year. The wreck lies on the seabed some 80 meters (265 feet) below the surface in international waters off a Finnish island, and is considered a graveyard, which gives the area protection under the law. Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. ANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP)Nearly 300 people trapped overnight in their vehicles by mudslides on a highway in British Columbia were being flown to safety by helicopters Monday while authorities sought to determine if anyone was swept up in the flow of debris set off by torrential rain. A yellow Cormorant chopper dropped people off near the community center in the town of Agassiz before taking off for another rescue trip. Trapped between two slides are approximately 275 additional people, including 50 children, who were advised to shelter in place overnight as debris was unstable and unsafe to cross, the City of Vancouver and Canada Task Force 1 said in a joint release. Multiple highways in British Columbia were closed due to the downpour. Melanie Forsythe said her drive home from Vancouver to Hope, British Columbia, had her making at least five detours as rain washed out a bridge, closed roads and trapped her overnight between two mudslides before a helicopter landed on the highway and carried her to Agassiz. Forsythe, who was with her boyfriend, Shawn Ramsay, and a friend, made it to the town about 18 hours after they were forced to stop on Highway 7 with nearly 300 other travelers. All three of us were kind of hyping each other up, saying its going to be good, were going to get out of here. But then we all had moments like, `Is this it? Is this the last time were going to see our kids? We were talking to our parents and our families, but it was just a scary situation, she said. Forsythe said everyone in her vehicle joined about two dozen people on the flight to Agassiz, where nearly 80 others from the highway had already arrived. Forsythe said their vehicles were expected to be towed. Her group was about a nine-hour drive from home and couldnt find a hotel room to spend the night. Twelve people had been rescued from Highway 7 by the local fire department Sunday evening before the Vancouver Heavy Urban Search and Rescue Team was called in Monday Jashanpreet Singh and his wife, Harleen Kaur, were also caught between the two slides Sunday and said they came upon a vehicle that had been partially crushed by a slide. A 9-year-old boy was injured and had blood coming out of his nose and ears, Kaur said. Firefighters who were first to the scene Sunday were able to take the boy to care, she said. The couple was flown out Monday. Singh said they learned a valuable lesson because they had no food or water with them. The deluges in parts of the province also caused the interior town of Merritt to issue an evacuation order Monday, warning its 7,000 residents not to use water from faucets or flush toilets. Flood warnings and watches were issued on rivers and streams for areas from Merritt south to the border with the United States, the lower Fraser region and sections of southern Vancouver Island. About the photo: Search and rescue personnel help flood evacuees disembark from a helicopter in Agassiz, British Columbia, Monday, Nov. 15, 2021. (Jonathan Hayward/The Canadian Press via AP) Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Claims and regulatory actions involving per- and poly- fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are continuing to evolve at a rapid pace across the country. From the ongoing multi-district litigation in District Court of South Carolina, involving hundreds of claims, to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agencys release of its Strategic Roadmap for PFAS in October 2021, it is clear that litigation and regulation of PFAS are really just ramping up. PFAS, which have been around since the 1930s, gained wider use in the 1960s, showing up in all manner of products including firefighting foam, carpeting, metal working fluids, cosmetics, and even food packaging. PFAS include chemicals such as perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), GenX and more than 7,800 others. PFAS chemicals are extremely stable and persistent in the environment and in the human body, meaning they do not break down and can accumulate over timethus they are given the moniker of forever chemicals. These chemicals are often found in soil and water near sites where they are manufactured, used or discarded. The chemical chains of PFAS can travel long distances, move through the soil, seep into groundwater, or be carried through the air, making them especially difficult to contain. The EPA intends to approach the issue by viewing the entire lifecycle of PFAS from their production process to all subsequent offspring of production. Growing awareness over the last decade of the potential health dangers has led to increased public and political scrutiny. Among the potential health effects of PFAS are several different organ cancer categories, kidney disease, stroke, high cholesterol, diabetes, diminished immune response, and negative impacts during fetal development. Claimants and environmental advocacy groups typically cite information indicating that 95% of humans have detectable levels of PFAS in their blood. Given the breadth with which PFAS are dispersed all across the country and the negative impacts to human health and the environment, significant litigation and regulatory actions continue to advance across the country as well. A major step in the regulation of PFAS occurred on October 18, 2021, when the EPA released its PFAS Strategic Roadmap: EPAs Commitments to Action 2021-2024. The EPAs roadmap intends to approach the issue by viewing the entire lifecycle of PFAS from their production process to all subsequent offspring of production. Taking a page from the Resource Conservation and Recovery Acts (RCRA) cradle-to-grave approach, the PFAS Roadmap is based on the three objectives of research, restrict, and remediate. While various industries can likely expect more targeted rulemakings and data collection efforts in the near future, the PFAS Roadmap already identifies specific industries and activities as particular targets for regulation, including: organic chemicals; biosolids; plastics/synthetic fibers; metal finishing/electroplating; electrical components; textile mills; landfills; leather tanning/finishing; plastics molding; paint formulating; pulp/paper/paperboard; and airports. Many of the expected rules will rely on EPA authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). Specifically, TSCA Section 8(a)(7) provides authority for EPA to collect information on PFAS, and TSCA Section 4 provides EPA the authority to require PFAS manufacturers to pay for PFAS studies. As EPA progresses through the PFAS Roadmap, it anticipates relying on authority granted under other environmental statutes such as the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known also as the Superfund act. Further, among the critically important potential actions in EPAs Roadmap is a proposal to list certain classes of PFAS as hazardous substances under CERCLAs federal Superfund provisions. This step could lead to such actions as EPA revisiting former cleanup sites that may still contain PFAS, and would require testing for designated PFAS as part of any future five-year reviews. This likely listing under CERCLA would represent a significant risk to almost any company that has been involved as a potentially responsible party at a CERLCA site in the past. The consequences of EPA declaring PFAS as hazardous substances could also trigger new rounds of litigation on coverage, apportionment, and cost recovery across the country. Currently, the bellwether cases are concluding written discovery and moving into the testimonial discovery phase of pre-trial preparation. These regulations will only serve to expand existing PFAS litigation, as PFAS are already the focus of complex legal battles around the country. Perhaps most significant of these battles is the massive multi-district legal action in the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina. In December 2018, the Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation established a multi-district litigation for claims involving aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF), or firefighting foam. The MDL litigation differs from previous PFAS lawsuits in that the consolidated lawsuits all target defendants that manufactured and distributed AFFF and its constituent chemicals, specifically PFAS. The MDL is now handling more than 1,000 member cases that include the following categories of claims: property damage asserted by water providers, property damage asserted by property owners, bodily injury claims, and claims for medical monitoring for potential future injury. Judge Richard Gergel, the presiding judge in the MDL, recently selected a set of bellwether cases to help gauge the likely outcome of the larger body of challenges. In selecting cases focused on PFAS contamination claims from water system providers to be the first set for trial, the court has decided to focus on claims with a relatively simpler path to determining causation. In the water provider cases, the municipal districts need only demonstrate on a very basic level that PFAS have contaminated the water they draw from, and then trace the contamination pathway back to the source. The more complex cases involving personal injury causation issues will not be tried for some time still. Currently, the bellwether cases are concluding written discovery and moving into the testimonial discovery phase of pre-trial preparation, though as many as 50 depositions have already taken place in the MDL. And, the first cases are scheduled to be ready for trial later next year. However, over the next year it is expected that many significant battles will take place through motion practice challenging the claims. With such a focus on PFAS by litigators and regulators alike, insurers and companies alike should continue to monitor both the MDL and the approaching regulations to understand the nature and extent of risks associated with PFAS liability. CLEVELAND (AP) Three retail pharmacy chains failed to follow government guidelines to make sure pain pills werent flooding Ohio communities, said an attorney for two counties that brought a federal lawsuit to hold the companies accountable for the opioid crisis. Attorneys for the pharmaciesCVS, Walgreens and Walmartsaid that they had safeguards in place and that their employees would look for signs of suspicious orders. The counties failed to show that the pharmacies had a substantial role in the crisis, the attorneys said Monday during closing arguments in U.S. District Court. While the lawsuit involves just two counties, it is being closely watched because it could set the tone for U.S. city and county governments that want to hold pharmacies accountable for their roles in a crisis that has killed more than 500,000 people over the past two decades. Two other chainsRite Aid and Giant Eaglealready have settled lawsuits with the two Ohio counties. Attorney Mark Lanier, who represents the counties in the lawsuit, said the companies put profit over public safety. You cant just point a finger at everyone else, he said. The pharmacies were the last line of defense to stop the opioid abuse and missed many warning signs, Lanier said. Attorneys for the pharmacies told jurors that no law enforcement officials or government regulators testified during the trial that the companies broke any laws or were to blame. Not one witness on the ground came and testified, `I saw CVS, I saw Walgreens, I saw Walmart do this, said Eric Delinsky, an attorney for CVS. Walgreens attorney Brian Swanson said that the companies followed proper procedures and that many others were responsible for the crisis, including the Food and Drug Administration and Drug Enforcement Administration. Each of the counties in northeast Ohio say the crisis has cost them about $1 billion as it has overwhelmed courts, social services agencies and law enforcement. Roughly 80 million prescription painkillers were dispensed in Trumbull County alone between 2012 and 2016 _ equivalent to 400 for every resident. In Lake County, some 61 million pills were distributed during that period. About the photo: Attorneys and staff associated with a federal trial of pharmacies, CVS, Walgreens, Giant Eagle and Walmart leave the Carl B. Stokes Federal Courthouse in Cleveland, Monday, Oct. 4, 2021. The pharmacies are being sued by Ohio counties Lake and Trumbull for their part in the opioid crisis. Pittsburgh-based Giant Eagle, one of the four retail pharmacy companies on trial for their alleged roles in fostering an opioid crisis in two Ohio counties announced Friday, Oct. 29, 2021 it had settled lawsuits filed by 10 government entities in the state that have accused the companies of creating a public nuisance. (AP Photo/Phil Long, File) Copyright 2021 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) Family members of healthcare workers cannot avail yet of the booster shots offered by the government, a health official said on Wednesday. Although family members of healthcare workers belong to the expanded A1 priority sector, Health Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire said they are not included in the amended emergency use authorization. "Ang binigyan pa lang ng EUA ng FDA is for us to deploy or provide boosters to senior citizens, healthcare workers, and to individuals with comorbidities. So 'yun pong expanded A1 for family members, hindi po muna natin sila bibigyan," she said in a media briefing. [Translation: The Emergency Use Authorization of the Food and Drug Administration only allows us to deploy or provide boosters to senior citizens, healthcare workers, and to individuals with comorbidities, so their family members cannot receive them yet.] The government started giving booster doses to 1.6 million fully vaccinated health workers on Wednesday to boost their waning immunity. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has denied 126 party-list applications for the 2022 polls, an official said Wednesday. In a series of tweets, Comelec commissioner Rowena Guanzon said majority of the applicants turned down by the poll body have filed an appeal. "More than 100 of denied party-list applicants filed motion for reconsideration," Guanzon wrote on social media. "[Comelec] must finish by Dec. 6. Final date for ballot prep Dec. 15," she added. Comelec has yet to release the names of the concerned groups. Based on its tentative list of candidates, there are 270 party-list groups seeking a seat in Congress. The final list of candidates for the May 2022 elections is expected before the year ends. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) The country's total number of COVID-19 deaths breached 46,000 on Wednesday after 309 more people lost the battle against the disease, the Department of Health reported. The death toll is now at 46,117 or 1.64% of the case tally. Of the newly reported deaths, the agency reported 18 happened this month, and "61%" or around 188 in October. The late reporting was due to delayed encoding of information in the COVIDKaya data storage system, it added. This issue is currently being coordinated with the epidemiology and surveillance units to ensure information is up to date, said the DOH in an addendum on its case bulletin. Meanwhile, the case tally is now at 2,820,494 with 1,190 new infections. About 0.8% of the cases are active or currently sick patients with 58.1% experiencing mild symptoms, 19.6% in moderate condition, 12% with severe symptoms, 5.2% without symptoms and 5% in critical condition. Recoveries also increased to 2,750,531 - about 97.5% of the COVID-19 count - with 2,759 new survivors. The DOH said it reclassified 264 survivors into deaths after validation, and deleted 37 duplicate cases, including 33 recoveries. One laboratory did not submit data on time and was excluded from the report. The non-reporting laboratory contributed an average of 0.1% of tested samples and 0.1% of positive individuals in the last 14 days, the Health department added. The positivity rate - or percentage of tested people with positive results - rose slightly to 3.5% based on 33,567 tests reported on Nov. 15. On Tuesday, the rate was at 3.2% based on 28,081 tests reported on Nov. 14. The rate has been below 5% for the past five days. The World Health Organization recommends countries and regions to reopen if they maintain a positivity rate of below 5% for at least 14 days. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) The Senate Energy Committee is now looking into undoing the deal involving the sale of shares in the Malampaya natural gas facility to Udenna Corporation, Sen. Sherwin Win Gatchalian, the panel's chairman, said Wednesday. Thats what were studying. Were studying it very carefully if this can be undone but definitely theres a basis to, if possible, undo the transaction to protect the Filipino people, Gatchalian said at the Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum. Gatchalians committee has been looking into the Dennis Uy-led firms acquisition of its stake in the gas project, which now stands at 90% following the sale of Chevrons and Shells respective 45% shares in Malampaya. The senator noted that the lack of a proper evaluation from the Department of Energy (DOE) of Udennas capability could mean it is not qualified to run the facility. Should something go wrong with Malampaya, up to 4 million households and 20% of the countrys power supply could be affected, he added. Ang gobyernong dapat protektahan tayo, niluto yung transaction. Tayo ngayon ang kawawa, lamented Gatchalian. [Translation: The government that was supposed to protected us cooked up the transaction instead. Now its us who are aggrieved.] The senator said the transaction must be undone in a way that will minimize disruption. The next step is to hold individuals involved in the issue accountable, said Gatchalian. The ultimate action is to hold them to account administratively and criminally through our court system. Ibig sabihin [This means] cases should be filed whether its in the Ombudsman or in the other courtsitong mga fact-finding na ginawa namin [the fact-finding we have done] will enable us to paint the picture, he said. DOE Asec. Gerardo Erguiza Jr. separately addressed criticisms that PNOC-EC which holds Malampayas remaining 10% stake supposedly not matching Udennas offer to both petroleum giants on the sale of their shares. Again, we must remember that PNOC-EC is not just the country's energy investment arm. Their mandate is to help the government achieve energy security, and foster the development of and sustain a conducive industry environment to help attract more investors into doing business in the Philippines, he said. Erguiza further explained that PNOC-EC went further and dug deeper into its mandate apart from taking into account economic and risk factors at play. For PNOC-EC to pounce on Chevron's shares actually runs counter to their mandate. If acquiring the Chevron shares was so financially lucrative, then why didn't Shell grab at them at the first opportunity? said the DOE official. Just last month, three private individuals lodged a graft complaint against DOE Secretary Alfonso Cusi along with Uy and dozen of others for the alleged questionable sale of shares to Udenna and for supposedly allowing the firm unwarranted benefits and causing the government undue injury. Udenna has maintained the legality of its acquisition of Malampaya shares. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) An infectious disease expert on Wednesday advised pregnant healthcare workers to choose the COVID-19 vaccine they originally received for their booster shot as a precaution. "On a personal note, I would probably advise homologous rather than a heterologous platform just to decrease the variables, and decrease the likelihood of any adverse reactions," Dr. Anna Ong-Lim said in a town hall organized by the Department of Health. A homologous dose is a vaccine from the same brand while a heterologous dose is from a different brand. But for Dr. Edsel Salvana, "this has to be a personal discussion between your OB and yourself," noting there are a lot of "unknowns" about the boosters. Salvana also said it might be best for pregnant healthcare workers to "wait for more data" before getting a booster shot. Booster shots are now being offered to healthcare workers. Fully vaccinated medical personnel can choose which COVID-19 vaccine to receive, provided the one they prefer is available at vaccination sites. Approved to be used as booster shots are Sinovac, Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca vaccines. READ: PH allows health workers to pick COVID-19 booster shot The Health department said vaccine recipients with "higher risk for adverse reaction" such as the elderly, people with underlying illnesses, and those prone to blood clots, myocarditis and anaphylaxis should consult their attending physicians for the recommended boosting strategy. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 17) The camp of presidential aspirant Isko Moreno said former Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) chief Vince Dizon joined his campaign team, but it was refuted by Malacanang. Moreno's chief campaign strategist Lito Banayo on Wednesday said Dizon would act as deputy campaign manager and head of statistical research of their team. He also said he tapped Dizon to help run the campaign. "Nagpaalam siya kay PRRD (President Rodrigo Duterte) nung mid-October, then flew to US with his family for a breather," Banayo added. [Translation: He gave his notice to President Rodrigo Duterte in mid-October, then flew to the US with his family for a breather.] Another source told CNN Philippines that Dizon "has been helping our communications efforts, particularly our branding and imaging." Acting presidential spokesperson Karlo Nograles on Thursday said Dizon continues to be part of the Cabinet as adviser for COVID-19 response despite resigning from the BCDA. "Sec. Dizon is focused on the vaccination efforts of government, and not with any political campaign," Nograles said in a statement. CNN Philippines sought comment from Dizon and his staff, but has yet to receive a reply. If it is true that Dizon has shifted his alliance, he is the third former government official to join the Moreno campaign after former Metropolitan Manila Development Authority General Manager Tim Orbos and Banayo, who served as chairman of the Manila Economic and Cultural Office in Taiwan. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 18) Three Chinese Coast Guard vessels blocked and fired water cannon on two Philippine boats en route to transport supplies to military personnel in Ayungin Shoal on Nov. 16, government officials said on Thursday. National Security Adviser and National Task Force for the West Philippine Sea chair Hermogenes Esperon Jr. said two Chinese vessels blocked the Philippines' boats, while another one of its vessels blasted a water cannon for an hour. No one was hurt, according to Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr, but the Philippine boats had to abort their mission to bring food. Locsin also said he talked to Chinese Ambassador Huang Xilian and Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi to condemn and protest the incident since Ayungin Shoal is part of the Kalayaan Island Group, which the Philippines considers part of Palawan province. "I reminded China that a public vessel is covered by the Philippines-United States Mutual Defense Treaty. The acts of the Chinese Coast Guard vessels are illegal. China has no law enforcement rights in and around these areas. They must take heed and back off," he said in a statement. He warned that China's "failure to exercise self-restraint threatens" the warm ties between President Rodrigo Duterte and Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The Department of Foreign Affairs said it will continue to provide supplies to troops in Ayungin Shoal. "We do not ask permission to do what we need to do in our territory," Locsin said. The Kalayaan Island Group is part of the Philippines exclusive economic zone and continental shelf. The Philippines said it has sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction over the island group. However, China has been claiming the area through a historic nine-dash line, which a 2016 arbitral tribunal ruling has invalidated. Increasing Chinese presence in PH waters Esperon expressed alarm after more of Beijing's vessels were spotted in Ayungin Shoal and Pag-asa Island. He said there are usually only two Chinese maritime militia in the area of Ayungin, but the number increased to 19 in the past week. In Pag-Asa Island, the number of Chinese vessels spiked to 45 which the official described as a "record number." "Very aggressive sila so we are protesting that... Some of them remain there, hindi sila umaalis dyan, maaring mabawasan, maaring mabawasan but last week umabot sila ng 45, masyadong marami," he said in an interview. [Translation: They are too aggressive so we are protesting that. Some of them remain there. The number may go down. but last week it reached 45. That's too much.] He said the DFA has been continuously filing diplomatic protests for China's incursions in the West Philippine Sea. The Philippines has filed over 150 this year alone. Outrage Lawmakers and local officials expressed outrage over the outright disrespect for Philippine territory. Kalayaan Vice Mayor Hermoso Ornopia said he will lead the passing of a resolution to "condemn in the highest terms" the militia's harassing actions. "Hindi tama na tayo ay aapihin sa ating sariling bakuran. Habang ginagalang natin ang karapatan ng atin mga kapitbansa, ay atin din namang marapat ipaglaban ang ating soberanya," he said. [Translation: It's not right that we are being oppressed in our own territory. Although we respect the rights of our neighboring countries, we must continue to fight for our sovereignty.] Reelectionist Senator Risa Hontiveros showed supposed for the DFA's move to protest China's "incessant bullying." CNN Philippines' Lara Tan, Tristan Nodalo, and David Santos contributed to this report. Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, November 18) President Rodrigo Duterte and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio expressed their desire for "deeper security engagement and coordination" by considering a Foreign and Defense Ministerial Meeting or 2+2. In a phone call, the two leaders discussed a host of issues touching on coordination in maritime security efforts, support for the country's infrastructure programs, and the situation in Myanmar, according to the Office of the President. Duterte said he looks forward to the projects aimed at strengthening the two countries' cooperation in maritime security, such as maritime domain awareness, connectivity and preservation of the marine environment. He also acknowledged Japan's support for the government's Build, Build, Build program, the peace process in Mindanao and the ongoing transition of the Bangsamoro Region. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan also released a statement on the 25-minute conversation, saying Kishida committed to continue supporting the Philippines' infrastructure development, COVID-19 pandemic response, and maritime law enforcement. The ministry added that Kishida voiced opposition against changing the status quo in the East and South China Seas. The two leaders also discussed cooperation to achieve a "Free and Open Indo-Pacific" - which aims to open the region as "international public goods" - and the "ASEAN Outlook for the Indo-Pacific," which seeks to promote an environment of peace, stability, and prosperity in the region. They also tackled working closely in dealing with North Korea, particularly its "abductions issue" and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Duterte congratulated Japan after its draft resolution on the elimination of nuclear weapons submitted to the United Nations General Assembly was adopted, the ministry said. A national organization that supports pro-choice, Democratic women candidates on Tuesday endorsed state Rep. Yadira Caraveo, the Thornton pediatrician running in a primary to represent Colorado's new 8th Congressional District. In a news release, EMILY'S List president Laphonza Butler said the group is backing Caraveo because she "understands the complexities of the health care system as well as the reforms needed to make high quality care affordable and accessible for everyone." Citing Caraveo's work on legislation to lower prescription drug costs, regulate polluters, increase funding for preschools and protect renters during the pandemic, Butler added: "We know that Dr. Caraveo will continue to advocate for Colorados families from Washington, and we are thrilled to stand with her historic campaign to become the first Latina to represent Colorado in Congress. The race in the northern Front Range district, which covers suburbs in Adams County and parts of Weld County, including Greeley, is getting crowded. Yesterday, state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer joined the Republican primary for the seat, which is shaping up to be the most competitive congressional contest in Colorado next year. The 8th CD's voters have favored Democratic candidates in recent statewide elections by 1.3 percentage points, on average, according to an analysis by the independent commission that drew new congressional district boundaries by far the closest of any new district in the state. Caraveo is facing Adams County Commissioner Charles "Chaz" Tedesco in the Democratic primary. Other Republicans running in the district include Weld County Commissioner Lori Saine, former congressional candidate Ryan Gonzalez and first-time candidate Giulianna "Jewels" Gray. EMILY'S List it originally stood for "Early Money is Like Yeast" because it "helps raise the dough" is a candidate training and fundraising powerhouse with more than five million members nationwide. The group spent just under $50 million on independent expenditures in the last cycle, according to a release, and has raised more than $700 million and helped elect roughly 1,000 women since its launch in 1985. In its only other Colorado endorsement this year, the group got behind Guyleen Castriotta's successful bid for re-election earlier this month as mayor of Broomfield. Progressive veterans group endorses Democrat Chaz Tedesco in 8th CD primary The national progressive political action committee VoteVets has endorsed Democrat Charles "Chaz" Tedesco, an Adams County commissioner and ca Democrat Joe Salazar says he won't run in Colorado's new congressional district Former state Rep. Joe Salazar, a key Colorado supporter of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' presidential bids, told Colorado Politics on Thursday that he isn't going to seek the Democratic nomination in the state's new congressional district. Who's your doppelganger? Send a photo of your look-alike to The Gazette Are you a current print subscriber to Columbia Gorge News? If so, you qualify for free access to all content on columbiagorgenews.com. Simply verify with your subscriber id to receive free access. Your subscriber id may be found on your bill or mailing label. 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 11/17/2021 Photo (c) Ahmed Zaggoudi - Getty Images Coronavirus (COVID-19) tally as compiled by Johns Hopkins University. (Previous numbers in parentheses.) Total U.S. confirmed cases: 47,331,191 (47,233,212) Total U.S. deaths: 766,232 (764,608) Total global cases: 254,723,729 (254,092,019) Total global deaths: 5,120,194 (5,111,573) Michigan now the nations worst hot spot Cases of the coronavirus are surging in the northern tier of states along the Canadian border, and Michigan has now emerged at the nations number one COVID-19 hot spot. Federal health officials put the seven-day case rate at 503.8 per 100,000 residents. Thats putting increased pressure on hospitals around the state, with caseloads climbing by nearly 50% over the last month. There were more than 3,000 hospitalized COVID-19 patients at the start of this week. "The current growth in COVID-19 hospitalizations is very concerning," John Karasinski, a spokesman for the Michigan Health and Hospital Association, told the Detroit News. Definition of fully vaccinated may be changing These days, many places of businesses dont require patrons to wear masks if they are fully vaccinated. Thats generally taken to mean that they have had two doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or one dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. But with the increasing number of breakthrough cases, the definition of fully vaccinated may be changing to include a booster shot. Countries in Europe, where the virus has undergone a resurgence, are leaning in that direction. There has been little discussion of that in the U.S. so far. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) currently considers full protection to include two shots of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or one shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. However, the health agency advises all eligible people to get a booster shot. Five states expand booster shot eligibility Its up to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the CDC to decide who is eligible to receive a COVID-19 booster shot. But some states where cases are rising are in open rebellion and are not waiting on government health authorities. Local health officials in at least five states -- Arkansas, California, Colorado, New Mexico, and West Virginia -- have expanded eligibility for booster shots to everyone 18 and older, six months after their second dose. Current federal eligibility is limited to those 65 and older and other high-risk individuals. "From a public perception, there are some that really do want the boosters. They are worried about breakthrough transmission," Hemi Tewarson, executive director of the National Academy for State Health Policy, told CNN. "So, I think this is where governors -- at least some governors -- are trying to address the tension here of some in the public who really want to take that extra step even though we don't know yet what all the data tells us." Around the nation Washington, D.C.: The District of Columbias mandate requiring people to wear masks indoors will expire Monday. Mayor Muriel Bowser said the city will shift to risk-based guidance from D.C. Health thats based on current health metrics and a persons vaccination status. Colorado: State officials have announced that people attending large public indoor events in certain jurisdictions must be vaccinated in an effort to blunt the sharp increase in COVID-19 cases. Gatherings of more than 500 people in parts of metro Denver will require attendees to provide proof of vaccination. Alaska: Nearly 100 doctors have signed a letter addressed to the state medical board that asks it to launch an investigation into health care professionals who may be spreading misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. We are writing out of concern that medical misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine and treatment is being spread in Alaska, including by physicians, the letter stated. North Carolina: Theres a new variant to worry about, and its shown up in North Carolina. State health officials report that North Carolina is one of eight states reporting the presence of the AY42 variant, also known as Delta Plus. So far, they say theres not much data on the new variant. 11/16/2021 Photo (c) Darryl Fonseka - Getty Images Coronavirus (COVID-19) tally as compiled by Johns Hopkins University. (Previous numbers in parentheses.) Total U.S. confirmed cases: 47,233,212 (47,084,497) Total U.S. deaths: 764,608 (763,168) Total global cases: 254,092,019 (253,543,995) Total global deaths: 5,111,573 (5,103,757) U.S. cases are rising again The U.S. has lower infection rates than a lot of other developed nations, but some areas of the country are seeing sharp increases. Its enough to worry some health experts, including President Bidens chief medical adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci. The only thing thats a little bit disconcerting is that were beginning to plateau, Fauci said during an interview hosted by the Bipartisan Policy Center. In other words, the deceleration of cases is now plateaued, and in some areas of the country, were starting to see a bit of an uptick. Infections had been falling for weeks after hitting a Delta variant peak of 172,500 new cases per day in mid-September. Cases have recently spiked in the Mountain West and in states along the Canadian border. Some states considering new holiday guidelines The U.S. will celebrate its second pandemic Thanksgiving next week, but unlike last year, most of the people around the table will have been vaccinated. While many parts of the country have seen a decline in cases, states where the virus has spiked are considering new holiday guidelines. With cases rising in many northern states, the Minnesota Department of Health is urging families to "think carefully" about their Thanksgiving plans. However, the agency is not asking people to cancel their plans. However, it is asking unvaccinated people to take extra precautions that are in line with advice from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It says unvaccinated people and those in areas of high transmission rates should wear masks while around other people. Study: Antidepressants may help against COVID-19 Can taking Prozac protect you from the coronavirus? A large analysis of health records from 87 health care centers in the U.S. concluded that people taking a class of antidepressants called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), particularly fluoxetine, were significantly less likely to die of COVID-19 than a control group. Fluoxetine is sold under the brand name Prozac and is a widely used antidepressant. Scientists say the results suggest that SSRIs may have beneficial effects against the worst symptoms of COVID-19. They say further studies are needed to prove it. We can't tell if the drugs are causing these effects, but the statistical analysis is showing significant association, said Marina Sirota, Ph.D., associate professor of pediatrics and a member of the Bakar Computational Health Sciences Institute (BCHSI) at UC San Francisco. There's power in the numbers. Around the nation Connecticut: A COVID-19 outbreak has claimed the lives of eight residents of a nursing home since September. In a statement, Geer Village Senior Community in North Canaan reported that 89 residents and staff, many of them fully vaccinated, have tested positive for the virus. California: Attorney General Rob Bonta has secured a court order requiring Amazon to pay a $500,000 fine for "concealing COVID-19 case numbers" from workers. Its the first judgment under the states new right to know law. Tennessee: Gov. Bill Lee has signed comprehensive legislation that limits what businesses and governments can do to curb the spread of COVID-19. But the State Comptrollers Office said it would grant an exemption to any business that claimed a loss of federal funding if it obeyed the law against vaccination mandates. Alabama: Attorney General Steve Marshall has filed a lawsuit to block a federal mandate that would require health care workers to be vaccinated. One can only imagine the damage that will be done by this mandate to already short-staffed rural and community hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes that receive federal funds for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Marshall said. Theres some talk that EU passport-holders are ruling the roost in the interesting job stakes, and by interesting, I mean a contract or temporary assignment which is overseas if youre a Brit, writes Kevin Austin, of contracting overseas advisory Access Financial. The Brexit bounce for EU passport-holders Well, there is quite a lot of truth to this talk specifically, that anyone fortunate enough to hold an EU passport has a master key to unlock more exotic work opportunities abroad. And broadly, its because of a six-letter word: B-r-e-x-i-t. In fact, since the Brexit agreement effective since December 31st 2020, a UK national (possessing no EU passport) must generally have a work permit to take gainful employment in an EU country in France, for example. Enviously for Brits, EU nationals and individuals hailing from Norway, Switzerland and Iceland, can work in, say, France, without a work permit under the in-place Free Movement of Workers. All is not lost, especially if youre a UK tech consultant However, perhaps all is not lost for Brits in certain sectors, including technology. Indeed, in France, and specific to France, certain categories of person and activity CAN work in France without a work visa. These categories are dictated by a time threshold, however. Firstly: Without limits of time 1.Citizens of a European Union (EU) or European Economic Area (EEA) Member State or Switzerland; 2. Citizens from outside the above countries (in 1), who are working lawfully and customarily for an employer established in an EU or EEA Member State, or Switzerland, in the context of providing a service, subject to proof of a residence permit issued by the European State authorising work in this state. The second time threshold, which may apply more widely to UK IT contractors, is: For periods of less than 90 days So, the following categories of foreign employees can come to work in France and its territories for up to 90 days -- to carry out salaried professional work in the following areas: a) Sporting, cultural, artistic and scientific events. b) Conferences, seminars and trade shows. c) Production and distribution of cinematic and audiovisual works, shows and recordings. d) Modeling and artistic posing. e) Personal service workers and domestic workers working in France during their private employers stay in the country. f) Audit and consulting in IT, management, finance, insurance, architecture and engineering, under the terms of a service agreement or intra-company transfer agreement. g) Occasional teaching activities by invited lecturers. Freelance-friendly? Probably, yes The wording Ive used above (borrowed from the French immigration authorities) suggests the worker should be employed, although the categories imply that some of the services may be freelance or self-employed. And this is especially the case, IT contractors take note, under the headings g, and f which specifies consulting in IT. Be further reassured that a director of their own services company is commonly, but not always, regarded by the immigration authorities as an employee. So the above may provide a way-in for IT contractors from the UK who are looking to work in France on short-term contract (under 90 days). Bon voyage, potentially But almost finally, a word of caution. It would be wise not to extrapolate these rules to any other EU or EEA state, because the framework permitting this entry into France as a UK IT consultant is not courtesy of the EU, but is instead thanks to a unilateral agreement by the state of France. So always ensure you check each country and your circumstances to determine if you can work -- for gain -- without a work visa. Note here, I specify doing fee-paying work because business trips to France by Britons, where working and earning are not undertaken, are permissible under a business and tourist visa. Bon voyage! The cases were separate, but overlapped, the common denominator being FBI surveillance recordings of Colombo soldier Ralph Scopos conversations, which alerted the Feds to the initial evidence that would help them build the Commission Case. Scopo was the bagman in a large-scale ongoing racket involving shaking down concrete contractors at major construction projects. As the president of the Cement and Concrete Workers District Council of the Laborers' International Union of North America from 1977 to April 1985, Scopo used his position to extort money from cement contractors in New York in return for large construction contracts and labor peace. Contracts between $2 million and $15 million were reserved for contractors who belonged to the Mafia Commission-selected "Concrete Club." In return for membership in the club, the contractors gave the Commission a kickback worth 2% of the contract's value. How they caught him: Federal law-enforcement officials finally focused their search and combed Connecticut's DMV databases, locating two of Persico's aliases. They also heard from ''tipsters'' that he was in West Hartford. Carrying photographs of Persico, deputy marshals canvassed West Hartford and found several people who ''thought they recognized" the fugitive wiseguy.Persico was arrested alone while cooking sauce in November 1987 at around 5:30 pm by seven deputy United States marshals at an apartment building in West Hartford. Allie Boy had around $7,000 in cash when he was taken into custody. (They reportedly couldn't link him to any type of employment that could explain the source of the money.) Persico had been considered armed and dangerous and was known to travel with armed guards, but he did not resist arrest and was not armed. He vanished on June 23, 1980, avoiding the presentencing hearing before Chief Judge Jack B. Weinstein in Federal District Court in Brooklyn. (The New York Times later reported that "By failing to appear for the presentencing hearing in June 1980, [Allie Boy] forfeited $250,000 in bail. It meant that the homes of Mr. Persico and his brother, Carmine, in the Dyker Heights section of Brooklyn, became Government property.") Carmines first choice for acting boss to supervise the family in his absence was his older brother, Alphonse, the original Allie Boy. But when Carmine went away following one of his 1970s convictions, his brother's reign lasted only a few months. Allie Boy, who was officially the crime family's underboss, lammed it to avoid a potentially long prison sentence for a 1980 extortion conviction. As for how Allie Boy survived on the lam, Persico alleged he had only $60,000 on him when he skipped out--plus his aliases, "Al Longo" and "Anthony Perri." He reportedly posed as a retired accountant and/or a rug dealer.According to a UPI report, a probation department memo , which was confirmed by Edward McDonald, the chief of Brooklyn's Organized Crime Strike Force, said that Allie Boy had found refuge via the Patriarca crime family's "underground railroad," which had supplied him with funds and phony identification papers.Among his many other roles, William (Billy the Wild Man) Grasso ran a sanctuary for fugitive wiseguys and associates in the 1980s. When Allie Boy Persico went on the lam, he "lived for years under Grasso's protection in a West Hartford apartment," the Hartford Courant reported in 2014 in The Mob In Connecticut: Grasso's Reign Of Terror, which was based on newly released FBI files. According to an FBI affidavit , "since the disappearance of Salvatore Annunziato and the gangland murders of Ralph 'Whitey' Tropiano and Frank Piccolo, Grasso has been able to absorb a number of the interests of the deceased (or missing) individuals." Salvatore (Midge Renault) Annunziato, 59, was the portly longtime capo for the Genovese crime family who oversaw rackets in Connecticut. A former boxerMidge Renault was his ring nameAnnunziato was last seen getting into a car with Tommy Vastano, his driver, to head to a meeting with Grasso. In the months prior to his disappearance, Annunziato supposedly had robbed some of Grassos gambling dens. Whitey Tropiano, 67, was the longtime capo in the Colombo family (he was bumped up around the time when the Profaci family was being renamed) who operated in Connecticut. Tropiano was gunned down in April 3, 1980, in Brooklyn by masked assailants as he was seeking to make a comeback that put him head to head with his onetime protege, Grasso. A reputed hitter for the dreaded Murder, Inc., the mob's enforcement wing in the 1930s, in his early years, Whitey had put Grasso in charge of his New Haven gambling operations in the 1960s. Frank (Frankie Cigars) Piccolo (aka The Attorney) was 58 when on September 19, 1981, the Gambino crime familys longtime Connecticut capo was gunned down outside a telephone booth. Prior, Piccolo had been encroaching on the Genovese crime family's territory in Bridgeport and New Haven. When slain, he was also facing trial for extorting Las Vegas entertainer Wayne Newton. Grasso became Patriarca underboss in 1984. Many in the FBI as well as the mob believed Grasso was de facto boss rather than Raymond (Junior) Patriarca, who reached the top after his father died from a fatal heart attack in 1984. Junior was viewed as weak, inexperienced, and ineffective. Salvatore (Midge Renault) Annunziato, 59, was the portly longtime capo for the Genovese crime family who oversaw rackets in Connecticut. A former boxerMidge Renault was his ring nameAnnunziato was last seen getting into a car with Tommy Vastano, his driver, to head to a meeting with Grasso. In the months prior to his disappearance, Annunziato supposedly had robbed some of Grassos gambling dens.Whitey Tropiano, 67, was the longtime capo in the Colombo family (he was bumped up around the time when the Profaci family was being renamed) who operated in Connecticut. Tropiano was gunned down in April 3, 1980, in Brooklyn by masked assailants as he was seeking to make a comeback that put him head to head with his onetime protege, Grasso. A reputed hitter for the dreaded Murder, Inc., the mob's enforcement wing in the 1930s, in his early years, Whitey had put Grasso in charge of his New Haven gambling operations in the 1960s.Frank (Frankie Cigars) Piccolo (aka The Attorney) was 58 when on September 19, 1981, the Gambino crime familys longtime Connecticut capo was gunned down outside a telephone booth. Prior, Piccolo had been encroaching on the Genovese crime family's territory in Bridgeport and New Haven. When slain, he was also facing trial for extorting Las Vegas entertainer Wayne Newton.Grasso became Patriarca underboss in 1984. Many in the FBI as well as the mob believed Grasso was de facto boss rather than Raymond (Junior) Patriarca, who reached the top after his father died from a fatal heart attack in 1984. Junior was viewed as weak, inexperienced, and ineffective. The only photo of Grasso, who once ran a sanctuary for fugitive wiseguys. Patriarca mobsters from Hartford, Springfield, and Boston plotted to murder The Wild Man, which became part of a wider attempt by disgruntled Patriarca factions in Hartford and Boston to seize control of the family. The guys who finally got rid of Grasso, according to The Gangster Report , were "members of a faction in the Family led by Boston capo Joseph (J.R.) Russo and his young protege Vincent (Vinnie the Animal) Ferrara who were trying to take control of the New England mob for themselves by force. The Patriarca soldiers who clipped Grasso included "triggerman Gaetano Milano, brothers Frank (Frankie Pug) Pugliano, Louis (Louie Pug) Pugliano, and Frank (Frankie C) Colatoni." All were convicted of the crime and have since been released from their respective prison sentences. Of course it also could be said that the FBI also played a role in the Grasso murder. According to a Writers of Wrong report , years afterward, it was learned that "some in the FBI had worked with informants within the New England underworld to create a destructive rivalry" within the Patriarca crime family. "Seeds planted by the FBI convinced groups within the Connecticut and Massachusetts branches of the organization that the Patriarca administration was planning to eliminate them. That prompted them to act against Grasso and Salemme, and it also figured in several other murders. "Defense attorney Anthony Cardinale revealed in a 1997 affidavit that intentional FBI activities caused the plots against Grasso and Salemme and that the FBI knew of the plots but kept silent about them for a period of sixteen months. FBI improprieties were documented in the following years." "Defense attorney Anthony Cardinale revealed in a 1997 affidavit that intentional FBI activities caused the plots against Grasso and Salemme and that the FBI knew of the plots but kept silent about them for a period of sixteen months. FBI improprieties were documented in the following years." As for Grasso sidekick Grant, according to The Gangster Report , "Grants hit was called in from New York and related to a belief that" the 56-year old Grant was feeding information to the FBI. "The contract was given to Grasso by the Colombo Family." Grasso's luck finally ran out on June 13, 1989, when the Hartford crew got Grasso into a van on the pretext of traveling to a meeting in Worcester. Grasso was shot in the back of his neck. On that same day, Grasso's right hand in Boston, Frank (Cadillac Frank) Salemme, was shot up while exiting the International House of Pancakes. Salemme survived and is today serving a life sentence for murder.Patriarca mobsters from Hartford, Springfield, and Boston plotted to murder The Wild Man, which became part of a wider attempt by disgruntled Patriarca factions in Hartford and Boston to seize control of the family. A reddit page devoted to Missing In Connecticut includes original information, much of which is attributed to anonymous underworld sources. The nonbylined report notes: "Law enforcement described William F. Grant, JR, as a lieutenant of William Grasso... Grant helped William Grasso win control over a scattered network of largely independent bookmaking offices in the Hartford area. The nonbylined report notes: "Law enforcement described William F. Grant, JR, as a lieutenant of William Grasso... Grant helped William Grasso win control over a scattered network of largely independent bookmaking offices in the Hartford area. "William Grant has also been linked to Alphonse Allie Boy Persico, the former underboss of New Yorks Columbo crime family. Allie Boy was a convicted murderer. When Allie Boy applied to an apartment on Talcott Ridge in Farmington using the alias Al Longo to get away from a federal indictment, he wrote OK per Biz. Friend of Billy Grant. The word Biz referred to the company that owned the apartment, and the former employee of that company. The former employee states he recalls nothing about the rental agreement. "William Grant admitted he knew Allie Boy while he was a fugitive and went under an alias, but didnt realize he was Persico. He recalled occasionally seeing Al Longo at the bar at the Place for Steak in West Hartford on Friday nights (the restaurant is no longer open). Allie Boy often visited the bar for drinks and to play cards. Allie Boy admitted that he never told William his real name, but felt the other man knew who he was anyway. "Allie Boy lived as a fugitive in the area for seven years. He had also lived briefly in Massachusetts. ... Allie borrowed money from William to purchase that house. A mutual friend of both men stated that William was a regular visitor at the property. Allie Boys residence in both Massachusetts and Connecticut were part of an underworld agreement struck between crime bosses in Connecticut and New York, anonymous underworld sources claimed. "The crime figures set up a kind of underground railroad to support and hide colleagues facing certain prison sentences. Part of Allie Boys participation in this agreement required William to act as his protector per the underworld source. In the summer of 1987 the agreement became strained over who was financially responsible for protecting Allie Boy. Allie Boy had no known source of income while he was in hiding. William was paying for the majority of, if not all of, Allie Boys expenses. The underworld source claimed Allie Boy was asking William for more money at the time. Various underworld sources stated that William was so upset about this claimed he complained about it to William Grasso. The same underworld sources said William Grasso did not try to help William Grant with the situation in any way. Shortly after William Grant complained, the U.S. Marshals apprehended Allie Boy at his West Hartford apartment in October of 1987, and he was sentenced to 25 years for extortion..... "William went missing on May 18, 1988. He was last seen between 7 and 9 pm at his new business, the South End Seaport. He was last seen by his family on Wednesday. His wife reported him missing three days later on Saturday to East Hartford police. ... "The Grant family had a party planned at the home for the Sunday after he went missing to celebrate their sons college graduation. The party had to be cancelled. Williams absence from the party really concerned his relatives because he was so dedicated to his family. ... "The FBI, state police, and East Hartford police were involved in the search for the missing man. ... Law enforcement believed he was the victim of foul play. They had little hope of locating him. "But Lt. Bruce W. Haines stated that the investigation would continue, although they felt they would not be able to locate the man. "Law enforcement believe that organized crime associates suspected that there was a connection between William Grants complaints about financially supporting Allie Boy, and Allie Boy quickly being arrested afterwards. The organized crime associates felt William had become an informant, and was responsible for the apprehension of Allie Boy. These suspicions worsened after Allie Boy was apprehended. The organized crime associates expected William Grant to be arrested for harboring a fugitive, but he was never officially charged. The crime associates also suspected William Grant of becoming an informant after Skyball was sentenced in 1988. The sources say there were other instances Grant was suspected of being an informant. In 1984, Skyball had defended William to Anthony Salerno, who was a powerful chairman of a commission of mobsters who regulated dealings between rival crime families. This conversation was one of many the FBI secretly tape-recorded between Salerno and Sciabelli during their investigations of organized crime. "Law enforcement will not confirm that William Grant was an informant - or that an informant provided information leading to Allie Boys or Skyballs capture in the first place. "When Allie Boy was arrested, one of the first things he said was, Somebody must have dropped a dime. "Law enforcement believes William was lured to a meeting in the parking lot of Westfarms Mall in Farmington, and was killed. (This one spooks me out a lot. I have gone to that mall several times without realizing someone may have been lured to his death there.)... "A federal grand jury began investigating Williams disappearance. Persico was asked to testify during the investigation. Persico was serving a 25-year sentence for extortion at a federal prison in Lompoc, California at the time. He was transported to New Haven to testify. Salvatore (Mickey) Caruana also was given protection by Grasso in the1980s. He was the Patriarca family's principal marijuana smuggler and fled in 1983, following his indictment for distributing $173 million of marijuana. He went missing in 1984 and is believed to have been murdered.The sanctuary operation relied on two Grasso associates. First, Grasso had a guy inside the state Department of Motor Vehicles who was able to make phony identifications. Then, Hartford area restaurateur William (The Hot Dog) Grant, whom Grasso had put in charge of much of the gambling in Hartford, arranged apartments from a principal in one of the state's largest real estate companies. Grant disappeared in May 1988.Before Grasso lured him away (as part of a takeover attempt, Grasso ensured an alliance with Grant by "buying" his debt to the Genovese family), Grant had been a loyalist to Genovese capo Frank (Skyballs) Scibelli, who controlled Springfield for the Genovese crime family. Grasso had recruited both Grant and John (Sonny) Castagna, a Hartford gangster who would later flip and join the Justice Department's witness relocation program.Not long after Grasso's 1973 return to Connecticut from a prison in Atlanta (where he had gotten his "big break" when he shared a cell with Raymond Patriarca Senior), he embarked on a spree, seizing chunks of Connecticut and pushing into Western Massachusetts and toward Springfield for the Patriarca family. At the same time, wiseguys in those places who posed rivalries to the Patriarca family (and/or Grasso) began getting shot, blown up, or vanished off the face of the earth. Jenny dies without us learning anything more about her disease, but it has to be AIDS, right? She had been a drug addict and a prostitute, and she dies in 1982, the same year the media first reported on it. Surely this is an extremely dark twist on Gump's 20th-century retrospective? The movie's fans widely assume it's AIDS, discussing it as a given, and the University of Pennsylvania has an essay discussing how Jenny's poor life choices ended with her contracting AIDS. Even Family Guy did a bit on how Forrest is too dumb to grasp the implications of sex with an HIV-positive woman. Continue Reading Below Advertisement But the movie never actually says "AIDS." Jenny drops dead of Plot Convenience Syndrome, and viewers rushed to assumptions based on the fact that she slept around. The sequel to the original novel, Gump And Co., clarifies that it was in fact meant to be hepatitis C. That fits the timeline perfectly. Hep C wasn't identified until 1989, but "non-A, non-B hepatitis" was acknowledged as a mysterious new disease in 1981, the same year Jenny reveals her condition to Forrest. Granted, it did have a name, but it's not unreasonable to assume that Jenny left as many multi-syllabic words as possible out of her explanation to Forrest. At least you don't have to worry about Forrest and his son suffering slow, painful deaths after the movie anymore. In 1965, six boys in Tonga decided they were sick of boarding school. So the kids, ages 13 through 16, stole a boat and sailed off, hoping to sail to Fiji. They didn't have a map, and didn't have much experience sailing, so you shouldn't be surprised to learn their boat got caught in a storm and broke down. They drifted and finally landed on a rocky uninhabited island named 'Ata. If this were a story written to teach us that humans are naturally brutish and need civilization to keep us from killing each other, the boys would have split into warring factions. If this were more of a fun children's story, maybe by Enid Blyton, they would have brought enough biscuits to survive but would have a tense encounter with smugglers. The most realistic outcome, you'd assume, would be that without rescue, the boys would quickly starve and die. Instead, the boys stayed on the island for 15 months, peacefully and in good health. Early on, they ate fish and birds, but after they discovered the remains of a century-old settlement, with crops and chickens, they started farming. They collected and stored fresh water. They set up one area of the island as a gym, complete with weights, and another as a badminton court. They held organized music sessions and organized prayer sessions. Welcome to ComedyNerd, Cracked's daily comedy vertical. For more ComedyNerd content, and ongoing coverage of the Iran/Contra Affair, please sign up for the ComedyNerd newsletter below. SIGN ME UP Nearly a decade after the last installment of The Office aired on NBC back in 2013, it seems we haven't been able to stop thinking about what, exactly, made the series so special. A topic that has inspired podcasts and interviews, with the show's cast and crew sharing new behind-the-scenes stories what feels like every single day since the series finale, the sentiment of why The Office had and continues to have -- such a stronghold on our pop culture zeitgeist is the driving question behind Welcome to Dunder Mifflin: The Ultimate Oral History of The Office, a new book penned by Brian Baumgartner a.k.a the actor behind Kevin Malone. Hitting shelves on November 16, the book is based on a series of conversations Baumgartner conducted with nearly everyone involved in the development, writing, and production of The Office, sharing a variety of new stories aimed at understanding why the series was so exceptional. To me, art on every level from theater, film, television, whatever is infinitely more interesting when its about a question as opposed to an answer, right? If I just tell you why this is great, thats not so interesting, Baumgartner recently told the Washington Post of his approach to chronicling one of the most beloved sitcoms in history. So lets explore what happened and why now its popular. From John Krasinski narrowly saving Jim from cheating on his wife, Pam, to the star-studded pool of actors auditioning for Michael Scott, here are four mind-boggling revelations from Baumgartner's book. Continue Reading Below Advertisement Its actually a funny story when I met Willem for the first time. Obviously, at that time, all of the villains in the film, it was a huge secret that they were in the film," Holland recalled after the trailer dropped on Tuesday. So just how secret is a huge secret" in the scope of the MCBTSU (Marvel Cinematic Behind The Scenes Universe)? Well, according to Holland, the identities of the villainous actors were so secret, that the actors were kept literally under wraps while filming the project. "They would walk around set with these cloaks on, Holland explained of his co-stars' presumably mandatory fashion statements, a look seemingly designed to not only to give the entire set a 16th-century monastery vibe, but also to protect the cast from peeping paparazzi, secret snaps, or, more realistically, the threat of Holland spilling spoilers to the world for the umpteenth time, presumably much to the chagrin of Marvel overlord, Kevin Feige. Continue Reading Below Advertisement Yet even with these bold looks that would make Benedictine monks weep tears of jealousy, a clumsy moment led Holland to learn that Willem Dafoe would be reprising his role as the Green Goblin, a character he first portrayed in Marvel's original 2002 Spider-Man. I just sort of bumped into this guy in a cloak. I was like, Watch out, mate,'" he explained of his literal run-in with Dafoe. He took his cloak off, and I almost got really scared Oh shit, the Goblins here," he continued, adding that naturally, these guys were very excited to be coming back and bringing these roles back to life." Top Image: Marvel/Sony For more internet nonsense, follow Carly on Instagram @HuntressThompson_ on TikTok as @HuntressThompson_, and on Twitter @TennesAnyone. Christmas! My favorite time of the year! Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! Joy to the world! Right? We all want to be happy especially at Christmas time. I love the story of a little boy whose dad promised him a new puppy. Tomorrow was the day! When they arrived at the pet store, the father turned to his Son and said, "Now Son, we're going to look at every puppy before making a decision. Right?" The little boy nodded. "We've talked about the responsibility of taking care of your puppy, so we need to be careful choosing that puppy. Okay?" Again, the little boy gave a slight nod to his dad. When they entered the pet store, they were greeted by a remarkable display of puppies. One little dog ran up to them, his tail wagging ferociously and a smile on his face (if puppies can smile and I believe they can). The little boy pointed at the puppy and said, "Dad, I want that one!" His father smiled and said, "Remember our agreement? To look at all of the puppies before making a decision?" The little boy's smile disappeared, but he agreed. After looking at every puppy in the store, the father and Son ended up where they started. The dad said, "Okay, Son. Which one will it be?" The little boy could hardly contain his excitement as he pointed to the puppy they had seen when they walked in. "I want that one! I want that one with the happy ending!" Christmas can be a wonderful time of the year, a time filled with joy. Unfortunately, it can also be the hardest time of year to find joy. The holidays can magnify a person's sense of loneliness and loss. The reality is that everyone has problems and sources of unhappiness in their lives. Christmas won't change any of that. But what if this Christmas is different? I believe the Advent season is not just a date on the calendar. It's a way of life. Advent can be an adventure when God takes us from where we are to places we would never be able to go without him. And here's a story to help us adventure from sorrow to joy. It's the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Scripture says that Mary was from a town called Nazareth. Photo credit: Getty Images/rudall30 "In the days of Herod, king of Judeathe angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin, and the virgin's name was Mary." (Luke 1:5,27) Nazareth was a small town in 1st century Israel during the time of King Herod, the Great. Nobody understood sorrow better than Mary's people. It had been generations since they were a nation in their own right. King Herod the great was not great. He wasn't even their true king. The conquering Roman Empire gave him the title for political reasons. Herod ruled Mary's country with an iron fist. Roman soldiers were everywhere, and they were brutal toward anyone they thought was getting out of line. The people were being taxed up to 90%, losing their land and homes. So, 1st century Israel was a pretty sad place. And Nazareth was at the bottom of the totem pole in a nation that was already at the bottom. Archeologists tell us that Nazareth might have been a town of no more than 150 people. Nazareth's only claim to fame at the time was that it had a red-light district for Roman soldiers. When the boys in the army got a few days off, they headed to Nazareth, looking for cheap wine and cheap women. Mary was an ordinary teenage girl of probably no more than 13 or 14 years of age. She was engaged to Joseph, and beyond that, we don't know anything about her. But it's safe to say she felt the humiliation of her people. And then the adventure begins. "The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.' 'How will this be,' Mary asked the angel, 'since I am a virgin?' The angel answered, 'The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.'" (Luke 1:28-34) Since angels don't just show up every day, I imagine Mary was rattled. I mean, seriously? There's an angel in her living room. The angel says, 'Don't be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God! God is with you! You're going to have a baby, and the baby will be God's only Son.'" Since Mary had taken a 7th-grade health class, she asks the obvious question, "How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?" I'm sure Mary wondered how that could be possible physically. But I also think she wondered why God would choose someone like her from a place like Nazareth to be the mother of Jesus. How could she have a baby who would change the world and set her people free? I wonder if she was thinking, "Look around, Mr. Angel. I live in the armpit of Israel. This place is a dump. Are you kidding me? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? The Son of God whose kingdom will never end is going to be from Nazareth? God often takes the most broken to do the most unlikely, to accomplish his greatest work. In her confusion and doubt, Mary stepped out in faith. "I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May your word to me be fulfilled." God always honors faith and turns sorrow into joy. Photo credit: GettyImages/Nankimstudio "Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! For he took notice of his lowly servant girl, and from now on, all generations will call me blessed." (Luke 1:46-48) Maybe her source of joy is in the fact that she is going to have an amazing baby. But He was also going to turn her life upside down and create more problems not less in her life. She was engaged to Joseph. What was her fiance going to think? What were people in her little town going to say behind her back? What is the source of this joy? Remember, at the beginning of the story, Mary gets a greeting card of sorts. The angel says, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you." Don't miss this! We don't find God's favor because we are better than others. The word "favor" here means "grace." It's saying, "You are receiving grace." And "grace" literally means "gift." Gifts are free. You don't do anything to deserve a gift. The angel is saying, "You are the recipient of God's grace. The Lord is with you!" And I believe that greeting is the source of Mary's joy. The words "happiness" and "joy" are not the same thing. Happiness comes from the word "happenstance" and depends on our circumstances. But joy is different. Joy is a deeply rooted confidence that God is in control no matter what is happening. Our inward attitude does not have to reflect our outward circumstances. Mary's joy comes when she is told that she was highly favored, and God was with her. She's about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime - which was terrifying. But it became a journey of joy because she knew she was favored and that the Lord was with her. Jesus is saying the same thing to you that He said to Mary so long ago. "Greetings favored one. The Lord is with you." You are highly favored by God Himself. Not because of who you are or what you've done but because you are His child, and He cherishes you. I know what you may be thinking! If I am highly favored, and God's with me, why is my life so hard? Why aren't I happy or at least happier?" Because God's favor and God's presence are not meant to bring us happiness, they're meant to bring us joy. We all have problems. Jesus said it Himself, "In this world, you will have trouble." (John 16:33) As long as I'm in this world, trouble is not optional, but joy is possible. I believe the adventure God wants to experience this Christmas is an adventure toward more joy, and it starts with "Greetings to you who are highly favored. God is with you." Jesus is called Emmanuel, which means "God with us." It's a gift. You are loved. That's the first thing. So, claim the greeting for yourself today. And here's the second thing. Don't just claim it for yourself today. Claim it for yourself - every day. Write "Greetings, favored one. The Lord is with you" on a post-it note and stick it on your computer or your dashboard. Make it your screensaver. Write it on your bathroom mirror. Life is hard, but joy is a gift God wants to give you through a personal relationship with the one conceived in Nazareth and born in Bethlehem. Being a follower of Christ is not easy, but it is an adventure because it brings your life purpose. First, we receive God's love and grace and then share it with others. The kind of Christmas you will have this year depends on where you choose to focus. Focus on your sorrows, and you will mourn through Christmas. Focus on your joys, and you will celebrate through Christmas. How do we do this? First, follow the example of Jesus. "We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame." (Hebrews 12:2, NLT) Jesus had to endure the cross, but He chose to do it with joy and the end result in mind. Let me share a story from my book, Escaping the Stress Trap, that sums up the message and adventure of Christmas. It was Christmas Eve, and the family was preparing to attend the church service. Everyone was going except Dad. He could not understand the story of the baby in a manger born to save the world. As his family went into the cold wintry night, the man added a log to the fire and settled into his favorite chair to wait for his family's return. A knock at the window startled him. Glancing outside, he was stunned to see that the knocking sound was a small bird desperately trying to reach the warmth of the fire. The man opened the window, but the bird ignored him. He tried opening the front door, but the bird again refused his offer. The kind-hearted man finally grabbed his coat and stepped into the Christmas night. He trudged through the snow, determined to save the tiny bird by opening the barn doors. Still, the bird rejected his plan. The man thought, "If only I could be a bird, for just a moment, I could lead the bird to safety." But then, the sound of church bells suddenly rang through the cold night and he knew. He finally understood the reason Jesus came - to be one of us to lead us into the safety of His will and the certainty of eternal life. "Greetings favored one. The Lord is with you." I pray that this Christmas is the greatest adventure of your life! Merry Christmas! Photo credit: GettyImages/undefinedundefined Mary Southerland is also the Co-founder of Girlfriends in God, a conference and devotion ministry for women. Marys books include, Hope in the Midst of Depression, Sandpaper People, Escaping the Stress Trap, Experiencing Gods Power in Your Ministry, 10-Day Trust Adventure, You Make Me So Angry, How to Study the Bible, Fit for Life, Joy for the Journey, and Life Is So Daily. Mary relishes her ministry as a wife, a mother to their two children, Jered and Danna, and Mimi to her six grandchildren Jaydan, Lelia, Justus, Hudson, Mo, and Nori. At its recent Ignite conference, Microsoft announced a new product targeted to businesses with less than 300 users or seats called Microsoft Defender for Business. Any small businesses that does not have an automated way to investigate intrusions and other security issues, or any sort of endpoint detection and response (EDR) technology in place should evaluate it. So should managed service providers that support small business or have connections to a small business that supplies to your firm. Defender for Business ensures that you can monitor and control the native antivirus protection and pull in cloud protections and detections as Microsoft receives the security information from across its cloud properties. For small businesses that have not invested in EDR, the console will point out anomalies and identify when unusual events have occurred. The timeline functionality allows you to review processes on systems to determine what has occurred on systems and keeps a cloud forensic version of the workstation processes so that you can review it later. Microsoft is also working on overview platforms for managed service providers that will allow them to monitor and proactively manage many customers at the same time. Called Microsoft 365 Lighthouse, it gives you a view of security incidents and alerts across customers onboarded into Lighthouse. An upcoming Microsoft seminar will provide more information for Microsoft Defender for Business. If your business has access to Microsoft 365 E5 licenses and the Microsoft Defender Security Center, you are already familiar with the technologies bundled with this new offering. Any firm that has a license to Microsoft 365 Business Premium, this new offering will be included. If they do not, it can be added on with a $3 per user fee. Microsoft Defender for Business includes the Threat and Vulnerability Management console that showcases weaknesses in the network so that firms can prioritize actions to take. This dashboard provides an overall exposure score of the issues in your network. It also provides a score of the risks for your devices that provides the risks to your applications, the operating system, network, accounts and security controls. This provides actionable information to ensure that small businesses are not entry points into larger enterprises. Lucky for cyber criminals, but not so lucky for enterprise security pros: Theres a quick and easy way to get started in cybercrime known as dropper-as-a-service (DaaS). Sophos researchers recently uncovered evidence of a malware campaign using a network of websites acting as a dropper as a service to distribute the malware. The malware includes an assortment of click-fraud bots, other information stealers, and even ransomware, and often bundle multiple unrelated malware together in a single dropper. Sophos Senior Threat Researcher Sean Gallagher says his team found the offerings on a group of blogs, mostly hosted on WordPress, maintained by a criminal group and using them to post links to malware downloads. It is a network of websites that were connected together; a criminal advertising network that works through search engine optimization, says Gallagher. When people go into Google and search cracked software they see advertisements that the products are available and that they can obtain tools that will allow them to get a valid license key to download the software package. But instead these sites are delivering packages of software that is actually malware. In this instance, users seeking pirated software are the perfect target for the scam. Its one more way in which criminals can get access, he says. These sites were advertised through underground bulletin boards to prospective cyber criminals. For low overhead you can get these tools and it requires little technical skill to run them. In a world where remote work is the new normal, and more people are sharing work and personal devices, these types of malware campaigns pose a serious but little-known risk to businesses. Its cyber street crime. Its not just a threat to people trying to download pirated software now. It is part of the larger background radiation of cybercrime on Internet, he notes. The good news? Almost all these malware droppers are easily detectable, and all of them were found by using either signature or behavior products. But awareness is still essential in protecting systems, he notes. Gallagher offers this advice for thwarting potential threats: Review security software, settings and policies to ensure that you can detect and block malicious and unwanted downloads this includes having a robust approach to web filtering Ensure that your endpoint protection is up to date, and that it has behavioral detection capabilities on all of the devices that employees use to remotely access work-related services Educate end users on the dangers of downloading pirated software Encourage employees to practice good cyber hygiene, such as using unique passwords, updating software regularly, and implementing MFA Have users separate company machines from personal use Use a multilayer security strategy to detect and remediate malware Sophos also advises consumers to install a security solution, such as Sophos Home, on the devices that they and their families use for online communications and gaming to protect everyone from malware and cyberthreats. Learn how you can detect these kinds of malware droppers on your systems at Sophos.com. By Cynthia Hubert Mia Settles-Tidwell is ready to lead Sacramento States charge toward becoming an antiracist university, but she says she cannot do it alone. Were never going to get rid of bias, because we all have it, said Settles-Tidwell, Sac States new vice president for Inclusive Excellence and the Universitys diversity officer. But together, we can create a campus where everyone feels a sense of care and belonging. The process already has begun. Last year, 80 students, faculty, and staff members developed the Antiracism and Inclusive Campus Plan, designed to be a roadmap for sustainable change. Katherine Betts, director of Belonging Education and Support. (Sacramento State/Andrea Price) Settles-Tidwell and her team will lead the effort to gather further input from the campus community through informal roadshows and circles that begin at the end of November and culminate in an Antiracism Convocation on Friday, Feb. 25. The team plans to audit University procedures and practices, including those pertaining to the retention and experiences of people of color, and set timelines for implementing key changes. We all need to be self-aware and reflective, and actively dismantle practices that contribute to exclusion and erode a sense of belonging, she said. We need to really look at how we are including or excluding people. Settles-Tidwell has been thinking about her privileges and the effects of racism, sexism, and classism since she was a young girl growing up in the Bay Area. She attended honors classes, was a high school and college cheerleader, and received the encouragement and support she needed to succeed. However, other students whose families were less privileged than hers often were left behind. I began asking myself the question, Why am I being given open doors, when others are not? she said. She concluded that privilege played a role, and decided she could use her privilege to be an agent of change. Settles-Tidwell comes to Sac State with a strong background in equity and advocacy work for underserved communities. Robert Reyes, director of Inclusive Excellence Learning. (Sacramento State/Andrea Price) She earned a bachelor of arts in Social Welfare from UC Berkeley, and a masters in Educational Leadership and a doctorate in Educational Leadership for Social Justice from CSU East Bay. Following in the footsteps of her mother, Queen, she worked in the Oakland Unified School District for more than two decades as a teacher, principal and network officer for the district. She ended her K-12 career as its first Black female chief operating officer. In recent years, she has served as assistant vice chancellor and chief of staff for Equity and Inclusion at UC Berkeley. During her tenure, she curated and led the Disability Strategy Team, and consulted on various diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging initiatives. Dr. Settles-Tidwell has a record of challenging institutions to examine inequitable practices, and has extensive experience removing barriers that impede success for students, staff, and faculty, said Sac State President Robert S. Nelsen, adding, she is just what the Hornet Family needs right now.. Settles-Tidwell will oversee a division that includes the Office of Equal Opportunity and the Office of Inclusive Excellence, with three new directors who have all joined the University in recent months. Katherine Betts, director of Belonging Education and Support, leads the effort to increase belonging on campus and address and heal discriminatory experiences against individuals and groups on campus. Lina Rincon, director of Faculty Diversity and Inclusion. (Sacramento State/Andrea Price) Betts most recently led African and African American Initiatives in the Multicultural Center at The Ohio State University. Robert Reyes, director of Inclusive Excellence Learning, came to Sac State from the Los Angeles Unified School District, where he worked as a diversity and inclusion specialist, designing and developing workshops for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education. At Sac State, he oversees opportunities and programs in the classroom that support the Universitys commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion. Lina Rincon, director of Faculty Diversity and Inclusion, received her doctorate from the State University of New York at Albany and served as an associate professor at Framingham State University in Massachusetts. Her research focuses on understanding the experiences of people of color in various fields, including higher education. In her new role, she leads and coordinates professional development programs for faculty that create inclusive and equitable practices in curricula, recruitment, tenure, and promotion. The team, said Settles-Tidwell, is eager and ready to engage the campus on issues around racism and other forms of oppression. We have a core of individuals who are committed to doing amazing things, with the help of people all across the University, she said. These are not just words. We are ready to get to work, and we really want to get things done. Share This Story email copy url url copied! Related Topics: Inclusion and Diversity BALTIMORE (AP) U.S. Catholic bishops overwhelmingly approved a long-anticipated document on Communion on Wednesday that stops short of calling for withholding the sacrament from politicians such as President Joe Biden who support abortion rights but offers plenty of tacit justification for individual bishops to do so. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' first major statement on Communion in 15 years, The Mystery of the Eucharist in the Life of the Church, does not explicitly address the debate over elected officials, abortion and the sacrament that has surrounded the document over the past several months and partly inspired its creation in the first place. Instead, it gives an overview of church teaching, emphasizing the centrality of the Eucharist in the faith and worship and in part reflecting concern among bishops that many Catholics dont know or accept such teachings. It was approved by a 222-8 vote at the conference's fall assembly in Maryland after receiving only minor revisions in recent days by drafters on the bishops Committee on Doctrine. Drafters added a reference to defending the unborn along with other vulnerable persons, such as immigrants, older adults and victims of racial injustice. They also bolstered the definition of scandal as weakening the resolve of other Catholics to follow church teachings. The latter revision came in a passage reaffirming a 2006 statement saying its a scandal if a Catholic in his or her personal or professional life were knowingly or obstinately to reject the churchs doctrines or moral teachings. The document does not identify Biden or other politicians by name, though it says at one point, Lay people who exercise some form of public authority have a special responsibility to embody Church teaching. It calls on Catholics to examine their conscience and make sure they're in harmony with church teachings, and says bishops have a "special responsibility" to respond to situations that involve public actions at variance with the visible communion of the church and the moral law. Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, who chairs the Committee on Pro-Life Activities and whose work includes advocacy against abortion, took the document as affirming the importance of our responsibility for the care of the souls of these politicians. Naumann, wearing a facemask with the words REMEMBER The Unborn, called for bishops to find common ground where politicians agree with the churchs vision for the dignity of the human person. But he also urged them not to be afraid to fulfill our obligations to let them know how serious it is to dissent from church teaching. Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, an outspoken critic of the president, asked colleagues to amend the document by quoting the church catechism and the Bible as saying anyone who creates scandal would be better off having a millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in ... the sea. The proposal was met with silence when put to a voice vote and was not adopted. The conference cannot dictate a blanket policy on denying Communion to politicians; each bishop has authority in his own diocese. While some bishops have said they would deny the sacrament to Biden, the archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Wilton Gregory, has affirmed that the president is welcome to receive the sacrament there. Biden has said that Pope Francis, too, told him in a recent private meeting in Rome to continue receiving Communion. While the Vatican has not confirmed that, Biden did subsequently go to Mass and receive Communion at a church in Rome evidence that Francis did not forbid priests in the Diocese of Rome, which he oversees, from giving Communion to Biden. The document highlights the centrality of the doctrine of transubstantiation, which says that when a priest celebrates Mass, the bread and wine is transformed into Jesus actual body and blood. It says Catholics can perceive this as a reality through faith, even though the elements appear to the senses to be bread and wine. Some bishops have expressed concern over Catholics acceptance of the doctrine, citing a 2019 survey that found most church members dont believe in transubstantiation. Other researchers have questioned that finding, however, saying that when survey questions are phrased differently, higher numbers of Catholics align with church teaching. Auxiliary Bishop Andrew H. Cozzens of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, who is spearheading efforts to increase Eucharistic devotion, said the statistic that convinced the bishops there was a crisis ... was the fact that 75 percent Catholics dont go to Mass on Sunday. If people believed in the Eucharist, how could they possibly miss Mass on Sunday? The document also says the sacrament is central to church unity and worship and leads to personal and moral transformation, motivating believers to take care of vulnerable people and, in a broader sense, the environment. Bishops began working on the document after Biden took office, with some citing confusion over the president presenting himself as a devout Catholic despite his political stance on abortion. The Vatican repeatedly sent caution signals to the U.S. bishops as they prepared the document. The papal ambassador to the United States, Archbishop Christophe Pierre, on Tuesday urged bishops to listen before they teach, even in situations where some want to clarify confusion. And earlier this year, the head of the Vaticans doctrine office urged bishops to go slowly on the document, pursuing dialogue among themselves and with Catholic politicians. Also during the fall meeting, bishops are launching a broader initiative to promote devotions centered on the Eucharist with plans for a major gathering focused on the sacrament in 2024 in Indianapolis. Later Wednesday, Naumann expressed optimism about a pending request by the state of Mississippi before the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the Roe v. Wade decision permitting abortion. Parishes and dioceses, he said, need to be ready for increased requests for assistance if the court allows states to ban abortion. Naumann touted a new program, Walking with Moms in Need, in which parishes assess and support programs for expectant mothers in their communities. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content. NEW ORLEANS (AP) Energy companies including Shell, BP, Chevron and ExxonMobil offered a combined $192 million for drilling rights on federal oil and gas reserves in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, as the first government lease auction under President Joe Biden laid bare the hurdles he faces to reach climate goals dependent on deep cuts in fossil fuel emissions. The Interior Department auction came after attorneys general from Republican states led by Louisiana successfully challenged a suspension on sales that Biden imposed when he took office. Companies bid on 308 tracts totaling nearly 2,700 square miles (6,950 square kilometers). It marked the largest acreage and second-highest bid total since Gulf-wide bidding resumed in 2017. Driving the heightened interest are a rebound in oil prices and uncertainty about the future of the leasing program, industry analysts said. Biden campaigned on pledges to end drilling on federally owned lands and waters, which includes the Gulf. Prices are higher now than they've been since 2018," said Rene Santos with S&P Global Platts. The other thing is this fear that the Biden administration is here for another three years. They're certainly not going to accelerate the number of lease sales and they could potentially have fewer sales. It will take years to develop the leases before companies start pumping crude. That means they could keep producing long past 2030, when scientists say the world needs to be well on the way to cutting greenhouse gas emissions to avoid catastrophic climate change. Yet even as Biden has tried to cajole other world leaders into strengthening efforts against global warming, including at this months UN climate talks in Scotland, hes had difficulty gaining ground on climate issues at home. The administration has proposed another round of oil and gas sales early next year in Wyoming, Colorado, Montana and other states. Interior Department officials proceeded despite concluding that burning the fuels could lead to billions of dollars in potential future climate damages. Emissions from burning and extracting fossil fuels from public lands and waters account for about a quarter of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The thing that is really bedeviling people right now is this conflict between the short term and long term when it comes to energy policy, said Jim Krane, an energy studies fellow at Rice University in Houston. We still need this energy system that is basically causing climate change, even as were fighting climate change. Wednesday's livestreamed auction invited energy companies to bid on drilling leases across 136,000 square miles (352,000 square kilometers) about twice the area of Florida. Federal officials estimated prior to the sale that it could lead to the production of up to 1.1 billion barrels of oil and 4.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Shell Offshore Inc., the largest leaseholder in the Gulf, said the 20 tracts on which it successfully bid $17.9 million could offer development opportunities near existing platforms or new areas. The need absolutely continues for continued competitive leases in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, said Shell spokesperson Cindy Babski. Chevron USA was the top bidder, offering almost $49 million for 34 tracts. BP Exploration and Production had $30 million in high bids on 46 tracts, and Anadarko US Offshore had almost $40 million in high bids including the day's highest bid, $10 million on 30 tracts. ExxonMobil bid nearly $15 million in two areas off the Texas shoreline in the northwest Gulf. Those 94 tracts are in shallow water less than 656 feet (200 meters) deep where oil has mostly played out and there are few active leases. Not far away in the Houston Ship Channel, Exxon is pursuing a government-industry collaboration that would raise $100 billion to capture carbon dioxide from industrial plants, carry it away in pipelines and inject it deep under the floor of the Gulf of Mexico, a process known as carbon capture and sequestration, or CCS. The Exxon bids have to be a play on their proposed CCS project, said Justin Rostant with industry consulting firm Wood Mackenzie. ExxonMobil spokesperson Todd Spitler declined to say if there was a link between its bids and the carbon capture proposal. The company is evaluating the subsurface geology for future commercial potential" and will work with the Interior Department on its plans after leases are awarded, he said. Shallow waters have typically been more attractive to smaller oil firms with less to spend on costly deep water exploration, said Rice University's Krane. As managing carbon becomes more viable, he said, shallow tracts will become attractive for things beyond oil production. Environmental reviews of the lease auction conducted under former President Donald Trump and affirmed under Biden reached an unlikely conclusion: Extracting and burning the fuel would result in fewer climate-changing emissions than leaving it. Similar claims in two other cases, in Alaska, were rejected by federal courts after challenges from environmentalists. Climate scientist Peter Erickson, whose work was cited by judges in one of the cases, said the Interior Department's analysis had a glaring omission: It excluded greenhouse gas increases in foreign countries that result from having more Gulf oil enter the market. Federal officials recently changed their emissions modeling methods, citing Ericksons work, but said it was too late to use that approach for Wednesday's auction. An attorney for environmental groups challenging Wednesday's sale in federal court said it was based on incorrect data that doesn't reflect its impact on the environment. It's basically a giveaway to industry of millions of acres of the Gulf of Mexico so they can lock in production for years, at a time when we need to be shifting away from fossil fuel development," said Earthjustice attorney Brettny Hardy. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for about 15% of total U.S. crude production and 5% of its natural gas. Federal officials have 90 days to award or reject the bids. __ Brown reported from Billings, Montana. ___ Follow Matthew Brown on Twitter: @MatthewBrownAP BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) The man who fatally shot Ahmaud Arbery spoke publicly about the killing for the first time Wednesday, testifying at his murder trial that the 25-year-old Black man forced him to make a split-second life or death decision by attacking him and grabbing his shotgun. I was thinking of my son," a teary Travis McMichael told the jury of the moment before he pulled the trigger. "It sounds weird, but thats the first thing that hit me. He was the first witness called as defense attorneys for the three white men charged in Arbery's death opened their case, building on arguments that their clients were lawfully trying to stop burglaries in their neighborhood and that McMichael opened fire in self-defense. The Feb. 23, 2020, shooting of Arbery after he was spotted running in the defendants' neighborhood deepened a national outcry over racial injustice after cellphone video of his death leaked online two months later. The slain man's family got support not only from civil rights activists, but also from powerful figures including Georgia's governor and President Joe Biden. The three men on trial Travis McMichael; his father, Greg McMichael; and neighbor William Roddie Bryan have had virtually no defenders aside from for their attorneys. Travis McMichael's testimony marked the most personal and detailed account yet of why the men suspected Arbery of wrongdoing and why McMichael shot him. He had my gun, McMichael, 35, testified. He struck me. It was obvious that he was attacking me, that if he would have gotten the shotgun from me, then this was a life or death situation, and Im going to have to stop him from doing this so I shot. He said warnings between neighbors and social media chatter about car break-ins and suspicious people had been increasing since 2018 when he moved in with his parents in the Satilla Shores subdivision just outside the port city of Brunswick. A man building a house five doors down from the McMichaels installed security cameras after items were stolen from a boat in his open garage. Those cameras recorded Arbery inside on four nights and on the day he was killed. Travis McMichael said he was aware of the theft when he spotted Arbery, whom he didn't know, lurking and creeping outside the unfinished home on Feb. 11, 2020. He testified that when he tried to confront the man, Arbery reached for his waistband. McMichael fled and called 911. Im not going to chase or investigate somebody who might be armed, he testified. But he did chase the same man 12 days later, after his father came running into the house in almost a frantic state and told him the guy who has been breaking in down the road had run past their house. Father and son armed themselves and headed out in Travis McMichael's pickup truck. They came upon Arbery running, and McMichael said he drove next to him, yelling at Arbery to stop so they could talk. McMichael said that when he told Arbery police are on the way, Arbery ran faster deepening his suspicion of the man. A Black pickup driven by Bryan eventually joined the pursuit. It was Bryan who recorded the shooting on his cellphone. McMichael had stopped and gotten out of his truck. Bryan's cellphone video shows Arbery running toward the truck. McMichael is standing with his shotgun by the driver's side door and his father in the truck bed. McMichael testified that he pointed his gun at Arbery saying his intent was to get him to back off and Arbery then turned and ran around the passenger side. McMichael said Arbery attacked him immediately: Hes at the front quarter panel on the right hand side and he turns and is on me. And it is on, in a flash. In the video, the truck blocks the view until after the first gunshot is fired. The video then shows both men with hands on the gun as a bleeding Arbery punches McMichael. After the third shot, Arbery turns to run, then falls facedown in the street. The medical examiner who performed the autopsy said only two of the shotgun blasts hit Arbery, but each struck at close range. One punched a hole in the center of his chest. The other severed an artery near his left armpit and fractured his arm. Authorities say the McMichaels and Bryan chased Arbery for five minutes before the shooting, using their trucks to cut off Arbery's escape. Greg McMichael told police they had him trapped like a rat. Bryan said he used his truck to run Arbery off the road several times. Speaking to reporters outside the courthouse, Arberys mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, said: Mr. Travis McMichael killed my son all on assumptions. He didnt know where Ahmaud was coming from or what Ahmaud had done. He just took actions into his own hands. Bryans attorney, Kevin Gough, argued Wednesday that Bryan never intended to harm Arbery and never tried to hide his involvement in the pursuit. He noted that Bryan openly shared his video the key piece of evidence with police officers at the scene. The defense began its case after Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley denied a request from defense attorneys to ban prominent civil rights leaders and other high-profile visitors from the courtroom, where seating has been limited because of COVID-19 precautions. The Rev. Jesse Jackson sat with Arbery's parents in court for the second time this week. The defendants' attorneys have said Jackson's presence and that of others who have spoken in support of convictions could unfairly influence the jury. The trial is taking place before a disproportionately white jury at the Glynn County courthouse in coastal Georgia. Arbery, 25, had enrolled at a technical college and was preparing to study to become an electrician like his uncles when he was killed. ___ Associated Press reporter Kate Brumback in Atlanta contributed to this report. Ron Chapple / Getty Image A Guilford man pleaded not guilty Tuesday after police found hundreds of images and videos depicting child sexual abuse on his cell phone, according to federal officials. Police seized the mans phone on Jan. 9, 2019 while they were arresting him at his home for state charges from Rhode Island, authorities said. At the time, 37-year-old Christopher Michaelson of Guilford was charged with molestation, solicitation and enticement, according to the U.S. Attorneys office. KENOSHA, Wis. (AP) Kyle Rittenhouse's attorneys asked the judge to declare a mistrial even as the jury in the murder case was deliberating Wednesday, saying the defense received an inferior copy of a potentially crucial video from prosecutors. Judge Bruce Schroeder did not immediately rule on the request, the second mistrial motion from the defense in a week. The jury deliberated a second full day without reaching a verdict and will return in the morning. At issue was a piece of drone video that prosecutors showed to the jury in closing arguments in a bid to undermine Rittenhouse's self-defense claim and portray him as the instigator of the bloodshed in Kenosha in the summer of 2020. Prosecutors said the footage showed him pointing his rifle at protesters before the shooting erupted. Rittenhouse attorney Corey Chirafisi said the defense initially received a smaller compressed version of the video and didn't get the higher-quality larger one used by the prosecution until the evidence portion of the case was over. He said that the defense would have approached things differently if it had received the better footage earlier and that it is now asking for a level, fair playing field. He said the mistrial request would be made without prejudice, meaning prosecutors could still retry Rittenhouse. Last week, the defense asked for a mistrial with prejudice, meaning Rittenhouse could not be put on trial again. That request was prompted by what the defense said were improper questions asked by prosecutor Thomas Binger during his cross-examination of Rittenhouse. Rittenhouse, 18, is on trial on homicide and attempted homicide charges for killing two men and wounding a third with an AR-style semi-automatic rifle during a tumultuous night of protests over the police shooting of Jacob Blake, Black man, by a white police officer. Rittenhouse, a then-17-year-old former police youth cadet, said he went to Kenosha to protect property from rioters. He shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, now 28. Rittenhouse is white, as were those shot. The case has become a flashpoint in the debate over guns, racial injustice, vigilantism and self-defense in the U.S. He could get life in prison if convicted of the most serious charge against him. The dispute over the video erupted after the jurors asked to rewatch footage on Day 2 of their deliberations. Defense attorneys said they would object to the jury viewing the drone video. The same footage prompted heated dispute earlier in the trial over technical questions of whether a still image taken from the video was distorted when it was enlarged. The prosecution contends the video proves Rittenhouse lied on the stand when he said he didnt point his rifle at protesters. But the key moment in the video is hard to decipher because of how far away the drone was and how small a figure Rittenhouse is in the frame. A smaller file size or lower-resolution video file is fuzzier and grainier, particularly if played on a larger screen, said Dennis Keeling, adjunct professor in the cinema and television arts department at Columbia College Chicago. Thats why people working with video footage are careful to check file size, length and other details after making a copy to ensure the new version is what they wanted, he added. Prosecutors told the judge Wednesday that the jury saw the highest-quality version during the trial and that it was not the state's fault that the file size got smaller when received by the defense. Were focusing too heavily on a technological glitch," prosecutor James Kraus said. The judge said he had qualms about admitting the video during the trial, but because it had already been shown in court, he would allow the jury to rewatch it during deliberations. But if it turns out the video should not have been admitted into evidence, its going to be ugly, Schroeder warned. He said the mistrial request will have to be addressed if there is a guilty verdict. If Rittenhouse is acquitted, the issue will be moot. But if he is found guilty, a mistrial ruling would essentially void the verdict. Julius Kim, a Milwaukee-based defense attorney who has been watching the case, said a mistrial could be declared even if the judge finds it was an honest mistake or a technical problem. But to win a mistrial, the defense will have to meet a high bar and explain to the judge why what happened actually hurt Rittenhouse, said Ion Meyn, an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School. You cant just say, The state gave me a lower-quality video and therefore I get a mistrial," Meyn said. Thats a losing argument for sure. Earlier in the day, the judge criticized news coverage of the case and second-guessing from legal experts in the media, saying he would think long and hard about allowing televised trials in the future. He took exception to news stories about his decisions not to allow the men Rittenhouse shot to be called victims and to let Rittenhouse draw the lots that determined which jurors were alternates. The judge also complained about criticism that he had yet to rule on the earlier mistrial request. Schroeder said he hadn't had a chance to read the motion because he had just received it and wanted to give the state a chance to weigh in. Its just a shame that irresponsible statements are being made, the judge said of comments in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story from law school professors. ___ Forliti reported from Minneapolis; Bauer from Madison, Wisconsin. Associated Press writer Tammy Webber contributed from Fenton, Michigan; Kathleen Foody from Chicago. ___ Find the APs full coverage of the Rittenhouse trial: https://apnews.com/hub/kyle-rittenhouse WASHINGTON (AP) Pete Buttigieg, the transportation secretary who holds the purse strings to much of President Joe Bidens $1 trillion infrastructure package, was holding forth with reporters on its impact the promise of more electric cars, intercity train routes, bigger airports when a pointed question came. How would he go about building racial equity into infrastructure? The 39-year-old former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate laid out his argument that highway design can reflect racism, noting that at least $1 billion in the bill will help reconnect cities and neighborhoods that had been racially segregated or divided by road projects. Im still surprised that some people were surprised when I pointed to the fact that if a highway was built for the purpose of dividing a white and a Black neighborhood ... that obviously reflects racism, he said. Racial equity is an issue where Democratic priorities and Buttigiegs future align. One of his greatest shortcomings as a White House candidate was his inability to win over Black voters. How he navigates that heading into the 2022 midterms will probably shape the fortunes of Bidens agenda and the Democratic Party, if not his own prospects. Republicans seeking to exploit the issue pounced on Buttigieg's words. I heard some stuff, some weird stuff from the secretary of transportation trying to make this about social issues, said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. To me, a road's a road. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted sarcastically: The roads are racist. We must get rid of roads. But Buttigieg didn't engage and was off to his next stop, the climate summit in Scotland. There he stood for almost a dozen interviews as he promoted provisions of Biden's bill that would build a network of electric vehicle charging stations. He also engaged with young climate activists and took photos with former President Barack Obama. On racism in roadways, he said simply: I dont know who it hurts to acknowledge that harm was done and to propose doing something to fix it. His department later announced it would grant extra discretionary aid to help as many as 20 U.S. communities remove portions of interstates, redesign rural main streets and repurpose former rail lines. That could help places from Syracuse, New York, where many residents back a plan to tear down portions and build a walkable grid, to racially divided areas in New Orleans and St. Paul, Minnesota. As Biden prepares to sign the infrastructure bill on Monday, eyes are turning to the man still best known as Mayor Pete, a newcomer whose promise of generational change and real-world sensibility of fixing potholes launched him to the top of the early Democratic primary contests during the 2020 campaign. Quickly endorsing Biden after abandoning the race, Buttigieg now stands to become one of the more powerful brokers in Washington, handling the largest infusion of cash into the transportation sector since the 1950s creation of the interstate highway system. Armed with that much money and significant latitude in how to spend it, Buttigieg is poised to be the most influential secretary of transportation ever," said Jeff Davis, a senior fellow at the Eno Center for Transportation. The department was founded in 1967. In all, about $120 billion of the $550 billion in new transportation spending in the bill would come in the form of competitive grants that give Buttigieg discretion in how the money is used. A separate social spending bill pending in the House would pour billions more dollars into the Transportation Department, which already expects to see its annual budget surge by over 50% to $140 billion. Its a whole lot of money, says Ray LaHood, a former Republican congressman from Illinois and transportation secretary under Obama, who in comparison presided over the release of $48 billion in transportation money in the 2009 Recovery Act. Since then, LaHood said, major federal investments in transportation have been stagnant, creating pent-up demand for road, bridge and Amtrak projects that can quickly launch. Its both a boon and challenge to Buttigieg, who revealed in August that he was going to become a dad with husband Chasten. He took several weeks of paternity leave to care for the twins, returning in October as Republicans criticized him for leaving his post. More recently, he juggled time keeping watch over his infant son, who was ill for three weeks and hospitalized for a respiratory illness, while he worked to address national supply chain problems. When somebody welcomes a new child into their family, and goes on leave to take care of that child thats not a vacation, its work," he said last month. Im not going to apologize. Starting this week, Buttigieg will join other Cabinet members to pitch the plan around the country. Look, a lot of this sells itself because communities never needed to be persuaded that their bridge needed to be fixed or that their airport needed an upgrade or that their ports needed investment, Buttigieg said. Theyve been trying to get Washington to catch up to them. Anthony Foxx, who was Obama's transportation secretary from 2013 to 2017, said a big challenge will be the massive operational details in the department, where Buttigieg is supported by veteran hands. Many programs are new, requiring clear guidelines to states and localities on what they are eligible for and how the money is to be awarded. They will be managing multiple plans with very high dollar figures, creating pressure on administrative staff, Foxx said. On Sunday, Biden named former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who oversaw the citys rebuilding effort after it was devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, to be a watchdog on the disbursement of the money. Once many programs are in place, after six to nine months, Foxx said, that's when the magic happens on what to fund and what may not cut the mustard." The winners would come in the form of hundreds of grant announcements for medium-sized road projects that could accelerate into spring 2023 with the first awards for multibillion-dollar bridges, intercity rail and New York's Gateway tunnel. As a mayor, Buttigieg was attuned to calls to fix roads and potholes. He relished talking about state-of-the-art sewer system. Now that message will be national with the stakes far greater. The currency of politics is exposure, and hes getting a lot of exposure, said Larry Grisalano, who was Buttigiegs advertising consultant. At the White House, staff warmly refer to him as Secretary Mayor Pete, and Biden has compared Buttigieg to his late son Beau. The White House celebrated Chastens birthday with cupcakes. Youre the best, man," Biden said after Buttigieg spoke at the White House over the summer. Yet in a city laden with ambition, Buttigiegs potential to move farther onto the national stage can make him a target. Nina Smith, Buttigiegs former traveling campaign press secretary, said as Biden's top lieutenant on the bill, Buttigieg has the opportunity to lead an effort to eradicate past injustices." Buttigieg during the 2020 campaign was never able to win over large shares of Black voters. Thats an added responsibility that I think hes very much aware of and making a central part of the work, said Smith, a Democratic political consultant. ___ Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa. MINNEAPOLIS (AP) Two people were charged Tuesday in the beating death of a pregnant woman whose body was discovered last week in Minneapolis. One of the suspects is a convicted sex offender. Shannon Michael Benson, 42, of Minneapolis, and Jade M. Rissell, 27, of Elk River, are accused in connection with killing the woman, whose identity was unknown when police found her body in a burned-out travel trailer on Nov. 8. Police say they have identified the victim but are waiting for conformation from the medical examiner. RENO, Nev. (AP) A 45-year-old Reno man is being held without bail on more than a dozen criminal counts after he was arrested following a five-hour standoff with a SWAT team that forced a lockdown at a nearby elementary school. Police say Brian Earle had threatened multiple people and barricaded himself in an apartment on the southwest side of town Monday afternoon before they fired tear gas into the residence and he was arrested Monday night. GOLDEN, Colo. (AP) A former Craig city councilman convicted of internet luring of a child and other charges has been sentenced to a minimum of 10 years in Colorado's sex offender supervision program. A First District Court judge sentenced 50-year-old Brian MacKenzie on Friday, the district's attorney general's office said Monday. A Jefferson County jury convicted MacKenzie in September of internet luring of a child with intent to exploit, internet sexual exploitation of a child and attempted sexual assault of a child, the office said in a statement. DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) A former Pleasantville police officer has been charged with several counts in a child sex abuse case. The Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation said Tuesday in a news release that Alec Veatch was arrested Monday at his Norwalk home. ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) New Yorkers in upstate communities seeing upticks in COVID-19 cases could again face more pandemic restrictions if infection rates fail to drop, Gov. Kathy Hochul said Tuesday. The Democrat later tweeted a note of optimism: saying shell direct the state health commissioner to relax rules like masks in schools if New York gets through the holidays without a spike. Hochul didn't outline any specific COVID-19 protocols she could put back in place, or how she would define a decline or spike in COVID-19 rates. But she said she's troubled by vaccine holdouts and signs of rising COVID-19 cases in parts of western and central New York. At some point if the numbers dont start on a downward trend, were going to have to talk about larger protocols," Hochul said. "I truly hope the community at large will listen to this because it doesnt have to be this way. Hospitals across New York reported 2,051 patients with confirmed COVID-19 as of Monday, up 9% from 1,878 as of the previous Monday. Hospitalizations have plateaued statewide since late August. But hospitalizations are rising in Western New York and the Finger Lakes region. And the rates of new COVID-19 positives per capita is higher in less-vaccinated rural counties along the border with Pennsylvania: just 40% of residents in Allegany County are fully vaccinated, for example. The governor said anyone who feels theyre at high risk of getting COVID-19 should get a booster shot. This area is a high-transmission area, Hochul said, speaking in Buffalo on Tuesday. She added: Anyone who personally feels that risk should get the booster. NEW HAVEN A federal judge on Tuesday rejected a request for an early release for former Bridgeport drug kingpin Adrian Peeler convicted of conspiring to kill a woman and her young son following impassioned pleas to keep him behind bars by the victims family. Twenty years after he was last in court, sentenced to 25 years for the deaths of Karen Clarke and her 8-year-old son, Leroy BJ Brown, and another 35 years in federal court for his drug operation, Peeler stood before U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton and asked to be released for compassionate reasons. I take full responsibility for all my actions that led me to be here today, Peeler told the judge. I sold drugs in the communityIt is something I think of every day. Peeler said that during his 20 years behind bars he has turned his life around and worked hard to become a better person. But while Arterton lauded Peeler for making progress while in prison, she said, Shockingly missing was any expression of remorse or apology to the families of Miss Clarke and B.J. He didnt turn around to face them and simply say Im sorry. The judge did reduce Peelers federal drug sentence to 15 years to reflect current sentencing guidelines but added that it will run consecutively to any state sentence he has remaining. It was one of the most horrifying crimes in the citys history. Clarke and B.J. were found shot to death in their East Side home on Jan. 7, 1999 just days before they were scheduled to testify in the trial of a major city drug dealer, Russell Peeler Jr. Russell Peeler was convicted of ordering the murders of Clarke and Brown in state Superior Court. His initial death sentence was later converted to life in prison without the possibility of release after the death sentence was abolished in the state. Adrian Peeler, who was identified by an eyewitness as the shooter, was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder by a jury in Waterbury and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. He would be scheduled to be released next April, according to court documents, but is also being held in prison on a consecutive 35-year federal sentence for drug dealing. He requested Tuesday that the federal sentence be ended so that he will go free when the state sentence is completed next year. His father, Russell Peeler Sr. told the judge Adrian Peeler could come live with him in Las Vegas. Holding up a large photograph of Clarke and B.J. during Tuesdays hearing, Oswald Clarke, Karen Clarkes brother, urged the judge to reject Peelers request. There is irony in this man seeking a compassionate release, Clarke said, as Peeler, seated a short distance away, turned his head to avoid looking at the photographs. He had zero compassion for my sister and nephew. This man should not be on the streets, he will kill again. Janet Gordon, Clarkes cousin, had testified during Peelers trial. He has yet to show any remorse to my family for taking away B.J. and Karen, she told Arterton on Tuesday. In order to change you first must apologize for what you did. If he is released, Im scared for my family, Im scared for everyone who testified against him. Both Oswald Clarke and Gordon said later as they left the federal courthouse that they were satisfied with the judges ruling. Assistant U.S. Attorney Nancy Gifford vehemently opposed Peelers early release, calling the murders of Clarke and B.J. one of the most horrific executions in the state of Connecticut. Killing witnesses is the ultimate attack on the judicial system, Gifford said, pointing out that the case resulted in the creation of the states witness protection program. Bridgeport State's Attorney Joseph Corradino prosecuted the Peeler brothers for the murders. The defendant is not a nonviolent drug offender for whom this legislation was intended, he wrote in a letter that was presented to the judge. He and his brother terrorized the streets of Bridgeport, destroying the very community that raised him, disgracing the memory of their mother who was a Bridgeport police officer, and leaving drugs and bodies in their wake. TRUMBULL A local man has been identified after being involved in an armed standoff with authorities stemming from a domestic disturbance Tuesday night that sent a neighborhood into lockdown, police said. Capt. Keith Golding said officers were sent to the area of Tashua Road on a reported domestic disturbance. He said before the units arrived, the alleged suspect fled from the house to an adjacent building on the property, armed with a gun. The 911 caller reported the man left the home with a loaded gun and fired one shot in an unknown direction just outside the front door, police said. The individuals in the home were told by authorities to shelter in place as officers responded and surrounded the property. Officers called in the Southwest Regional Emergency Response Team, which negotiated with the alleged suspect, Golding said. Police said 42-year-old Robert Zambrzycki, of Tashua Road, surrendered to authorities around midnight outside the residence after hiding in a boat on the property. As police units were on scene, authorities locked down the area of Tashua Road and Madison Avenue that lasted through midnight. Zambrzycki was taken to St. Vincents Medical Center in Bridgeport for evaluation after the incident. Police said Zambryzcki was charged with unlawful discharge of a firearm and first-degree reckless endangerment. He was released on a promise to appear and was given a Nov. 29 court date in Bridgeport. An alert was sent to area residents and updates were posted on social media as the incident unfolded, informing residents of the police activity. Residents were told to remain in their homes and keep the doors locked until further notice as police investigated. Once the suspect was in custody, police canceled the alert shortly after midnight Wednesday. There were no injuries reported during the incident, which Golding said remains under investigation. Hugh Baileys column (CT in desperate need of new transportation thinking, Oct. 10), concerning state officials aspirations to widen Interstate 95 to fix regional traffic woes and how such plans could induce more congestion, is on target. Is it worth spending hundreds of millions of tax dollars to widen the current roadway? Refurbished some 15 years ago, Bridgeports Interstate 95 has a limited service life which if extended indefinitely will cost more to maintain with each passing decade. So what new, economically and environmentally sustainable alternatives can be explored? Commuters in the states southwestern corridor endure repeated traffic delays due in part to overreliance on Bridgeports I-95 viaducts and Route 8/25 connector, particularly at their interchange at Exit 27A. Redesign and replacement is called for. Planned in the mid 1950s, I-95 slashes through shoreline cities and towns, dividing neighborhoods and displacing walkable streets with noisy, pedestrian-unfriendly overpasses. Nowhere is this blight more impactful than in Bridgeports West Side, East Side and downtown neighborhoods. With the presidents infrastructure bill now law, state, regional and local planners should consider its provisions to study how this vital but hobbled economic lifeline should operate into the next century. Two alternatives are worth investigating: A new Bridgeport Harbor tunnel Imagine a widened I-95 achieving superior functional and aesthetic outcomes by placing most of the roadway, including the 8/25 connector, below ground; the new system would run beneath the harbor with room for added express and high occupancy vehicle lanes, streamlining traffic flow and eliminating shadows cast by viaducts currently lumbering over the Pequonnock riverfront, State Street and Fairfield Avenue, among many others important public urban thoroughfares. Southwest Corridor Bus Rapid Transit Adding new lanes below grade can accommodate flexible Bus Rapid Transit, or BRT, service using express connections within and through the city. Avoiding sunk costs of light rail, BRT offers commuters a speedier, greener choice by taking thousands of passenger vehicles off the road. Successful in Europe and South America, BRT encourages walkable transit-oriented development in the urban core where it belongs. Too often, Americans see images of Chinas progress in transportation innovation and ask what similar examples exist in the United States. Bostons recently completed Central Artery Tunnel replacement took over a decade to complete but more than paid for itself by attracting a cascade of new real estate and business investment after its obsolete eyesore I-93 expressway was buried below grade. Replaced with the pedestrian-friendly Rose Kennedy Greenway above grade, its success has spawned urban highway relocation and/or removal campaigns across the nation. New Orleans and Syracuse are following suit. In the Bronx, the obtrusive Sheridan Expressway will be replaced with a tree-lined boulevard. Nearby, in New Haven, a Connecticut DOT plan to reknit blocks severed by the canceled Route 34 connector is now flourishing with new development. Bridgeport can achieve similar aims by recovering revenue-yielding urban fabric lost to highways over the latter half of the 20th century. In a 2015 UConn civil engineering masters research study by Kristen Floberg, the planner cites this loss stating: The most startling result (of the highways) is the change of density and diversity of land uses. From the passenger train station in downtown, a pedestrian can reach only 28 percent of the number of establishments that a 1913 pedestrian could in a 5-minute walk. If examined by land use, only a startling 6 percent of the number of residential properties can be accessed today, greatly diminishing the walkable nature of the city. Although its population and real estate values hold steady, more work can be done to promote reinvestment in Bridgeports urban core. Placing emphasis on internal growth and reducing the regions contribution to greenhouse gases, a phased, tunnel-based roadway replacement in full or in part could greatly improve Bridgeports regional mobility as we know it, inaugurate a physical and cultural transition to using expanded mass transit and relieve the New Haven-Bridgeport-Stamford corridor from traffic headaches for many decades to come. President Dwight Eisenhower, creator of Americas now aging Interstate Highway System, famously quipped: Plans are worthless, but planning is everything. Just as I-95 and Route 8/25 spurred enthusiasm for Bridgeports suburban growth and lifestyle innovations during the decades following World War II, a new era of planning can turn the tide on Connecticuts outdated pattern of inefficient sprawl, making Bridgeport far more attractive to citizens, commuters and investors. Michael J. Tyrrell, a Fairfield native, is a Boston-based consultant in architecture, planning and urban design. John J. Harrington, of Stratford, is an attorney in Norwalk and president of the Bridgeport Harbor Tunnel Organization, Inc. There is no denying the crisis currently happening in our state regarding childrens mental health. Emergency departments around the state are seeing increased numbers of children in distress, waiting for admission for behavioral and mental health issues. Every one of these children are in various stages of crisis, and the longer we wait to find solutions for them, the worse the problem will become. In late October, as chairs of the Childrens Committee, we held a two-day informational hearing to learn more from professionals about this issue, how widespread it is and how we can find solutions for families in need. The first day, we offered practical help for parents including how to find care, utilizing school resources, managing safety plans at school and home, and even addressed immediate diversions for children who self-harm. The entire video is on CT-N, and individual topics will be released on our Facebook pages for the next few weeks. The second day, we heard from state agencies and experts on their current plans to address the crisis, so that we may develop a plan to fill in the gaps in care. What we know is there is both immediate and long-term need. Connecticut has numerous services for crisis intervention and entry-level care, but few know what they are, and how and when to use it. Mobile Crisis Intervention, a service available through 2-1-1, allows anyone to call for a mental health assessment, in-person. These are individuals trained in de-escalation and assessment of next needs the exact place you should call when your child is self-harming, having suicidal thoughts or in any behavioral health crisis. This resource is wonderful, but underused, as shown by the overflowing emergency rooms. Even as an underused resource, it is still having trouble meeting the demands of the community. While the phone lines are open 24/7, the access is not 24/7. Evenings, nights and weekend coverage needs expansion. An immediate plan of action must include at least $4.5 million of American Rescue Plan Act funding to hire social workers to tend to crises in the overnight hours, as well as make more clinicians available during the day. This one action will save lives, help keep spaces open for the most acute children in the emergency departments, and act as care coordination to the many places for entry-level and higher care available in the state. Many other mental and behavioral health nonprofit resources are available across Connecticut, but when one talks to parents and even pediatricians, they just arent aware of them. In the last legislative session, our committee passed a law to require this information be given to every parent in school twice a year, and to every family who enters the emergency department for any reason, mental health related or not; that goes into effect in January. We must expand this and put that information in the hands of every pediatrician in the state. The state must also do a better job of sharing these resources with families. What good is access to care when parents dont know it exists? The second immediate action is aimed at those children who arent at the entry level of care, but who also arent in need of residential care. These children, adolescents and teens have more complex needs than therapy-only intervention and require medication management. Ask any parent of these kids and theyll tell you that a psychiatrist who has a specialty in childrens mental health is hard to come by. Often theres a waiting list, or they dont take your insurance, if they take insurance at all. This issue (which we will aim to fix long-term) means more are trying to access meds through their pediatrician, even if the pediatrician feels it is beyond the scope of their training. Therefore, many pediatricians use Access Mental Health, a tele-consult service for pediatricians to work with a psychiatrist to advise them on managing care plans for these kids in crisis. The result is helpful, but we need more. Again, an immediate influx of ARPA funds is required to provide greater staffing for the consultation lines, and to expand the service to include three additional follow-up telehealth services for families whose pediatrician utilized the service. Medication management is a long process, and both parents and pediatricians need help navigating the complexities of med management. We cannot forget that these families are also in crisis, and we must do something to help them immediately. This is a starting point to address immediate needs. We will need to have investments so that all levels of workforce development can be achieved in the entire spectrum of the mental health management of our children. The longer-term solutions include payment parity for mental health providers, workforce development and retention incentives, requiring insurance companies to incentivize care coordination in pediatricians offices, and more. Childrens mental health care positions require difficult work and highly specialized training, yet they do not pay nearly at comparable rates contrasted with other health care roles requiring less stringent requirements. Refocusing how we approach childrens care is an important need; refocusing how we view the professionals caring for them, and ensuring they receive proper restitution, is just as important. This is a problem not unlike a leaking boat the biggest hole requires an imminent fix, but without patching the smaller ones, as well, it wont take long for them to grow and become other weak points. Every day that this goes on, more children are in harms way, and some may struggle to recover over time. We are already communicating with our colleagues on how the General Assembly can help improve the situation. The reality is that to have a comprehensive solution to this complex issue, we will need policy adjustment, place more personnel and financial resources, and create efficient systems and make sure the community including all parents are aware of these changes and processes. In our minds, theres no more important investment of state funds and resources, nor one with bigger dividends then the investment in our childrens mental health and their well-being. For detailed information on how and where to find help for your child, including a listing of providers by town, visit the Childrens Committee website to download their guide at https://bit.ly/3wHPXEB. State Sen. Saud Anwar, who represents the Third District, and state Rep. Liz Linehan, who represents the 103rd District, are co-chairs of the Childrens Committee of the Connecticut General Assembly. Knoxville TVA Employees Credit Union ($3.3B, Knoxville, TN) is near the top of its peer group in several key performance areas including loan growth, member growth, and return of the member, Callahan & Associates proprietary scoring system of member value. Knoxville TVA Employees L.E.A.D. Academy is a new offering that helps the credit union achieve such results by facilitating team members understanding of each persons impact today, thereby paving the way for continued success tomorrow. WHAT IS L.E.A.D.? In 2020, Knoxville TVA Employees rolled out LEAD Academy, a program to support the development of emerging leaders. The program consists of four sections geared toward different leadership levels. Each section requires 12 months to complete and builds off the teachings of the previous sections. The sections are: NAFCU Vice President of Legislative Affairs Brad Thaler wrote to House Small Business Committee Monday ahead of todays hearing to discuss Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzmans vision for the agency moving forward. In the letter, Thaler expressed NAFCUs ongoing opposition to the provisions in the committees language from the Build Back Better Act that allow the SBA to directly offer 7(a) loan products to market, dodging current partners and community lenders including credit unions. Thaler reiterated NAFCUs concerns with the language in the BBBA that would allow the SBA to originate and disburse loans to small businesses. NAFCU has serious concerns that this provision does not require the SBA to work with lenders as they do with other 7(a) loan products and would allow them to make loans on their own should they so choose, wrote Thaler. Thaler also highlighted that NAFCU and credit union members do support the concept of expanding access to small dollar business loans, highlighting credit unions utilization of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) to fill the need for more access. First it was known for the Black Friday stock market crash then for being the biggest shopping day of the year. The meaning may have evolved, but today, Black Friday is still a subject for stock market scrutiny. Which retailers look set to benefit? What can we learn from the price action of past years? And what factors help you trade the period? Well find out. But first, a history lesson. What is Black Friday? Black Friday was originally the term used to describe the stock market collapse of 1869, when American investors Jay Gould and James Fisk caused a financial meltdown after a failed attempt to corner the gold market. The modern concept of Black Friday, however, came about in the 1940s to entice people to the stores the day after Thanksgiving. Named for its tendency to contribute to traffic accidents, Black Friday later took on a new meaning as companies expected to make enough sales to put them in the black, or profitable, for the year. It was not until the 1980s, however, that retailers began to slowly use the day as a marketing tool, culminating in its widely-held status as the most popular shopping day of the year in the 2000s. Today, Black Friday is more than just a US-based tradition; it has spread to some 20 other countries, including Mexico, Russia and Pakistan. In conjunction with Cyber Monday, the Monday after Thanksgiving that pushes online sales, the shopping period is seen by some analysts and market commentators as providing a measure of economic prosperity. That measure can then be used to predict the performance of other assets such as stocks. The influence of Black Friday Marketing gimmick or useful indicator; whats the overall influence of Black Friday? To answer, its worth examining its effect on retail spending and consumers, the economy, and the resulting effect (if any) on traders and stocks. 1) Retail spending and consumers There is no doubt that Black Friday influences consumers to spend. Across a range of countries, the event is promoted as a rare chance to save money across a gamut of products, from laptops to lawnmowers, and historical media coverage of the event has featured stampedes in retail outlets as bargain-hungry punters battle for deals. In 2018, Adobe Analytics data shows $6.22 bn was spent online in the US, representing a 23.6% increase on the previous year. Furthermore, every Black Friday bar one has seen higher retail sales volume than any other date. 2) Economy Black Fridays influence on the economy is more debatable. Some argue in favor of the Keynesian effect of spending driving economic activity, which puts more money into circulation and potentially buoys the economy. At a time when the US economy has shown signs of recession, consumer spending might be welcomed. But others say that the influence of the event is negligible, with only short-term effects observed. This is due in part to lessons from previous years, when many retailers have seen poor sales figures once the discounting has ended. However, if stores decide to go another route and prolong discounts, profit margins can be eroded, potentially meaning staff cuts and increased unemployment. Knock-on economic effects of this could include decreased income tax receipts and a raised welfare burden, factors which raise an argument for Black Friday having a net negative economic effect. 3) Stocks/stock markets The influence of Black Friday on stock markets and individual stocks is also less than straightforward. Perhaps predictably, a range of retail stocks can be expected to rise if sales expectations are met. Conversely, unexpectedly weak sales can suggest poor consumer confidence and a fragile underlying economy, giving traders reason to go short. But even if a given company has enjoyed strong sales, this performance has no bearing on its profitability or overall financial health, which are factors traders should consider when picking one stock over another. Examining the impact of previous Black Fridays on financial markets gives an insight into the trends traders might expect to see following this key date in the future. Black Friday and Stock Market History While Black Friday history begins with the catastrophic 1869 stock market crash, the modern iteration of Black Friday has seen retail stocks making strong returns around the Black Friday period. This can be observed in the S&P 500where, in a ten-year timeframe, Bloomberg data shows a 5% return for retail stocks compared to an average 3% over a period of one week before Black Friday to one week after. The Black Friday periods 2014-2018 are circled on the S&P 500 chart below. However, while such data suggests that retail stocks perform well over this period, stock pickers should be aware of the nuances between retail sub-sectors as well as the likelihood of online sales taking business from more brick-and-mortar reliant stocks, as well as additional fundamental factors that can move the market. Black Friday retail stock performance: A snapshot When measuring Black Friday retail stock performance, heres an insight into how 15 major global retail stocks did in 2018 over the period one week before to one week after Black Friday: Closing stock price: Nov 16 2018 ($) Closing stock price: Nov 30 2018 ($) Percentage increase/decrease Amazon 1,502.06 1,690.17 +11 Apple 193.53 178.58 -8 Best Buy 66.43 64.59 -3 Burlington Stores 161.75 165.76 +2 Costco 231.02 231.28 +0 CVS 79.33 80.20 +0 H&M 3.49 3.63 +4 Home Depot 177.02 180.32 +2 Lowes 93.25 94.37 +1 Sainsburys 15.90 15.60 -2 Target 79.68 70.96 -12 Tesco 7.82 7.51 -4 TJX 51.49 48.85 -5 Walgreens 82.52 84.67 +3 Walmart 97.69 97.65 -0 Amazon reaped the rewards in 2018, enjoying its biggest shopping day in history on Cyber Monday. Customers ordered more than 18 million toys and 13 million fashion items on Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined, according to Bloomberg data, and saw its share price rise to the tune of 11% over the two-week period from November 16 to November 30, as the table shows. On the short side, while Target shares saw a dip of 12% over the same period, the fall can probably be attributed more to a wider fall in the stock market caused by trade wars and concerns about global growth than any other factors. This underlines the importance of traders considering a range of fundamental reasons that can contribute to moves during the holiday season. Key considerations when trading stocks on Black Friday Once traders have assessed the market and gained a feel for the retailers taking a lead in Black Friday sales, there are a variety of other considerations to make when trading stocks around this period. Stock market liquidity : Trading around the holidays can seriously distort liquidity and Black Friday is no exception. With fewer traders on the desk, liquidity dries up and the potential for larger swings can increase especially as stop losses are triggered automatically and positions are ditched. Fundamental factors : These may give clues as to how consumer spending may go, allowing traders to consider certain retail stocks. For example, lower gasoline prices and strong employment figures could signal more spending power and company sales expectations being met. However, as mentioned above, its important to be aware of a whole range of other fact ors that can impact the market and overshadow any moves caused by consumer sentiment. Online vs brick and mortar sales: Brick and mortar retailers have lost ground to their online competitors in recent years and Cyber Monday threatens to take the crown in terms of total sales. To capitalize on this, it may be worth keeping an eye on stocks like Amazon and Best Buy which offer attractive online shopping deals around the holidays. Earnings usually arent released until January: Traders should also be mindful that company performance may not be entirely clear until earnings, which for many companies will be released in January. What time does the stock market close on black Friday? The stock market open on Black Friday is 9:30 ET as normal, but the market closes at 1pm. The market is closed for the whole of Thanksgiving. Further reading on stocks and trading major indices If youre interested in learning more about stocks, boost your equities knowledge with our helpful articles. Crude Oil Trading Strategies and Tips Crude oil is ranked among the most liquid commodities in the world, meaning high volumes and clear charts for oil trading. Oil traders should understand how supply and demand affects the price of oil. Both fundamental and technical analysis is useful for oil trading and allows traders to gain an edge over the market. Traders should follow a risk conscious crude oil trading strategy for greater consistency and efficiency. WHY TRADE CRUDE OIL AND HOW DOES CRUDE OIL TRADING WORK? Crude oil is the world economys primary energy source, making it a very popular commodity to trade. A naturally occurring fossil fuel, it can be refined into various products like gasoline (petrol), diesel, lubricants, wax and other petrochemicals. It is highly demanded, traded in volume, and extremely liquid. Oil trading therefore involves tight spreads, frequent chart patterns, and high volatility. Brent crude is the worlds benchmark for oil with almost two thirds of oil contracts traded being Brent oil. WTI is Americas benchmark oil, it is a slightly sweeter and lighter oil compared to Brent. CRUDE OIL TRADING HOURS WTI trades on CME Globex: Sunday - Friday, 6:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. (with an hour break from 5:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. each day) Brent trades on ICE: Sunday - Friday - 7:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. CRUDE OIL TRADING BASICS: UNDERSTANDING WHAT AFFECTS PRICE MOVEMENTS When trading oil, the two major focal points are, as with many commodities, supply and demand. Whether there was an economic report like a news event or press release or tensions in the Middle East, the two factors that will be taken into consideration is how supply and demand is affected, because this will affect the price. Supply Factors Outages or maintenance in key refineries around the globe, whether its the Forties pipeline in the North Sea or the Port Arthur refinery in Texas, must be monitored because of the effect it can have on the supply of oil. War in the Middle East leads to concerns about supply. For example, when the Libyan Civil war began in 2011, prices had seen a 25% rise from in the space of a couple of months. OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) production cuts or extensions lead to changes in the price of oil. For example, back in 2016 when the cartel had announced their decision to curb global supply by 1.9% (see chart below), the price of oil has risen from $44/bbl to as much as $80/bbl. {{GUIDE|OILTRADINGFUND }} WTI and Brent Crude price reaction to OPEC supply cut: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, TradingView Oil Suppliers: Similarly, with understanding the importance of OPEC, it is also worth knowing who the top global oil suppliers are, and this information can be fond from the EIA website. Demand Factors Seasonality : Hot summers can lead to increased activity and higher oil consumption. Cold winters cause people to consume more oil products to heat their houses. Oil Consumers: The largest consumers of oil have typically been developed nations such as the U.S. and European countries. However, in recent times there has been a surge in oil consumption in Asian countries, namely China and Japan. As such, it is important for traders to pay attention to the level of demand from these nations, alongside their economic performance. Any slowdown could affect oil prices and demand may fall. Correlation to Global Growth: The chart below shows the largely positive correlation between the price of crude oil and global growth. The Chinese and US economies being the two largest in the world are a great barometer for global growth. The chart includes their respective major stock indices which move in line with crude oil prices when the equity indices fall, the price of crude oil tends to fall and vice versa. WTI and Brent Crude positive correlation with FTSE China A50 and S&P 500 chart representation: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, TradingView Alternative Energy: While fossil fuels such as oil and gas continue to dominate cleaner energy sources, there is an incessant push towards sustainability on a global scale. This will definitely impact crude oil prices going forward which makes this a key factor to monitor in a crude oil trading strategy. The impact of derivatives on the traditional valuations of crude oil have been thought by many to have destabilized the asset class. Simply put, the oil futures are thought to have reflected higher proportions of noise which do not reflect the fundamental data at the time. This is contentious within the investing community with some in disagreement with the above rationale, but it cannot be ignored that large speculative traders are becoming more influential with the flourishing derivative market. Want to know more about oil? Here are 8 Surprising Crude Oil Facts Every Trader Should Know! HOW TO TRADE OIL: TOP TIPS AND STRATEGIES Expert oil traders generally follow a strategy. They will understand the fundamental factors that affect the price of oil and use a trading strategy that suits their trading style. Each trading strategy is different, risk management is an important component to consistent trading, like the effective use of leverage and avoiding top trading mistakes. A comprehensive crude oil trading strategy could include: Fundamental Analysis Technical Analysis Risk Management Once a trader understands the fundamental supply and demand factors that affect the price of oil, he/she can look for entries into the market using technical analysis. Then, when a buy or sell signal has been identified using technical analysis, the trader can implement the proper risk management techniques. Lets go through an example using the steps outlined above: Fundamental Analysis On the 30th of November 2017, OPEC and Russia agreed to extend an oil production cut, which lead to a decrease in supply. The basic theory of supply and demand suggests that a decrease in supply should be succeeded by an increase in demand and consequently price. This is the fundamental analysis a trader would need to incorporate into their strategy in order to identify potential buy signals in the market. WTI daily chart highlighting supply cut: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, IG 2. Technical Analysis The next step would be to analyze the chart using technical analysis. There are a variety of technical indicators and price patterns a trader can use to look for signals to enter the market. There is no need to use many technical indicators, one that you understand well will do the job. A common yet very effective way to begin analyzing any chart is to identify the overall trend of the market. In this example, the implementation of simple price action is used to identify higher highs and higher lows which is suggestive of a preceding upward trend. This falls in line with our fundamental expectation of further upward price movement. WTI daily chart showing preceding upward trend: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, IG Once the bullish trend has been confirmed, the next step in the trading strategy would be to recognize possible entry points. Again, there are multiple tools and techniques to locate entry points but this example uses the Commodity Channel Index (CCI) indicator which moves into oversold terrirtoy shortly after the fundamental supply cut announcement was made. An oversold signal on the CCI advocates further price appreciation and the possibility of a long (buy) entry. WTI daily chart with CCI indicator: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, IG 3. Risk Management The final step in any trading strategy would be to employ sound risk management to every trade. At DailyFX we support the 1:2 risk-reward ratio guideline which basically means that the target level should be roughly two times more than the position stop-loss level. To manage risk, the trader could look to set a take-profit above the recent high and set a stop-loss at the recent low. In this example, a recent swing low ($49.30) has been identified as stop level which is approximately $8 away from the entry price ($57.20). There is no recent high which in this case which would allow for a target projection using basic maths. With the stop distance being roughly $8 away from entry, a 1:2 projection could seee initial resistance at the $73 level. WTI daily chart with 1:2 risk-reward ratio: Chart prepared by Warren Venketas, IG This sample trade would illustrate a positive risk to reward ratio. We researched millions of live trades in a variety of markets and discovered a positive risk to reward ratio was a key element to consistent trading. Additionally, at DailyFX, we recommend risking less than 5% of capital on all open trades. ADVANCED TIPS FOR OIL TRADING Advanced traders can incorporate additional information when setting up trades. Traders sometimes look at the futures curve to forecast future demand, CFTC speculative positioning to understand the current market dynamic and can use options to take advantage of forecasted high volatility moves or to hedge current positions. Futures Curve: The shape of the futures curve is important for commodity hedges and speculators. As such, when investors analyze the curve, they look for two things, whether the market is in contango or backwardation: Contango : This is a situation in which the futures price of a commodity is above the expected spot price, as investors are willing to pay more for a commodity at some point in the future than the actual expected price. This typically signals a bearish structure. Backwardation: This is a situation when the spot price is above the forward price for a commodity. This typically signals a bullish structure. CFTC/Speculative Positioning: The Commodity Future Trading Commission Report (CFTC) is important when trading crude oil futures. It provides traders with information related to market dynamics and therefore s can be a good way to gain a sense of where oil prices are heading. Movements in the CFTC managed money net positions typically precede the move in oil prices. Trading via futures and options Buying futures and options, a trader must use the appropriate exchange for the oil benchmark he/she wants to trade. Most exchanges have criteria for who is allowed trade on them, so the majority of futures speculation is undertaken by professionals. Oil Investing Instead of trading the individual market, a trader can get exposure to oil through shares of oil companies or through energy-based exchange traded funds (ETFs). The price of oil companies and ETFs are heavily influenced by the price of oil. Major Oil/Energy ETFs: Energy Select Sector SPDR (XLE) Vanguard Energy ETF (VDE) United States Energy Fund (USO) KEY REPORTS EVERY OIL TRADER SHOULD FOLLOW Weekly updates on the amount of crude oil inventories in the U.S. are very important pieces of data for oil traders the release of which frequently leads to a bout of volatility. The inventory data is an important barometer for oil demand. For example, if weekly inventories are increasing, this would suggest that demand for oil is dropping, while a drop in inventories suggests that oil demand is outstripping supply. American Petroleum Institute (API): The API produces a weekly statistical report, which highlights the most important petroleum products that account for more than 80% of total refinery production, while crude oil inventories are also included. This data is typically released on Tuesday at 16:30ET/21:30 London time. Department of Energy (DoE/EIA): Much like the API report, the DoE report provides information on the supply of oil and the level of inventories of crude oil and refined products. This is announced on Wednesday at 10:30ET/15:30 London time. USING SOCIAL MEDIA TO TRADE CRUDE OIL Over the years, social media has become an increasingly useful platform to share ideas, pass on information and receive breaking news. This is the case for oil traders using #OOTT, which stands for the Organization of Oil Traders on Twitter. Here traders and industry leaders provide breaking news and key reports related to the oil market. Looking to trade in a simulated environment to better learn strategies, tactics and approach? Click here to request a free demo with IG group. The Star Casino in Sydney has launched a groovy new bar with an impressive food and drink menu that'll have you coming back for more. Bar Nexus is the latest location for afternoon cocktails before a night out, to catch up with loved ones for a bite to eat, or for a beverage before your next theatre show. With a mouth-watering selection to choose from your tastebuds will be dancing to the tune of a crispy chicken burger, a refreshing apple-flavoured cocktail and classic thickshake in this retro establishment. Bar Nexus is lit up with neon lights and has been fit out with black marble tables and leather booths to create a retro look Need a pick me up? The Popcorn Espresso Martini is also available at Bar Nexus The drink menu features a Popcorn Espresso Martini with popcorn vodka, cold drip coffee and coffee liqueur and a Peanut Butter and Jelly Old Fashioned with peanut butter washed bourbon, strawberry jam and bitters. For a fruitier variety customers can opt for an Appletini, with calvados, pisco and green apple liqueur, which has a theatrical mist-like bubble on top of the glass. There is also a selection of craft beers to choose from to tickle everyone's fancy. For something appropriate for all ages the new bar offers a range of signature thickshakes including an Oreo Biscoff shake, packed with Oreos, Biscoff, vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce. There is also the Kinder Bueno shake with Kinder Bueno Bars, vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce and a Berry Bounty with Bounty Bars, vanilla ice cream and strawberry sauce. Bar Nexus offers a refreshing selection of contemporary cocktails and classic thickshakes for all occasions For the foodies Bar Nexus serves up spicy chicken wings and fully loaded tater tots, covered in cheese, chicken, jalapenos, pickles and green onion. There is a selection of burgers including the 'Take 2', with a double patty, cheese, maple bacon, pickles and buttercrunch and the Southern Chicken burger packed full of crispy fried chicken, white slaw, pickles and buttermilk ranch. If you're looking for a vegetarian option there's the deliciously hearty 'Room For Mushroom' burger, with mushroom steaks, cheese, caramelised onion and a fresh salad. A tasty selection of fried chicken wings, burgers and loaded tater tots are on offer 'If juicy burgers are calling, Bar Nexus Is answering. Dine in and check out the mouth-watering menu, carefully crafted cocktails and super-sized shakes. Make way for a new favourite in your life,' the website read. The Bar, which opened on October 28, is located on Level G, Cafe Court, in The Star. Customers can visit on Wednesday and Thursday from 5pm to 8pm and Friday to Sunday from 12pm to 8pm. A pair of best friends from high school are celebrating the marriage of their son and daughter who fell in love despite being raised hundreds of miles apart. Madeline Cohen and Adam Rosenstein, tied the knot in Colorado on October 24, 26 years after they were born within weeks of one another, reports People. Their mothers, Ruth Cohen, 54, and Shery Rosenstein, 55, had plenty of visits over the years during which Madeline and Adam got to know each other and eventually, as teens, the two began keeping in touch of their own, going to his senior prom and becoming a couple in college. In 2008, Adam popped the question on a bench in San Francisco the same one where he and Madeline had posed together as five-year-olds. Madeline Cohen and Adam Rosenstein, both 26, met at four months old thanks to their mothers, who are best friends. They got married last month Ruth and Shery attended high school together in California, where they became best friends. Even as they moved to different parts of the country, they stayed close and as fate would have it, they both ended up pregnant at the same time, with the same due date in June of 1995. Having a shared birthday seems to be the only place where this story didn't align: Maddie arrived a month early, in Atlanta, and Adam wasn't born until July, in New York. They were raised far apart, he in New York and she in Colorado, but met for the first time at four months old. They would go on to see each other occasionally in the following years. Adam claims there was a connection early on, recalling a visit when they were eight. They had lunch and played mini gold, and Adam said he and Maddie had a great conversation. As they grew older, they learned through their mothers that they had a lot in common and experienced similar things at the same time. For example, both would win awards in the same week or get strep throat at the same time. Ruth Cohen, 54, and Shery Rosenstein, 55, met in high school and California and remained best friends for years While living in different cities, they both learned they were pregnant and had the same due date in June 1995, though Ruth gave birth first (pictured left: Ruth, right: Shery) But they didn't begin a friendship of their own until a family visit in New York at age 14, after which they stayed in touch. 'She was the friend I could talk to about everything even the stuff I don't want to talk to her about,' Adam said. 'There was something about her that was so much the ideal and perfect woman in my eyes.' When he was a senior, Adam asked Maddie to prom. 'Before I knew it, I was in New York dancing the night away with my best friend, and I realized my feelings for him were much more than friendship. As it turns out, he felt the same way,' Maddie told The Knot. Adam also said he was excited to go to prom with his 'best friend,' and that night, they had their first kiss. But they knew that having any sort of serious relationship wasn't 'practical' because they lived so far apart and would stay that way when they went off to college, with him attending the University of Rochester in New York and her going to Drake University in Iowa. Still, miles away, they kept in touch with long phone calls and soon realized it was love. In high school the offspring became long-distanced friends, and Madeline went with Adam to prom They began dating while attending different colleges and both moved to California upon graduation 'Finally, during our second years of college, we decided our feelings could withstand the distance and we officially started dating on October 13, 2014,' Maddie said. 'We both had an "it's-now-or-never" moment,' she added. 'We knew there would always be a million excuses not to have what we want, but we basically said, "Screw it, it's time to make this happen." 'The distance wasnt all bad we got to travel the world together (he even visited me when I studied abroad in Italy!).' The whole time, Madeline's mother Ruth insists that she and Shery weren't 'pushy.' In 2017, they graduated from college and moved to California, where they lived 45 minutes apart. Then, on October 13, 2014 the fourth anniversary of their first date Adam popped the question. He had the perfect spot in mind. In 2018, Adam proposed on a bench in San Francisco - where they'd posed together as five-year-olds 'And so, the two moms who became best friends in high school got to celebrate their kids getting engaged over 30 years later,' Maddie said 'When we were five years old, our parents took us to a park in San Francisco and took a photo of us on a bench together,' he explained. 'Ever since we started dating, wed talked about recreating the photo in the same spot, but no one could remember exactly where it was taken.' He tracked it down on Google Street View and invited Maddie to recreate the photo. 'Just before we were going to ask someone to take the photo for us, he got down on one knee and asked me to spend forever with him. I said yes!' she said. Both Adam and Maddie's parents had flown in to celebrate with them. 'And so, the two moms who became best friends in high school got to celebrate their kids getting engaged over 30 years later,' Maddie said. Finally, last month, they had a 'big family reunion' and married in front of 85 guests The couple had originally planned to say 'I do' in November of 2020, but their nuptials were pushed back a year because of the pandemic. Finally, last month, they had a 'big family reunion' and married in front of 85 guests. 'We always considered one another's family our family, and now we really are,' Adam said After honeymooning in New Mexico, they've come back to live in Colorado to be near Maddie's mom, who is undergoing chemotherapy for lymphoma 'I really feel like we were made for each other,' Maddie said. 'There were so many things drawing us to each other, I feel so lucky.' A beauty guru has revealed her three-step regime for achieving dewy skin and radiant eyes - and it comes neatly packaged together for the ultimate Christmas gift. Neha Prasad, who specialises in Desi makeup tutorials and beauty looks on Instagram, showed off her glowing skin - with nary an undereye bag in sight - on Tuesday with a side profile image of her face sans makeup. She immediately divulged her secret concoction was none other than the Shelfie Stars Set by Danish skincare master Ole Henriksen, featuring three of his most-loved products. 'The perfect skin prep before makeup in one little box,' Neha wrote. 'Ole Henriksen have released some incredible curated Christmas sets featuring their iconic products.' Neha Prasad, who specialises in Desi makeup tutorials and beauty looks on Instagram, showed off her glowing skin on Tuesday, with her followers quick to ask what products she was using This particular $65 option she bought from Ole Henriksen includes the Banana Bright Eye Cream - which sells every three minutes at Sephora - the Dark Spots Toner and Truth Daily Cleanser This particular $65 option includes the Banana Bright Eye Cream - which sells every three minutes at Sephora - the Dark Spots Toner and Truth Daily Cleanser. 'Excuse me your glow is unmatched,' said one of her 14,000 followers in the comments below her post. 'You look fresh,' replied another. Ole Henriksen, 71, whose eponymous skincare line is beloved by some of world's biggest stars, is a firm believer that beauty starts from the inside out. The renowned expert, who has even advised Australian-born Crown Princess Mary of Denmark, previously told Daily Mail Australia that skincare should never be rushed, allowing at least two minutes for each product to soak in for maximum results. 'It doesn't take much longer to do it in this way than it does to slap it on in a rush. It's a moment to give back to yourself - make love to your skin!' he said. Just in time for Christmas: The Shelfie Stars Set by Danish skincare master Ole Henriksen Age-defying: Danish skincare guru Ole Henriksen, 71, has previously revealed his secrets for radiant, youthful-looking skin The Danish cosmetician, 71, whose eponymous skincare line is beloved by some of world's biggest stars, is a firm believer that beauty starts from the inside out FOR HYDRATION For supple, healthy skin, Mr Henriksen recommends his 'Truth Serum' ($182) and 'C-Rush Brightening Gel Creme' ($62) - but admits the real key to hydration is actually free. He says drinking plenty of water is the secret to natural radiance, adding that you must 'hydrate, hydrate, hydrate' in pursuit of a glowing complexion. Mr Henriksen also believes exercise is essential, noting: 'The skin must be kept in motion just like the body'. He is known to perform 300 push-ups a day and run long distances barefoot, as well as being a long-time fan of yoga and dancing. Mr Henriksen emphasised the importance of drinking plenty of water and eliminating junk food completely FOR BRIGHT EYES AND CLEAR SKIN Mr Henriksen laced many of his best-selling treatments with vitamin C, after learning about its healing and restorative benefits from leading cancer specialists. Also among them are his famous 'Truth' collection and the cult favourite 'Banana Bright Eye Creme' ($54), which promises to stimulate the production of collagen and brighten dark under-eye circles like a natural concealer. 'It's light as a feather - it's makeup and eye care in one jar!' he said. Mr Henriksen also raved about the 'Banana Bright Vitamin C Serum' ($96 AUD), which is the best-selling vitamin treatment in its category in Sephora Australia. 'It gets rid of dead skin cells to reveal a beautiful brightness,' he said. Mr Henriksen laced many of his best-selling treatments (pictured) with vitamin C, after learning about its healing and restorative benefits from leading cancer specialists FOR YOUTHFUL-LOOKING RADIANCE Radiant skin starts when the sun goes down, according to Mr Henriksen, who says a simple night-time routine and enough sleep is the secret to the natural dewy finish everybody craves. 'The night is when skin repairs itself, so sleep is vital,' he said. To achieve a youthful-looking glow, he believes it's hard to look past his 'Goodnight Glow Retin-ALT Sleeping Creme' ($88 AUD), which has been proven to improve firmness by up to 60 per cent in just four weeks. Made with bakuchiol, a plant-based alternative to retinol, the cream reduces the appearance of fine lines and pigmentation by exfoliating dead skin cells, transforming the face overnight. Mr Henriksen also recommends his best-selling 'Dewtopia 20% Night Acid Treatment' ($85 AUD), which has repeatedly sold out since launching in Australia in July 2021. his latest product, 'Dewtopia 20% Night Acid Treatment' ($85 AUD), is unparalleled in its ability to transform tired skin while you sleep The serum, which is packed with powerful natural ingredients such as aloe vera, Nordic birch sap and licorice extract, promises to nourish and brighten skin while you sleep. 'You can see the difference almost immediately,' he said. Independent product review site Finder Australia declared: 'If you can afford it, this potent night serum will make a great addition to your skincare routine.' A customer shows the brightening benefits of Ole Henriksen's $64 Banana Bright cream Mr Henriksen's tips could best be described as the secret to celebrity skin. The Danish skincare king has treated the the faces of pop icons such as Cher, Katy Perry and Madonna, as well as movie stars including Hugh Jackman, Charlize Theron and Vanessa Hudgens. He has been photographed at elite events with some of the world's top models like Danish-born Nina Agdal and once gave a facial to the queen of the catwalk, Naomi Campbell. He even enjoyed a long-standing professional relationship with the late David Bowie. When it comes to his ultra-famous clientele, Mr Henriksen is characteristically humble. 'I view it as an honour to have worked with so many celebrities - the list is a mile long,' he said. They are the fabulously bejewelled eggs which entranced the last tsars and tsarinas and could now sell for up to 25 million each. Only the Russian Revolution cut short their creation, with goldsmith Carl Faberges St Petersburg jewellers seized by the Bolsheviks before he fled to Switzerland and died broken-hearted in 1920. Now, the largest exhibition in a generation of Faberge imperial eggs, made as unique Easter gifts from the tsar for his tsarina, is being staged in London at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Fifteen of the astonishing creations have been gathered together, alongside other masterpieces. The Diamond Trellis Egg (pictured) was given by Emperor Alexander III to his wife, Empress Maria Feodorovna, for Easter in 1892. This egg holds a surprise of an ivory elephant automaton, which was lost until 2015 The Colonnade Egg (pictured) was given by Emperor Nicholas II to his wife Empress Alexandra Feodorovna for Easter in 1910. The egg's decorative elements portray the emperor's family: the four gold cherubs around the base represent his daughters, the doves inside refer to him and his wife, and the cherub on top symbolises his son Tsarevich Alexei The Alexander Palace Egg (pictured) was given by Emperor Nicholas II to his wife Empress Alexandra Feodorovna for Easter in 1908. The children and homelives of Emperor Nicholas II are celebrated with this jewelled and gold-mounted nephrite egg. Its shell is inlaid with oval miniature watercolour portraits of the couple's five children The Basket of Flowers (pictured) features a basket containing a colourful abundance of enamelled wildflowers emerging from a bed of gold moss. The base was originally enamelled white to match the shell, but later damaged and re-enamelled blue. Queen Mary bought the egg for her Faberge collection in 1933 A spokesman for the V&A says: This is the largest collection on public display for more than 25 years. It includes several never before shown in the UK including the largest, the Moscow Kremlin Egg, inspired by the architecture of the Dormition Cathedral in Moscow and featuring a music box that plays Tsar Nicholas IIs favourite hymn. Also on display for the first time is the Alexander Palace Egg, featuring watercolour portraits of the children of Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra and containing a model of the palace inside. Another highlight is the Third Imperial Egg of 1887, found by a scrap dealer in 2011 one of the elusive missing eggs that was lost for many years. It still contains its surprise, a gold Swiss pocket-watch. The Peacock Egg of 1908 contains an enamelled gold peacock automaton. The exhibition by curators Kieran McCarthy and Hanne Faurby illustrates for the first time the importance of Faberges London shop, which opened in 1903. Three of the eggs on display are from the Royal Collection, owned by the Queen the Mosaic Egg, Basket Of Flowers Egg and Colonnade Egg. The Cradle with Garlands Egg (pictured) was given by Emperor Nicholas II to his mother Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna. From 1890, the Imperial Easter Eggs' designs began to celebrate events in Romanov family life. This egg marks the family's joy at the birth of Tsarevich Alexei, a male heir, in 1904 The Winter Egg (pictured) was inspired by Russia's harsh winters. Its rock crystal body is decorated with delicately engraved and diamond-mounted platinum frost patterns The Third Imperial Easter Egg (Pictured) was given by Emperor Alexander III to his wife Empress Maria Feodorovna for Easter in 1887. Seven of the 50 Imperial Easter Eggs produced by Faberge are now missing. This jewelled yellow gold egg was also lost until 2012, when it was rediscovered in America The V&A spokesman adds: Royalty, aristocrats, American heiresses, exiled Russian grand dukes and maharajas, as well as socialites and financiers with newly made fortunes, all flocked to the London Faberge jewellery shop, the only overseas branch. They bought gifts of unparalleled luxury for each other. The first egg, known as the Hen Egg, was commissioned by Tsar Alexander III in 1885. He and Tsarina Maria were delighted with its white enamel shell, ruby-eyed hen, gold yolk and miniature replica of the tsars crown. Faberge became the official imperial crown goldsmith. Each egg was unique and after a few years it became established that each contained a glittering surprise element. The Peacock Egg (pictured) contains a surprise of an enamelled gold peacock automaton perched on a coloured gold flowering tree. The peacock can be removed and wound up to walk and fan its tail feathers proudly The total freedom given to the master jeweller, who delivered his creations by hand, meant they became ever more elaborate. His Diamond Trellis Egg from 1892 contains a surprise of a miniature clockwork elephant, crafted from ivory, which was only discovered lying unidentified in the Queens collection six years ago. Nicholas II, who became tsar in 1894 but was executed with his wife and children by communist revolutionaries as Lenin swept to power in 1917, continued the tradition. Poignantly, the 1915 Red Cross Egg reflects the much-needed battlefield healthcare in Russias disastrous involvement in World War I against Germany. Faberges lucrative contract only came to a definitive end in 1918 when the Bolsheviks seized the company, the largest jewellers in Russia. The Hen Egg (pictured) was given by Emperor Alexander III to his wife Empress Maria Feodorovna for Easter in 1885. It was the first of its kind, and the emperor was so happy with it, he went on to commission an egg every year for Easter After the outbreak of the First World War, the designs of the Imperial Easter Eggs reflected the conflict. The Russian Red Cross was the theme of the Red Cross with Triptych Egg (pictured) given in 1915. By this time, Empress Alexandra and her two eldest daughters, Grand Duchesses Olga and Tatiana, had enrolled as nurses with the organisation All its stock was confiscated. The final two commissioned eggs, believed to have been unfinished, were neither delivered nor paid for. In total, 50 imperial eggs were made. Initially, ten were kept in the Kremlin, ten were believed stolen, and others began to be sold by the Bolsheviks to wealthy European and American collectors. Seven eggs remain missing but, as the works of art featured here show, they will for ever be something to treasure. n Faberge In London: Romance To Revolution at the V&A runs from Saturday, November 20, to Sunday, May 8, 2022. The famous crystal clear waters of Maya Bay have been off limits to eager tourists for three long years but come January a flurry of activity, including swimming and snorkeling, will return once more. The idyllic cove in Thailand, made famous after it was featured in The Beach starring Leonardo DiCaprio, was closed in June 2018 after being inundated by 5,000 travellers a day for two decades. In a bid to give the intricate coral reef system time to heal officials decided to close it off to the public, before the Covid pandemic settled in last year and decimated tourist numbers across the entire region. The famous crystal clear waters of Maya Bay (pictured) have been off limits to eager tourists for three long years because of environmental damage The idyllic cove in Thailand, made famous after it was featured in The Beach starring Leonardo Di Caprio, was closed in June 2018 Come January 1 2022 Maya Bay, which is only an hour's boat ride away from Phuket in Hat Noppharat Thara-Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park, will welcome back travellers with strict instructions, to avoid damaging the region again. 'Maya Bay has been continuously receiving interest from tourists around the world. But this has also caused (the natural area) to deteriorate, especially the corals,' said Natural Resources and Environment Minister Varawut Silpa-Archa in a statement. 'After shutting down Maya Bay to revive and restore it, up until the present, it has returned to a good condition.' Come January 2022 Maya Bay, which is only an hour's boat ride away from Phuket in Hat Noppharat Thara-Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park, will welcome back travellers with strict instructions Visits will be capped at an hour with a maximum of 300 individuals allowed per 'round' which begins at 10am and finishes at 4pm each day Did 'The Beach' crew damage Maya Bay? In 1999 the Krabi Provincial Administration Organisation, the Ao Nang Tambon Administration Organisation (TAO) and several environment groups filed a lawsuit against 20th Century Fox for the alleged damage the film's production caused on Maya Beach when they turned it into the late 20th century Utopia. At the time Leonardo DiCaprio released a statement: 'From what I see everything is okay. I have seen nothing that had been damaged in any way. I've seen Fox taking meticulous care, and their respect for the island. I consider myself an environmentalist. I believe that whenever we leave the island, it is going to be better off than it was before.' The Supreme Court ruled in 2006 that orders were to be issued for damages, upholding a 2002 appeal court ruling that found filming had damaged Maya Beach. Source: E Online Advertisement Boats will no longer be allowed to enter the bay and instead have to drop tourists off at a pier at the back of the island - with only eight speedboats permitted to be in the area at one time. Visits will be capped at an hour with a maximum of 300 individuals allowed per 'round' which begins at 10am and finishes at 4pm each day. The pier is almost completely constructed and will be finished before the January 1 reopening date. During the time it was closed Maya Bay's coral reef was replanted and visitor facilities were expanded on the island, which is only 250 metres long and 15 metres wide During the time it was closed Maya Bay's coral reef was replanted and visitor facilities were expanded on the island, which is only 250 metres long and 15 metres wide. At present fully-vaccinated Australians living in NSW are permitted to travel to Thailand and stay one night in a government-approved hotel while they await the results of a Covid test, which will be taken when they arrive. Then those living in NSW can return to the state without quarantining at home. Advertisement The Duchess of Cornwall cut an elegant figure in a mint green gown last night as she and Prince Charles joined Queen Rania for a private dinner at the Al Husseiniya Palace. Camilla, 74, jetted out to Jordan on Sunday with the Prince of Wales, 72, the couple's first overseas engagement since Covid clipped the royals' wings in March 2020. The royal was chic in a pastel green dress for the occasion, which featured sequin detailing across the bodice and skirt. Meanwhile Queen Rania was stunning in a cream gown with gold embellishments across the neckline and waist. The Duchess of Cornwall cut an elegant figure in a mint green gown last night as she and Prince Charles joined Queen Rania for a private dinner at the Al Husseiniya Palace The Duchess and Queen Rania could be seen chatting as they walked into the dinner banquet side-by-side last night Prince Charles opted for a dark suit for the occasion, donning a baby pink tie and pocket square The Duchess was glamorous in the stunning green dress for the outing, and was in high spirits as she arrived at the event. Camilla's blonde bob was styled in an impeccable blow-dry, and she sported a dash of blush for a healthy glow. Meanwhile she carried a cream pashmina and a silver clutch bag in one hand as she arrived at the palace. The royal added a touch more glamour to her outfit with a pair of silver drop earrings and a glittering silver necklace. And today the Prince of Wales admired his portrait given to him by the Syrian refugee artist Faihaa, 38, during a visit to the Al Nuzha Community Centre in Jordan, on the second day of the Royal tour of the Middle East The royal was on jovial form this afternoon in Jordan as he met four-year-old Salapelo while visiting the community centre A natural! The Duchess, who is president of the Women of the World Foundation (WOW) tenderly held baby girl Sarah Abu Ameerah as she attended the WOW event at Manara Arts and Culture gallery in Amman on Wednesday afternoon Day two! Prince Charles, 73, and Camilla, 74, arrived in Umm Qais, the site of the ancient city of Gadara, this morning for a walking tour around the historic ruins, which lie two hours' drive north of the Jordanian capital of Amman, where the couple enjoyed an extravagant dinner at Al Husseiniya Palace on Tuesday evening (Pictured: Charles and Camilla on the main Roman street at Umm Qais) Let's take some home! The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall dipped their fingers in water from the holy River Jordan yesterday which is used to baptise royal babies - with Charles rumoured to have requested bottles of the water to take home for future royal baptisms Then they bent down and each dipped their fingers in (pictured) before walking carefully back up the path to sign a visitor's book Meanwhile Queen Rania looked radiant in a cream dress, worn with a gold belt and matching geometric earrings. The Duchess is facing a packed schedule during their mini Middle Eastern tour which will see them take in two countries in just four days - after a weekend representing the Queen to mark Remembrance Sunday. It comes after a royal expert claimed the Duchess is 'dreading' the spotlight that will be thrown onto her when Prince Charles becomes King. Penny Junor has said Camilla will face a 'very difficult time' when the Prince of Wales ascends to the throne. King Abdullah II and Queen Rania could be seen waving the royal couple off after enjoying a banquet dinner together The two women showcased their friendship as Queen Rania placed a hand onto the Duchess of Cornwall's arm after the meal Speaking to The Telegraph, the royal expert said: 'She is a normal woman who, because of her relationship with Charles, has found herself in an abnormal situation. 'I don't think titles do it for her, and the prospect of being Queen or Princess Consort, the fuss there will be at the time, the comparisons to Diana, it will be a very difficult time for her.' Meanwhile she predicted Camilla would be Queen rather than Princess Consort, because 'Charles is so proud' and 'grateful' of her. The guard of honour, red carpet and time spent with Jordan's king and queen is likely to serve as a reminder that public life - and the media glare - will only ramp up further when Charles takes the throne. Prince Al Hussein opted for a smart black suit for the occasion with a red tie, while Queen Rania wore a cream dress with gold accessories (left and right) Camilla was in good spirits as she spoke with Prince Al Hussein ahead of the banquet dinner last night in Jordan The Duchess cut an elegant figure in the mint green dress, adding a touch of glamour with silver accessories and a cream pashmina The Queen was radiant in the cream and blush pink gown, which was embellished with gold detailing across the neckline and cuffs (left and right) King Abdullah II and Queen Rania and His Royal Highness Crown Prince Al Hussein chatted with one another after the banquet One former courtier explained that because the Duchess was 57-years-old when she became a member of the Royal Family, she has spent the vast majority of her life living outside The Firm. Explaining her unique position, the insider continued: 'She understands how strange the world of the Royal Family can be, and how the public sees that, and knows that at times her husband, the Prince of Wales, can't see that.' They said the Duchess has 'none of the apparatus' of Royal life at her house in Wiltshire and engages in a 'fairly normal' existence, adding: 'Her children will tell her how the outside world views things the Royal Family are doing. 'It means she is better able than almost anyone else to persuade certain members of the Royal Family of a certain point of view that they might not see otherwise.' Earlier in the day, the Duchess was treated to an electrifying tour of Amman - hosted by Queen Rania driving a top of the range Tesla in stiletto heels. Meanwhile Queen Rania was stunning in a cream gown with gold embellishments across the neckline and waist The Duchess was glamorous in the stunning green dress for the outing, and was in high spirits as she arrived at the event Camilla accompanied the Queen for the 30 minute journey in the fully electric 90,000 Model X P90d, cruising across the capital city with a police escort to visit a children's centre set up in her name. Meanwhile the Prince of Wales is flying 'five or six dozen bottles' of Holy water taken from the River Jordan back to the UK for royal baptisms - which could include that of Lilibet, the grand-daughter he has never met. The heir to the throne and his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall were yesterday afforded the honour of dipping their fingers in the water where Jesus was baptised as they embarked on a whirlwind visit of the Middle East. Now it can be revealed that Charles will be taking home with him on the return flight later this week a consignment of vials full of water to be used for future royal christenings. Meanwhile Queen Rania looked radiant in a cream dress, worn with a gold belt and matching geometric earrings A grandfather who was sceptical of climate change before dying of lung cancer left BBC viewers heartbroken after re-evaluating his views on air pollution. Richard, 75, from Kent, was one of 108 Britons selected for a forum where ordinary people discussed how the country can reach the goal of net zero carbon emissions by the year 2050. Ahead of the UK's first ever Citizen's Assembly on Climate Change last year, former aircraft refueller Richard said he 'wasn't particularly worried' about the environment and was against the idea of raising tax to tackle climate change. However after being diagnosed with stage two lung cancer during the first lockdown, Richard admitted that air pollution is an increasingly worrying issue, and he had become 'more and more convinced we have to do something'. Appearing on BBC2 documentary The People V Climate Change, which aired yesterday evening, ahead of the first conference meeting, Richard said: 'I'm not particularly worried about climate change. Richard, 75, from Kent, left BBC viewers heartbroken after re-evaluating his views on air pollution before dying of lung cancer 'At my age, I don't really have to be. I'd like to see it proved. How much is the earth actually warming up against what we're doing to it?' The Climate Assembly UK took place over three weekends in Birmingham from January to late March 2020, and a further three online weekends from April to May 2020 following the UK's coronavirus outbreak. The first session saw participants undergo a crash course on the science behind climate change, and Richard was sceptical about the rate of rising sea levels. 'I must admit to a selfish interest in this', he said. 'The thing about sea level rising, it's only going to be one metre in the next century. Richard, pictured outside his home in Kent, was one of 108 Brits selected for a forum where ordinary people discussed how Britain can reach their goal of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2050. 'This is rather a personal interest because I have a house that looks out on the sea. One metre in 100 years I don't see as devastating.' When it came to the issue of flying less, Richard argued that after Brexit, Britain would suffer from less accessible international travel. 'We're going to lose business,' he said. 'This country is now planning to be a global country with their trade and we're going to cut it down, it's cutting off our noses to spite our face.' He clashed with another committee member when it came to the idea of a frequent flyer levy, a policy proposal that aims to tackle the environmental impacts of flying by progressively taxing those who fly the most. Sue, an ex-fishmonger from Bath who had been shocked by the science she discovered on her climate change course, was in favour of the proposed policy. 'When 15 per cent of the people travelling are causing 75 per cent of the overall travel that would make a frequent flyer levy mean those 15 per cent would be paying more than everybody else', she said. After a year of cancer treatment, Richard passed away peacefully in March 2021 and heartbroken viewers quickly took to Twitter to share their condolences However Richard argued: 'This would be a nightmare to administer, I'm against just taxing because you can, it's going to limit people.' As the pair continued to debate, Sue said: 'You're thinking of your social life, not the air we're breathing, the air your kids are breathing. You're not thinking about the planet. To make a better planet for the younger generation, that's what we're doing it for.' Richard, who had retired from his job as an aircraft refueller ten years prior to filming the documentary, said that despite learning about the rising temperature of the planet, wasn't too concerned about his personal carbon footprint. 'Just looking at the front there and looking at the three litre motorhome, I'm not yet feeling guilty about it, I'm still hoping nature will take care of itself', he said. Sue, an ex-fishmonger from Bath who had been shocked by the science she discovered on her climate change course, debated with Richard over a proposed frequent flyer tax levy 'I think Brexit has really shown that you can't push the British public around. When it comes to it, they will do what they want to do and if you can't persuade people on climate change you won't get it. 'I think it's important people like me are there because otherwise it will be, "Lets go green tomorrow". Doesn't matter about the cost, that people are going to end up starving, jobs are going to disappear. It's not as simple as that.' When the documentary caught up with contributors again during lockdown, Richard shared the devastating news that he had been diagnosed with stage two lung cancer. 'My big regret and it's a major regret is, I smoked when I was younger, cigarettes were so cheap it was one after the other and it's affected my health now and I hate cigarettes now. 'Sixty per cent of lung cancers are caused by smoking, which leaves the question, how did the other 40 per cent get it? The obvious answer is obviously traffic, traffic fumes, industrial pollution. When the documentary caught up with contributors again during lockdown, Richard shared the devastating news that he had been diagnosed with stage two lung cancer 'Even if you disagree with climate change, you can't argue that clean air will be bad for the future. I'm becoming more and more convinced we'll have to do something.' After a year of cancer treatment, Richard passed away peacefully in March 2021 and heartbroken viewers quickly took to Twitter to share their condolences. One said: 'Watching 'The People v Climate Change' on BBC 2. Had a guy, Grandfather who has lung & Blood Cancer. And I know exactly what he is going through. He talked about his smoking and air quality. I never smoked, but for a good 25 yrs or more I was breathing in second hand smoke.' 'Enjoyed The People v Climate Change on BBC Two. RIP Richard', wrote another. 'Really enjoyed this. Sobbed a bit throughout and found it gave me a strange sense of hope. BBC iPlayer - #ThePeoplevsClimateChange, said a third. The People V Climate Change is available on BBCiPlayer A rare doll of the Queen as a toddler that incurred the wrath of her mother because it made her look 'too chubby' has been unearthed as it goes on sale in a collection estimated to be worth 40,000. The Queen Mother was so displeased with the German-made model of a three-year-old Princess Elizabeth that she refused to give it the royal seal of approval. As a result the doll never made it into mass production and very few of the prototypes exist today. The blonde haired and blue-eyed toy was made in 1929 by toy manufacturers Schoenau and Hoffmeister. A rare doll of the Queen as a toddler (pictured) that incurred the wrath of her mother because it made her look 'too chubby' has been unearthed as it goes on sale in a collection estimated to be worth 40,000 The Queen Mother was so displeased with the German-made model of a three-year-old Princess Elizabeth that she refused to give it the royal seal of approval. Pictured, some of the 500 dolls in the collection The smiling rosy-cheeked doll was dressed in a frilly pink dress and white oil-cloth shoes and socks. It is believed the outfit was modelled on one which was worn by baby Elizabeth (pictured in 1929) The smiling rosy-cheeked doll was dressed in a frilly pink dress and white oil-cloth shoes and socks. It is believed the outfit was modelled on one which was worn by baby Elizabeth. But it also depicted her with chunky legs and arms and chubby cheeks. Due to its rarity and the fact that it retains its original red card tag, the 16in high porcelain doll has become a sought-after item. The one for sale forms part of a huge collection of vintage dolls amassed by the late Betty Fox, a farmer's wife and seamstress who made clothes for her 500 figures and displayed them around her home in Nottinghamshire. Betty passed away in 2019 aged 95 and now her family are selling the 500 doll collection with Special Auction Services of Newbury. Specialists said it is the one of the largest ever to come to auction and could be worth more than 40,000. As a result the doll never made it into mass production and very few of the prototypes exist today. Pictured, some of the 500 dolls in the collection The one for sale forms part of a huge collection of vintage dolls amassed by the late Betty Fox (pictured), a farmer's wife and seamstress who made clothes for her 500 figures and displayed them around her home in Nottinghamshire Several highly valuable dolls are included, such as a late 19th Century Phenix Star Baby from France worth 3,000. Daniel Agnew, expert at Special Auction Services, said: 'This is a significant collection both because of its scale and the rarity of many of the items. 'It is the largest single owner collection that Special Auction Services has ever sold. 'The owner died in 2019 and had been collecting for 60 years. She displayed her cherished dolls all around her house in glass cabinets. As she was a keen seamstress, she also made her dolls some lovely clothes. 'The collection includes some some very rare early dolls dating from late 19th century France to the 1960s, the most expensive of which could sell for 3,000. Phenix Star Baby, pictured left, a 19th century French doll that is the most expensive in the collection, and an Italian fashion doll from the 1960s, pictured right, with an estimate of 80 to a 120 'By far the most notable item is the doll of our Queen Elizabeth II as a baby. The Queen Mother didn't approve of it because she thought it looked really chubby - as a result it never received the royal warrant and wasn't a big seller. 'It is especially rare because it retains its card tag which was usually torn off and thrown away. We believe the outfit is based on one which was actually worn by Elizabeth.' Betty's son, who wished not to be named, said: 'Mum had dolls all over the house - in the bedrooms, in the middle room and she had a sewing and doll room which everyone loved to visit to see her latest acquisitions and projects. 'She would spend many a cold winter night in her doll room sewing with her hand-powered machine. 'As a family we were devastated when Betty passed before Christmas 2019. Only now can we face parting with her doll collection. We'd like others who share her passion to give them good homes.' Betty's collection will be sold between November 22 to 24. Advertisement Meghan Markle is to make a surprise appearance on the Ellen show in the former actress' first major TV interview since her notorious Oprah tell-all alongside Prince Harry amid fears she may be about to drop more bombshells about the Royal Family. In a clip released ahead of the broadcast in the US tomorrow, the Duchess of Sussex reminisced about being a struggling actress who would arrive for auditions in a bashed up second hand car. Meghan, wearing a white 1,991 Oscar De La Renta blouse and black trousers, said the Ford Explorer had 'a life of its own' and broken front doors that she couldn't afford to fix so she had to climb 'out of the trunk'. Her new TV appearance came as a shock today. It was long rumoured that the Duchess would give her first interview to Ellen after she and Harry emigrated in January 2020. But in the end the Sussexes chose their neighbour in Montecito, Oprah Winfrey. The clip will raise fears in Buckingham Palace that she may be about launch a fresh attack on the royals, who the Sussexes have previously accused of racism towards Archie and allegations they ignored Meghan when she claimed to be suicidal while pregnant and living in London. Ellen, who is ending her show after 19 seasons amid plunging ratings after being accused of running a toxic workplace last year, is close friends with Meghan having bonded at a LA dog shelter where the talk show host encouraged Meghan to adopt her first dog Bogart. The women have stayed in touch ever since. In the 120-second clip, the Duchess of Sussex, 40, who is currently living in her $14million mansion in California having quit with Harry as a frontline royal, talked about how she used to audition for acting roles on the lot where they she was being interviewed by her friend. During her appearance today, the Duchess spoke about her Hollywood auditions, and said: 'So I had this very old Ford Explore Sport and at a certain point the key stopped working on the driver's side, so you couldn't get yourself in through the door so after auditions I would park at the back of the parking lot and I would open the trunk and climb in, pull the door shut behind me and crawl all over my seats to get out. That's how I would come to and fro.' Meghan told the host: 'I would park on gate three and I would scoot on over and the security guards here would always say "break a leg, I hope you get it". So driving today was very different.' Teasing the full interview, Ellen tweeted the clip and said: A lot has changed since the last time Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex, was on the Warner Brothers lot. Dont miss the rest of our interview tomorrow. Meghan Markle, 40, reminisces about being an actress during an appearance on the Ellen show which is set to air tomorrow A Hollywood friendship: How Meghan Markle befriended Ellen Degeneres after meeting at a dog shelter when she was a struggling actress Ellen and Meghan met by chance years ago at a dog shelter in Los Angeles where Ellen encouraged Meghan to adopt her first dog Bogart, and the women have stayed in touch. Ellen and her wife Portia de Rossi even took a trip to London to visit Prince Harry and Meghan after the birth of Archie over the summer, remarking on her talk show: 'I see them get attacked and it's not fair. They are two of the most down-to-earth compassionate people, they're doing so much good for the world.' She also revealed how she held and fed Archie on a summer trip to Britain. DeGeneres said the boy 'looks like Harry' and described Prince Harry and Meghan, who live at Frogmore Cottage in Windsor, as 'the cutest couple'. Ellen hinted at how close they were back in November, revealing she had invited a pair of dancers onto her show after Meghan sent her a text about the 'great' duo. She also said that while spending time with Meghan and Harry in London, they talked about their work on wildlife conservation, something both couples share a passion for. The insider added: 'Meghan adores Ellen and loves the fact that she and Portia are huge animal lovers. 'She said they have stayed in touch since meeting in person and have become close. 'She said they actually have a lot in common and that Ellen has been a huge support, especially since moving to Canada.' The two were so close that it was long rumoured that Ellen would get the first interview after Megxit. In January, a friend told DailyMail.com: '[Meghan] said Ellen understands her pain and suffering. That she epitomizes authenticity. [Meghan] feels like they are kindred spirits.' And the friends are now also neighbours after Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi reportedly snapped up a $49million estate in Montecito, California. Advertisement The discussion marks the second high profile interview the Duchess has given in recent months, and comes after her bombshell interview with Oprah in March. Meghan's description of her lack of cash while starting out as an actress came weeks after she said she 'grew up on the $4.99 salad bar at Sizzler' in a letter to US politicians asking them to vote for Joe Biden's plans for better maternity and paternity pay. Royals experts questioned whether Americans would be impressed 'by her account of how she had to struggle' when her estranged father Thomas put her through private school from kindergarten and she now lives in a $14million LA mansion while sitting on a $100million fortune. Her claims also faced serious questions after it emerged she previously bragged that as a schoolgirl her estranged father Thomas Markle regularly took her to one of LA's most famous restaurants where celebrities gobble up steaks, which now cost $55. A 2013 post from Meghan's Instagram account, deleted when she started dating Prince Harry, reveals that the Duchess told her 3million followers of 'happy' times at the Musso and Frank Grill on Hollywood Boulevard - and hinted she ate there regularly after dance lessons. Ms Markle shared a picture of its famous sign above a vintage Mercedes with the caption: 'I used to have lunch with my dad here after every tap & ballet class. Happy. Thank you. More please #mussos #hollywood'. The restaurant, opened in 1919 and famed for its grilled meat and fish, is a world away from the cheap Sizzler salad Meghan claims to have been brought up on and is loved by Johnny Depp, George Clooney, Harrison Ford, Brad Pitt and Keith Richards. One critic told MailOnline: 'She has receipts all over her Instagram contradicting her poverty letter'. Another wrote: 'She went to one of the most expensive schools in Los Angeles - but they couldnt afford to spend more than $5 on a weekend dinner. I mean, during this time, Thomas was working on a hit TV show and had won an Emmy. WTH is she talking about?' During the Ellen appearance, the mother-of-two wore her hair in soft waves which cascaded down her shoulders. Meanwhile she opted for her usual sweep of eyeliner and a touch of blush for the TV appearance. The Duchess is known for her love of designer brands, with Oscar de la Renta being one of her favourites. The royal rarely wears the same outfits twice, selecting new outfits from favourite designers such as Givenchy and Victoria Beckham on almost every appearance. During her time as a senior royal, the mother-of-one wore a parade of designer outfits from brands such as Dior, Prada and Chanel and an array of expensive accessories. It was long rumoured that the Duchess would give her first post-royal interview to Ellen, however Oprah ended up landing the job. However the two are known to be close friends. They met by chance years ago at a dog shelter in Los Angeles where Ellen encouraged Meghan to adopt her first dog Bogart, and the women have stayed in touch. Ellen and her wife Portia de Rossi even took a trip to London to visit Prince Harry and Meghan after the birth of Archie over the summer, remarking on her talk show: 'I see them get attacked and it's not fair. They are two of the most down-to-earth compassionate people, they're doing so much good for the world.' In the clip which was shared today, the mother-of-two can be seen wearing a white blouse and black trousers as she joins the famous chat show host on-stage Ellen hinted at how close they were back in November last year, revealing she had invited a pair of dancers onto her show after Meghan sent her a text about the 'great' duo. She also said that while spending time with Meghan and Harry in London, they talked about their work on wildlife conservation, something both couples share a passion for. An insider previously said: 'Meghan adores Ellen and loves the fact that she and Portia are huge animal lovers. 'She said they have stayed in touch since meeting in person and have become close. 'She said they actually have a lot in common and that Ellen has been a huge support, especially since moving to Canada'. The appearance comes days after the Duke and Duchess attended a glamorous gala in New York City to celebrate the military on the eve of Veterans Day in the US and Armistice Day in Britain. Meghan cut a stylish figure at the 'Salute to Freedom' event in a show-stopping red gown by Carolina Herrera, featuring a deep neckline, pleated skirt and thigh-high split. She completed her glamorous ensemble with a pair of matching 696 slingback heels by Giuseppe Zanotti featuring crystal-embellished buckle detail. Asked on the red carpet whether Meghan was proud of her husband, she replied: 'I'm always proud of him.' Harry, who served in the British Army for ten years, handed out medals for the Intrepid Valor Awards to five service members, veterans and military families who are living with the 'invisible wounds of war'. Harry is banned from wearing military uniform after he was stripped of his honorary military titles following him stepping down as a senior royal last year, but was allowed to pin his medals on his black tie suit at last nights event. Despite his decade of Army service, the Duke lost his titles of Captain General Royal Marines; Honorary Air Commandant, RAF Honington; and Commodore-in-Chief, Small Ships and Diving, Royal Naval Command. Harry received the Golden Jubilee medal in 2002, the Operational Service medal for Afghanistan in 2018 after his frontline service in Helmand province and the received the Diamond Jubilee medal in 2012. The two met by chance years ago at a dog shelter in Los Angeles where Ellen encouraged Meghan to adopt her first dog Bogart (right), and the women have stayed in touch DeGeneres held Archie on a summer trip to the UK, previously telling her studio audience how she fed him. Ellen also said that while spending time with Meghan and Harry in London, they talked about their work on wildlife conservation In April, all the Royal Family wore morning coats with medals or day dress, rather than military uniforms, for Prince Philips funeral at Windsor Castle amid concerns from Buckingham Palace that Harry would be the only senior male royal dressed differently. It comes after Meghan apologised to the Court of Appeal in London last week for failing to remember she told a royal aide to brief the authors of the Finding Freedom biography. The Duchess, who previously insisted she and Harry did not co-operate with the two writers of the gushing book, said she had 'forgotten' providing the aide details of what to reveal 'when you sit down with them'. The Mail on Sunday is seeking to defend itself against Meghan's claims that it unlawfully breached her privacy by publishing extracts of a letter to her father Thomas Markle. Prince William cut a dapper figure as he arrived at a reception of the Joint Ministerial Council at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London on Wednesday evening. The Duke of Cambridge, 39, who opted for a smart black suit, crisp white shirt and polka dot tie, was accompanied by Chairperson of the Conservative Party Amanda Milling for the occasion. The Tory chairman, who wore her blonde hair loose, looked elegant in a black patterned dress and heels as she appeared to share a joke with the royal. The Joint Ministerial Council is an annual meeting between UK Ministers and the leaders of the UK's Overseas Territories that enables cooperation on a wide range of issues. Prince William, 39, was accompanied by Chairperson of the Conservative Party Amanda Milling as he arrived at a reception of the Joint Ministerial Council at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London on Wednesday evening The royal put on a very animated display as he spoke with various UK Ministers and leaders of the UK's Overseas Territories It is the principle forum for reviewing and implementing the shared strategy for promoting the security and good governance of the Territories and their sustainable economic and social development. Taking to Twitter, Amanda told how it had been a 'busy' second day, where she had spoken to British Overseas Territories on a whole host of matters. These included security & law enforcement collaboration and overseas Territories contribution to Global Britain. Other topics discussed were how to build back better and stronger from Covid-19 and the importance of increasing inclusivity in our societies. The Duke of Cambridge gave passionate speeches and also shared laughter as he made his way around the room The Duke of Cambridge looked deep in thought as he engaged in conversation with guests at the reception The Joint Ministerial Council is an annual meeting between UK Ministers and the leaders of the UK's Overseas Territories that enables cooperation on a wide range of issues. Pictured, Prince William During the course of the evening, the Duke of Cambridge put on a very animated display - ranging from impassioned speeches to fits of laughter. On Tuesday, Amanda noted how she'd had a 'productive' first day of discussions at the Joint Ministerial Council. She informed her social media followers that she and other guests had focused on several crucial topics. These include the environment, the International Maritime Organisation III Code audit and economic resilience. The Duke of Cambridge look deep in thought as he mingled with guests at the reception (pictured, left and right) The Duke was seen breaking into a big smile as she shared a laugh with some of the guests at the reception The Duke of Cambridge and Chairperson of the Conservative Party Amanda Milling looked in high spirits as they were seen laughing with guests Prince William mingled with guests during a reception of the Joint Ministerial Council at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London Guests listened closely as Prince William discussed topics of concern The royal took to the stage and gave a passionate speech at an annual meeting between UK Ministers and the leaders of the UK's Overseas Territories The Duke of Cambridge spoke at a reception of the Joint Ministerial Council at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London Since Botox first appeared on the market 30 years ago, the treatment has been aimed at women over 50. They, after all, have the wrinkles that botulinum toxin injections temporarily smooth by freezing the face. But a new trend for Baby Botox promises something very different: a face that never gets wrinkles at all. The catch is, you have to start injections in your 20s. People think they dont need Botox until theyre 50, says Ana Sakinyte, an aesthetics practitioner who calls herself the Queen of Youth. But by then its often too late to get the results they want. Botox is injected into the superficial layer of the muscle and relaxes it. That stops the muscle contracting, so it doesnt create a line but it doesnt do anything to erase deep wrinkles [that you already have]. Thats why its so good to start early. Radhika Sanghani investigated the risks associated with starting Botox in your twenties. Pictured: Kate Thompson, who has been having Botox since age 25 In other words, although Botox can smooth small existing wrinkles, especially the kind caused by muscle movement when you smile or squint, it cant fill out or smooth away deeper lines. Ms Sakinyte recommends that people start at the age of 25, when what youre freezing is already smooth. I know society thinks my gosh, theyre too young, but I advise starting with smaller doses to stop the wrinkles ever appearing. Im 37 and have been having Botox for a decade every four to five months, and I havent got lines. What youre doing is freezing time. In the past year, the Botox industry has been booming the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS) says there has been a 70 per cent increase in requests for consultations, with Botox accounting for half of all procedures and the market is getting younger. Ms Sakinyte says she sees increasing numbers of women in their 20s and 30s, while existing patients in their 50s and 60s have started bringing in their daughters. But does it work? Is it safe? And who are the women paying thousands of pounds to have back-to-back injections from their mid-20s onwards? Kate Thompson, now 38, was 25 when she started Botox treatments. A married mother of two from Leeds, she had noticed a few lines at the corners of her eyes. She wanted to prevent them getting worse and stop any others forming. So despite the protestations of her parents and her husband Edward, Kate, founder of The Kindr Company, began having treatments at a cost of 150 per eye. Thirteen years on, she estimates she has spent 5,000 on Botox. Karolina Kotlowska, 28, (pictured) who lives in Northampton, had been spending 100 a month on creams to prevent wrinkles before starting her Botox treatment four months ago You cant put a price on how you feel, she says. I think the fact Ive had it regularly for all these years means the lines havent become as deep as they would have done. In the past two years, Ive been having it on my forehead as well as around my eyes and I can still move my face fully. I think I probably look my age now, rather than tired or older than I should. Im so glad I started early. Indeed, Kate is so pleased with her preventative Botox, she thinks she should have started injections at the very start of her 20s. Karolina Kotlowska, 28, began her Botox treatment four months ago with Ms Sakinyte. Initially, I wasnt a fan of Botox, she says. I thought it was for people who already have a lot of wrinkles. But when my friend told me shed been getting it since she was 27, I decided to have a consultation because I wanted to look good for my best friends wedding in Portugal, where Id be maid of honour. Until then Karolina, a financial services investigator living in Northampton, had been trying to prevent her wrinkles with creams, which cost her 100 a month, and fortnightly anti-ageing facials at 60 each. Her Botox costs 250 for three areas, and she has it two to three times a year. Stina Sanders, 30, (pictured), who started Botox four months ago, said everyone told her she didn't need it including the doctor but she could see tiny lines appearing on her forehead I dont mind the cost because it actually works and its just like going to the hairdresser once every couple of months, she says. Its a great way of delaying the ageing process. The subtle results werent noticeable to her friends and family but for Karolina, they were a big confidence boost. She acknowledges the role played by social media in her decision indeed, it seems likely the desire to project a perfect self-image on platforms such as Instagram and Facebook is a big driver of the twentysomething Botox trend. Before, I was putting on lots of make-up and using filters on social media to look good, says Karolina. Now Ive had the Botox, Im happy posting natural photos, even without make-up. Yet practitioners are divided on the wisdom of Botox at such an early age. The Therapie Clinic, which has practices throughout the UK, advises people at the end of their 20s to try it. If Botox is injected during the initial stages of fine lines, it will help to stop them in their tracks, the clinics website states. But other doctors say it could be harmful, changing the shape of the face over time and even thinning the skin. Dr Jonquille Chantrey, a surgeon and lecturer in aesthetics, acknowledges that Botox can reduce the appearance of ageing but stresses there can be risks and side-effects, particularly on the forehead. A very light dosing can gently soften some existing lines, she says. However, if the same doses are given routinely in the main areas without really looking at the face as a whole, it can create a heaviness of the eyebrow if you use your face muscles a lot. Karolina (pictured) said she was putting on lots of make-up and using filters on social media to look good, before starting her Botox treatment It may not happen in the first few years but, down the line, it can lead to people looking heavy or pinched, and create an earlier frown descent. She advises people in their 20s to try other forms of anti-ageing first, such as using vitamin C and retinol products. Many injectors might say everyone should do it, but are they thinking about the best interest of the patient in the mid- to long-term or are their motives financial? she asks. There could be financial, mental and physical side-effects, such as making people more self-conscious about other features. And physically, it could create a mid-term effect where you might need to have other treatments. For example, if people get used to their forehead and eyes looking young, they may then want other treatments to make sure other parts of the face or neck look just as young. Stina Sanders started Botox four months ago, at the age of 30. Everyone said I didnt need it, even the doctor, she says. But I could see really tiny horizontal lines starting to appear on my forehead. You have a choice to either embrace ageing or not and I decided I didnt want to. Stina, a psychotherapist and author, visited oculoplastic surgeon Dr Maryam Zamani in Chelsea, West London, to have her first round of Botox injections. She felt I could still wait a few years, but I wanted to stop more lines forming on my forehead. So she put some Botox in and now those lines have completely gone and wont increase. Im so glad Ive started at 30, rather than waiting. Now I know this is an option, I can do something about it if I notice other wrinkles starting to form elsewhere on my face. Stina (pictured) admits she didn't like her appearance in the mirror and thought she looked dehydrated before starting Botox Botox used to be so medical and taboo but now it just feels like getting your hair dyed or going to the dentist. Like Karolina, Stina is aware that the pressures of social media influenced her decision to turn to Botox. Its the selfie culture, she says. Im so used to looking at myself up close, I didnt like it when Id catch myself in the mirror and I looked dehydrated. Now when I look in the mirror, I look a lot shinier. I look glowy, like Ive had a face mask. Dr Zamani herself points out that there can be a risk of skin thinning if Botox is overused. My ethos is less is more and that it is best to wait until you have faint lines or wrinkles caused by dynamic movement to treat with neuromodulators [wrinkle-relaxing injections such as Botox], she says. The reason for this is that constant suppression of movement may cause atrophy of the muscles injected. For instance, contact treatment on the forehead can atrophy the frontalis muscle over time and make the skin look thinner, so its best to wait until you have a faint line or wrinkle to treat. Yet many of the young women doing it now have no intention of stopping. Kate Thompson has even inspired her friends to start having Botox. It feels so normal now, she says. We all talk about it the same way we talk about getting our nails done. The thought of getting it done for ever doesnt bother me. Stina still hopes she doesnt become addicted to Botox treatments. I dont want the overdone look, she says. As much as it has become normalised, we need to be careful and aware of the dangers. I think Ill do it long-term but I dont want to become a pin-cushion. Making lighter tweaks now prevents you looking overdone at 50 or 60. Maybe Ill stop and go natural then or maybe I wont. Advertisement The Duchess of Cornwall dazzled in a glamourous all-white ensemble on the second day of her and Prince Charles' official visit to Jordan on Wednesday evening. Camilla, 74, cut an elegant figure in a floaty white top and trousers by Anna Valentine, which she paired with a matching white scarf, as she and husband Prince Charles attended a Centenary Celebration of the founding of the Jordanian state at the Jordan Museum in Amman. The royal, who wore her white blonde-hair carefully coiffed, looked perfectly poised in the stylish outfit following a busy day of engagements around the Jordanian capital. Meanwhile, Prince Charles, who also made a quick change for the occasion, cut a dapper display in a crisp white shirt, navy blue suit, patterned tie and smart pocket square. The Prince of Wales, 73, and the Duchess of Cornwall, 74, attended a centenary celebration of the founding of the Jordanian state at the Jordan Museum in Amman on the second day of their tour of the Middle East this evening Camilla made a stylish entrance tonight with an all-white ensemble. The evening will culminate with the couple viewing the Dead Sea scrolls exhibit The Duchess of Cornwall accessorised with gold bracelets on each wrist, an elegant necklace and a pair of pearl drop earrings. She completed her outfit with an eye-catching gold clutch bag and matching shoes to complement her ensemble. Camilla opted for glamourous makeup and added a dash of mascara to bring out her blue gaze, a layering of foundation to complement her healthy glow, as well as a nude lipstick. The couple arrived alongside the British ambassador to Jordan Bridhet Brind, who looked smart in a white suit jacket and pale pink dress, and the Jordanian Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad, who was dressed in black. Bridget Brind, dressed in white, left, listened on as Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall spoke with British Council Director in Jordan Summer Xia, right Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall were joined by British Ambassador to Jordan Bridget Brind and Jordanian Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad, right The Duchess of Cornwall sported a glamourous makeup look with a nude lip and mascara, bringing the focus to her blue gaze. Pictured, with Prince Charles The royal couple were treated to a musical performance from the Mahali Musical Production before mingling with the other attendees. Later, they proceeded to the Museum's main atrium where they admired the Rejuvenation and Modernisation of Extinct Arts and Crafts (RMEAC) pop-up art exhibition. The evening will culminate with Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall viewing the Dead Sea scrolls exhibit. The pair were perfectly relaxed tonight and full of smiles after a busy day of engagements. The stylish couple (pictured, left and right) arrived together after a day busy meeting local organisations and visiting historic landmarks Stylish Charles put on a very animate display as he and Camilla made their way to the event (pictured, together) The Duchess of Cornwall wore her white blonde-hair carefully coiffed and opted for a dash of makeup to complement her natural glow For their glamourous evening in Amman, Charles changed to a blue suit, a crisp white shirt and pale blue tie, while Camilla opted for a ethereal white outfit The couple, pictured, made a striking pair as they arrived tonight. The Duchess of Cornwall accessorised with a gold clutch bag Both the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall looked relaxed as they set to enjoy the evening after a day busy with engagements After arriving in the Jordanian capital yesterday on official duties, the couple were hosted at Al Husseiniya Palace by King Abdullah II and Queen Rania, including a lavish private dinner on Tuesday evening. Today, the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall arrived in Umm Qais, the site of the ancient 3rd century BC city of Gadara, before returning to Amman to visit a secondary school and refugee centre. Keeping cool in the desert sun, the Prince of Wales opted for a light, camel-hued suit with a striped tie and white checked shirt and a comfy-looking pair of beige shoes, while Camilla wore a sage-coloured Fiona Clare floral dress - with low-heeled court shoes in caramel. The second day of their visit, delayed by almost two years due to the Covid pandemic, saw the couple turn tourists as they made the 75-mile hop north of the Jordanian capital to the town - where Jesus was said to have performed one of his seven miracles. Day two! Prince Charles, 73, and Camilla, 74, arrived in Umm Qais, the site of the ancient city of Gadara, this morning for a walking tour around the historic ruins, which lie two hours' drive north of the Jordanian capital of Amman, where the couple enjoyed an extravagant dinner at Al Husseiniya Palace on Tuesday evening (Pictured: Charles and Camilla on the main Roman street at Umm Qais) The Prince of Wales admires his portrait given to him by the Syrian refugee artist Faihaa, 38, during a visit to the Al Nuzha Community Centre in Jordan, on the second day of the Royal tour of the Middle East The Prince carries a floral bouquet as he arrives at the community centre in the capital; the project supports refugees starting a fresh life in Jordan after fleeing nearby countries After a walking tour of the main amphitheater and museum, accompanied by Jordan's Princess Dana Firas, the couple returned to the capital this afternoon, as the Duchess of Cornwall carried out two solo engagements focusing on empowering women. The Prince spent time hearing the stories of refugees at a Amman community centre. Addressing guests at an event for the Women of the World Foundation, of which Camilla is President, the Duchess said: There are so many inspirational ladies here doing so many things and they have done it by themselves. Weve got the first lady plumber here, someone from the Army, so many things. I think here[Jordan] would be the perfect place to start a WoW. I feel we could do a great job here. She joked with the gathered crowd: 'I have written down a speech but I seem to have gone off-piste a bit! She went on: 'I heard some wise words from Queen Rania. Her Majesty once said: When a woman succeeds, she reaches out to those around her and pulls them up to her. That is why when you empower women, you empower a whole society. The collective experience of the women in this room proves the truth of those words. You've got one's likeness! The Prince of Wales admires the portrait given to him by Syrian refugee artist Faihaa You never forget! The Duchess, who is president of the Women of the World Foundation (WOW) tenderly held baby girl Sarah Abu Ameerah - just four weeks' old - as she attended the WOW event at Manara Arts and Culture gallery in Amman on Wednesday afternoon Acknowledging the strong relations between the UK and Jordan, the royal added that there was now serious reaching out and pulling up across our two countries. At the WoW event, which was held at the Manara (the Arabic word for lighthouse) Arts and Culture Cafe in the cultural district of Amman [NB the embassy chap described this to me as the Shoreditch of Amman], Camilla enjoyed a cuddle with four-week-old baby Sarah Abu Ammerah. Sarahs mother Dr Alaa Azzam, 42, a Physics Professor at the University of Jordan, said: The Duchess said to me Sarah will be one of the women of the future and that is very inspiring. Camilla was presented with a picture of herself, framed with the words Women Empowerer. The royal looked to be enjoying the encounter with the adorable baby girl ahead of addressing attendees at the Women of the World Foundation (WOW) event Camilla made an impassioned speech on Wednesday afternoon as she addressed those attending the Women of the World Foundation (WOW) event. The charity fights for a gender equal world During the tour, the Prince of Wales was shown a reed bed sewage treatment machine. The plant-based systems see organic matter in effluent digested by bacteria, fungi and algae McDonald's is celebrating the 50th anniversary of its beloved Egg McMuffin by offering it for just 63 the same price it was sold at when it debuted in 1971. Customers can order their bargain breakfast exclusively on the McDonald's app on Thursday, November 18 from 6 am to 10:30 am. And to further give the Egg McMuffin its due in the spotlight, McDonald's has also shared some fan-favorite menu hacks for upgrading the breakfast sandwich with add-ons like has browns, a McChicken patty, and sauces like syrup and jelly. McDonald's will sell Egg McMuffins for just 63 exclusively on the McDonald's app on Thursday, November 18 from 6 am to 10:30 am That was the price that it sold out when it debuted in a single store in California in 1971, before it was rolled out nationally over the next few years (pictured: one of the original McDonald's) The Egg McMuffin made its debut at a single McDonald's location in Santa Barbara, California 1972, the brainchild of franchise owner Herb Peterson. It would soon be rolled out nationally after the company's owner Ray Kroc, paid the Santa Barbara location a visit and tried the breakfast sandwich despite his skepticism. According to McDonald's, fans have found ways to customize the Egg McMuffin over the years, and now they're sharing some of the best 'hacks' to try. 'The Egg McMuffin, the first-ever quick service restaurant breakfast sandwich, joined the McDonalds menu in 1971 in Santa Barbara, California, and customers have been getting creative with it ever since,' said Molly McKenna, McDonalds Senior Director of Brand Communications,' said in a press release. The chain has also shared several 'hacks' for upgrading the sandwich, like adding hash browns, bacon, tomato, and sauces Customers can do away with the English muffins and add two hash browns (left), while adding a McChicken patty and hot sauce makes a 'Sweet Chicken Sammie' (right) 'Its been fun to see all the ways theyve made it their own whether its adding some heat with salsa or sweetness with jam or combining it with the Sausage McMuffin, theyre always innovating. I personally love to add a little heat to my Egg McMuffin.' The 'hack' recipes include adding bacon and tomato to create the 'B.E.T,' or bacon, egg, and tomato McMuffin. Adding hash browns and grape jelly makes an 'HB&J,' while adding a McChicken patty and hot sauce makes a 'Sweet Chicken Sammie.' Or customers can do away with the English muffins altogether and sandwich the egg, Canadian bacon, and cheese between two hash browns. Santa Barbara franchise owner Herb Peterson invented the sandwich in 1971 as an excuse to open his store in the morning When Ray Kroc, then the company's owner, visited in 1972, Peterson made him try the sandwich - and he loved it, rolling it out nationwide The Egg McMuffin is certainly one of the chain's more popular orderings, with breakfast sales making up about a quarter of their overall sales and its addition to the menu almost didn't happen. Peterson, the Southern California franchise owner, wanted a reason to open his restaurant before noon. He liked eggs Benedict and wanted to make something similar, but found Hollandaise sauce to be too messy and realized that pre-packaged sauce didn't 'do the trick.' Instead, he swapped it out for cheese and butter. He also developed Teflon rings to shape the eggs into circles as they cooked, debuting the sandwich in his store in 1971. But Peterson was just a franchise owner and he had to get Kroc, then owner of the whole company, to see what a great idea it was. That name was dreamt up by Patty Turner, the wife of a McDonalds executive Kroc revealed how he got on board in his autobiography, Grinding it Out: The Making of McDonalds. At the time, fast food restaurants weren't really offering breakfast, so the McMuffin changed the business Peterson, the Southern California franchise owner, had been selling breakfast sandwiches at his store since 1971. In 1972, Kroc paid him a visit and Peterson insisted that he look at something without saying what it was. 'He didnt want me to reject it out of hand, which I might have done, because it was a crazy idea a breakfast sandwich,' he wrote, according to Time. 'It consisted of an egg that had been formed in a Teflon circle, with the yolk broken, and was dressed with a slice of cheese and a slice of grilled Canadian bacon. This was served open-faced on a toasted and buttered English muffin. I boggled a bit at the presentation. But then I tasted it, and I was sold. Wow!' At that point, it wasn't yet called an Egg McMuffin that name was dreamt up by Patty Turner, the wife of a McDonalds executive. McDonald's expanded its breakfast offerings, adding a whole breakfast menu in 1977 The Egg McMuffin began in test markets that same year, and over the next three years, the company worked to get them into all McDonald's locations at the low, low price of 63. At the time, fast food restaurants weren't really offering breakfast, so the McMuffin changed the business. 'The Egg McMuffin was introduced at a time when going to a fast food restaurant for breakfast was a new thing,' Professor Jordan LeBel, who teaches food marketing at Montreals Concordia University, told Ad Week. When it proved successful, McDonald's expanded its breakfast offerings, adding a whole breakfast menu in 1977 that included hotcakes, toasted English muffins, scrambled eggs, sausages, hash browns, and danishes. The nation's top infectious disease expert says he believes the definition of being 'fully vaccinated' against COVID-19 in the U.S. could change to include booster shots. Currently, any American who has received both shots of the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines, or one shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, is considered fully vaccinated. But Dr Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said this may need to change to include extra doses. 'In my opinion, boosters are ultimately going to become a part of the standard regimen and not just a bonus,' he told Axios on Tuesday. It comes as sources told the news organization that the Biden administration is set to announce plans to expand booster shots to all adults in the U.S as early as this week. Dr Anthony Fauci said he believes that the definition of 'fully vaccinated' against COVID-19 may be updated in the future. Pictured: Fauci testifies before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee in Washington, DC, November 2021 Booster shots are not included in the definition, but Fauci says he believes this will change due to waning immunity of vaccines. Pictured: A man receives a COVID-19 vaccine booster shot at the Haverford Township Municipal Building in Havertown, Pennsylvania, October 2021 In August, boosters were approved for immunocompromised Americans who had received either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine after data showed this group was less likely to develop high antibody levels after two doses. Shortly after, the White House announced booster shots would become available for all Americans starting on September 20 due to data suggesting waning efficacy of the initial shots. But many scientists, including senior officials at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), disagreed and argued that the vaccines are still highly effective at preventing severe illness and death. This led to boosters of Pfizer's and Moderna's vaccines only being authorized for those aged 65 and older or at high risk due to their jobs or underlying conditions six months later, and Johnson & Johnson shots approved for all adults more than two months later. The FDA is now expected to authorize Pfizer's booster for all adults aged 18 and older as early as Thursday, sources told The New York Times. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 30.7 million Americans - or 15.7 percent of the population - have received a booster shot, as of Tuesday. 'As every month goes by, the immunity wanes more and more,' Fauci told Axios. 'So as time goes by, you're going to see more vaccinated people' fall ill with the virus. A recent study from the Public Health Institute in Oakland, California, found that the overall effectiveness of the three Covid vaccines available in the U.S fell from 87 percent in March to 48 percent by September. The Moderna jab was the most effective, but still fell with the risk of infection being reduced from 89 percent to 58 percent. The Pfizer shot's efficacy decline from 87 percent protection to 43 percent and the J&J shot saw a drop from 83 percent to 13 percent. Most breakthrough cases are not severe with fewer than 0.1 percent of fully vaccinated people hospitalized or dying from the virus, according to the CDC. 'As is always the case, the elderly are more vulnerable, because they're more likely to have waning of protection over time,' Fauci told Axios. CDC data suggest that 70 percent of breakthrough infections that have led to hospitalization have been in adults aged 65 and older. Because of this, some states and cities have already begun expansion of boosters to all adults, including Arkansas, California, Colorado, New Mexico and New York City. Fauci said he's hopeful that U.S. regulators will soon authorize boosters for the entire population. 'I believe it's extremely important for people to get boosters, and I am hoping very soon we will see a situation where there won't be any confusion about who should and should not get boosters,' he told Axios. Advertisement The U.S.'s national drug problem has reached a harrowing mark. From April 2020 to April 2021, the first full year of the COVID-19 pandemic, a total of 100,306 Americans died of drug overdoses, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It is the first time that more than 100,000 overdose deaths were reported over a 12-month period. This is also a 28.5 percent increase from the 78,056 overdose deaths recorded between April 2019 and April 2020. Drug abuse, and specifically opioid abuse, has long been an issue in America, and the pandemic proved to be a setback in the nation's battle against overdoses. In a statement on Tuesday, President Joe Biden called the figured a 'tragic milestone.' 'As we continue to make strides to defeat the COVID-19 pandemic, we cannot overlook this epidemic of loss, which has touched families and communities across the country,' the statement read. 'As we grieve those we've lost and honor their memories, my Administration is committed to doing everything in our power to address addiction and end the overdose epidemic.' More than 100,000 Americans died of drug overdoses from April 2020 to April 2021, the most ever recorded over a single 12 month span. More than 78,000 of those deaths were caused by opioids States in the Appalachian Region of the country have been struck hardest by drug overdoses, with West Virginia, South Carolina, Tennessee, Ohio and Pennsylvania among the leaders in overdose deaths per 100,000 residents Vermont reported the biggest increase in overdose deaths, at 88% (dark orange). In total, 15 U.S. states recorded an increase of 40% or more. Three states, South Dakota, New Jersey and New Hampshire (in blue), recorded decreases during the first year of lockdowns The report, published on Wednesday, finds that opioids are the biggest culprit for the surge in opioid deaths. More than 75 percent, or 75,673, of overdose deaths during the lockdown were caused by opioids. It is an increase of around 50 percent from the 56,064 opioid deaths recorded over the previous 12 months. HOW AMERICA GOT HOOKED ON OPIOIDS Prescription opioids and illicit drugs have become incredibly pervasive throughout the US, and things are only getting worse. In the early 2000s, the FDA and CDC started to notice a steady increase in cases of opioid addiction and overdose. In 2013, they issued guidelines to curb addiction. However, that same year - now regarded as the year the epidemic took hold - a CDC report revealed an unprecedented surge in rates of opioid addiction. Overdose deaths are now the leading cause of death among young Americans - killing more in a year than were ever killed annually by HIV, gun violence or car crashes. In 2019, the CDC revealed that nearly 71,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. This is up from about 59,000 just three years prior, in 2016, and more than double the death rate from a decade ago. It means that drug overdoses are currently the leading cause of death for Americans under 50 years old. The data lays bare the bleak state of America's opioid addiction crisis fueled by deadly manufactured drugs like fentanyl. Advertisement Vermont suffered the largest increase in overdose deaths, with the 211 deaths during the first year of lockdowns being an 85 percent increase over the previous year. West Virginia (62 percent), Kentucky (57 percent) and Louisiana (56 percent) were among the largest increase as well. In total, 15 states recorded increases of more than 40 percent year-over-year. Not all states recorded rises in overdose deaths, though. South Dakota reported a 17 percent decrease in overdose deaths, from 77 during lockdowns to 93 the year before. New Jersey also reported a one percent decrease, and New Hampshire a 2.8 percent drop. West Virginia also recorded the most overdose deaths per capita, with 87.19 for every 100,000 residents - a figure that dwarfs other states. The Appalachian Mountain region was struck hardest the the surge in deaths, with many states in the area finding themselves among the leaders in death rate. South Carolina (69.47 deaths per 100,000), Kentucky (51.46), Tennessee (50.29), Maryland (46.55), Ohio (46.53) and Pennsylvania (42) are also among the leaders. While not in the Appalachian region, Louisiana (47.61) and New Mexico (41.13) were also among the top ten states in overdose deaths per capita. South Dakota, with 8.68, is the only state where the rate of deaths for every 100,000 residents was below ten. The figures break a newly-set record from only three months ago. In August, the CDC reported that 93,000 people had died overdose deaths in 2020. At the time, it was a staggering figure, and the most ever recorded in a single year. 'This is the highest number of overdose deaths ever recorded in a 12-month period, and the largest increase since at least 1999,' said Dr Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, in a statement in August. She said that the disruptions to every day life, and stressors caused by the pandemic were among the reasons opioid deaths sharply increased during the pandemic. 'This has been an incredibly uncertain and stressful time for many people and we are seeing an increase in drug consumption, difficulty in accessing life-saving treatments for substance use disorders, and a tragic rise in overdose deaths. 'As we continue to address both the COVID-19 pandemic and the opioid crisis, we must prioritize making treatment options more widely available to people with substance use disorders.' The updated figure being reported removes the start of 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic had begun, and adds the January and February months where the pandemic was at its worst to the figures. In 2020, over 60 percent of opioid deaths were attributable to synthetic versions of the drug, after accounting for less than one in five the previous year. During the first year of COVID-19 lockdowns, an estimated 63 percent of drug overdose deaths were a result of synthetic opioids. Around a quarter of the deaths, 26 percent, were caused by psychostimulants that have abuse potential and 20 percent were cocaine overdoses. Methadone accounted for nearly four percent of overdoses. Synthetic opioids (brown) like fentanyl accounted for more than 60% of overdose deaths in the U.S. during the first year of COVID-19 lockdowns, and a majority of total opioid deaths (black). Other drugs like psychostimulants (gray), cocaine (pink) and methadone (purple) also caused thousands of deaths in the U.S. In his statement, Biden said his administration is working on expanding health care coverage so Americans experiencing additions can receive treatment for substance use disorder and mental health. The U.S. set a record 93,000 overdose deaths in 2020, with a majority of those deaths being due to opioids as well. Synthetic opioids have become a major problem in America, accounting for 60% of opioid deaths in 2020. Pictured: Percocet tablets, a popular opioid 'We are strengthening prevention, promoting harm reduction, expanding treatment, and supporting people in recovery, as well as reducing the supply of harmful substances in our communities. substance use disorder and mental health. And we won't let up,' the statement read. 'To all those families who have mourned a loved one and to all those people who are facing addiction or are in recovery: you are in our hearts, and you are not alone. Together, we will turn the tide on this epidemic.' The opioid epidemic has long been an issue in the U.S., and was officially declared a national state of emergency by former President Donald Trump in 2017. Opioid overdoses have especially grown in recent years as fentanyl and other synthetic opioids began to hit the illicit drug market in the U.S. According to the Defense Intelligence Agency, 68 percent of fentanyl and precursors used to make the drug originate in China. These factory-produced drugs, cheap and easy to make, are sold either directly to the US or via trafficking networks set up in Mexico. Some who sell drugs like cocaine, meth and others will dilute their drug with the cheap synthetic opioids in order to make more money. This means that a person using an illicit drug could accidentally overdose on a synthetic opioid without even knowing they are taking it. Jake Ehlinger, a 20-year old who played for the University of Texas' football team, is one of the many Americans that died of a fentanyl overdose. Ehlinger played linebacker for the Longhorns, and was the younger brother of former Longhorns quarterback and current NFL player Sam Ehlinger. He was found dead on May 6, and it is believed that he ingested a dose of the drug Xanax that had been laced with fentanyl. 'The spread of counterfeit pills is an ongoing and significant issue throughout our country, particularly in schools, colleges, and universities,' the family said in a statement released at the time. 'As our family continues to process Jake's death, we felt it was important to share these details with the hope that Jake will not have died in vain. 'We pray that sharing Jake's story will help shed light on this problem and prevent other families from also tragically losing a loved one.' Ehlinger is one of several notable athletes to die from fentanyl overdoses in recent years. Most famously, Los Angeles Angeles pitcher Tyler Skaggs was found dead at 27 in his suburban Dallas hotel room on July 1, 2019. A coroner's report said Skaggs had choked to death on his vomit with a toxic mix of alcohol and the drugs fentanyl and oxycodone in his system, which Kay was accused of providing. At just 31, former NHL player Jimmy Hayes, married for three years and a father of two young boys, was found dead this summer inside his family home from an accidental overdose of cocaine and fentanyl. NHS Providers chief executive Chris Hopson says people calling 999 requesting an update on their delayed ambulance is contributing to a record number of emergency calls Hundreds of thousands of 999 calls each month are from desperate people asking for updates on where their ambulance is, NHS bosses have admitted. More than 1.3million emergency calls were made in England in October up 273,025 on the same period last year. The unprecedented demand, combined with worsening handover delays, has left heart attack and stroke patients waiting nearly an hour for an ambulance. But three quarters of these extra calls almost 205,000 are people repeatedly pleading for an update on the arrival of an ambulance crew, according to NHS Providers. The admission from Chris Hopson, who is chief executive of the body which represents NHS trusts, comes in the midst of deadly NHS emergency care crisis that is seeing thousands of patients waiting up to 13 hours for an A&E bed. There are growing reports of patients dying in the back of ambulances in hospital car parks and in NHS corridors because of handover delays. NHS England boss Amanda Pritchard has also commented on the crisis, saying patients are spending 'too long in A&E' and unable to be discharged due to an overstretched social care system. A record number of 999 calls were made in England in October, with 1,012,143 urgent calls for medical help made. But the time it took answer these calls also increased to a record 56 seconds The NHS has long struggled to meet its recommended ambulance response times for Category 2 incidents which include medical emergencies such as strokes and severe burns but the last few months months have seen unprecedented rise with patients waiting nearly an hour on average for an ambulance after calling 999 Paramedic cares for just ONE patient in 14.5-hour shift due to hospital queues A paramedic has described only caring for one patient in a whole shift due to handover delays at hospital. Faye Shepherd, a student paramedic for South Western Ambulance Service, said on Tuesday that she saw just one patient in a 14.5-hour work day because her crew was 'stuck at hospital for the entire duration waiting for bed space'. In October, Ms Shepherd had described the 'palpable sense of concern among staff' as her ambulance was '23rd in the queue out of 25 ambulance crews waiting to enter the emergency department'. Advertisement The comments come as NHS data for October shows the average waiting time for some emergency 999 ambulance calls reached 54 minutes. This is triple the 18-minute target for ambulance trusts to respond to these 'Category 2' calls, which includes strokes and heart attacks. Speaking at the NHS Providers annual conference yesterday, Mr Hopson said: 'We think that about three quarters of the extra phone calls that are coming in on 999 are repeat diallers basically trying to find out what's happened to the ambulance they are having to wait far too long for.' Ms Pritchard also warned about the pressures the health service is under in a separate speech at the NHS providers conference yesterday. While she said the health service was still dealing with 'thousands' of people seriously ill with Covid, she warned the NHS was under even more pressure from non-Covid patients. 'Even greater pressure is being felt in the non-Covid urgent and emergency care system as people come back to our services having perhaps, for understandable reasons, stayed away during the pandemic,' she said. Ms Pritchard said there were 'challenges' in discharging patients to a 'very stretched social care system' which resulted in delays in A&E with a knock-on effect on ambulance response times. 'Patients are spending too long in A&E, meaning ambulances are spending too long waiting to hand over patients, meaning response times are not what any of us would want them to be,' she said. She also added that there was no sign this would abate in the short-term and the NHS and patients have a potentially grim winter ahead. 'Indications suggest, we are not going to get any let up for a while,' she said. 'The next few months are going to be a winter like no other.' In recent weeks, South Central Ambulance Trust has urged 999 callers to continue to hold and 'stay on the line' if their calls aren't answered swiftly as a high volume of calls is causing significant delays to response times. Nationally, nearly one in ten patients classed as a 'category two' emergency are having to wait nearly two hours for an ambulance. Waiting times for life-threatening 'Category 1' calls, such as when someone is not breathing or their heart has stopped, are also the worst on record. Category 1 incidents, the most serious, life threatening emergencies, have also seen delays with patients waiting nine minutes and 20 seconds for an ambulance, well above the NHS's target of seven minutes Eight NHS ambulance bosses got 20,000 bonuses this year - despite record emergency call times Eight NHS ambulance bosses were awarded taxpayer-funded bonuses worth up to 20,000 this year, MailOnline has revealed. The revelation comes amongst pleas for ministers to call in the Army to tackle the ambulance sector's current crisis which has seen patients die in hospital car parks. Heart attack and stroke sufferers now have to wait almost an hour for an ambulance to arrive, which medics say is due to unprecedented demand triggering a record number of 999 calls and a lack of space in hospitals forcing vehicles to be parked outside because of handover delays. Despite the shocking figures, senior executives at three trusts were given bonuses and pay rises during the last year. West Midlands Ambulance Service's chief executive Professor Anthony Marsh saw his salary increase by 50,000 to 235,000 in the year ending March. He also received a bonus of between 15,000 and 20,000, despite not getting any add-ons before the pandemic. Five directors took home bonuses totalling up to 60,000 at South Central Ambulance Service in the same year, while North East Ambulance Service's chief executive raked in more than 15,000. Critics today slammed the bonuses, calling it an 'insult' to taxpayers. Daniel Boxall, media campaign manager at the TaxPayer's Alliance said: 'We keep hearing the health service is facing a cash crisis, and it's little wonder when ambulance trusts give out generous pay packages like these. 'Not only is this an insult to taxpayers, but it's even worse for the patients who have suffered because of mismanagement. Taxpayers' hard-earned money should go towards treating the sick, not feathering the nests of the top brass.' Advertisement Guidelines state ambulances should respond to these within seven minutes, but in October they took nine minutes and 20 seconds on average. In one case in Waveney, Suffolk a woman died because so many ambulances were stuck outside a hospital nobody could respond to the 999 call. The patient was classified as Category 1, meaning a crew was meant to be on the scene in seven minutes, but it took the ambulance an hour to arrive - by which time she was dead. Meanwhile, one stroke patient in Norfolk waited nine hours for a vehicle, while his wife called 999 six times. Health chiefs warned that when patients finally get to hospital, many are facing further waits outside hospitals. Investigations are underway into several incidents where patients died while trapped in queues of parked ambulances because A&Es were too busy to admit them. Paramedics say they are operating under 'horrendous' pressure and 'start every shift knowing patients will be put at risk' Dr Katherine Henderson, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, has said: 'Patient safety is very much at risk - long waiting times and long stays, ambulance handover delays, dangerous crowding - these are appalling practices that can lead to avoidable harm or death.' Richard Webber, of the College of Paramedics, said his colleagues 'have never before experienced anything like this at this time of the year'. He added: 'Every day services are holding hundreds of 999 calls with no-one to send. 'The ambulance service is simply not providing the levels of service they should - patients are waiting too long and that is putting them at risk.' Speaking to the BBC, he added: 'We have members who have been working for 20, 30 years, and they have never before experienced anything like this at this time of the year. 'Every day, services are holding hundreds of 999 calls with no one to send. Patients are waiting too long and that is putting them at risk.' Mr Webber pointed to lengthy delays in handing patients over to hospital staff, with waits of three or four hours not uncommon. 'It means on a 12-hour shift we can only attend two or three incidents, whereas previously we would do six, seven or eight,' he said. NHS England wrote to trusts and integrated care systems at the end of October telling them to take urgent action to 'immediately stop all delays' to ambulance handovers, and that 'corridor care' is 'unacceptable as a solution'. Trusts have reported record levels of A&E attendances in recent months, with ambulance services across the country declaring black alerts due to escalated pressure. West Midlands Ambulance Service warned last month that it is causing 'catastrophic' harm to patients due to handover delays. The pressure the emergency care sector is under comes as it was revealed eight NHS ambulance bosses were awarded taxpayer-funded bonuses worth up to 20,000 this year. The revelation, from MailOnline, comes amid pleas for ministers to call in the Army to tackle the current crisis. Despite shocking waiting times, senior executives at three ambulance trusts were given bonuses and pay rises during the last year. West Midlands Ambulance Service's chief executive Professor Anthony Marsh saw his salary increase by 50,000 to 235,000 in the year ending March. He also received a bonus of between 15,000 and 20,000, despite not getting any add-ons before the pandemic. Five directors took home bonuses totalling up to 60,000 at South Central Ambulance Service in the same year, while North East Ambulance Service's chief executive raked in more than 15,000. Ambulance service bosses were given bonuses worth up to 20,000 this year despite the current crisis in waiting times and handover delays that have caused patients to die in the back of vehicles. Map shows: The total upper bracket of performance pay and bonuses received by ambulance trust directors in the year April 2020 to March 2021 in trusts across England. Critics today slammed the bonuses, calling it an 'insult' to taxpayers. Daniel Boxall, media campaign manager at the TaxPayer's Alliance said: 'We keep hearing the health service is facing a cash crisis, and it's little wonder when ambulance trusts give out generous pay packages like these. 'Not only is this an insult to taxpayers, but it's even worse for the patients who have suffered because of mismanagement. Taxpayers' hard-earned money should go towards treating the sick, not feathering the nests of the top brass.' Data yesterday revealed 160,000 patients are harmed each year because of the delays. The NHS target is for handovers outside hospitals to last no longer than 15 minutes but the number waiting more than an hour has quadrupled in a year. Sajid Javid was yesterday urged to call in the Army to deal with the burgeoning staffing crisis, which has already been done in Scotland and Wales to bolster their struggling services. Faye Shepherd (pictured), who is on placement at South Western Ambulance Service, warned about the handover delays A trainee paramedic has revealed how she treated just one patient during a 14-and-a-half hour shift, in an example that lays bare the scale of the NHS crisis. Faye Shepherd said she spent the entire shift on Monday caring for the patient in the back of an ambulance while waiting for a bed to free up in A&E. The student, on placement at South Western Ambulance Service, warned that the handover delays are leaving 'people dying waiting for ambulances'. She also described how her ambulance was 23rd in a queue of 25 vehicles stuck outside waiting to offload patients at an emergency department in a separate incident last month. More than 1.3million emergency calls were made in England in October up 273,025 on the same period last year, the latest figures show. In the same month, more than 7,000 patients waited 12-plus hours to be seen in A&E in October more than triple the number in the same month pre-Covid. The unprecedented demand, combined with worsening handover delays, has left heart attack and stroke patients waiting nearly an hour for an ambulance. Paramedic bosses have said crews are currently seeing two to three patients in a shift, whereas normally they would get to up to eight. It came as South East Coast Ambulance Service declared a 'critical incident' because of a 'significant' IT issue, and urged patients to avoid calling 999 where possible. Ms Shepherd posted this picture after her shift on Monday night, saying they had only helped one patient because of the queues outside the hospital A record number of 999 calls were made in England in October, with 1,012,143 urgent calls for medical help made. But the time it took answer these calls also increased to a record 56 seconds The NHS has long struggled to meet its recommended ambulance response times for Category 2 incidents which include medical emergencies such as strokes and severe burns but the last few months months have seen unprecedented rise with patients waiting nearly an hour on average for an ambulance after calling 999 Ms Shepherd wrote on Twitter yesterday morning: 'During last night's 14.5 hour shift, we saw one patient. 'That's not because there's no demand, but because we were stuck at hospital for the entire duration, waiting for bed space. 'Meanwhile, people are dying waiting for ambulances. What part of this is sustainable [Health Secretary] Sajid Javid?' She added: 'We were not able to hand over our patient to the hospital before the end of our shift, so a day crew drove to the hospital and took our patient on, which released us to go home.' It came as an NHS official yesterday admitted hundreds of thousands of 999 calls every month are from desperate people asking where their ambulance is. Father, 70, dies of suspected heart attack after 70-minute wait for an ambulance A 70-year-old father has died of a suspected heart attack after waiting an hour and 10 minutes for an ambulance. The man from south east London, who has not been named, made the first call to 999 and then alerted his two daughters. One daughter Emma, not her real name, rushed to his house from her home two miles away. She made repeated frantic calls to 999 pleading for an ambulance, but was told one would arrive 'within 41 minutes'. An hour after the first call was made the man stopped breathing, and Emma had to give him CPR. An ambulance eventually arrived 69 minutes after the first call. His daughter Jane, also not her real name, who is in her 30s said: 'The emotional trauma of witnessing this and desperately trying to save his life, knowing he was seriously let down, is overwhelming. 'His last words to (Emma) was that this is the most excruciating pain Ive ever had and she now has to live with that. 'Nothing will bring him back but we will do all we can to make sure no-one else loses their life unnecessarily and no-one else goes through this trauma.' Ambulances in England aim to respond to category 2 calls such as strokes and heart attacks within 18 minutes, and reach 90 per cent of all calls within 40 minutes. But the latest data for October shows ambulances are taking 53 minutes and 54 seconds to reach patients, or almost three times as long. A London Ambulance Service spokesman said: 'Our thoughts are with the patients family and friends during this difficult time and we send them our deepest condolences. 'We are looking into how we responded to the patient, and would encourage the family to reach out to our patient experiences team so we can support them in reviewing what happened.' Advertisement There were more than 1.3million calls made in October a record but three quarters were from repeat callers pleading for an update on the arrival of their ambulance. There are growing reports of patients dying in the back of ambulances in hospital car parks and in NHS corridors because of handover delays. NHS England boss Amanda Pritchard has said patients are spending 'too long in A&E' but cannot be discharged due to an overstretched social care system. She warned last month that there was a 'palpable sense of concern' among staff because of the delays. NHS data for October shows the average waiting time for some emergency 999 ambulance calls has reached 54 minutes. This is triple the 18-minute target for ambulance trusts to respond to these 'Category 2' calls, which includes strokes and heart attacks. Speaking at the NHS Providers annual conference yesterday, the organisation's chief executive Chris Hopson said: 'We think that about three quarters of the extra phone calls that are coming in on 999 are repeat diallers basically trying to find out what's happened to the ambulance they are having to wait far too long for.' Ms Pritchard also warned about the pressures the health service is under in a separate speech at the NHS providers conference yesterday. While she said the health service was still dealing with 'thousands' of people seriously ill with Covid, she warned the NHS was under even more pressure from non-Covid patients. 'Even greater pressure is being felt in the non-Covid urgent and emergency care system as people come back to our services having perhaps, for understandable reasons, stayed away during the pandemic,' she said. Ms Pritchard said there were 'challenges' in discharging patients to a 'very stretched social care system' which resulted in delays in A&E with a knock-on effect on ambulance response times. 'Patients are spending too long in A&E, meaning ambulances are spending too long waiting to hand over patients, meaning response times are not what any of us would want them to be,' she said. She also added that there was no sign this would abate in the short-term and the NHS and patients have a potentially grim winter ahead. 'Indications suggest, we are not going to get any let up for a while,' she said. 'The next few months are going to be a winter like no other.' In recent weeks, South Central Ambulance Trust has urged 999 callers to continue to hold and 'stay on the line' if their calls aren't answered swiftly as a high volume of them is causing significant delays to response times. Nationally, nearly one in ten patients classed as a 'category two' emergency are having to wait nearly two hours for an ambulance. Waiting times for life-threatening 'Category 1' calls, such as when someone is not breathing or their heart has stopped, are also the worst on record. Category 1 incidents, the most serious, life threatening emergencies, have also seen delays with patients waiting nine minutes and 20 seconds for an ambulance, well above the NHS's target of seven minutes Ambulance service declares 'critical incident' and tells patients to avoid calling 999 for help An ambulance service today declared a 'critical incident' and urged patients to use alternatives to 999. South East Coast Ambulance Service said it had hit the emergency button after suffering a 'significant' IT issue. A spokesman said: 'Following a significant IT issue overnight, we have declared a critical incident this morning. 'Our staff are working extremely hard as we continue to respond to patients. 'We would ask that you consider alternatives to calling 999, including NHS 111 online, unless it's absolutely essential.' It is the second time in a week that an ambulance service has experienced a technical issue. On November 10 East of England Ambulance Service said its IT had experienced a failure. As a result, 999 calls had to be temporarily rerouted to neighbouring ambulance services. Advertisement Guidelines state ambulances should respond to these within seven minutes, but in October they took nine minutes and 20 seconds on average. In one case in Waveney, Suffolk, a woman died because so many ambulances were stuck outside a hospital nobody could respond to the 999 call. The patient was classified as Category 1, meaning a crew was meant to be on the scene in seven minutes, but it took the ambulance an hour to arrive - by which time she was dead. One stroke patient in Norfolk waited nine hours for a vehicle, while his wife called 999 six times. Health chiefs warned that when patients finally get to hospital, many are facing further waits outside. Investigations are underway into several incidents where patients died while trapped in queues of parked ambulances because A&Es were too busy to admit them. Paramedics say they are operating under 'horrendous' pressure and 'start every shift knowing patients will be put at risk' Dr Katherine Henderson, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, has said: 'Patient safety is very much at risk - long waiting times and long stays, ambulance handover delays, dangerous crowding - these are appalling practices that can lead to avoidable harm or death.' Richard Webber, of the College of Paramedics, said his colleagues 'have never before experienced anything like this at this time of the year'. He added: 'Every day services are holding hundreds of 999 calls with no-one to send. 'The ambulance service is simply not providing the levels of service they should - patients are waiting too long and that is putting them at risk.' Speaking to the BBC, he added: 'We have members who have been working for 20, 30 years, and they have never before experienced anything like this at this time of the year. 'Every day, services are holding hundreds of 999 calls with no one to send. Patients are waiting too long and that is putting them at risk.' Mr Webber pointed to lengthy delays in handing patients over to hospital staff, with waits of three or four hours not uncommon. 'It means on a 12-hour shift we can only attend two or three incidents, whereas previously we would do six, seven or eight,' he said. NHS England wrote to trusts and integrated care systems at the end of October telling them to take urgent action to 'immediately stop all delays' to ambulance handovers, and that 'corridor care' is 'unacceptable as a solution'. Trusts have reported record levels of A&E attendances in recent months, with ambulance services across the country declaring black alerts due to escalated pressure. West Midlands Ambulance Service warned last month that it is causing 'catastrophic' harm to patients due to handover delays. Ambulance service bosses were given bonuses worth up to 20,000 this year despite the current crisis in waiting times and handover delays that have caused patients to die in the back of vehicles. Map shows: The total upper bracket of performance pay and bonuses received by ambulance trust directors in the year April 2020 to March 2021 in trusts across England. Three-quarters of 999 calls are repeat callers pleading for an ambulance Some three-quarters of 999 calls are repeated callers pleading for an ambulance, a health boss has revealed. There were more than 1.3million calls to the service made in October, which was a record. But chief executive of NHS Providers Chris Hopson said the vast majority were people asking where their ambulance was. He told NHS Providers annual conference yesterday:'We think that about three quarters of the extra phone calls that are coming in on 999 are repeat diallers basically trying to find out what's happened to the ambulance they are having to wait far too long for.' Advertisement The pressure the emergency care sector is under comes as it was revealed eight NHS ambulance bosses were awarded taxpayer-funded bonuses worth up to 20,000 this year. The revelation, from MailOnline, comes amid pleas for ministers to call in the Army to tackle the current crisis. Despite shocking waiting times, senior executives at three ambulance trusts were given bonuses and pay rises during the last year. West Midlands Ambulance Service's chief executive Professor Anthony Marsh saw his salary increase by 50,000 to 235,000 in the year ending March. He also received a bonus of between 15,000 and 20,000, despite not getting any add-ons before the pandemic. Five directors took home bonuses totalling up to 60,000 at South Central Ambulance Service in the same year, while North East Ambulance Service's chief executive raked in more than 15,000. Critics today slammed the bonuses, calling it an 'insult' to taxpayers. Daniel Boxall, media campaign manager at the TaxPayer's Alliance said: 'We keep hearing the health service is facing a cash crisis, and it's little wonder when ambulance trusts give out generous pay packages like these. 'Not only is this an insult to taxpayers, but it's even worse for the patients who have suffered because of mismanagement. Taxpayers' hard-earned money should go towards treating the sick, not feathering the nests of the top brass.' Data yesterday revealed 160,000 patients are harmed each year because of the delays. The NHS target is for handovers outside hospitals to last no longer than 15 minutes but the number waiting more than an hour has quadrupled in a year. Sajid Javid was yesterday urged to call in the Army to deal with the burgeoning staffing crisis, which has already been done in Scotland and Wales to bolster their struggling services. CAUSE CHILDREN TO HAVE A LOW IQ: Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, found in May 2019 that children born to mothers who live in polluted areas have an IQ that is up to seven points lower than those living in places with cleaner air. CAUSE CHILDREN TO HAVE POORER MEMORY: Researchers at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health found boys exposed to greater levels of PM2.5 in the womb performed worse on memory tests by the time they are 10. DELAY THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN: Youngsters who live less than one-third of a mile away from busy roads are twice as likely to score lower on tests of communication skills in infancy, found researchers at Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health in April. They were also more likely to have poorer hand-eye coordination. MAKE CHILDREN MORE ANXIOUS: University of Cincinnati scientists claimed pollution may alter the structure of children's brains to make them more anxious. Their study of 14 youngsters found rates of anxiety was higher among those exposed to greater levels of pollution. CUT YOUR CHILD'S LIFE SHORT: Children born today will lose nearly two years of their lives because of air pollution, according to a report by the US-based Health Effects Institute and the University of British Columbia in April 2019. UNICEF called for action on the back of the study. RAISE A CHILD'S RISK OF AUTISM: Researchers at Monash University in Australia discovered youngsters living in highly polluted parts of Shanghai have a 86 per cent greater chance of developing ASD. Lead author Dr Yuming Guo said: 'The developing brains of young children are more vulnerable to toxic exposures in the environment.' CAUSE ASTHMA IN CHILDREN: Four million children around the world develop asthma each year because of road traffic pollution, a major study by academics at George Washington University estimated. Experts are divided as to what causes asthma - but exposure to pollution in childhood increases the risk by damaging the lungs. MAKE CHILDREN FAT: University of Southern California experts found last November that 10 year olds who lived in polluted areas when they were babies are, on average, 2.2lbs (1kg), heavier than those who grew up around cleaner air. Nitrogen dioxide pollution could disrupt how well children burn fat, the scientists said. LEAVE WOMEN INFERTILE EARLIER: Scientists at the University of Modena, Italy, claimed in May 2019 that they believe pollution speeds up ageing in women, just like smoking, meaning they run out of eggs faster. This was based on them finding almost two-thirds of women who have a low 'reserve' of eggs regularly inhaled toxic air. RAISE THE RISK OF A MISCARRIAGE: University of Utah scientists found in January that pregnant women are 16 per cent more likely to suffer the heartbreak of a miscarriage if they live in areas of high pollution. RAISE THE RISK OF BREAST CANCER: Scientists at the University of Stirling found six women working at the same bridge next to a busy road in the US got breast cancer within three years of each other. There was a one in 10,000 chance the cases were a coincidence, the study said. It suggested chemicals in the traffic fumes caused the cancer by shutting down the BRCA genes, which try to stop tumours growing. DAMAGE A MAN'S SPERM: Brazilian scientists at the University of Sao Paulo found in March that mice exposed to toxic air had lower counts and worse quality sperm compared to those who had inhaled clean air since birth. MAKE MEN LESS LIKELY TO GET SEXUALLY AROUSED: Scientists at Guangzhou Medical University in China found rats exposed to air pollution struggled to get sexually aroused. Scientists believe it may also affect men, as inhaling poisonous particles may trigger inflammation in blood vessels and starve the genitals of oxygen affecting men's ability to become sexually aroused. MAKE MEN MORE LIKELY TO HAVE ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION: Men who live on main roads are more likely to have difficulty getting an erection due to exposure to pollution, a Guangzhou University in China study suggested in February. Toxic fumes reduced blood flow to the genitals, tests on rats showed, putting them at risk of developing erectile dysfunction. RAISE THE RISK OF PSYCHOSIS: In March, King's College London scientists linked toxic air to intense paranoia and hearing voices in young people for the first time. They said uncovering exactly how pollution may lead to psychosis should be an 'urgent health priority'. MAKE YOU DEPRESSED: Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers found in January that that the more polluted the air, the sadder we are. Their study was based on analysing social media users in China alongside the average daily PM2.5 concentration and weather data where they lived. CAUSE DEMENTIA: Air pollution could be responsible for 60,000 cases of dementia in the UK, researchers from King's College London and St George's, University of London, calculated last September. Tiny pollutants breathed deep into the lungs and enter the blood stream, where they may travel into the brain and cause inflammation a problem which may trigger dementia. Michigan is currently recording the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. as several hospitals report they have reached capacity. Over the past week, the state has reported an average of 503.8 new infections per 100,000 people according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This is the second time this year that Michigan has led the country in cases, with the last time occurring in April, between the third and fourth surges of the pandemic. Meanwhile, the number of COVID-19 hospitalized patients has risen more than 50 percent in the last month and at least nine hospitals are reporting that they've reached capacity. Michigan is recording 503.8 new infections per 100,000 in one week, the highest 7-day case rate in the U.S. with a rolling average of about 9,000 per day (above) Health officials say that around 75% of all cases and deaths are among unvaccinated people or those not yet fully vaccinated. Pictured: An ambulance crew weaves a gurney through the halls of the emergency department at Sparrow Hospital in Lansing, Michigan, undated According to state data, there were 2,097 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 on October 18. This has since risen to 3,197 as of Wednesday, a 52 percent increase. 'The current growth in COVID-19 hospitalizations is very concerning,' John Karasinski, a spokesman for the Michigan Health and Hospital Association, told the Detroit Free Press. '[Hospitals are] seeing a stark increase in hospitalizations in just the past few days... We have both this stark surge of COVID-19 patients, but we also have hospitals that have been dealing with staffing challenges and staffing shortages, as well as high volumes of non-Covid patients. 'And we've been seeing that pent-up demand of non-Covid admissions since this past summer.' Individual hospitals are also reporting similar increases. Dr Adnan Munkarah, executive vice president and chief clinical officer of the Henry Ford Health System, told the Free Press than 330 COVID-19 patients were admitted across its five hospitals. This marks a 60 percent increase in the total number of patients admitted to the facility by midnight than was seen just three weeks prior. 'We were hoping that we would be in a better situation this Thanksgiving than we were last year, especially with the availability of the vaccines,' Munkarah told the newspaper. 'We've been watching with...trepidation and worry, the number of COVID cases climb and rise throughout our community and around the state. 'The vast majority of the patients continue to be unvaccinated patients. So when we look at general admissions for COVID, 70 to 75 percent of those patients have been unvaccinated.' CDC data show that 59.8 percent of Michigan's total population has received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose and 54.1 percent are fully vaccinated. Over the last month, hospitalizations have increased 52% from 2,097 patients to 3,197 patients, state data show This is behind the national averages of 68.6 percent of the U.S. population with at least one dose and 58.9 percent fully vaccinated. Lynn Sutfin, a spokesperson for the state health department, told the Free Press that 73 percent of Covid cases across the state have been among unvaccinated or not yet fully vaccinated people. Additionally, 69 percent of COVID-19 hospitalizations and 74 percent of deaths have been among people not fully vaccinated. 'The majority have some other underlying complex clinical conditions that make them compromised,' Bob Riney, Henry Ford's chief operating officer, told the newspaper. 'So the facts really still support that the unvaccinated population is being hit dramatically different than the vaccinated population as it relates to the activity that we're seeing today.' A Maryland resident has tested positive for the rare virus monkeypox after a recent trip to Nigeria. The Maryland Department of Health (MDH) says the patient has not been hospitalized and is currently recovering in isolation with mild symptoms. No details are available regarding the resident's name, age, sex, where he or she lives, and where he or she traveled to in Nigeria. Currently, health officials say that the general public does not need to take any special precautions. A Maryland resident traveling back to the United States from Nigeria has been confirmed to be infected with monkeypox. Pictured: Skin lesions, which are are a common symptom of monkeypox The unnamed resident is currently recovering in isolation with mild symptoms and has not been hospitalized. The virus can cause skin spots, which then turn to blisters and can take weeks to clear up (above) 'Public health authorities have identified and continue to follow up with those who may have been in contact with the diagnosed individual,' Dr Jinlene Chan, deputy secretary for public health at MDH, said in a statement. 'Our response in close coordination with (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) officials demonstrates the importance of maintaining a strong public health infrastructure.' The CDC released a media statement revealing its scientists confirmed on Tuesday that the traveler had a case of monkeypox. What's more, the strain that the patient contracted matches the strain that has been re-emerging in Nigeria since 2017. Currently, CDC is working with the airline and health officials to contact passengers who were on the same flight as the patient and may have come into contact with him or her. 'Travelers on the flight to the United States were required to wear masks on the plane as well as in the U.S. airports due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic,' the CDC said in a statement. 'Therefore, its believed the risk of spread of monkeypox virus via respiratory droplets to others on the planes is low. 'Working with airline and state and local health partners, CDC is assessing potential risks to those who may have had close contact with the traveler on the plane and after their arrival in the United States.' Monkeypox was discovered in 1958 when outbreaks of a pox-like disease occurred in crab-eating macaque monkeys kept for research. The first-ever human case was detected in 1970 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, since spreading to many central and western African nations. Monkeypox originated in crab-eating macaques (pictured) kept for research in central and western Africa and kills 1% of those infected It is believed that the virus transmits from animals to humans when the primate bites or scratches a person. It can also spread person-to-person by respiratory droplets in the air - similar to the way humans spread COVID-19 to each other. People with more serious cases of the virus will often develop skin lesions, among other symptoms such as rash and fever, and it kills abut one percent of those infected. The disease had largely vanished, until a 2003 flare-up in the U.S. saw the virus return among humans. There are no specific treatments or vaccines available for monkeypox, though the smallpox vaccine is believed to have helped make it a non-problem in humans for many years. Other cases of monkeypox have been detected recently including in a Texas man in July and in Wales in June, when at least two people came down with the virus in the northern part of the country. In an article published on October 27 about a woman who had been tried for posting revenge porn images online, we reported that Antonia Traynor was a Deputy Headteacher who had been sacked from her job. We have since been contacted by Ms Traynor who advises that she was a former Teacher, not a Deputy Head, and was not sacked from her previous employment. She was unemployed at the time of conviction. We are happy to set the record straight. To report an inaccuracy, please email corrections@mailonline.co.uk. To make a formal complaint under IPSO rules please go to www.mailonline.co.uk/readerseditor where you will find an easy-to-use complaints form. You can also write to Readers Editor, MailOnline, Northcliffe House, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT or contact IPSO directly at ipso.co.uk Nearly half of UK drivers say they'll be forced to cut back on spending elsewhere in light of petrol and diesel prices being at record highs and set to continue increasing in the build-up to Christmas. Of the 2,500 UK licence holders polled by the RAC at the end of October, 46 per cent said they will have to make compromises on other household spending to be able to afford sky-rocketing pump prices as we near the most expensive time of year. A third of motorists surveyed said the never-before-seen high cost of both petrol and diesel has already resulted in them driving less than before - and another quarter plan to reduce their time at the wheel if pump prices continue in the same direction, the study found. The report was published as the latest Consumer Price Index figures showed that inflation in October had risen to 4.2 per cent from 3.1 per cent in September - the biggest month-to-month jump recorded for a decade. Sky-high fuel prices a real concern for Britons: With no end in sight for rising petrol and diesel prices, nearly half of drivers say they will need to make cut-backs elsewhere The cost of filling up is just one of a number of financial concerns for Britons in the face of rising grocery prices as well as soaring gas and electricity bills. Petrol and diesel both eclipsed previous record high prices - which were last set in April 2012 - last month and have continued to rise since. The average price of a litre of diesel rose above the 1.50 mark over the weekend, while petrol has surpassed 1.46-a-litre. Such has been the dramatic rise in fuel prices in recent months that the cost to fill an average petrol-powered family car's tank is now 80 - some 17.50 more than it was a year ago (when unleaded was around 1.14 a litre). Since diesel rose above 150p per litre, the average family diesel car's fuel tank is now close to 83 to brim. Inflated motorway services prices for fuel means both petrol and diesel is now being sold for eye-watering prices above 1.60-a-litre in some regions. Drivers have been experiencing record fuel prices for the last three weeks, with petrol beyond the previous high on 24 October and diesel surpassing the former high on 31 October Prices have been forced higher by a combination of rising oil and biofuel used in both petrol and diesel, which are both showing no signs of slowing. The RAC says three in five (61 per cent) of the drivers it polled are now worried about the implications of rising fuel costs due to their dependency on their vehicles. Almost half (48 per cent) are worried that rising pump prices are coming hand-in-hand with bulging household gas and electricity bills. Stick to supermarkets to fill up with cheapest fuel, say campaign group FairFuelUK says the nation's overall average published figures are being 'misleadingly distorted' by lower fill up costs at the big four supermarket suppliers, who continue to be always 4-6p per litre cheaper. Many motorists are already seeing petrol being sold above 1.50-a-litre and diesel exceeding an eye watering 1.54 per litre. In a review of 476 UK forecourts and their prices over the weekend, FairFuelUK's independent garages and big oil brands are charging drivers considerably more than supermarkets. The report said average retail profits for both petrol and diesel are now exceeding 20p per litre. That is 11 from every driver filling up their family car with diesel. And nearly 10 profit from drivers using unleaded. Howard Cox, founder of FairFuelUK said this is unfairly stinging drivers who do not live close to big supermarkets who are 'being forced to fill up where they have no choice but to swallow the rip off prices of the big oil brands and independent forecourts'. 'Shopping around to save a few pennies is pointless unless you are close to one of the big four supermarket outlets, ' he said. Mr Cox has called on the Government to introduce a 'PumpWatch' watchdog to monitor fuel prices across the UK. Just under a fifth (17 per cent) of the drivers questioned by the motoring organisation said they are going to walk or cycle more often while fuel prices are at such a premium. Alarmingly, five percent of motorists said they have genuine fears theyll be unable to keep running a car at all if prices keep heading north. The RAC said the research 'paints a chilling picture of the impact of the current record petrol and diesel prices on UK households' and force more drivers to consider switching to electric vehicles - granted they can afford to do so. Fuel spokesman Simon Williams said: 'These figures throw a light on the chilling impact the current record high petrol and diesel prices are having on drivers every time they fill up. 'And theres seemingly no end in sight the price of unleaded is already up by more than 2p in November and this, combined with the fact domestic energy costs are also spiking, means households need to brace themselves for what could turn out to be a particularly expensive winter.' Mr Williams added that, for many, a car is their lifeline and the only feasible way for them to complete necessary journeys each day. For example, the RAC's recent motoring report found that 68 per cent of drivers who have to care for family or friends live too far away to attend them by foot or bicycle. When it comes to grocery shopping, 78 per cent rely on a vehicle. 'This reliance on cars, coupled with the fact the cost of fuel represents such a large proportion of many households spending, should be ringing alarm bells in government, but its not obvious the message is getting through,' says Williams. 'The Chancellor had the perfect opportunity last month to show his support for drivers who are struggling with the increasing fuel prices which is happening at a time when domestic energy bills are also rising by temporarily cutting VAT on motor fuel or reducing fuel duty. 'Were disappointed he chose to do neither, but a commitment to freeze fuel duty for another year was at least some consolation. However, we fear that rocketing prices risk storing up all kinds of problems for drivers as we go into the winter.' On Wednesday it was confirmed by the Office for National Statistics that the rate of Consumer Price Index inflation increased to 4.2 per cent last month. It means inflation surged close to a ten-year peak - partly on the back of higher household energy bills - as it hit the highest level since November 2011. The ONS found there were 12-month inflation rates of 18.8 per cent for electricity and 28.1 per cent for gas - the highest annual rates for both since early 2009. An investment banking giant is suing Tesla for 120million over claims it flagrantly breached a contract. JP Morgan bought warrants which are contracts to buy shares at a specific price from the electric car maker in 2014. But the bank changed the prices twice in the wake of controversial tweets from Teslas boss Elon Musk in 2018, in which he said he had secured funding to take the company private. Twitter storm: JP Morgan changed its warrant prices twice in the wake of controversial tweets from Tesla's boss Elon Musk (pictured) in 2018 The tweets got Musk got into trouble with US regulators, who fined him 15million. And the deal quickly fell apart with Tesla arguing the changes the investment giant made to the prices were unnecessary. The bank argues Tesla did not fully honour the agreement and owes it a shortfall of 120million. Musk, 50, has sold 5.8billion shares in the group in a matter of days, after another string of controversial tweets where he asked people on Twitter to vote on whether he should sell 7.4billion of stock to pay tax. The party is over, declared Australian mining magnate turned eco-warrior, Andrew Forrest who is known as Twiggy in his home country. Speaking in a gravelly Antipodean brogue from a breakfast table laden with tea and toast, the tycoon claimed fossil fuels are in terminal decline. And he warned climate change chaos would wipe out the entire human race if left unchecked. The video message was not subtle, nor was it meant to be. Give it some gas: Australian mining magnate turned eco-warrior, Andrew Forrest (pictured) describes cleanly-produced hydrogen as the fuel of the future For this rallying call to ditch fossil fuels and save the planet also marked Twiggys latest naked sales pitch for green hydrogen power, which he described as the fuel of the future. The 59-year-old who has already amassed a 15billion fortune from the iron ore riches of Western Australia was perfectly open about his desire to cash in from tackling climate change. The difference this time is it would be guilt free. He said: The great thing is when you make a serious dollar out of it, you can still go home and you can look your kids straight in the eye, not a lump of guilt in our throat. The iron ore billionaire is a household name in his native Australia. But he is largely unknown in the UK. This could change because Forrest founder of mining giant Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) has his sights set on bringing green hydrogen power to Britain. He has already found a heavyweight backer in the form of Lord Bamford, chairman of manufacturing giant JCB and one of the biggest names in British business. Just before Cop26 got underway, Forrest announced a huge hydrogen export deal with JCB and Ryze Hydrogen, a firm set up by Lord Bamfords son Jo. The agreement will see Fortescue Future Industries FMGs green energy arm become the largest supplier of hydrogen in the UK. JCB will buy 10 per cent of Fortescues global green hydrogen production or 1.5m tonnes a year and then manage its distribution in Britain. Forrest has said the deal will be worth between 5.1billion and 6.6billion annually if, of course, he can produce hydrogen at this scale. Some are highly sceptical, and say green hydrogen is unproven. But it represents one of the first major global hydrogen export deals and will be according to Forrest the first of many. He estimates the green hydrogen market could generate revenues of 9 trillion by 2050, dwarfing any other industry. Heavyweights: Boris Johnson with JCB chairman Lord Bamford. JCB will buy 10% of Fortescues global green hydrogen production or 1.5m tonnes a year Forrest became Australias richest man though not richest person as the top spot is claimed by mining magnate, and his Perth neighbour, Gina Rinehart after founding Fortescue Metals Group almost 20 years ago. Having generated more than his fair share of carbon emissions over the years, he is trying to save the planet and make another vast wad in the process. His Damascene conversion has seen him develop a fixation on green hydrogen power, which he says will replace fossil fuels and be critical to tackling climate change. Glasgows Cop26 summit, crammed with world leaders, captains of industry and financiers, represented the ultimate sales opportunity for Twiggy and his team. Green hydrogen power uses renewable sources of energy such as solar and wind power to create electricity. Electrolysers are then used to send an electric current through water to separate it into its component parts of hydrogen and oxygen. Energy giants like BP and Shell are investing heavily in producing blue hydrogen, which uses methane from natural gas instead of renewable energy to generate electricity, and is cheaper to produce. But blue hydrogen has been dismissed by Forrest as a charade because it still generates carbon emissions which are then stored in the ground. Boris Johnson has talked of transforming Britain into the Qatar of hydrogen, with households eventually using hydrogen gas made across Northern England to cook their breakfast. If Forrest gets his way, it will be his hydrogen which will be used to fry our bacon and eggs, as well as power machinery across the UK and the world. JCB, too, is also convinced hydrogen energy will play an essential role for heavy industry. Last month it announced it is investing 100m to develop super-efficient hydrogen engines for its machines, which it hopes will be on sale by the end of next year. But the scope of Forrests ambition in hydrogen power is on a different level. He has pledged to produce 15m tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030, many times the amount produced globally today. He is so confident of hitting this target he has vowed to make Fortescue carbon neutral by 2030, 20 years earlier than the 2050 net zero target agreed by dozens of developed nations. Producing hydrogen in industrial quantities will require vast plains of solar panels, wind turbines and huge hydro-electricity schemes. Which brings us to perhaps the biggest problem with green hydrogen. It is hugely difficult and expensive to produce one of the reasons why Tesla boss Elon Musk has branded the concept of hydrogen powered cars as mind bogglingly stupid. Forrest is undeterred. He recently announced plans to build the worlds largest hydrogen manufacturing facility in Central Queensland, which is expected to double the worlds hydrogen production capacity. He also has hydrogen projects on the go in Papua New Guinea, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and also Kenya and Ethiopia. His mission to become a global hydrogen power has seen him criss-crossing the globe on a private jet. As part of a PR blitz in London before heading up to Glasgow for the Cop26 summit, Forrest had a fleet of black cabs painted green and emblazoned with the Fortescue Future Industries logo, and the message: Green hydrogen can save us. If he is right, then Twiggy may well become the wealthiest environmentalist of them all. Richard Branson has sold another 224m of Virgin Galactic shares to prop up a business empire hammered in the coronavirus pandemic. The billionaire got rid of 15.6m shares 6 per cent of the space travel company leaving him with 11.9 per cent. Branson, 71, has been engaged in a space race against Elon Musks SpaceX and Jeff Bezoss Blue Origin. Bailing out: Richard Branson (pictured) got rid of 15.6m Virgin Galactic shares - 6% of the space travel company leaving him with 11.9% On July 11, Branson beat Amazon founder Bezos to space in a battle that made headlines globally. Bezos achieved the feat nine days later. But delays to the start of commercial flights have resulted in Virgin Galactics stock tumbling 20 per cent this year. Based in Las Cruces, New Mexico, the company expects to be flying paying passengers to space three times a month in 2023. But Branson has been selling stock to support his travel and leisure businesses, including Virgin Atlantic. He has sold nearly 800million of shares in Virgin Galactic since the start of the Covid-19 crisis. Some speculated that he was looking at listing Virgin Atlantic in London, but that has cooled after transatlantic travel started up again last week. LV could still be owned by its members under a deal with Royal London, the rival company has claimed. The historic insurer has been trying to sell itself to private equity shark Bain Capital in a transaction which has angered its customers and politicians of all parties. They are worried that the 178-year-old business, which is owned by its policyholders as a mutual and run with their interests in mind, could end up being milked for profits by Bain. Loggerheads: LV chairman Alan Cook (left) and Royal London boss Barry ODwyer (right) But as an extraordinary war of words erupted between LV and Royal London yesterday, the larger insurer said LV members did not have to give up their ownership. Bosses at Royal London said they were willing to table a new offer which would allow LV to remain a mutual, and urged the companys board and Bain to open discussions. But Mark Hartigan, LVs chief executive, accused Royal London of lobbing a hand grenade into its deal, and said he was disappointed with its tactics. Royal London has held talks about buying LV over the past eight years, and it is understood that a deal was almost signed in 2017. But when Alan Cook took over as LV chairman that year, he decided to ditch the deal and launch a strategic review. LV then put itself up for sale last year, claiming it desperately needed more money to invest in modern technology and IT systems. The mutual courted other suitors, and the process culminated last year with the selection of US private equity firm Bain as its preferred bidder sparking a furious backlash. Now, as LV policyholders prepare to vote on the deal, Royal London has attempted to revive its offer. Keen: Royal London has held talks about buying LV over the past eight years, and it is understood that a deal was almost signed in 2017 Royal London chief executive Barry ODwyer said: The near-universal dismay which has greeted [Bains] proposal means that I think there is a significant risk now that members wont support that proposal. So I sent a private email to the LV chief executive [Hartigan] offering to help construct an alternative. He claimed this alternative could involve LV staying a mutual. Hartigan hit back, as he finally revealed more details of Bains and Royal Londons rival deals. He admitted that Royal London had actually offered 540million to buy LV, 10million more than Bain. But he claimed that Royal London planned to leave material liabilities with the fund, which is responsible for making pay-outs to LVs so-called with-profits members. These liabilities, understood to include loss-making policies called Lifetime Plus, could have eaten up members cash if the business began to struggle. Hartigan claimed that Royal London also failed to complete its due diligence the under-the-bonnet checks which a firm does on a rival its hoping to buy. And he said Royal London had been grossly misleading to suggest that LV could remain a mutual under its offer. Hartigan said Royal Londons 11th hour intervention was a hand grenade to disrupt the process. But Royal London stuck to its guns. Staying mutual is an option if LV makes this a priority and engages in talks with us, it said. It is understood that Royal Londons original proposal would have seen LV demutualised. But the firm claims it could structure an offer which would see LVs business merged with its own, and owned by the combined pool of members. ODwyer said: LV members have an important choice to make. Ministers have ordered a full-blown investigation into Nvidias 31billion swoop on chipmaker Arm in a move that could scupper the takeover. The controversial deal will face more delays after Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries intervened on competition and national security grounds. The US tech giant agreed to buy Cambridge-based Arm from Softbank last September. But the planned tie-up has triggered uproar from Arms customers and is already under scrutiny in China, the US and EU. Probe: Nvidia's controversial swoop on chipmaker Arm will face more delays after Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries (pictured) intervened on competition and national security grounds Dorries believes it is crucial for the UKs national security to maintain reliable access to Arms technology, the Government said in a letter yesterday, and that there are fears the Nvidia takeover could remove this. The National Cyber Security Centre has also raised concerns about the deal, documents revealed yesterday. Over the summer, UK regulator the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) flagged concerns about what it could do to the wider semiconductor industry saying it could stifle innovation, lead to less competition and drive up prices. It also comes at a critical time as a global shortage of microchips is sending shockwaves throughout the manufacturing sector and slowing down production lines. The CMA will now carry out the Phase Two investigation. It has 24 weeks to complete this, though this could be extended by another eight weeks. The watchdog will have the power to block the takeover on competition grounds, while Dorries will be able to block it if it poses a security threat. Dorries said: The Governments commitment to our thriving tech sector is unwavering and we welcome foreign investment, but it is right that we fully consider the implications of this transaction. Arm is seen as a jewel in the crown of the UKs tech sector. It was spun out of a firm called Acorn Computers in 1990, and after years on the stock market was snapped up by Japans Softbank for 24billion in 2016. Arms customers include Google, Samsung and Apple. Softbank licenses Arms designs to more than 500 companies which use them to make their own chips, which are used in 95pc of smartphones and in an array of other devices from cars to fridges that are connected to the internet. More than 200bn chips have been made worldwide using its designs and some 900 are produced per second. Russ Shaw, founder of Tech London Advocates, said: The UK was caught napping in 2016 when Arm was sold to Softbank a sale which faced virtually no scrutiny and was a major failure of national security. A Nvidia spokesman said: We plan on addressing the CMAs initial views on the impact of the transaction on competition, and we will continue to work with the Government to resolve its concerns. The Phase Two process will enable us to demonstrate that the transaction will help to accelerate Arm and boost competition and innovation, including in the UK. CMC markets pre-tax profits were 74 per cent below levels seen during the 2020 trading boom, falling to 36million in the six months to 30 September compared to 141.1million at the same time last year. The decline will not come as a shock to investors after the UK trading platform issued a profit warning in September, with a collapse in trading volumes driving income 45 per cent lower than last year to 126.7million. However, performance remains well above pre-pandemic levels, with pre-tax profits and income 20 per cent and 24 per cent higher than 2019, respectively. As expected, CMC Markets' profits dipped after a slowdown in the pandemic home trading boom Revenues within CMC Market's more profitable leveraged trading business fell 50 per cent on 2019 levels to 101million this year, while non-leveraged revenues fell 8 per cent to 24.1million. The former remains 19 per cent above pre-pandemic levels, while the latter is 67 per cent above. In what would be the biggest shake-up since its founding in 1989, CMC Markets announced recently that it is considering dividing its online investment group into a retail-focused trading platform and a leveraged operation. Its number of leveraged clients fell 9 per cent during the half, while non-leveraged clients grew by 10 per cent. The firm highlighted aims to diversify and grow its non-leveraged earnings via the acquisition of the ANZ Share Investing, which when completed over the next 12-18 months will boost the business division with approximately 500,000 new clients and AUD$45billion (24.4billion) of assets. It followed CMC Markets' September profit warning, which saw shares go into freefall after the group cut its annual earnings outlook by 80million in response to 'subdued' trading volumes in July and August. However, CMC Market's forewarning did not stop its shares falling another 3.5 per cent in early trading to 264.5p. As basic earnings per share fell 75 per cent on the same time last year to 9.6p, CMC Market's dividend per share fell 62 per cent to 3.5p. Lord Cruddas, chief executive, said: 'I'm very pleased to see the business is operating well above pre-pandemic levels across all our business lines. 'This is testament to the resilience and quality of our platform and offering. CMCX shares fell sharply in September after the firm issued a profit warning 'We are on a fast track to diversification, using our existing platform technology to win B2B and B2C non-leveraged business. 'This will be further boosted with the launch of our new UK investment platform planned in the early part of the next financial year, which will offer both B2C and B2B potential. 'In line with this strategy, we believe it is right for us to evaluate the viability of separating the businesses in order to unlock the significant value within the current group structure. 'The board is expected to start this review before year end and complete it by June 2022. We will update on progress in due course.' CMC shares are down 34.6 per cent since the start of the year and 28.8 per cent over one year. Analysts at Peel Hunt said the stock 'is materially undervalued', noting investment in strategic initiatives and 'good progress' being made. Maintaining a target price of 462p, they added: 'CMC continues to invest in products and services to support future growth.' Historic insurer LV is facing a furious backlash from loyal customers over a controversial takeover by a private equity firm. Scores of Mail readers have vowed to vote against the deal, with some threatening to ditch LV in protest. Many have been members of the mutual for decades, and chose the firm because they trusted it to look after their money. Unimpressed: Retired lecturer Clarissa Johnson (pictured) says she was horrified when she first heard that LV could fall into the hands of Bain Capital They now say they feel bitterly let down amid concerns about what the sale would mean for their pensions and investments. Formerly known as Liverpool Victoria, the investment and insurance giant was founded in 1843 to help impoverished Liverpudlians bury their dead. Since then, it has been owned by its members as a mutual, run with their benefit in mind and not for profit. But the firm is now considering accepting a 530 million bid from U.S. firm Bain Capital, which would see it stripped of its mutual status. This has led to fears for members as private equity firms are notorious for slashing jobs, hiking prices and prioritising the pay packets of top bosses and shareholders. The Mail has launched a campaign to save LV and today we are calling on members to ensure their voice is heard. Around 1.2 million LV members with life insurance, pension policies and annuities are eligible to vote on whether the sale goes ahead next month. And many have already pledged to cast their vote against it. Retired lecturer Clarissa Johnson says she was horrified when she first heard that LV could fall into the hands of Bain Capital. The 74-year-old grandmother took out an enhanced annuity with the mutual over a decade ago, which pays out just under 500 a month. However, she now says she has lost trust in LVs board and plans to vote against the deal next month. Bain Capital has pledged to pay each member up to 100 if the takeover goes ahead. Retired couple Joseph and Jennifer Schneider, from Bushey, Hertfordshire, are horrified that LV chairman Alan Cook is backing a move that would demutualise the business And around 297,000 customers who have with-profits policies where payouts depend on how much profit companies make will receive an extra 0.1 pc of the value of their policy for every year that they have held it. This is around 52 for most members. LV bosses claim Bains bid is the only option that offers an excellent financial outcome for members along with unrivalled support for the brand, staff and UK-based offices. But, given that Scottish Widows members received an average windfall of 6,000 when it was demutualised and bought by Lloyds in 2000, many feel the cash payment they have been offered is derisory. Clarissa, who lives in Dorset, says: The sum of money they offered us not only sounds like a bribe, its a paltry amount. How does it amount to an excellent financial outcome for me, like LV says? If LV is no longer a mutual, its members will have no say on any decisions made by the company. Bain Capital has pledged to keep mutual bonuses received by with-profit customers at a similar rate. But experts fear the firm could hike exit fees and premiums for new customers in the future. Takeover will end in tears, say experts Tony Hazell, Money Mail letters editor Why would a bunch of American investors want to buy a modest-sized insurance company owned by its members? Because they can sniff a fast buck. Private equity is the antithesis of mutuality. It is about maximising profits for a few rather than fair shares for all. Mutuality lay at the heart of family finances for more than two centuries. Then short-term greed undermined the sector. That ended in tears as nearly every former mutual was forcibly taken over to prevent savers losing everything. Now LV investors are being encouraged to give up their mutuality for a handful of private equity cash, by directors who will stuff rather more into their own pockets. Martin Shaw, chief executive, Association of Financial Mutuals Its sad to see a once great mutual in such a weak position that it has to sell its mutual soul to the wolves of Wall Street. One advantage a mutual has is the flexibility to run the business without too strong a focus on profits, and in the interests of customers. The money from Bain will yield a paltry 100 per member next to nothing compared to everything members will lose. Sylvia Morris, Money Mails savings guru Savers pick mutuals because they like the idea of owning the organisation looking after their money. All profits benefit them rather than going to outside owners. Insurance companies owned by outsiders typically earmark 10 per cent of profits for themselves on a so-called with-profits investment fund. With a smaller share of the profits, the final payouts of LV savings policies could fall. Ros Altmann, former Pensions Minister It is very difficult to see how customers can expect to benefit from this deal. The financial reward of a paltry 100 is unlikely to compensate for the increased future risks they face. They are currently invested in a firm which is not seeking to make profit, but this will be replaced by an owner which aims to earn good returns. James Daley, Fairer Finance Almost all financial services scandals of the past few decades have in my humble opinion been caused by firms prioritising shareholder returns over good customer outcomes. Ive always been a fan of mutuals because that tension between customer and shareholder does not exist they are one and the same. I struggle to think of a single large financial services business that improved customer performance after moving into private equity ownership. I hope members will vote against and force the management to think again. Helen Morrissey, senior pensions and retirement analyst, Hargreaves Lansdown Some of the most highly respected brands in the UK are mutuals. Their roots are in helping support the poorer members of society, there are no shareholders to pay and they are owned by their customers so there is a laser focus on doing the right thing by them. The tone has been set with reports that policyholders have been offered just 100 each to approve the takeover, a relatively small amount for signing over membership rights. Malcolm Murray, 77, has been an LV customer for more than 50 years, just like his parents and grandparents before him. And in 2000 the father of two set up a mutual investment bond with his wife Sheila, 73, to ensure she would be financially secure if he died unexpectedly. The with-profits policy has delivered returns of around 5 pc each year and is now worth a fivefigure sum. But the retired chartered engineer says he will consider moving his bond to another firm if the Bain Capital bid is successful, and plans to vote against the deal. Malcolm, who lives in Lincolnshire, says: The cash which Bain is offering to members is derisory. LV needs to be kept as a mutual. If it aint broke, dont fix it. Other customers are concerned about the perceived lack of transparency around the deal. They are also worried that bosses want to change LVs constitution to push the deal through. Currently, 75 per cent of voting members or more need to back the deal, with a turnout of at least 50 per cent. But LV is asking members to vote to ditch the 50 per centc requirement, which means it could go ahead with just a fraction of its members support. And even if the bosses lose this vote, they could still go ahead with the sale but members will be paid just 60 rather than 100. Derek Eade, 76, who has a five-figure sum invested in a with-profit growth bond, says all this uncertainty is unacceptable. John James is concerned other members will be tempted by a short-term reward of 100 The retired accountant, who lives with wife Pam, 74, in Epsom, Surrey, says: Policyholders need to know what they are voting for, especially the amount they will receive. Meanwhile, Joseph and Jennifer Schneider, from Bushey, Hertfordshire, are horrified that LV chairman Alan Cook is backing a move that would demutualise the business. The retired couple signed up to an LV pension plan more than a decade ago because they believed the firm cared about its members. But they have now lost trust in Mr Cook after discovering he was managing director of the Post Office between 2006 and 2010, when subpostmasters were falsely accused of theft. Joseph, 78, who has already voted against the deal, says: I just do not trust Bain Capital goodness knows what will happen to our pensions. Im ashamed and disgusted with the deal and Mr Cook should be ashamed of himself. John James, 72, is concerned that other members will be tempted by a short-term reward of 100 in cash. The retired construction project manager took out an annuity (which pays a regular income in retirement) with LV more than a quarter of a century ago. John, who lives in Norfolk, says: It is a terrifying thought that LV, a mutual, will be taken over by such a company. The 100 offer is a cheap joke, but other members could be easily influenced without looking at the long-term consequences. He is calling on City watchdog the Financial Conduct Authority to intervene to stop the deal going ahead. An LV spokesman says it needs significant investment to compete in a highly competitive market, adding: Whilst none of the bids would have allowed LV to remain as a stand-alone mutual, this deal provides the highest distribution to with-profits policyholders compared to continuing with business as usual or closing to new business. Matt Popoli, a managing director of Bain Capital, says its proposed investment maintains an independent LV, adding: To be sustainable and achieve long-term success, LV needs capital to address its heavy debt pile, fund its pension liabilities and invest for growth. f.parker@dailymail.co.uk Visit your local Barclays branch this week and prepare to be greeted by a new 6 ft sign. 'Look out for changes to banking in branch,' it reads. 'For everyday banking, you'll now need to use our self-service machines, the Barclays app or online banking.' This notice has now been placed near the entrance of 500 branches across the country. Automated service: Friendly cashiers, with whom you might once have been on first-name terms with, are increasingly being replaced by machines And the message is clear: the days of the traditional bank branch are numbered. The biggest banks have axed 2,766 branches in five years, according to Money Mail research. And as the regulator looks at halting more closures, banks are cutting branch services to the bone. Friendly cashiers, with whom you might once have been on first-name terms with, are increasingly being replaced by machines. Last month, Money Mail exposed how Barclays staff were refusing to help elderly and vulnerable customers in person, insisting they used a self-service machine instead due to pressures from head office. At the time, the bank said that these cases were unfortunate one-off incidents. But today, we can reveal how banks across the country are turning their backs on the traditional branch in a drive to boost profits. Bad sign: Signs have been appearing in Barclays branches since August suggesting a concerted drive to push customers online once and for all. Sign of the online times Both Barclays and HSBC, which have more than 32 million UK customers between them, are closing counters. Signs have been appearing in Barclays branches since August, suggesting a concerted drive to push customers online once and for all. Attached to a notice spotted in a London branch are two small plastic holders containing leaflets. One reads: 'Taking out less than 300 cash? Please use our self-service machines instead of the counter.' Another says the bank is 'on a mission to reduce how much paper we use' and includes detailed instructions on how to sign up for digital statements. If you still want a paper copy, 'you can use our online banking points in branch,' it adds. The branch also has a blackboard at the entrance boasting a list of telephone numbers customers can call to get help with their banking, rather than in branch. Both Barclays and HSBC, who have more than 32 million UK customers between them, are closing counters to ordinary customers Meanwhile, by the end of 2021, HSBC will have 208 counterless branches, more than a 40 per cent of its network. And 58 Lloyds locations are machine-only. Indeed, a Money Mail survey today reveals that almost one-in-five customers has been turned away when trying to use a counter. Banks say they are responding to customer demands. Yet nearly half of the 1,027 adults polled by Consumer Intelligence said they prefer a face-to-face service. Many explain this is so they can be sure their transaction is completed correctly. Others simply prefer speaking to a real person, and complained that the machines were often not working. Branches with no counters Bank branches have disappeared from our towns and cities at an alarming rate. High Street giants have shut 36 per cent of their branch network in the past five years alone. And at the end of June this year, 93 per cent of the biggest banks were still only open part-time after reducing their hours during the pandemic, according to City watchdog, the Financial Conduct Authority. One in three were not open after 3pm. Critics say the latest push to get customers online is an attempt to speed up closures, because by forcing customers to use machines, banks will find it easier to justify shutting more branches. Dennis Reed, from over-60s campaign group Silver Voices, says: 'The High Street is being dehumanised with more and more transactions becoming digital. 'With branch closures, reduced opening hours and face-to-face services, customers likely feel they are being forced online against their wishes.' Yet there is still a strong need for branches, particularly among the elderly and vulnerable. Some 38 pc of customers surveyed by Consumer Intelligence said they visit their branch at least once every three months. And one in five go several times a month. Of those, who said they rarely use a branch, many claimed this was because their bank had closed. But even when banks allow branches to remain open, many are limiting services, with some even refusing to accept cash. Of HSBC's counterless branches, just 19 have a coin pay-in machine, while the rest will not accept change. About 12 Barclays branches are cashless. Some 58 branches of Lloyds do not have counters, but the bank says cash and coins are still accepted. Many banks are also closing their counters hours before the branch shuts. Most Barclays branches open at 9.30am and close at 3.30pm or 4.30pm, while counters may shut as early as 2pm. TSB closes counters at 4pm, an hour before the branch. Nationwide says each branch is able to open or close counters depending on demand throughout the day. Bullied into using machines Even branches that still offer a counter service are increasingly restricting who can use it. Some say they are only for business customers, or those with more complex needs, such as the recently bereaved. It means anyone who just wants to bank a cheque, pay a bill or deposit cash is being turned away and sent to self-service machines instead. Barclays also has online banking points where you can print statements, pay bills and manage regular payments. And Nationwide has iPads where customers can open new accounts in branch. But many elderly customers complain that they find these machines difficult to use, and that they regularly reject their transactions which means they have to queue to use a counter anyway. Options: Santander says it asks its customers what they want to do in the branch to decide how to best help them Soaring numbers of customers are also complaining that they feel bullied and patronised by staff. Derek French, a former bank executive and founder of the campaign for community banking services, says: 'The big banks don't seem to want to interface with humans any longer. By making mass branch closures, reducing opening times and restricting counter access, they are getting there, but if that is not enough we are relentlessly pressured to take up their apps, do everything online and engage with robot chat lines. 'Enough is enough: please stop.' Rising backlash from customers Money Mail has been inundated with complaints from customers who feel aggrieved at the way they have been treated in branch. HSBC customer Sandra Hornblow, 71, says her local branch in Andover, Hants, has recently removed all its counters. When she visited earlier this month to deposit cash, she overheard an elderly gentleman trying to explain to staff that he could not use the machines because he had poor eyesight and did not have a computer to use online banking. She says: 'All he needed was someone to help him do what he wanted. What the large banks fail to realise is that they are making life extremely difficult for their elderly customers who do not have or want computers in their lives. A friendly cashier is all they want and expect from their bank.' Former bookkeeper Sandra also prefers the counter service. She says: 'If HSBC had asked any of us if we were happy with this decision, I think it would find lots of people would disagree. This is not progress, this is a cost-cutting exercise.' Pensioner Alan Stewart says his branch of Yorkshire Bank, which has since been rebranded as Virgin Money, in Scarborough refused to let him pay a 200 credit card bill with cash a few weeks ago. Abandoned: Last month we exposed how Barclays staff were refusing to help vulnerable customers in person - insisting they used a machine instead due to pressures from head office The former postman says he was told the bank does not take cash over the counter. So he had to pay by debit card and deposit the cash back into his account. Alan, 78, says: 'What are banks for if they refuse cash? Older people do not need this hassle and it feels as if the banks do not want to know us.' Tess Webster says she has been ordered to leave a queue for a counter twice in recent months. But both times she has had to rejoin after the machine failed to work. On one occasion, she had visited her local Barclays branch in Southport, Merseyside, to transfer money between accounts. There was one customer ahead of her but before she could be served, a cashier called out to ask what Tess, 69, wanted to do and directed her to a machine. However, because the sum involved was more than 2,000 the transaction was rejected, by which point there were eight people in front of her. Tess, a former administrator, says: 'There were lots of customers waiting around for staff to help them. The counter also closes earlier than the branch at 2pm or 2.30pm. And on one occasion staff were reluctant to help me as it was 15 minutes prior to closing. 'It was only after I kicked up a fuss that they dealt with the transfer by laptop. Barclays is letting us down.' Our story: Barclays blasted Cathy Harvey, 72, was shocked to see a new sign at her local Barclays branch in Pinner, Middlesex, ordering her to use self-service machines. And it took her four attempts to send 50 to her granddaughter for her birthday because an error message kept appearing. She says other customers were also struggling, with staff running around like 'headless chickens' trying to help. Cathy, who has been with Barclays for 30 years, says: 'I left feeling so angry. I just want to be able to go into a branch and do what I need to do. Why should we be forced to use machines?' What the banks say Barclays says if customers can carry out their transactions at a self-service point, they are directed to do so. With HSBC it depends on what type of branch you visit. Customers who visit one of its digital service branches must use machines as there are no counters. At other branches offering a full service, which are typically in cities, you will have choice. You can also use counters at sites based in communities with a greater need for cash. Lloyds, NatWest and Nationwide say staff may let customers know a self-service option is available, particularly if there are queues, but that customers can always use the counter service if preferred. NatWest also has a service called Banking My Way which allows customers to specify how they wish to be served. NatWest has a service called 'Banking My Way' which allows customers to specify how they wish to be served should they need extra time or a quiet space, for example Santander asks its customers what they want to do in the branch to decide how to best help them. TSB says it does not direct customers to use its machines. A Barclays spokesman says: 'We're sorry that these customers were upset at the service they encountered and being asked to use self-service machines. These machines allow branch colleagues to help a greater number of customers more effectively, and to become self-sufficient and feel more confident in managing their money themselves.' An HSBC spokesman says: 'We are very conscious that there will be some customers who are less confident or comfortable using self-service options, and we would like to assure them that we will not be leaving any of our customers high and dry. Branch staff are always on hand to help in the banking hall.' A Virgin Money spokesman says: 'Customers can pay their bills in store using cash. However, for security purposes, we ask customers to pay the cash into their account and then pay the bill from there. But we do not ask customers to pay the bill online.' a.murray@dailymail.co.uk Labour did not respond to a request for comment on why its members did not attend more meetings Meetings included evidence sessions on clearing NHS backlog and getting cancer services up and running A senior Tory said it is 'disappointing' any select committees has people that regularly do not turn up Meanwhile Tory members of the group attended around eight in 10 committee meetings in the last six months Two of them have attended just nine of the last 16 meetings, while the other two have only shown up for six Advertisement Labour MPs are turning up to fewer health committees designed to help the country recover from the pandemic than their Tory peers, MailOnline can reveal. Minutes show Labour representatives sitting on the Health and Social Care Committee have attended just half of its meetings in the last six months, on average. The equivalent figure for Conservative representatives was around 80 per cent. They include evidence sessions on clearing the Covid-fuelled NHS backlog and getting vital cancer services back up and running, as well as interrogating the Government over its response to the pandemic. The 11-member committee, headed by former Tory Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, has four Labour MPs on it. Two of them have attended just nine of the last 16 meetings, while the other two have only shown up for six. A senior Tory, who didn't want to be named, said: 'It's disappointing that any select committee should have people that regularly don't turn up, but particularly when what they are covering matters [that matter as] much as Covid.' Labour disputed the analysis, saying three of its members were excused by the chair for personal, health or other reasons. It also claimed its members played key roles in compiling evidence for the meetings, which grill senior ministers, and said rules barred them from attending virtually. Data shows that over the last six months, Tory MPs attended 82.5 per cent of oral evidence sessions, which are chaired by a Conservative party member. Meanwhile, the lone Scottish National Party MP on the committee went to 63 per cent and Labour MPs showed up for just 47 per cent. Labour members Rosie Cooper and Barbara Keeley attended 56 per cent of the meetings, while fellow party MPs Taiwo Owatemi and Sarah Owen showed up for less than four in 10. Meanwhile, Mr Hunt went to all the meetings , while Tory MPs Paul Bristow and Dr Luke Evans attended more than eight in 10. And Conservative party members Laura Trott and Dean Russell went to around 70 per cent Data shows that over the last six months, Tory MPs attended 82.5 per cent of oral session meetings. Meanwhile, the lone Scottish National Party MP on the committee went to 62.5 per cent. But she was only a member since May 25, meaning she effectively went to 76.9 per cet. Labour members Rosie Cooper and Barbara Keeley attended nine of the 16 meetings since the Government took the third step of its lockdown-easing plan in May. MPs launch inquiry into future of GPs as Jeremy Hunt warns the 'beating heart of the NHS is in crisis' due to staffing crisis and pandemic backlog MPs have launched an inquiry into the future of general practice, with former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt warning the service is 'in crisis'. There have been growing reports of patients showing up at A&E because they can't get access to a GP and not being seen face-to-face even when they do get an appointment. Cross-party MPs on the Health and Social Care Committee will examine the barriers stopping patients from accessing doctors and the challenges facing GPs. Mr Hunt, the Tory chair of the committee, said general practice is the 'beating heart of the NHS' but patients are 'increasingly uncertain of what they can expect'. He warned that doctors are 'utterly exhausted and demoralised'. GPs are currently facing crippling staff shortages, pandemic backlogs and unprecedented demand, with a record 28.5million appointments delivered in England last month. At the same time, the Government has scolded surgeries for not doing enough face-to-face consultations. Latest figures show just 60 per cent of GP appointments in September were in-person, compared to 80 per cent before the pandemic. Advertisement Fellow party MPs Taiwo Owatemi and Sarah Owen showed up for just six. The committee's chair Mr Hunt went to all the meetings, while Tory MPs Paul Bristow and Dr Luke Evans attended 14 and 13 meetings, respectively. And Conservative party members Laura Trott and Dean Russell went to 12 and 11 meetings, respectively. The eleventh member of the committee only joined last week, but has been to every meeting since then. The committee is responsible for scrutinising the Government and health service by examining policy, spending and administration. MPs on the committee often bring up local issues raised by their constituents, such as not being able to access crucial care. The committee, alongside the Science and Technology Committee, famously grilled Dominic Cummings when he detailed the Government's shambolic initial Covid response and called for the then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock to be sacked. And the two committees also questioned Mr Hancock over his handling of care homes, particularly his decision to send untested hospital patients back into care homes last spring. It has been singled out as the leading factor behind the crisis in the sector. All MPs on the Health Committee were present for the two sessions with Mr Cummings, which took place in May and Mr Hancock, which occurred in June. Around a quarter of the meetings in the last six months have been on clearing the NHS backlog caused by the pandemic. The MPs will produce a report on the level of pent-up demand in the health service and what changes need to be made within the organisation to manage the waiting list. And the inquiry which involved quizzing NHS England bosses Amanda Pritchard and Professor Stephen Powis will determine how much cash and staff are needed to clear the backlog, including in elective surgery, A&E, general practice and mental health. Another quarter of the meetings were on the cancer services inquiry, which is investigating why cancer outcomes in England are worse than other countries. During the committee's evidence sessions on cancer services, Professor Mike Griffin (pictured left), a cancer surgeon, said cancer survival rates could stall over the next decade due to the impact of coronavirus on the NHS. And Professor Pat Price (pictured right), a consultant clinical oncologist, said cancer doctors have been told to make sure a tenth of their staff are available to be redeployed to the NHS frontline this winter The committee will also determine how the pandemic has affected cancer services and what needs to happen to catch up. As part of evidence sessions, top doctors told the committee cancer survival rates could stall over the next decade due to the impact of the pandemic on the NHS. MPs also heard how oncologists were made to 'clear bedpans' on Covid wards or redeployed as 'mortuary assistants' instead of treating cancer patients. But no Labour MPs were present at the two most recent meetings on cancer care when these issues were brought up. Other meetings were on the lessons learnt from the coronavirus, which resulted in the report that laid bare the Government's catalogue of failures during the pandemic, leading to thousands of needless deaths. It also castigated the 'chaotic' performance of the 37billion test and trace system and found ministers were blinded by 'groupthink' among scientific advisers, who wrongly wanted to manage the spread of the virus, rather than suppress it. And other meetings on supporting people with dementia resulted in a damning report that sufferers will rack up tens of thousands of pounds up in care costs before the Government's health and social levy comes in in 2023. The report called for 'significant additional investment' in the sector within weeks, as well as a 'bold funding reform and long-term plan'. Tourists have been left stunned as millions of red crabs are seen making their yearly migration to the ocean to breed on the picturesque Christmas Island. Over 50 million of the blazing red crabs will make the journey from the jungle to the coast of the National Park, in Western Australia's far northwest. Locals and travellers alike have raced to capture what is considered one of the greatest animal migrations on the planet as the creatures turn the island red. In footage of the natural phenomenon the crustaceans are seen swarming across roads, bridges, rocks and streams to reach their destination in time to breed. Tourists have been left stunned as millions of Red Crabs are seen making their yearly migration to the ocean to breed on the picturesque Christmas Island (pictured) The crabs have been known to turn up in some pretty bizarre locations as they move over the cliffs and through the township. Staff on the island spend several months preparing for the migration by building specially constructed crab bridges and temporary barriers. Dr Tanya Detto, an invasive species program coordinator at Christmas Island, told Daily Mail Australia the area hadn't seen so many migrating crabs since 2005. Dr Detto said the team had been spending a lot of time managing the bridges and barriers that helped keep the crabs safe on their journey to Flying Fish Cove. 'It's been really nice to see them being funnelled away from the traffic and getting there safely,' she said. The specialist said while experts on the island could predict the rough route the crustaceans would take, it alternated slightly each year. While some crabs got stuck climbing over three-storey buildings or fell from the island's limestone cliffs, she said most of the crustaceans would survive. The highly-anticipated migration is usually triggered by the first rainfall of the wet season that occurs in October or November. A few days of solid rain at the start of the month prompted the male crabs to leave their homes and march towards the beach, picking up females on the way. Christmas Island has the largest population of red crabs in the world with tourists warned the crustaceans are 'protected and respected' in the area Staff on the island spend several months preparing for the migration by building specially constructed crab bridges (pictured) and temporary barriers In footage of the natural phenomenon the crustaceans are seen swarming across roads, bridges, rocks and streams to reach their destination and breed The exact timing and speed of the migration is determined by the phase of the moon with the crabs predicted to spawn on the 29th or 30th of this month. The clever crustaceans know exactly how to time the departure from their burrows to reach the beach in time for optimal spawning. Each female crab will release a staggering 100,000 eggs into the Indian Ocean over five or six consecutive nights during the migration. One month later, the baby red crabs will return to shore to make the journey home into the tropical forest of the island. However, the vast majority of the larvae will be feasted on by fish, manta rays and the giant whale sharks that wait in the surrounding waters for the annual feast. The clever crabs know exactly how to time the departure from their burrows to reach the beach in time for optimal spawning on this lunar date The highly-anticipated migration is usually triggered by the first rainfall of the wet season that occurs in October or November Bianca Priest, the acting manager of Christmas Island said the incredible natural event took place on the picturesque island every year. 'Christmas Island National Park staff put up kilometres of temporary barriers, erect signs and close roads across the island to protect millions of crabs leaving their forest homes for the coast,' Ms Priest said. 'Over the years visitors have travelled from every corner of the world to witness this wildlife phenomenon.' Roads on the island can be closed unexpectedly to cater for the crab's movements with public notice boards and local radio providing updates on their passage. Visitors are encouraged to park their cars and carefully walk among the sea of bright red creatures making their way to the shore Roads on the island can be closed unexpectedly to cater for the crab's movements with public notice boards and local radio providing updates The vast majority of Red Crab larvae will be feasted on by fish, manta rays and the giant whale sharks that inhabit the surrounding waters Visitors are encouraged to park their cars and carefully walk among the sea of bright red crabs as they make their way to shore and amass on the rocks. The island is also home to another species of crustacean known as the robber crab. The creatures are harmless despite their menacing appearance and have been known to steal items from campsites, earning them their namesake. This species can measure up to a metre in length and have a strong sense of smell that often sees the crabs wind-up in some unlikely locations. Last year, campers on the island captured the moment they were surrounded by dozens of the giant robber crabs as they tried to enjoy a family barbecue. Last year, campers on the island captured the moment they were surrounded by dozens of giant robber crabs as they tried to enjoy a family barbecue A series of amazing photos show more than 52 of the clawsome creatures eagerly awaiting a chance to snack on some leftovers A series of amazing photos showed more than 52 of the creatures eagerly awaiting a chance to snack on some leftovers. The crabs were seen scaling fold-out chairs, tables and even the barbecue to get closer to the delicious meal being prepared. Amy Luetich and her family had lived on Christmas Island for a few years and were camping with some other families in the tropical jungle of Grants Well. 'We have camped in that area a few times and we have never seen so many robber grabs,' Mrs Luetich she told Daily Mail Australia last year. She said when they arrived there were 20 under a tree, which had started to seed. The crabs were seen swarming across specially constructed bridges to make their way to the ocean in time for optimal spawning Red Crabs are considered a delicacy with aphrodisiac qualities across the Pacific, but are considered a protected species in Australia and can't be eaten 'But as soon as we started cooking, they swarmed around us. My son counted 52 of them,' she recalled. 'His job was to pick them up and move them away from where we were eating. He was loving it. 'We kept our tents away from where we had eaten, but one of the families said the whole night they could feel one tapping on the outside of their tent.' Christmas Island has the largest population of red crabs in the world with tourists warned the crustaceans are 'protected and respected' in the area. Robber crabs are considered a delicacy with aphrodisiac qualities across the Pacific, but are considered a protected species in Australia and can't be eaten. E-cigarette maker Juul has been sued by the Attorney General of North Carolina, with the company accused of creating products that target children. Josh Stein announced on Tuesday that he is suing the founders of Juul over his concerns that their product is being marketed to children through kid-friendly flavors and poor age verification. Stein said he is suing Juul founders James Monsees and Adam Bowen, who launched the company in 2015 and are now worth an estimated $900 million each. Juul accounted for 63 per cent of all U.S. nicotine vaping sales in 2020, making it the largest nicotine vaping brand in the United States by far. Accounting for about a quarter of that year's dollar sales, Vuse stood in second place. Stein also said he is launching a statewide investigation into several e-cigarette manufacturers, distributors and retailers. 'All companies and individuals involved in manufacturing, distributing and selling e-cigarettes in North Carolina should hear this message loud and clear,' Stein said. 'If you get North Carolina's teens addicted to nicotine, there will be consequences.' Josh Stein, the Attorney General of North Carolina, is seen in June announcing a settlement had been reached with Juul, with the company paying $40 million. On Tuesday he announced a new suit against the e-cigarette company Juul's co-founders, Adam Bowen (left) and James Monsees are seen in December 2018, when the company was valued at $38 billion. Their firm is now worth less than $5 billion Teenage use of e-cigarettes has surged in recent years, a trend that largely coincided with the rise in popularity of Juul in 2017 and 2018. E-cigarette use among high school students grew from 11.7 per cent in 2017 to 27.5 per cent in 2019, before declining to 19.6 per cent last year, according to a federal survey. North Carolina was the first state to sue Juul, in May 2019. In June this year, Juul Labs Inc. agreed to pay $40 million to North Carolina and take more action to prevent underage use and sales under the terms of an agreement with the state - the settlement preventing a trial scheduled for July from going ahead. Stein had sued Juul previously, accusing it of employing unfair and deceptive practices that targeted young people to use its vaping products, which deliver addictive nicotine. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia have now sued Juul, seeking money to pay for combating the youth vaping crisis. A criminal investigation of the company by the Justice Department is still underway. There is also multi-district litigation in a federal court in California, which has combined nearly 2,000 cases filed by cities, counties and school districts under the purview of one judge, similar to the treatment of opioid cases. Juul's advertising, pictured, has been accused of targeting young people Juul products are seen on sale in New York City in January 2020. Fourteen states, including New York, have now placed restrictions on Juul and are taking legal action On December 20, 2018, Altria, one of the world's largest cigarette manufacturers, bought 35 per cent of Juul for $12.8 billion - the deal valued Juul Labs at $38 billion. Yet the company has been in the crosshairs of concerned parents and regulators ever since, and is now worth less than $5 billion. Facing a backlash from parents, teachers and regulators, including state attorneys general, Juul stopped selling its popular fruit- and mint-flavored nicotine pods in 2019, ahead of an FDA ban on such flavors in early 2020. Over the last two years, Juul has tried to repair its relationship with regulators and the public by taking a lower profile. It stopped print, TV and online advertising in 2019, and pulled back on its international expansion plans to focus on winning regulatory approval in the United States. Federal survey data from last year showed that Juul's popularity among teenagers declined significantly from 2019, but was offset by increases in teenage use of other brands. Juul was still the most popular brand among teenagers, according to the survey. Stein also targeted another e-cigarette company that he said sells kid-friendly flavors such as chocolate milk and strawberry doughnut. He also said his investigation would look into retailers statewide which are located near middle schools and high schools who are selling e-cigarettes, three distributors and one online seller. The attorney general said he would urge Robert Califf, nominated to be commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) by President Joe Biden, to create national, industry-wide regulations on flavored e-cigarettes. James Monsees is seen testifying before the House Economic and Consumer Policy Subcommittee - which was examining Juul's role in the youth nicotine epidemic - in July 2019 Juul and other e-cigarette makers were ordered to submit, by September 2020, applications to the FDA showing their products provided a net benefit to public health. Juul has not made its 125,000-page application to the agency public. But it paid $51,000 to have the entire May/June issue of the American Journal of Health Behavior devoted to publishing 11 studies funded by the company offering evidence that Juul products help smokers quit, according to The New York Times. The companies were given a one-year grace period to remain on the market without FDA enforcement, while the agency reviewed applications. A decision was expected in September 2021, but has been delayed. The agency said on September 9 that it continues to 'work expeditiously on the remaining applications,' adding many are 'in the final stages of review.' It said products that have not been authorized by the FDA - a category that now includes Juul after the one-year grace period - 'are subject to enforcement action at the FDA's discretion.' The agency said it will work 'as quickly as possible to provide regulatory certainty' and is prioritizing enforcement of e-cigarette products that have not applied for FDA authorization. The FDA's scientific review of e-cigarettes will decide whether they are effective in getting smokers to quit and, if so, whether the benefits to smokers outweigh the health damage to new users - including teenagers - who never smoked. E-cigarettes have operated in a regulatory gray area for years. The products, which vaporize a nicotine-laced liquid, have been available in the United States since at least 2007, but the FDA did not formally get jurisdiction over the industry until May 2016. During that time, Juul and dozens of competitors introduced products that were grandfathered into the market because they were already being sold before the regulation took effect. Juul was valued at $38 billion in December 2018, but is now worth less than $5 billion The 2016 rule required e-cigarette makers to file extensive applications to the FDA by August 2018 demonstrating the public health benefits of their products, along with data on potential toxins. Under the administration of Donald Trump, the FDA pushed back the application date to 2022, but public health groups sued in federal court and succeeded in getting the deadline moved up to last year. In June, FDA acting Commissioner Dr. Janet Woodcock told a congressional panel the agency had received applications for 6.5 million products from more than 550 companies, and said reviewing all submissions by September 9 'will be challenging.' In August, the agency denied marketing applications for nearly 55,000 flavored e-cigarette products from three small companies for failing to provide evidence they appropriately protect public health. The FDA has so far denied applications from more than 100 companies, but has not made a decision on Juul or other major tobacco industry players. An elite school on Auckland's North Shore has come under fire after 30 students turned up to school drunk for their last day. More than 30 Year 13 Takapuna Grammar students spent last Friday drinking alcohol in the school common room as part of end of year celebrations. A fellow student said they saw a number of senior students on the school grounds visibly drunk, according to the NZ Herald. More than 30 Year 13 Takapuna Grammar (pictured) students spent last Friday drinking on school grounds as part of end-of-year celebrations In a letter to parents, the school said it was 'disappointed' to learn some senior students had made 'poor choices'. 'I am deeply disappointed to inform you that today a significant number of Year 13 students have made poor choices that resulted in them breaking school rules and not living up to the school community's expectations,' the letter read. 'This behaviour had been planned by the students, so they had plenty of opportunity to decide whether or not to go ahead or not with these arrangements. 'These students went ahead regardless of the consequences.' Principal Mary Nixon went on to say the behaviour had 'tarnished' the relationship staff had with students and cancelled further end-of-year celebrations. However, an event planned for Monday was rescheduled to later in the week after Ms Nixon decided to honour students who made 'good choices'. In a second letter to parents on Sunday, she said the school needed to send a 'clear message' to students on last week's behaviour. Principal Mary Nixon went on to say the behaviour had 'tarnished' the relationship staff had with students at the prestigious grammar school (pictured, stock photo) 'I remind everyone that the priority for the school is the safety of our students and Friday's events put students involved at risk and was a harmful example to the younger students observing the unacceptable behaviour of senior students. 'We cannot condone such conduct and need to send a clear message to all our students to prevent others following this poor example,' she said. Ms Nixon added the school was 'letdown' students took advantage of their privileges but concluded those who did the right thing didn't deserve to be punished. An end-of-year BBQ will still be held with students who attended the event last Friday discouraged from going to the event. Senior students at Takapuna Grammar have had a tough year after the school only reopened for face-to-face learning to Years 11, 12 and 13 on October 26. Auckland's ongoing Covid-19 Delta outbreak had delayed the return as students faced increased pressure in the lead up to assessments and upcoming exams. The institution had decided to remain closed after the government gave the green light for schools to reopen. A manhunt is underway for two men police would like to speak to about the shooting death of a Melbourne rapper which they describe as a targeted attack. Chris Habiyakare was at his Sunshine North home in Melbourne's west on the night of August 24 when he was confronted by a group of males at the front door. Police say the intruders forced their way inside the home and were armed with various weapons including a gun. Two men and three women visiting Mr Habiyakare at the time fled outside with one woman forced to smash a window to escape. Habiyakare was involved in a physical altercation with the group before he was shot. Chris Habiyakare (pictured) was shot dead during an altercation with a group of males at his Sunshine North home on August 24 The group then fled the scene in at least one vehicle. One of the friends who was visiting Habiyakare at the time called triple-0 before commencing CPR. Habiyakare died at the scene, despite desperate attempts to revive him. Three months on, Homicide Squad detectives have released photos of two males they would like speak to as part of their inquiries. They are keen to speak to anyone who might know these men and are also appealing for the men themselves to come forward. Investigators believe the shooting was a targeted incident but are yet to establish an exact motive. Habiyakare went by the rap name Lyr1cur7 and had just started gaining traction in the Australian hip-hop scene, with a freestyle released last year notching up a million views on YouTube. Homicide detectives have released images of two men (pictured) they would like to speak to Police attended the home three days earlier on August 21 following reports of a physical altercation. 'At this stage one of the lines of enquiry is determining if there are any links between this and the subsequent fatal shooting,' a statement read. 'At this stage this is only one, but a very important, line of enquiry for police.' Detectives are also keen to speak to anyone else who may have knowledge of the incidents or the circumstances leading up to the shooting. 'I believe there are people out there who can identify those involved in Chris' death,' Detective Inspector Tim Day said. 'It's time for those people to do the right thing and come forward.' Detectives have spent the last three months investigating the death of Chris Habiyakare He added Habiyakare was known to police and had a history involving drugs. 'However he was also much loved by his family and friends, all of whom are still grieving his loss and searching for answers as to why this has occurred,' Det Insp Day 'We need to speak to anyone who can shed light on the motive for the shooting and why Chris might have been targeted.' While a significant CCTV canvas of the vicinity has already been conducted, police urge anyone with additional footage between 5pm and 10pm on the night of August 24 to come forward. A 'vanlife' family who were stranded in the South Australian outback for five days have assured their followers they are safe and well as they finally head home. Orios and Lindsey Zavros along with their children Zoe, three, and Zane, two, were travelling through the Simpson Desert when their van became bogged amid heavy rain on Friday morning. Efforts to rescue the family, who live in Perth, were hindered by bad weather but a helicopter was finally able to winch them to safety just after 4pm on Tuesday. Posting to their Instagram page Trucking OZ, Mr and Mrs Zavros thanked those who were supporting them during the terrifying five-day stint stuck in the desert. Orios and Lindsey Zavros along with their children Zoe, three, and Zane, two, were travelling around the Simpson Desert when their van became bogged amid heavy rain on Friday morning. (pictured is the family with rescue workers) 'We are safe! We have so many people to thank, so many messages and emails etc to reply to,' the family wrote. 'We will reply to every one of you soon. 'Right now our priority is making sure Zoe and Zane are comfortable and finding a way home asap.' Police confirmed the family were airlifted to Coober Pedy where they stayed the night and will now make their own way back to Perth. A paramedic was on board the helicopter as a precaution but there were no reports of anyone being injured. Mr Zavros said they feared they could have been stranded in the desert for weeks as the bad weather lingered and temperatures soared above a scorching 40C. 'It's been emotional, a bit of a rollercoaster but we got through it,' he told the ABC. A helicopter has winched the young Perth family to safety after they were bogged in the outback for several days 'Vanlife' couple Orios and Lindsey Zavros and their children Zoe and Zane (pictured) have finally been rescued after becoming stranded in the Simpson Desert in outback South Australia The family have been travelling around Australia in their campervan The family had set off their emergency beacon at about 10am on Friday. The Australian Maritime Safety Authority were able to send a plane from Melbourne to drop essential supplies over the weekend which included a phone to call to Mr Zavros' parents, nappies, DVDs and food and water. 'As soon as they dropped that sat phone to us, we were safe,' he said. The family developed a daily routine while stuck in the outback, including morning and afternoon walks, snacking on icy poles and watching a lot of Bluey on DVD. 'I don't regret it, it was an adventure I wouldn't do it again,' Mrs Stavros said. The AMSA and SA Police had coordinated a rescue effort, which initially planned to dig the campervan out of the mud so the family could make their own way out. However, they resigned to flying the family out of the area after digging no longer seemed like a feasible option due to bad weather. Orios, Zane, Lindsey and Zoe Zavros (pictured) have been travelling around Australia in a campervan Mr Zavros' mum Theo and dad Lagis Zavros spoke with their son and his family on 'a very crackly satellite phone' on Sunday. They were hugely relieved to find the family was coping well with their predicament. 'If you could pick the worst place in Australia to break down it would be there,' Lagis Zavros told The West Australian. Theo Zavros said the four-hour wait to get confirmation her family was safe was 'hectic and horrible'. She said three-year-old Zoe and two-year-old Zane were both coping well, but that the older child is more sensitive and understands some of what is going on. Zane told his grandmother on the call: 'Yaya, I love you'. Yaya is Greek for grandmother. Just hours before the disaster, the Zavros' posted on Instagram announcing how excited they were for the next leg of their journey. 'After three days of driving, we made it!' they wrote, sharing a photo of their van parked at Birdsville, near the Queensland-South Australian border. 'Bring on the Simpson Desert.' The family shared a photo of themselves in Birdsville, Queensland on Thursday, writing: 'after three days of driving, we made it! Bring on the Simpson Desert. Posts on the family's Instagram account shows little Zane and Zoe enjoying a swim in Fraser Island, a paddle-board in the Whitsundays and moments of everyday life in the van The cold front responsible for the heavy showers hit South Australia on Wednesday, bringing gale-force winds and a near-record amount of rain. The wild weather caused power outages in Adelaide and the Alberga River in the state's far north to flow for the first time in 18 months. The family has been careening across Australia since November 2020, with the modified vehicle taking them from the west coast of WA, across the south and east of South Australia, Darwin, and Queensland. They documented their outback adventures in their 'truck and home built camper' on an Instagram account Trucking Oz. The account boasts more than 6,000 followers with an accompanying YouTube channel also giving followers an inside look at the highs and lows of van life. A manhunt is underway for a young man caught on camera acting suspiciously at a Queensland shopping centre. The man, aged in his early to mid-20s, visited Riverlink Shopping Centre in North Ipswich on Thursday, September 9, from 2.30pm to 8pm, and allegedly filmed up several women's skirts with his mobile phone. Police said that the young man lurked around numerous stores in the shopping complex during the six-hour period. The man, aged in his early to mid-20s, visited Riverlink Shopping Centre in North Ipswich on Thursday September 9 from 2.30pm to 8pm CCTV footage obtained by Nine News from a store inside the centre showed a young man wandering around, looking at sunglasses and eyeing up clothing items. The man could be seen kneeling in front of a display in the footage. He allegedly positioned his mobile phone to allegedly film a woman within a close distance. Police said the man would also pretend to tie his shoelace at other times while allegedly filming the woman. He is described as white, about 175cm tall with dark brown, neatly cut hair. The young man was wearing a cream coloured t-shirt with a large grey print on the chest, black shorts, tan sneakers and a light blue surgical mask, holding a black mobile phone and wallet. Police said that the young man (pictured) was seen allegedly upskirting several women with his phone, and lurked around many stores in the shopping complex during the six-hour period Footage from a store inside the centre showed the young man kneel to the ground looking at stock in front of him while he allegedly situated his mobile phone to film a woman close by He was seen leaving the shopping centre at about 8pm in a silver Ford Falcon, driving in the direction of the Warrego Highway through the suburb of Brassal. Police urge anyone with information as to the identity or whereabouts of the man pictured to contact them. Any women who encountered the man or have information to assist are also urged to contact police. The House on Wednesday will vote on a resolution to censure GOP Rep. Paul Gosar, after the Arizona congressman shared an animated video photoshopped to show him killing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and President Joe Biden. He would be just the 24th House member in history to be censured, the Hill reported. The resolution would force Gosar to stand in the well of the House in front of his peers while the resolution is read aloud. The last member to be so censured was longtime New York Rep. Charles Rangel, who was stripped of his powerful Ways and Means Committee after a long fight that culminated in the censure, over misuse of congressional letterhead for fundraising and filing inaccurate financial reports and tax returns. Gosar defended sharing a photoshopped anime video online last week that showed him killing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez when he addressed fellow Republicans behind closed doors on Tuesday, reportedly saying he had not seen the violence before it was posted and that he was trying to reach a younger audience. The censure resolution notes that defense as one of its clauses, which highlight violence against women. 'Whereas, on November 7, 2021, Representative Paul Gosar posted a manipulated video on his social media accounts depicting himself killing Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking President Joseph Biden,' it begins. It states that 'depictions of violence can foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials,' and references the Jan. 6th riot. 'Whereas violence against women in politics is a global phenomenon meant to silence women and discourage them from seeking positions of authority and participating in public life, with women of color disproportionately impacted,' the resolution states. Democrats can pass it on a simple majority. One Republican, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), has said Gosar should be censured 'for his continued indefensible activities.' She sits on the House Select Committee on Jan. 6th. 'That is an insult, not only endangerment of that member of Congress, but an insult to the institution of the House of Representatives,' said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Tuesday. 'We cannot have members joking about murdering each other, as well as threatening the President of the United States,' she said. Events at Tuesday night's Rules Committee hearing foreshadowed a tense debate. 'What do you stand for? Do you stand for violence against women, or do you stand against it?' asked Rep. Norma Torres (D-Calif.). 'Its almost as if weve elevated this and made it more of a problem than it ever was, said Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Tex.). Republicans also complained that the matter didn't go before the bipartisan House Ethics Committee. The House could also consider a resolution to strip him of his membership on the influential House Government Oversight and Reform Committee, where he holds a seat and where Ocasio-Cortez also sits, although it was not included in a resolution being debated at Rules Tuesday. The resolution is authored by Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), who survived the Jonestown massacre and came forward in 2017 to describe being sexually assaulted as a young congressional staffer. The altered anime video shows a jetpack equipped Gosar attacking AOC with a sword Gosar reportedly told fellow Republicans at a Tuesday meeting that he had not seen the violence before the video was posted and that he simply wanted to reach a younger audience The video shows Gosar attacking Rep. Ocasio-Cortez with a sword House resolution to censure Rep. Paul Gosar Whereas, on November 7, 2021, Representative Paul Gosar posted a manipulated video on his social media accounts depicting himself killing Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking President Joseph Biden; Whereas the video was posted on Representative Gosars official Instagram account and used the resources of the House of Representatives to further violence against elected officials; Whereas Representative Gosar issued a statement on November 9, 2021, defending the video as a symbolic cartoon and spreading hateful and false rhetoric about immigrants; Whereas the leadership of the Republican Party has failed to condemn Representative Gosars threats of violence against the President of the United States and a fellow Member of Congress; Whereas the Speaker of the House made clear that threats of violence against Members of Congress and the President of the United States should not be tolerated and called on the Committee on Ethics of the House and law enforcement to investigate the video; Whereas depictions of violence can foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials, as witnessed in this chamber on January 6, 2021; Whereas violence against women in politics is a global phenomenon meant to silence women and discourage them from seeking positions of authority and participating in public life, with women of color disproportionately impacted; Whereas a 2016 survey by the Inter-Parliamentary Union found that 82 percent of women parliamentarians have experienced psychological violence and 44 percent received threats of death, sexual violence, beatings, or abduction during their term; Whereas the participation of women in politics makes our government more representative and just: Now, therefore, be it 1 Resolved, That Representative Paul Gosar of Arizona be 3 censured; Representative Paul Gosar forthwith 5 present himself in the well of the House of Representatives for the pronouncement of censure; and Representative Paul Gosar be censured with the public reading of this resolution by the Speaker. Advertisement During a closed-door G.O.P. conference meeting, Gosar said he did not support violence against members of Congress and had removed the video after criticism. 'It was not his intent to ever harm anybody,' House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy told reporters afterwards, according to The Hill. And Politico reported Gosar told his colleagues that he didnt intend to encourage violence, but was trying to appeal to 'a younger audience.' 'McCarthy told members at conference that Rs should be united on this & that Dems dont punish their own for comments,' tweeted reporter Olivia Beavers. But the controversy comes amid a rise in threats to lawmakers, who feel particularly vulnerable in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on Congress. The video shows a sword-wielding character with Gosar's superimposed face using a jetpack to soar onto a rooftop before attacking Ocasio-Cortez, striking her with the weapon as blood flies out of her. 'The cartoon depicts the symbolic nature of a battle between lawful and unlawful policies and in no way intended to be a targeted attack against Representative Cortez or Mr. Biden,' said Gosar last week. 'It is a symbolic cartoon. It is not real life. Congressman Gosar cannot fly.' Gosar is a close ally of former President Trump's and embraced his false claims that the election was stolen from him. The original video is from the Japanese anime series Attack on Titan. But the doctored version includes Biden and Ocasio-Cortez's faces projected on to villains. Ten Democrats introduced a resolution to censure Gosar. 'As the events of January 6th have shown, such vicious and vulgar messaging can and does foment actual violence. Violence against women in politics is a global phenomenon meant to silence women and discourage them from seeking positions of authority and participating in public life, with women of color disproportionately impacted,' they said. Democrats have not yet decided whether to bring it to the House floor this week, but a vote would make Gosar only the 24th House member to be censured in the chamber's history. McCarthy has also come under pressure from members of his own party to act. Liz Cheney, dumped out of a party leadership role earlier this year for her opposition to former President Trump, accused him of lacking strength. 'In a moment where you've got an avowed white nationalist in Rep. Gosar who has posted a video advocating the killing of another member, the idea that our leader will not stand against that but that hes somehow going after and allowing attacks against 13 members who are conducting themselves in a serious and substantive way is really outrageous,' she told the Associated Press. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has gone even further, calling on the House Ethics Committee and federal law enforcement to investigate Gosar. Dramatic images have captured the moment a shoeless man in sweatpants was arrested on a suburban street after allegedly trying to lure a child he was talking to online for sex. The 37-year-old was arrested in Summer Hill in Sydney's inner-west on Tuesday and charged with a string of child-abuse related charges. Australian Federal Police allege he sent indecent messages to a child under the age of 16 and tried to lure them into having sex with him. A shoeless man has been arrested on a suburban street in Summer Hill in Sydney's inner-west after allegedly trying to lure a child he was talking to online for sex The man has been charged with four offences including using a carriage service to procure a person under the age of 16 for sexual activity He was seen with his head bowed as federal officers led him into the back of a police paddy wagon. Investigators have since seized a smartphone after carrying out a search warrant at his home in the same suburb. The 37-year-old has been charged with four offences including using a carriage service to procure a person under the age of 16 for sexual activity. That offence alone carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison. He was also charged with transmitting indecent communications to a person under 16, one count of contravening a prohibition order and one of failing to comply with reporting obligations. The man was due to appear at Burwood Local Court on Tuesday. The 37-year-old has been charged with four offences including using a carriage service to procure a person under the age of 16 for sexual activity Police allege he came to their attention after child exploitation officers received a tip-off from a member of the public about a man communicating online with a child. 'This outcome shows that the AFP can make a difference to protect children and ensure suspected offenders are put before the courts,' Detective Acting Sergeant Thompson said. The man's phone will now be forensically examined by detectives. Attorney and Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz branded CNN and the New Yorker 'the real vigilantes' in the Rittenhouse case for 'convicting' him before the trial. During an interview with Breitbart's Joel Pollak on the SiriusXM show, Dershowitz said he hoped that the 18-year-old should be acquitted on murder charges for fatally shooting two and wounding a third during unrest in Kenosha last year. He also blasted left wing media for trying and convicting Rittenhouse in the court of public opinion, while supporters of Rittenhouse confronted Black Lives Matter protestors outside of the courthouse on Tuesday during jury deliberations. 'CNN and some of the other TV stations have become vigilantes,' he said. 'They're the vigilantes, not Rittenhouse. They're the ones who want to put not the thumb, but the elbow on the scale of justice. They want to influence the outcome of this case.' Eighteen jurors began deliberating Tuesday at the murder trial of Kyle Rittenhouse, 18, after listening to dueling portrayals of him as a 'wannabe soldier' who left his home in Illinois armed and looking for trouble, or a concerned citizen who came under attack while trying to protect property in Kenosha. As their hushed deliberations began away from public view, protesters descended on the courthouse. Jurors called time on their deliberations shortly before 6pm, and will resume on Wednesday morning. Five hundred National Guardsmen remain on stand-by near Kenosha, ready to step in if the situation escalates. Attorney and Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz (pictured) branded news outlets as 'the real vigilantes' in the Rittenhouse case for convicting him before the trial 'CNN and some of the other TV stations have become vigilantes,' Dershowitz said. 'They're the vigilantes, not Rittenhouse' Dershowitz contended that there was no tangible evidence to convict Rittenhouse (left), and compared his situation to that of infamous New York subway vigilante Bernhard Goetz (right), who shot four young black men in 1984, only to be acquitted of murder charges on self-defense grounds. Rittenhouse fatally shot two and wounded a third during unrest in Kenosha last year Rittenhouse is facing charges of first-degree intentional homicide, first-degree reckless homicide, attempted first-degree intentional homicide, and two counts of first-degree recklessly endangering safety. Dershowitz slammed media outlets for meddling in the case without legal grounds and asserted that Rittenhouse truly believed his life was in danger and acted in self-defense. 'And there are others who are threatening violence if there is anything but convictions in this case, as they threatened violence in previous cases and will in subsequent cases unless something is done about it. It's The New Yorker and CNN that are the vigilantes. They're the ones who are trying to influence justice without regard to evidence or the law,' Dershowitz went on to say. Dershowitz contended that there was no tangible evidence to convict Rittenhouse, and compared his situation to that of infamous New York subway vigilante Bernhard Goetz, who shot four young black men in 1984, only to be acquitted of murder charges on self-defense grounds. 'He [Rittenhouse] should be acquitted. There shouldn't even be - the jury should not be even able to consider the attempted murder of the guy who admitted on the witness stand he pointed a gun at him before was shot in the shoulder. That is a clear case of self-defense, no doubt about it, and it should never go to the jury,' Dershowitz said. He added: 'He seems to me to be sincere... Would a 17-year-old involved in the situation he was involved in - surrounded by people, etc - would that person reasonably believe.. reason can be expected in the presence of an unconflicted night? What about in the presence of guns and skateboards.' Host Joel Pollak also brought up the fact that Rittenhouse had been knocked on the head with a skateboard by one of the fatal victims before the shooting, and Dershowitz agreed that a head injury might have affected Rittenhouse's judgment of the situation. The moderate Democrat also offered some insight into why the outcome of the trial depended on the jury, and said that judges do not want to be the subject of vilification for convicting or acquitting the defense. 'Judges don't want to be responsible for letting defenses go free. They would much prefer to let the jury do it, which s why the judge didn't declare on this trial,' Dershowitz said. With the jury quietly tucked away deliberating Kyle Rittenhouse's fate, decorum outside the Wisconsin courthouse dissolved into angry protests on Tuesday with the arrival of BLM activists and Second Amendment enthusiasts. Protesters argue outside the Kenosha County Courthouse, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021 in Kenosha, Wis., during the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial. Rittenhouse is accused of killing two people and wounding a third during a protest over police brutality in Kenosha, last year Supporters of Kyle Rittenhouse stand in front of the Kenosha County Courthouse while the jury deliberates the Rittenhouse trial on November 16, 2021 in Kenosha, Wisconsin An armed security guard wearing riot gear was among those outside. The guard told DailyMail.com he had been hired by a TV station to provide security for journalists who had been threatened recently Supporters of Kyle Rittenhouse stand in front of the Kenosha County Courthouse while the jury deliberates the Rittenhouse trial on November 16, 2021 in Kenosha, Wisconsin The jury has now begun deliberating whether or not to convict the teenage gunman, whose case has divided the nation. Rittenhouse, now 18, was 17 when he shot dead two white BLM protesters at a riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin, last August, and injured a third. His lawyers say he was a scared boy acting in self-defense, eager to protect the town as it fell under siege from an angry mob. Prosecutors tried to paint him as a bloodthirsty vigilante and an embodiment of the systemic racism his victims were protesting against. The jury began discussions this morning, after a dramatic two-week trial and as their hushed deliberations began away from public view, protesters descended on the courthouse. An armed security guard wearing riot gear was among those outside. The guard told DailyMail.com he had been hired by a TV station to provide security for journalists who had been threatened recently. During closing arguments Monday, prosecutor Thomas Binger argued that Rittenhouse set the deadly chain of events in motion by bringing a semi-automatic rifle to a protest and menacing others, then walked off like a 'hero in a Western.' Rittenhouse had gone to Kenosha from his home in Antioch, Illinois, in what he said was an effort to protect property from rioters in the days after a Black man, Jacob Blake, was shot by a white Kenosha police officer. Attorneys argue without the jury in the room during Kyle Rittenhouse's trial at the Kenosha County Courthouse in Kenosha, Wis, on Monday Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger holds Kyle Rittenhouse's gun as he gives the state's closing argument in Kyle Rittenhouse's trial at the Kenosha County Courthouse in Kenosha Mark Richards, center, talks with reporters after the jury leaves the room for deliberations during Kyle Rittenhouse's trial at the Kenosha County Courthouse Kyle Rittenhouse, second from left, waits with his legal team for the day to start at his trial at the Kenosha County Courthouse in Kenosha on Monday Binger said Rittenhouse was 'looking for trouble that night,' and he repeatedly showed the jury drone video that he said depicted Rittenhouse pointing his weapon at demonstrators. 'This is the provocation. This is what starts this incident,' the prosecutor declared. He added: 'You lose the right to self-defense when youre the one who brought the gun, when you are the one creating the danger, when youre the one provoking other people.' Rittenhouse shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, now 28. In making his case for self-defense, Rittenhouse testified that Rosenbaum chased him down and made a grab for his rifle - testimony largely corroborated by video and some of the prosecution's own witnesses. As for Huber, he was gunned down after he was seen on video hitting Rittenhouse with a skateboard. And Grosskreutz admitted he had his own gun pointed at Rittenhouse when he was shot. In his instructions to the jury, Schroeder said that to accept Rittenhouses claim of self-defense, the jurors must find that he believed there was an unlawful threat to him and that the amount of force he used was reasonable and necessary. A former University of Miami professor who was the go-to academic on drug trafficking in Latin America will be going to prison for laundering money for an envoy of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's socialist regime. Bruce Bagley, 75, was sentenced to six months by a Manhattan federal judge on Tuesday. Bagley, who shared his knowledge with Congress, journalists, prominent attorneys and even the Central Intelligence Agency, secretly laundered millions of dollars on behalf of some of the same bad guys he dedicated his life to studying. 'I am ashamed of my irresponsible behavior,' Bagley, struggling to hold back tears, told Judge Jed Rakoff while appearing remotely via Zoom. 'I have spent my life as an academic working to understand and improve conditions in many countries in Latin America, and to be here today is the greatest departure from the life that I have aspired to.' Rakoff said a sentence of up to five years, as recommended by federal guidelines, would be 'irrational' and 'overly punitive' for Bagley and his health. But he said some prison time, however modest, was required to deter others in positions of authority from engaging in similar behavior. Bruce Bagley, a former University of Miami professor, was sentenced to six months in prison on Tuesday by a Manhattan federal court. The 75-year-old pleaded guilty to laundering nearly $3 million in payments he received from jailed Colombian businessman, Alex Saab, who is also accused of laundering $350 million under the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro Colombian businessman, Alex Saab, is also accused of laundering $350 million under the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro 'If there is anyone in the world who knew that this kind of activity was criminal it was Dr. Bagley,' said Rakoff, who recommended Bagley be allowed to complete his sentence at a prison with a good medical facility. Bagley's transition from writing textbooks to carrying out what prosecutors called a 'textbook case of money laundering' came from his dealings with another criminal defendant: Colombian businessman Alex Saab, who is accused of paying kickbacks to members of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's family and inner circle to win overvalued state contracts. Saab appeared before a Miami federal court judge Monday and pleaded not guilty. Bagley was introduced to Saab by a longtime government informant, Jorge Luis Hernandez, better known by his nickname Boli. Alex Saab (pictured) is accused by the United States government of laundering money under the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro Years earlier, Bagley helped Boli avoid deportation to his native Colombia, where Bagley said he faced a certain death from right-wing paramilitary groups who then dominated drug trafficking along the the Caribbean coast. At Boli's urging, Saab asked for Bagley's help securing a United States visa for his son and later agreed to hire him as a $1,000-per-hour consultant for an investment in Guatemala. Then starting in late 2017, Bagley began receiving monthly deposits of approximately $200,000 from a purported food company based in the United Arab Emirates. Additional funds were wired from Switzerland, bringing to nearly $3 million the amount he collected from Saab, according to prosecutors. Bagley then transferred 90 percent of the money into the accounts controlled by the informant, believing they would be forwarded to Saab's U.S. attorneys, who were then secretly meeting with federal investigators to explore a possible resolution of his own case. Bagley kept a 10 percent commission for himself and continued to accept the cash even after one of his accounts was closed for suspicious activity. 'Yes. It is corruption,' the professor told Boli in one recorded conversation from a December 2018 meeting, adding that he knew Saab was importing food on behalf of the Maduro government. 'They have imported the worst quality products with inflated prices, and they have filled their pockets with money.' It's not clear what motivated Boli to betray Bagley. He did not respond to a text message seeking comment. Prior to his downfall, Bagley had studied organized crime in Latin America for decades. He chaired the University of Miami's Department of International Studies, published numerous books and articles, and was quoted regularly by the media. 'If you are too ostentatious and too public, you attract a great deal of attention,' Bagley told The Associated Press in a 2012 interview on drug trafficking in Mexico. Bruce Bagley served as a consultant to a number of U.S. federal agencies - the FBI, DEA, CIA and the Pentagon - as well as the governments of Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Panama Bagley also served as a consultant to a number of U.S. federal agencies - the FBI, DEA, CIA and the Pentagon - as well as the governments of Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Panama, according to a 24-page resume in court filings. In seeking leniency, attorneys for Bagley presented him as a cross between an idealistic poverty fighter and an absent-minded professor who would forget to pay a utility bill or run out of gas while driving because he was too absorbed in his research. But evidence introduced at the last minute by prosecutors presented a darker side. At the same time Bagley was fielding calls from policy makers in Washington, he and Boli - the informant - were hobnobbing with shady politicians from across Latin America, including presidential aspirants from Paraguay and the Dominican Republic, as well as a Colombian governor, Kiko Gomez, then under criminal investigation for homicide. In 2015, Bagley signed an affidavit in which he affirmed that Gomez had no ties with right-wing paramilitary groups. But in a sentencing memo seeking leniency, lawyers for Bagley said he had refused to sign such an affidavit despite being offered $25,000 because his academic research had led him to conclude that the politician was indeed tied to the militias, which are designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. 'Either Bagley's representation about his research in his sentencing submission is false, or he signed a false affidavit in 2015,' prosecutors argued in a filing late last week. 'In either event, the Government respectfully submits that Bagley's misrepresentations are relevant to the Court's determination of the appropriate sentence to impose.' Bagley's attorneys said the document was based on only initial findings and that Bagley refused to provide a more in-depth report of the kind sought by Gomez. Jamie Moore, 39, was arrested on Friday on charges of second-degree endangering the welfare of a child A New Jersey teen who was found safe in New York City on Thursday after she went missing from her home one month earlier told cops her mother had been abusing her for years. Officials now say Jashyah Moore, 14, ran away from home on October 14 to escape the verbal and physical abuse she endured at home, after her mother beat her for losing their EBT card and refused to enroll her in school. 'The young lady appears to have run away,' Acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore Stephens said on Friday. 'And she did not want to make herself known to anyone as to where she was. 'She seemed to be... more so at ease where she was.' Jashyah was found safe on Thursday after a passerby recognized her and notified police. One day later, her mother, Jamie Moore, 39, was arrested on charges of second-degree endangering the welfare of a child, which includes 'allegations of physical abuse and also neglect,' according to a statement from the Essex County Prosecutor's Office. A detention hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, and Jashyah and her 3-year-old brother have been removed from their mother's custody by the Division of Child Protection and Permanency. It was unclear whether Jamie had an attorney who could speak on her behalf. Jashyah Moore, 14, went missing on October 14 after visiting a deli near her home in East Orange, New Jersey, and was found safe in New York City on Thursday. She reportedly told police who found her that she was trying to escape her mother's abuse According to a criminal complaint filed in an Essex County, New Jersey court, Jamie Moore beat Jashyah with objects like a frying pan several times, stabbed her in the shoulder, sprayed bleach in her eyes and pulled her braids out. The abuse left the 14-year-old with scars and bruises, according to the complaint, obtained by NBC News. The teenager was also reportedly forced to care for her 3-year-old brother and would have to cook for him and her mother, otherwise they would not eat. She was also allegedly forced to miss days of virtual schooling because she was caring for her younger brother, and her mother refused to enroll her in the 2021 - 22 school year. Instead, the complaint alleges, Jamie forced her daughter to stand in the street and beg for money. If she did not come back with a certain amount, it claims, Jamie would beat her. On the day she disappeared, the complaint further alleges, Jashyah had returned home after visiting a deli in East Orange, New Jersey, where the family lived, and told her mother she lost their EBT Card. At that point, it claims, Jamie beat her daughter for doing so. Surveillance footage from the morning of October 14 showed Jashyah buying several bottles from the US Quick Food Mart in East Orange with an older gentleman before she visited Poppies Deli, where she lost her family's EBT Card Jamie Moore previously cried and begged for the public's help in finding her daughter The complaint paints a different picture of Jamie Moore than the one she portrayed to the media in a news conference on Tuesday, as she cried and begged for the public's help to find her daughter. 'I cannot imagine what she might be going through just being away from us this long, being away from her family who loves her very much,' Jamie said. 'If anybody knows anything, please, please come forward.' She had claimed Jashyah was abducted, saying: 'I don't know who did it, but we're looking for you.' Jashyah had left her home at around 7.30am on October 14. Surveillance footage from the US Quick Food Mart in East Orange showed Jashyah entering the store with an older gentleman, People reports. She put several bottles on the counter, which the man paid for, before they left together. According to officials, the teen then went to Poppies Deli, where she was last seen. On Wednesday, officials increased the reward for any information about Jashyah's whereabouts to $20,000. At the time, Stephens said: 'This reminds us that the lives of little black and little brown girls is just as important as everybody else's lives. 'And we know that Gabby Petito, which is a very, very notorious case, that was constantly in the news did yield results and information. 'So we are hoping that today's effort will also bring some information so we can find young Jashyah.' The reward has not yet been claimed, according to ABC 7. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told congressional leaders Tuesday that the federal government has more time than her initial estimate on when it would fault on its debt. Yellen said in a letter that she has 'a high degree of confidence' in Treasury's ability to pay the country's debt until around December 15 - roughly two weeks longer than her initial projection of Dec. 3. Her gift of 12 additional days came as Democrats facing a crush of holiday deadlines, including passing President Joe Biden's $1.85 trillion package of social safety net programs and funding the federal government, which runs out on December 3. In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Yellen noted how she originally believed the government would be able to pay its bills through December 3, but was able to 'further refine that projection,' believing the new date would be December 15. After that, the Treasury Department would be left with 'insufficient remaining resources,' Yellen said. Republicans have vowed not to help Democrats raise the limit. The country has never defaulted on its debt and to do so could trigger a global-wide financial crisis. 'As the federal government's cash flow is subject to unavoidable variability, I will continue to update Congress as more information becomes available,' she wrote. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen gifted Congressional Democrats 12 additional days in December to pass legislation to lift the debt ceiling In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (pictured), Yellen noted how she originally believed the government would be able to pay its bills through December 3, but was able to 'further refine that projection,' believing the new date would be December 15 'To ensure the full faith and credit of the United States, it is critical that Congress raise or suspend the debt ceiling as soon as possible,' Yellen insisted. Treasury will also be able to make a $118 billion transfer to the Highway Trust Fund on that date, which is required. The new date gives Democrats more time to pass President Joe Biden's $1.75 trillion Build Back Better using the reconciliation process in the Senate - to bypass a Republican filibuster, and also work on a bill to raise or suspend the debt ceiling. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he hoped to pass the Build Back Better social spending bill before Christmas. 'That's a huge agenda for December and the end of November, but we aim to get it all done,' Schumer said. In October, the Senate voted to temporarily raise the debt limit by $480 billion. Congress also passed a stopgap spending bill that is set to still expire on December 3, which if missed could trigger a government shutdown. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell used the debt ceiling to try to derail the Build Back Better reconciliation bill. McConnell wanted Senate Democrats to pass a debt ceiling hike alone - using the process of reconciliation to bypass the filibuster and get a bill through. 'That's a huge agenda for December and the end of November, but we aim to get it all done,' Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Tuesday, as the Democrats hope to pass President Joe Biden's Build Back Better bill and raise the debt ceiling Biden and other top Democrats wanted Republicans to simply not filibuster a Senate debt bill, allowing them to pass it using regular order. They complained that reconciliation would take too long, and jeopardize the U.S. economy. The House had previously passed a bill that would suspend the debt ceiling until December 2022, after next year's midterm elections. Republicans, however, wanted a bill that would include a specific dollar amount - likely as a way they can nail Democrats on increasing the debt in advance of the midterm elections. Eleven Senate Republicans voted alongside every Democrat to break the GOP's filibuster. The bill was then passed 50 to 48, with every Democrat voting in the affirmative and every Republican against it. Donald Trump is threatening to sue the Pulitzer Prize board if it doesn't strip the New York Times and Washington Post of the 2018 National Reporting prize the news outlets jointly won for their investigation of Russia's influence on the 2016 election. 'It is hereby demanded that the Pulitzer Prize Board take immediate steps to strip the New York Times and The Washington Post of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. Pulitzer Prize Board's failure to do so will result in prompt legal action being taken against it. Please be guided accordingly,' wrote Trump attorney Alina Habba in a letter to Bud Kliment, the interim administrator of the awards. The former president, who has furiously denied he won in 2016 with any help from Moscow, cited a federal indictment that alleged that Russian-born analyst Igor Danchenko, a key source for infamous and unsubstantiated Christopher Steele dossier, fabricated conversations with one source and used a Democratic political operative as another. Danchenko pleaded not guilty to five felony charges of lying to the FBI last week. His arrest came about from Special Counsel John Durham, who is investigating the origins of the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane probe into claims that Trump conspired with Russia during the 2016 election. In the aftermath the Washington Post corrected two articles that contained references to the Steele Dossier - but neither of those articles were part of the citation that won the newspaper its Pulitzer. Trump cited that correction in his complaint to the Pulitzer Board. 'Even one of the recipients of the award, The Washington Post, has acknowledged the unsubstantiated nature of its reporting as it relates to these events. Specifically, on November 12, 2021, The Post retracted statements from several articles relating to the Steele Dossier and the alleged Russia-Trump connection and its executive editor proclaimed that 'The Post could no longer stand by the accuracy of those elements of the story,'' his attorney's letter to noted. Trump lawyer complained the articles 'were based on incontrovertibly false information provided by dubious sources who were maliciously attempting to mislead the public and tarnish our client's reputation.' In 2018, ten reporters from the New York Times and the Washington Post jointly won the Pulitzer for National Reporting for their 'deeply sourced, relentlessly reported coverage in the public interest that dramatically furthered the nation's understanding of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connections to the Trump campaign, the President-elect's transition team and his eventual administration,' according to the committee. But in the list of articles the Pultizer committee cites as the reason for the prize, there is little on the Steele dossier. The prize-winning articles included stories on the actions of former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos, Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with Russian officials, Russia's actions on social media, and Michael Flynn's communications with the Russian ambassador to the United States. One New York Times story on Papadopoulos mentions the dossier but doesn't detail its allegations. And a Washington Post article examined how the FBI paid Christopher Steele to continue his investigation into Russian actions. Donald Trump is threatening to sue the Pulitzer Prize board if it doesn't strip the New York Times and Washington Post of the 2018 National Reporting prize the news outlets jointly won for their investigation of Russia's influence on the 2016 election In 2018, ten reporters from the New York Times and the Washington Post jointly won the Pulitzer for National Reporting for their 'deeply sourced, relentlessly reported coverage' on Russia's influence in 2016 - the reporters are seen above Christopher Steele's controversial dossier was filled with unproven allegations, including a claim that the Russians had blackmail material on Trump, which Trump denied; above Steele and his lawyer arrive at a London courthouse in July 2020 The Steele dossier played a central role in the FBI obtaining FISA warrants on then Trump campaign aide Carter Page, who was the center of an investigation into whether Trump's campaign worked with the Russians. The dossier was read by many news outlets and was the foundation for several Trump conspiracy theories. Trump had called for the Pulitzers to be rescinded before, including last month. Enteries for a Pultizer prize are judged by 77 editors, publishers, writers, and educators, according to the board. Members of the Pulitzer Prize Board and journalism jurors receive no compensation. Awards are made by majority vote by the board based on the jurors' recommendations. Prizes have been rescinded in the past. Most famously, in 1981, the Pulitzer Prize Committee withdrew its feature-writing prize from Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke after she admitted that her award-winning story about an alleged 8-year-old heroin addict in the District of Columbia was fabricated. In his March 2019 report, special counsel Robert Mueller found no evidence that the Trump campaign 'coordinated or conspired with the Russian government in its election-interference activities.' But it did find that Russia interfered in the 2016 contest 'in sweeping and systematic fashion' that ultimately benefited Trump. Trump praised Durham for his work and claimed last week it'll 'only get deeper' from here. Durham's two-and-a-half year probe has so far produced two indictments and is still ongoing Christopher Steele's dossier was controversial from the start with its unproven allegation the Russians had blackmail material on Trump - including an alleged 'golden showers' incident. Trump vehemently denied the allegation. Danchenko, 43, was the primary researcher for Steele's dossier alleging that Trump's 2016 presidential campaign conspired with Russia in a covert operation to beat Hillary Clinton, and that Russia had salacious videos that could be used to blackmail Trump. He was charged with lying to the FBI, which he has denied. Michael Sussman, a cybersecurity lawyer who worked for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, was charged in September and pleaded not guilty to lying to the FBI. Sussman was indicted for allegedly telling the FBI in September 2016 that he was not doing work 'for any client' when he requested a meeting with the FBI's general counsel to warn them of concerns from cybersecurity researchers of potentially suspicious contact between Russia and the Trump team. At the meeting the attorney allegedly gave the FBI data and analytics from cybersecurity researchers who thought the numbers might be evidence of hush-hush communications between Trump Organization's computer servers and Alfa Bank - a Kremlin-linked Russian financial institution. The FBI looked into the matter but found no connections. Following the revelation of the arrests, the Washington Post took the unusual step of substantially editing and publicly correcting several of its prior stories about the dossier. Two online articles published by the newspaper in March 2017 and February 2019 were heavily edited, and an editor's note was attached to them explaining that certain claims in the reports were 'contradicted by allegations in a federal indictment and undermined by further reporting.' In September, former Clinton campaign-linked lawyer Michael Sussman (left) pled not guilty to charges stemming from Durham's probe. More recently, Durham's findings led to the arrest of Russian-born analyst Igor Danchenko (right) late last week An editor's note appended to a 2017 Washington Post article explains that the newspaper now believes the report was based on faulty information Both articles had alleged that Belarusian American businessman Sergei Millian was a key source of the Steele dossier. However, the new indictment alleged that Danchenko had lied when he claimed that he'd spoken to Millian when gathering information that was included in the dossier. 'As a result, portions of the story and an accompanying video have been removed and the headline has been changed,' one of the Washington Post editor's notes stated. Though policies differ among different media outlets, it is unusual to substantially edit and republish an online article when new information comes to light. Charles H. Dolan Jr, also known as Chuck, was revealed as a source for Danchenko Many outlets simply publish a new article containing the further information, possibly adding an editor's note to the outdated article. The original Post articles had alleged that Millian was the dossier's 'Source D', the source who claimed Russian intelligence had videos of Trump engaged in deviant behavior in a Moscow hotel room. The new indictment strongly suggests, but does not directly allege, that the source for that salacious claim was actually an American public relations executive, whose identity has been confirmed by his attorney as Charles Dolan. Dolan was a state chairman for both of Bill Clinton's successful presidential campaigns in 1992 and 1996, and an advisor to Hillary Clinton's 2008 campaign. He also previously worked as executive director of the Democratic Governors' Association, and actively campaigned for Hillary Clinton in 2016, according to the indictment. Former Attorney General Bill Barr had tapped Durham, then a US attorney in Connecticut, to look into the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane probe from when it began in July 2016 until Special Counsel Robert Mueller was appointed to take it over in May 2017. The traditional Christmas BBQ might be mince meat as prices of popular cuts soar in the next 18 months according to agribusiness experts Elders. Prime beef is already 30 per cent more expensive than the same time last year and is expected to continue rising. Butchers have warned prices would increase 10 to 15 per cent before the end of the year. Agribusiness experts Elders predicts beef (stock image) and lamb prices would rise in the next 18 months with butchers warning it could be 15 per cent more expensive by the end of 2021 Lamb is the more stable option after prices surged 18 months ago but still remains expensive while sausages and mince are the best value. Producers are blaming crippling droughts which have destroyed cattle herds over the last 10 to 15 years. Feed cost increases and Covid-19 panic buyers have also put undue stress on the battling industry. Elders CEO Mark Allison predicted beef and lamb prices would continue to increase for 18 months. 'I think there's probably another 18 months at a minimum,' he told the Australian Financial Review. 'There's a lot of rebuild and there is scarcity.' Craig Cook's Prime Quality Meats managing director Michael Honeysett said butchers were operating in the toughest environment in more than three decades. 'Not in 31 years of butchery have I ever seen such a thing,' he told 9News. Graziers who culled their herds during crippling droughts over the last 10 to 15 years are now restocking and driving up prices at sales yards which are being passed on to consumers Mr Honeysett said graziers who culled cattle during the drought were now restocking after recent rain but the demand has driven up prices at sales yard. 'Your restockers are buying all the cattle and your feed prices have gone up, so everything has worked towards putting prices up they're all skyrocketing at the moment,' he said. QUT Business School Professor Gary Mortimer said companies operating around the clock to cater for panic buyers were now passing the cost on to consumers. 'That led to higher wage costs. Those wage costs and extra productions costs are now filtering into higher prices,' he said. Australia's top female jockey could be back racing as early as next week after a successful Supreme Court appeal over her ban for breaching Covid-19 lockdown rules. Jamie Kah was one of five leading riders suspended over a wild party at a AirBnB on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula on August 25 during the state's lockdown. Her three month suspension was extended another two months for misleading a Racing Victoria inquiry into the illegal gathering. Kah, 25, broke her silence on Wednesday after winning a Supreme Court appeal over the additional ban which would have seen her not ride again until January next year. Banned jockey Jamie Kah (pictured) could be back on the race track rising within days She's eligible to ride again when her original suspension expires at midnight November 25. 'I am obviously very happy with the outcome,' Kah posted on Twitter afterwards. 'It's now time to move forward. 'I can't wait to get back to what I love, riding and being part of our amazing industry. 'Thanks to everyone who has said kind words to me or provided moral support over the last three months, it has been a real comfort through very tough times. 'As I said last time, I won't be making any further public comment. See you at the races!' Supreme Court Justice Richard Niall QC ruled the tribunal committed a jurisdictional error, namely a denial of procedural fairness. But he stopped short of of dismissing the charge completely when he upheld Kah's appeal, the Herald Sun reported. 'I propose to make an order setting aside the decision of the Victorian Racing Tribunal made in respect to the plaintiff (Kah),' Justice Niall said. Jamie Kah (pictured) was one of five jockeys suspended over a wild party during Melbourne's latest lockdown 'The position is counsel, I propose to set aside the determination of penalty, I'll provide parties with an opportunity in relation to any further order. 'Can I indicate for the benefit of counsel that the originating motions seeks by way of relief an order from the court dismissing the charge, although I'm prepared to hear further argument on it, I'm not minded to dismiss the charge. 'It's no role of the court of course, in judicial reviews, to determine the merits of the charge.' Kah was inundated with public support on social media following her successful appeal. She could be the first of the five suspended jockeys to return to the track. Mark Zahra, Ben Melham and Ethan Brown also stayed at the Mornington Peninsula property with Kah and apprentice jockey Celine Gaudray. All five pleaded guilty to 'failure or refusal to comply with an order, direction, or requirement of the stewards or an official'. Suspended jockey Jamie Kah (pictured right) was spotted helping out as a strapper on Derby Day at Flemington Jamie Kah broke her silence following Wednesday's successful Supreme Court appeal Stewards suspended all of their racing licences for three months which included the 2021 Spring Racing carnival. Brown, Zahra, Melham and Gaudray are also expected to return to the race track in the coming weeks. Kah was originally suspended another two months by the Victorian Racing Tribunal for not naming Zahra as an attendee of the party. While accepting Zahra was only there briefly, and not when police attended, she was reprimanded for not saying he was there. 'You did not give his name until directly confronted by stewards (August 30)' Judge John Bowman said it handing down the decision,' racenet reported. 'Your evidence was that, while you knew he had been at the premises, you thought the stewards were inquiring about who had been present at a later time. 'We made it clear this is an excuse which we simply do not accept.' Five jockeys were suspended over a wild party at this AirBnB (pictured) on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula during the state's sixth lockdown While Kah accepted responsibility and apologised for the Covid-19 lockdown breach, she has always insisted she never lied to stewards. Kah claimed she was denied procedural fairness because the Tribunal found her guilty of giving false and/or misleading evidence despite never being asked directly to name all gathering attendees. 'I am going to court to defend my reputation as to honesty. It is too important to myself as a person not to,' she said at the time. The suspension has already cost Kah hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost earnings and was seen helping out as a strapper on Derby Day at Flemington. She became the first jockey to ride 100 city winners in a Melbourne season of racing just weeks before her career was temporarily halted, breaking Brett Prebble's 21-year-old record. Kah then became the first female jockey to win the Scobie Breasley Medal, Victorian racing's most prestigious individual accolade. She rode Prince Of Arran to finish third in last year's Melbourne Cup. The daughter of one of Melbourne's most infamous gangsters has had the words 'Mad Lebo' tattooed on her leg in honour of her late father. Nabil Maghnie, 44, was shot dead outside a home in Epping, in the city's northern suburbs in January last year. His 21-year-old daughter Sabrine Maghnie shared a photo to Instagram this week of her new ink, which is a nod to a similar tattoo her dad had across his stomach. Nabil Maghnie's daughter Sabrine has had the words 'mad Lebo' tattooed on her in honour of her late father Her 44-year-old father who was fatally shot last year had the same words inked across his stomach Just weeks before Nabil's death, Ms Maghnie was allegedly assaulted following a minor car crash and a photo taken of her showed a bruise on her eye. Supporters of the family told the Herald Sun at the time she was assaulted following a minor collision in Melbourne's north. A fight allegedly broke out after the crash and police were notified of the incident, with Nabil, famously protective of his daughter, believed to be furious. On the night he was killed, the 44-year-old travelled to a home on Dalton Road at Lalor, where he reportedly demanded money from one of the men at the property. Nabil is believed to have attacked the householder before someone else pulled out a gun and shot him dead. He was seen lying dead next to his Mercedes utility vehicle after he was gunned down while two others, including his son, were wounded. Nabil Maghnie was shot outside a home in Epping, in Melbourne's north in January last year (pictured is Maghnie leaving court in 2019) An image of Sabrine Maghnie, taken in the weeks before her father's death, shows her with a bruise on her eye Nobody has been charged in relation to Nabil's murder. The underworld figure can famously be remembered for driving himself to hospital after being shot in the head in 2016. In 2011, the married father was the victim of another non-fatal shooting at Broadmeadows. Following his death, hundreds of mourners gathered together at a funeral service where a flower tribute spelling out the word 'Baba' was seen near his coffin. Nabil was being investigated by police over a double shooting at the Love Machine nightclub in Prahan in April last year and was prime suspect in an attempted hit on notorious Mongol's bikie Toby Mitchell. Maghnie was also on bail for serious driving offences at the time of his death. A man suffered a serious wound to his face when he was allegedly hit with a meat cleaver in a vicious attack. The man, 31, was allegedly attacked by a 30-year-old man and a 16-year-old boy just before 8pm on Tuesday in Ballarat, a town in regional Victoria. The victim from neighbouring Golden Point was rushed to hospital from the home on Little Bridge Street with a serious facial injury. Victoria Police arrested two males - including a 16-year-old boy - after a man was allegedly attacked with a meat cleaver on Tuesday night in Ballarat Two males, including the teenager, were arrested nearby. The 30-year-old Ballarat East man was charged with intentionally causing injury, reckless conduct endangering serious injury, affray, and assault with a weapon. He is expected to appear at the Ballarat Magistrates' Court on Wednesday. The 16-year-old boy, also from Ballarat East, was charged with affray, assault with weapon, and possessing a controlled weapon. He was bailed to appear in court at a later date. The motive for the alleged attack is a mystery, but it is believed the trio all knew each other. Prisoner are to be banned from drinking when they are freed from jail under a tough new crackdown on violent offenders. Serious and prolific criminals will be forced to wear an electronic tag which triggers an alarm if it detects alcohol in their system to prevent them from reoffending. They will be required to wear the devices for up to a year under the scheme, which ministers said was a world first. The technology has already been used in the UK for those on community sentences but this is the first time it has been imposed on prison-leavers. If alcohol is detected in sweat, the tag sounds an alarm in a monitoring centre to alert probation officers. Serious and prolific criminals will be forced to wear an electronic tag that triggers an alarm if it detects alcohol in their system (File image) The alert could be deemed a breach of licence conditions and see ex-offenders returned to prison. Alcohol plays a part in 39 per cent of all violent crime in the UK. Around 12,000 offenders will wear the tags over the next three years, beginning in Wales from today and rolling out in England next summer. Justice Secretary Dominic Raab said: This technology has been successful in policing community sentences with offenders complying over 97 per cent of the time. Rolling the tags out further will help cut alcohol-fuelled crime, which causes untold misery for victims and lands society with a 21billion bill each year. Offenders now have a clear choice. If they dont work with probation staff to curb their drinking and change their ways, they face being sent back to jail. He added: We are the first government in the world to use alcohol monitoring tags on offenders coming out of jail to reduce their risk of reoffending. Amy Ellie, a North Wales probation officer, said: The tag forces people to be honest. That honesty opens up conversations that we wouldnt ordinarily be able to have. Alcohol plays a part in 39 per cent of all violent crime in the United Kingdom (File image) Now we can see if their consumption is reasonable, or if theres a worrying pattern, and if so, what is contributing to that pattern. Andy Roberts, of Greater Manchester Probation Service, who led an alcohol-monitoring pilot scheme, said: We found the tag acted as a constant reminder. Offenders said they were less likely to do something stupid or reckless and it brought clarity to bigger decision making. Earlier this year, the Government introduced GPS tags to track prolific robbers, thieves and burglars. Up to 10,000 such offenders are expected to be tagged over the next three years to stop them reoffending and help police catch them if they commit new crimes. In total, an extra 183million is being invested to almost double the number of people tagged at any one time from around 13,500 this year to approximately 25,000 by 2025. Judge Alison Nathan is likely to be nominated to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The federal judge overseeing British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell's sex trafficking case is set to be recommended for higher court - sparking concerns about possible ethical conflicts. New York Senator Chuck Schumer announced on Tuesday he is going to recommend to President Joe Biden that he nominate Alison J. Nathan, 49, to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The nomination almost guarantees that Nathan will be appointed to serve in the state's second highest court, the New York Times reports, as presidents typically defer to their party's senior lawmaker in each state when choosing its judges and attorneys. If nominated, Nathan would have to be confirmed by the Senate. But during the process, she will be able to remain on Maxwell's high-profile case - sparking fears she could be swayed into being less critical of Biden's government during the case. Stephen Gillers, a professor at New York University School of Law, said Maxwell's lawyers might ask the judge to recuse herself from the trial, claiming that the Biden administration would be in a position to derail her promotion if she did not favor the government in the trial. But he admitted that a promotion like Nathan's would not provide a basis for such a request. 'This does not even come close to the sort of interest that leads to recusal,' he said. He also noted that Nathan would be just the second openly gay woman to serve on the Second Circuit. Ghislaine Maxwell was seen embracing her lawyer, Bobbi Sternheim, during jury selection on Tuesday Maxwell has pleaded not guilty to all charges against her Maxwell, 59, right, who is accused of procuring underage girls for pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, left, is set to stand trial on sex trafficking charges on November 29 Nathan is also known for her independence, the Times reports, and in at least two cases, she issued 'blistering criticism' of the US Attorney's Office in Manhattan, after it was accused of failing to turn over potentially favorable evidence to the defense before a trial. Nathan is a graduate of Cornell Law School and served as a law clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens in the Supreme Court's 2001 - 2002 term. She later became an associate White House counsel, a special counsel to the solicitor general's office and a special assistant to former President Barack Obama. In 2011, Obama appointed her to the US District Court for the Southern District of New York. In his statement announcing his recommendation, Schumer said her 'experience, legal brilliance, love of the rule of law and perspective would be invaluable in ensuring the federal judiciary fulfills its obligation to ensure equal justice for all.' Rebecca Roiphe, a professor at New York Law School, meanwhile said the only theoretical issue she could foresee is if Nathan were confirmed quickly and her new duties pulled her away 'from a very time-consuming trial. 'But I think that's unlikely given the timeline here,' she noted. New York Senator Chuck Schumer (pictured) announced on Tuesday he is recommending President Biden nominate Nathan for the Court of Appeals, saying her 'experience, legal brilliance, love of the rule of law and perspective would be invaluable in ensuring the federal judiciary fulfills its obligation to ensure equal justice for all' Nathan has served on the US District Court for the Southern District of New York for the past decade, after being appointed by former President Barack Obama When asked on Tuesday whether Nathan would stay on the case if she got the nomination, Edward Friedland, a spokesman for the district court, said he could 'neither confirm nor deny that she is under consideration. 'But I have every reason to believe that if she is recommended or nominated, she would - as is customary for lower court judges who are nominated to higher courts- continue to do her day job and preside over the trial to its conclusion.' The announcement came as Nathan oversaw jury selection in Maxwell's trial, which defense and prosecution attorneys argue could last up to six weeks. She questioned dozens of potential members of the jury who will decide her fate later this month in an effort to narrow down the potential jury pool to 50 to 60 members. Once that is completed, the prosecution and defense will be able to strike 10 jurors, to narrow down the 12 jurors as well as six alternates that will hear the case. Maxwell, 59, is charged with sex trafficking, with prosecutors claiming she helped pedophile Jeffrey Epstein recruit, groom and ultimately sexually abuse young girls. She has pleaded not guilty, and the trial is expected to begin on November 29. On Tuesday each prospective juror sat alone in a jury box for 10 to 15 minutes while Judge Nathan posed questions from about 10 feet away. Hundreds were previously dismissed after filling out a written questionnaire, according to AP. At one point they were asked if they had a 'specific familiarity' with Donald Trump's Palm Beach property, Mar-a-Lago, which was known as the 'Winter White House' when he was president. The inclusion of the question suggests that prosecutors plan to mention it during Maxwell's trial as a venue for allegedly recruiting and trafficking underage girls for Epstein. Of note in today's proceedings was the presence of Renato Stabile, jury consultant for Harvey Weinstein, who has apparently been hired by Maxwell's team. Stabile, who advised the disgraced film producer on how to pick a jury, was seen flipping through binders of jury profiles as he sat next to Maxwell's lawyers. Wearing a black suit, Maxwell hugged her lawyers when she entered the courtroom and briefly sketched a courtroom artist who was drawing her. Jeffrey Epstein and former President Trump had known each other for years until they reportedly fell out over a property dispute At one point prospective jurors were asked if they had a 'specific familiarity' with Donald Trump's Palm Beach property, Mar-a-Lago (pictured) suggesting that prosecutors plan to mention it during Maxwell's trial as a venue for allegedly recruiting and trafficking underage girls for Epstein During the hearing each juror was given a list of witnesses, companies, and locations and asked if they had any 'specific familiarity.' While they were supposed to only say the letter corresponding to each entry, four jurors blurted out 'Mar-a-Lago' as a place they recognized from the news - none had a personal connection. Epstein and former President Trump had known each other for years until they reportedly fell out over a property dispute. The two could also be seen in a 1992 video shot at Mar-a-Lago while a group of cheerleaders dance in front of them as Epstein doubles over in laughter. At one point in the video Maxwell can be seen walking in the background. During the Tuesday morning session of voir dire, some 14 jurors were cleared to be considered as members of the final panel. Potential jurors in British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell's sex-trafficking trial were vetted by Judge Alison Nathan in court on Tuesday ahead of the trial later this month Some prospective jurors told the judge they had heard of Epstein but not Maxwell while others said they had heard of both They were asked if they had any biases against law enforcement, the criminal justice system, and whether they had prejudice against people who lived 'luxurious lifestyles' - a question insisted upon by the defense. A 72-year-old white male juror laughed at this question and said that wealthy people had 'provided my livelihood' while working for a high-end catering company that worked at events at the UN, the Met Opera, and the Met Museum. A 24-year-old white woman said that a friend of hers was 'coerced' into having a relationship with her professor and 'blackmailed into it'. The friend was supposedly 'paid off by the school to keep her quiet'. Even though the juror was the one to report the incident, she insisted she could still give Maxwell a fair trial. Both were allowed into the final jury pool from which the panel of 12 will be chosen. A black woman in her 40s was excused from serving on the case because she said that the reports she had seen about Maxwell had made her feel 'very uncomfortable'. She appeared in court on Tuesday for jury selection, flanked by attorneys Laura Menninger and Bobbi Sternheim A 28-year-old woman who works as a special education teacher said she thought Epstein was 'famous, I think he's an actor'. She was allowed to proceed to the final pool. Last month Maxwell's lawyers won their first battle after successfully convincing the judge to keep the proposed juror questionnaire under seal to avoid tainting the jury pool. Federal prosecutors had agreed to the request, with Assistant U.S. Attorney Alison Moe writing in a two-page memo: 'The defense respectfully requests that the joint proposed juror questionnaire and joint proposed voir dire be filed under seal to avoid media coverage that may prejudice the jury selection. 'The government consents to the defense's request.' In a remote cluster of islands, off the tip of East Arnhem Land, Gurrumul's Toadlet is presumed to be croaking away with its unique 'squelching' call. The problem is no one's ever recorded it. But that could change sometime this week when armies of citizen scientists get to work on a census like no other. Friday marks the start of the fourth annual FrogID Week when nature lovers are encouraged to creep around their yards, local parks, and other green spaces listening for and recording the dulcet tones of Aussie frogs on a special app. The initiative has been an extraordinary success in its short life, producing a 'game changing' data set used by scientists across the nation, says Jodi Rowley, the curator of amphibian and reptile conservation biology at the Australian Museum. Australia's fourth annual 'frog census' will be held on Friday (above) 'In four years, we've almost doubled the number of frog records previously in Australia, that were collected over more than 200 years,' Dr Rowley says. 'FrogID has helped document range extensions in threatened species, it's helped discover populations of frogs that haven't been seen or heard of, or we didn't know were still around in certain places. 'And because frogs are such great indicators of environmental health, because they are so sensitive ... we're also getting an indication of the health of environments across Australia.' The FrogID project makes the most of fact that different frog species have unique calls. By collating audio recordings captured with the app they can work out what's living where, and how that's changing over time, without having to bother the frogs. Cairns Frog Hospital president Deborah Pergolotti with an injured White Lipped Tree Frog (above) That's particularly important right now, as Dr Rowley and others try to work out what's behind a mass mortality event that's so far affected 35 frog species across the country. It's not clear yet what is going on but there's certainly a big problem. On a single day earlier this year, Dr Rowley received 280 emails from concerned people documenting the death of frogs in their areas. People have dutifully stored them in zip-lock bags in their freezers and Dr Rowley's team are now gathering them for testing. Early results indicate the amphibian chytrid fungus, which attacks the skin of frogs, is involved, but other factors, such as a new disease, or toxicity from things like fire retardants and mouse might also be involved. As researchers try to get to the bottom of the mystery Dr Rowley says the die-off event makes this year's push to capture as many frog songs as possible even more important. 'It's like a joke, drought, bushfires, this, the frogs are coping it.' Who knows someone might even bag the very first recording of the long, squelchy call of Gurrumul's Toadlet - a newly discovered frog species named after the late musician Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu. It lives in the remote Wessel Islands archipelago, an hour and 20 minutes east of Darwin, by air. It's only been spotted by a scientist once. 'Scientists, at least, don't know what it sounds like. We suspect it has a call similar to some related species,' Dr Rowley says. 'But there are people there that might be able to make a significant scientific discovery and help us better understand this poorly known frog.' For more information go to frogid.net.au/frog-id-week. Advertisement Boris Johnson is facing a backbencher-led revolt today after ploughing ahead with the Tory party's anti-sleaze campaign as he backed a ban on MPs taking up lucrative second jobs as political consultants. The Prime Minister wrote to Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle to propose a dramatic overhaul of the rules that could hit the interests of dozens of Tory MPs, as he seeks to backtrack from a failed attempt to block the suspension of ex-minister Owen Paterson. Furious Tory backbenchers accused Mr Johnson of 'capitulation', as talk of a full-blown Tory revolt ramps up ahead of Wednesday's crunch vote. One MP told the Times: 'Its pouring petrol on to the flames. Hes caved to the left. Now if you have a consultancy it will be assumed youre evil.' Another accused Mr Johnson of being too concerned with being 'embarrassed' ahead of a meeting with the liaison committee of MPs. 'There's a lot of unease. It's the lurching, the u-turning, the lack of consultation', the MP added. Another elected representative whose additional earnings could be hit by any new regulations described the announcement as 'bizarre' and suggested it was a method of putting the 2019 intake of Tory MPs at ease. Concerns are also said to be mounting among backbenchers on proposals to place 'reasonable limits' on the amount of outside work an elected MP can conduct while in office. MailOnline understands there are at least 50 Conservative MPs who currently work as outside consultants, earning a collective 1.7million a year from second jobs. Mr Johnson said in his letter that the Code of Conduct for MPs should be updated, and endorsed 2018 recommendations from the Committee on Standards in Public Life. One of the new provisions would ensure 'any outside activity undertaken by an MP, whether remunerated or unremunerated, should be within reasonable limits and should not prevent them from fully carrying out their range of duties'. He said the changes should ensure 'MPs who are prioritising outside interests over their constituents are investigated and appropriately punished'. Mr Johnson also said he wanted MPs 'banned from acting as paid political consultants or lobbyists'. Sir Keir Starmer is also pushing the issue in the wake of the Westminster sleaze scandal, triggered by the Owen Paterson lobbying row, which has battered the Conservatives in recent weeks. The Labour leader has said it should be a 'point of consensus that paid directorships and commercial consultancies are not jobs for MPs' and 'the only people MPs should be lobbying for is their constituents'. Boris Johnson wrote to Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle to propose a dramatic overhaul of the rules that could hit the interests of dozens of Tory MPs, as he seeks to backtrack from a failed attempt to block the suspension of ex-minister Owen Paterson Sir Keir Starmer had planned to force a vote in the House of Commons today to try to ban MPs from holding paid directorships and commercial consultancies The PM has written to Speaker Lindsay Hoyle proposing a dramatic overhaul of the rules to crack down on abuses of the system - that could hit the interests of a number of Tory MPs Downing Street today insisted that Boris Johnson believes the 'primary job' of MPs 'must be to serve their constituencies' Third time lucky! MPs FINALLY vote to rebuke Owen Paterson for lobbying after Boris's abortive bid to save ally a fortnight ago MPs finally voted to rebuke Owen Paterson for lobbying today as the government made its humiliating sleaze U-turn official. Speaker Lindsay Hoyle announced that a motion approving the standards report into the former minister had been passed without a formal division. It was the third time the findings had come before the House, with Boris Johnson having caused a meltdown with an abortive attempt to save his ally from punishment a fortnight ago. The second effort was derailed late last night when veteran Tory Christopher Chope shouted 'object', forcing the government to bring a debate and vote today. Despite a furious backlash from colleagues who branded him a 'selfish tw**', Sir Christopher insisted this afternoon that he had 'no regrets' about stopping the measure going through 'on the nod'. Opening the hour-long debate, Leader of the House Jacob Rees-Mogg humbly admitted he had made a 'mistake' in pushing the retrospective overhaul of the standards system. Former PM Theresa May also waded in by condemning the government's behaviour as 'ill-judged and just plain wrong'. But Sir Christopher and fellow Conservative backbencher Bill Cash both risked inflaming the row again by defending Mr Paterson's position. Advertisement The potential tensions over the approach were laid bare on Tuesday when Cabinet minister Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested it would be impossible to make such rules work. Sir Keir was unaware of the PM's intervention at the start of his press conference as he accused Mr Johnson of 'corroding trust in our parliament and the belief that politics is a force for good.' He added: 'It's time to ban MPs from being paid directors and commercial consultants. That should not be a controversial situation.' After he was informed of Mr Johnson's announcement, Sir Keir joked: 'So we have won the vote tomorrow already?' He added: 'If he is accepting the motion in full, that's a significant victory for us in our work to clear up politics. But I would need to look at how he has put it.' Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner later tweeted that the party wants to 'ban second jobs for MPs, with limited exemptions for public service'. Owen Paterson was found by a standards watchdog to have committed an 'egregious' breach of rules by directly advocating for two companies while they were paying him more than 100,000 per year. The Government blocked his recommended 30-day suspension from Parliament before performing a U-turn after a ferocious backlash, with Mr Paterson then opting to quit as the Tory MP for North Shropshire. In his letter on Tuesday, Mr Johnson said his proposals would ensure MPs 'neglecting their duties to their constituents and prioritising outside interests would be investigated, and appropriately punished by the existing disciplinary authorities'. 'They would also ban MPs from exploiting their positions by acting as paid political consultants or lobbyists,' Mr Johnson added. He said: 'The code of conduct for MPs should be updated to state that: ''Any outside activity undertaken by a MP, whether remunerated or unremunerated, should be within reasonable limits and should not prevent them from fully carrying out their range of duties''.' That could potentially affect Tory MP Geoffrey Cox, who has been criticised for carrying out a 1million a year legal practice alongside his Commons duties. Meanwhile, Labour slammed the government and accused them of playing 'dirty tricks' over fears their amendment will not guarantee time for a vote on changing the standards rules next year. Mr Johnson also backed updating the rules to state: 'MPs should not accept any paid work to provide services as a Parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant, for example, advising on Parliamentary affairs or on how to influence Parliament and its members. MPs should never accept any payment or offers of employment to act as political or Parliamentary consultants or advisers.' Labour insists 50 Tory backbenchers and former ministers had been paid by management or consultancy firms over the past year. Mr Johnson said the changes could 'command the confidence' of the public, and he wanted them implemented as a 'matter of urgency'. 'The government believes that these two recommendations form the basis of viable approach which could command the confidence of parliamentarians and the public,' he wrote. Downing Street said the PM would leave the exact detail of the plans to the House of Commons to decide and finalise. His spokesman said 'it is important in terms of the detailed implementation that should rightly be for the Commons to take forward on a cross-party basis'. Labour is planning to use an Opposition Day debate in the Commons tomorrow to vote on ending paid directorships and commercial consultancies in Parliament. Sir Keir responded to the PM's move by claiming the premier had been 'dragged kicking and screaming' to his new position. He told reporters: 'We've had two weeks of Tory sleaze and corruption. Be under no illusion, the Prime Minister has only done this because his back was against the wall because the Labour Party have put down a binding vote for tomorrow. 'This is a significant victory for the Labour Party, it would not have happened if we hadn't put down that binding vote. This is a prime minister who has shown no leadership on this whatsoever. It is a step forward for standards in public life.' Earlier, Mr Rees-Mogg had questioned the viability of Labour's proposals, telling the Conservative Home Moggcast podcast: 'Where do you draw the line? Let me give you a specific example. I am a trustee of the Oxford Union Literary and Debating Trust which is the parent charity of the Oxford Union Society, Oxford's debating organisation. Owen Paterson was found by a standards watchdog to have committed an 'egregious' breach of rules by directly advocating for two companies while they were paying him more than 100,000 per year Any new regulation on MPs' second jobs could potentially affect Tory MP Geoffrey Cox (pictured), who has been criticised for carrying out a 1million a year legal practice alongside his Commons duties In his letter on Tuesday, Mr Johnson said his proposals would ensure MPs 'neglecting their duties to their constituents and prioritising outside interests would be investigated, and appropriately punished by the existing disciplinary authorities'. Jacob Rees-Mogg today slammed Labour's plans to crackdown on MPs holding second jobs as he said 'drawing lines' on what is and is not acceptable is 'extraordinarily difficult' 'It promotes free speech, it supports a very good, active charitable educational objective. 'It takes up a small amount of time each year, it is unpaid. Should MPs be able to be trustees of charities? I think most people would say yes, that is a perfectly reasonable role for them to be involved in. 'But what if they are involved with a charity that is a little bit more work and they actually get paid for it? Should they be involved in that? 'If you say yes, they should be involved in that, can they be doctors? And if you say well yes they can be doctors are they then allowed to be involved in the pharmaceutical industry? 'Say they have been helpful in developing drugs, have a great deal of knowledge about how drugs are developed and carry on involvement with potentially a start up company that is developing drugs that they may have founded, should they be allowed to continue with that?' The Cabinet minister said a key question is whether it is 'useful for a member of Parliament to know about different areas and different activities'. He continued: 'And if you can't draw the line other than you shouldn't do paid lobbying, how will we decide Labour's motion? 'Is it going to be you can do whatever Keir Starmer does but you can't do any more? Is that what they are proposing? 'So I think drawing lines is extraordinarily difficult and what do voters want? Well they want MPs with experience who contribute.' Mr Rees-Mogg said the current rules on paid lobbying are 'really clear and really important' but 'in terms of outside interests it is a much more complex question'. Jacob Rees-Mogg humbly admitted he had made a 'mistake' in pushing the retrospective overhaul of the standards system, as he urged members to vote for a motion that would official scrap the changes and rebuke Owen Paterson Former PM Theresa May also waded in during the Commons debate by condemning the government's behaviour as 'ill-judged and just plain wrong' Number 10 had said this morning that it would wait to see the exact wording of what Labour was proposing before commenting in detail. Asked what the PM's view was on MPs holding consultancies and directorships, his spokesman said: 'I think the Prime Minister has given his view that an MP's primary job is and must be to serve their constituencies and represent their interests in Parliament. 'They should be visible in their constituencies and available to help their constituents with any matters of concern.' Missouri Congresswoman Cori Bush's claim she was shot at 'by white supremacists' during the 2014 Ferguson marches has been met with a slew of skepticism - including from the city police chief who said he had no record of the attack. Bush, 45, a Democratic representative for Missouri's first congressional district, tweeted on Monday and referred to the ongoing Kyle Rittenhouse trial, who has been accused of shooting two people dead and injuring a third at a racial injustice protest in Kenosha, Washington, last year. 'When we marched in Ferguson, white supremacists would hide behind a hill near where Michael Brown Jr was murdered and shoot at us. 'They never faced consequences. 'If Kyle Rittenhouse gets acquitted, it tells them that even 7 years later they still can get away with it,' the tweet read. Missouri Congresswoman Cori Bush (pictured), 45, took to Twitter she was fired at 'by white supremacists' during the 2014 Ferguson marches and was greeted with a slew of skeptics who accused the Democratic representative for Missouri of lying She referenced Kyle Rittenhouse, who is currently standing trial for allegedly shooting two people dead and injuring a third at a racial injustice protest in Kenosha, Washington, last year One day later and the tweet has nearly 15,000 likes and thousands of replies, many accusing Bush of lying and calling on her to reference hard facts and respond to the skeptics. 'I too like to make up stories,' one user said. Ferguson Police Chief Frank McCall Jr (pictured) said Monday he had no idea what incident Bush was referring to Ferguson Police Chief Frank McCall Jr even said on Monday that he had no recollection of such an incident. 'None that I'm aware of,' he told the St Louis Post-Dispatch, adding that he did not know what the tweet was referencing to. McCall was named police chief in July of this year but was a veteran officer and chief at the Berkeley Police Department - a city just two miles away from Ferguson. A spokesperson for Bush's campaign released a statement later Monday night claiming that 'while on the frontlines of the Ferguson Uprising, Congresswoman Bush and other activists were shot at by white supremacist vigilantes'. 'The question we need to ask is why white supremacists feel empowered to open-carry rifles, incite violence, and put Black lives at risk across our country,' it added. Twitter users weren't so quick to take Bush's statement so seriously and while users called on her to state facts, Bush remained silent But Twitter users weren't so quick to take Bush's statement so seriously. One reply jokingly referenced Jeopardy and wrote: 'I'll take "things that didn't happen" for $6969' alongside a picture of a contestant unsure of the answer. 'Can you offer a rebuttal? Facts should be your friend,' yet another tweeted while a fourth claimed she was a TV reporter covering the riots. 'I can tell you this NEVER happened,' she responded, adding that 'there wasn't a hill at the site where Brown was shot'. 'The street was surrounded by apartments.' All the while Bush remained silent. One user asked if Bush was marching with Jussie Smollett, a 39-year-old 'Empire' star who was accused of staging a racist and homophobic attack on himself in January 2019 and then lying to police about it. 'Empire' star Jussie Smollett (pictured attending a hearing on July 14, 2021), 39, was accused of staging a racist and homophobic attack on himself in January 2019 and then lying to police One user replied to Bush's tweet asking the Congresswoman if she marched with Smollett, an obvious jab at Bush for fabricating a story to, like Smollett, bolster her publicity He pleaded not guilty to allegations that he lied to police about the incident, which authorities later claimed he had staged with two acquaintances to draw attention to himself. However, the charges were dropped by March and in April the city of Chicago sued Smollett for $130,000 - the cost of the investigation. Smollett was arrested in 2019 for allegedly faking the attack Therefore, the tweet was an obvious jab at Bush for fabricating a story to, like Smollett, bolster her publicity. In fact, Bush gained popularity in the aftermath of the Ferguson protests after Michael Brown Jr, 18, was killed by white Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in August 2014. The shooting happened after Wilson told Brown and a friend to get out of the street as they walked down the middle of Canfield Drive on a Sunday afternoon. A scuffle between Wilson and Brown ensued, ending with the fatal shot. Wilson said Brown came at him menacingly, forcing him to fire his gun in self-defense. Brown's body remained in the street for four hours, angering his family and nearby residents. Some people initially said Brown had his hands up in surrender when Wilson fired, although a grand jury and the US Department of Justice didn't find those accounts credible. The teen's death sparked months of unrest in the city and made the St Louis suburb synonymous with a national debate over police treatment of minorities. Brown Jr's death was widely regarded as the catalyst of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. St Louis County's top prosecutor announced in 2020 that he will not charge Darren Wilson (left), the police officer who fatally shot Michael Brown Jr (right) in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014 Brown's death in August 2014 sparked months of unrest in Ferguson (pictured) and made the St Louis suburb synonymous with a national debate over police treatment of minorities 2014: A fire bomb flies after a police car as it is vandalized by protesters in Ferguson 2020: Fireworks deployed by protesters explode in Ferguson in the wake of Floyd's death However, there were no reports that Bush was shot at in 2014 although there was an article published in June 2020 from local news station KDSK reporting that a white man was charged with shooting into a crowd of peaceful protestors in Brentwood - 12 miles away from Ferguson. Local activist Ohun Ashe referenced the story in what seemed like one of the only tweets siding with Bush. 'This is FACTS!' Ashe tweeted, adding: 'I vividly remember hiding under porches in Canfield as shots were fired at us. No one came to help us. 'We would come from under porches using cars as shields in between gun shots to make it out.' In 2020, six years after a grand jury declined to indict Wilson, St Louis County's top prosecutor Wesley Bell announced that he will not charge the former officer of murder or manslaughter. The dramatic decision promised to reopen old wounds amid a renewed and intensified national conversation about racial injustice following the officer-involved death of George Floyd in May 2020. Social media users are criticizing NPR for tweeting that the choice of Michelle Wu as Boston's new mayor is 'more of a disappointment' because Wu, who is Asian, beat out three black candidates. The nonprofit media outlet tweeted the comments on Tuesday, along with a link to a story featuring quotes from people who believe Wu's election is just another example of, 'What else is new?' Wu, a former city council member, became the first woman and the first person of color to be elected mayor of Boston on November 2. She assumed office Tuesday. NPR has since deleted the original tweet, saying that it 'misrepresented the story,' though the overall parameters and gripes in the original article remain the same. Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, left, beat out acting mayor Kim Janey, right, and two other black candidates earlier this month, becoming the first woman and Asian elected mayor As Wu assumed office on Tuesday, NPR tweeted a story suggesting her election was a 'disappointment' because 'three black candidates couldn't even come close' The publicly funded outlet later deleted the tweet, saying it 'misrepresented' the story The story, titled, 'Why Boston will need to wait longer for its 1st elected black mayor,' features quotes from Boston residents unhappy with Wu's election because of her race. Wu, 36, ran against three black candidates who didn't make the cut in the preliminary election on September 14. They are former city economic development chief John Barros, city council member Andrea Campbell and Boston acting mayor Kim Janey, who assumed office in March after former mayor Marty Walsh joined Joe Biden's administration as secretary of labor. Janey's officially stepped down Tuesday, when Wu, a Democrat, took office. NPR painted a picture of an unhappy electorate. 'I got home, and I cried,' Danny Rivera, an artist and civil rights activist, told NPR. 'I cried my eyes out because I don't know the next time we'll see a black mayor in our city.' A 20-year-old college student said: 'It's just one of those things where it feels like what else is new?' The radio station's website cited data showing that that the three black candidates got three-quarters of the vote in parts of the city with the highest concentrations of people of color, but only one-fourth in the whitest areas. 'I mean the data speaks for itself, and it's troubling,' said former Massachusetts State Rep. Marie St. Fleur. Wu, a Harvard Law graduate and former city council member, was sworn in as mayor on Tuesday alongside her husband and her sons Blaise and Cass 'For those of us born or raised in Boston, and who lived through some of the darker days, the fact that we blinked at this moment is sadness,' she says. 'At what point in the city of Boston will we be able to vote and I'm going to be very clear here for a Black person in that corner office?' Social media users reacted swiftly to NPR's tweet, arguing that Wu's election is momentous in of itself. 'Kim Janey became Boston's first black, first female mayor, but she finished 4th in the preliminary among 5 mayoral candidates of color. (Janey even endorsed Michelle Wu.)' wrote journalist Mia Cathell of the Post Millennial, a conservative Canadian outlet. 'NPR had applauded the diversity of the contenders. What changed? Why downplay an Asian American woman's win?' Wu, above after winning the general election on November 2, was born in Chicago to Taiwanese parents Reporter Mary Chao wrote: 'Tsk, tsk @NPR. Driving a wedge between People of Color, keeping underrepresented groups fighting each other for scraps.' Wu was born in Chicago to Taiwanese parents. She was elected on Nov. 2 with 64 percent of the vote, beating out Annissa Essaibi George, the other candidate who had moved on from the preliminary election. On Tuesday, Wu was sworn in alongside her husband Conor Pewarski and her sons Blaise and Cass. She went to Harvard and worked as a management consultant at the Boston Consulting Group after graduation, according to the Harvard Crimson. She moved back to Chicago to take care of her ailing mother. She opened a tea house there before accepting an offer to attend Harvard Law School, where she studied under Sen. Elizabeth Warren and graduated in 2012. She was elected to city council in November 2013. In her mayoral campaign manifesto, Wu called for defunding school policing, a stance that she hasn't changed even after a 61-year-old high school principal was knocked unconscious by a 16-year-old female student following her election. Wu wrote: 'Metal detectors have been found to negatively impact students' sense of safety at school, while school resource officers (SROs) disproportionately criminalize Black and Latinx students, perpetuating the school-to-prison pipeline. 'We must immediately move to dismantle these punitive measures and reinvest in restorative justice practices employed by trusted, adult school community members.' Patricia Lampron - the principal of Henderson Upper Campus school - was knocked unconscious in an attack at the school earlier this month. A 16-year-old student has been arrested and charged with assault and battery On Wednesday, November 3, an unnamed teenage girl was arrested after Patricia Lampron - the principal of Dr. William W. Henderson Upper Campus school - was taken to the hospital to treat a head injury and broken ribs. Wu, 36, was later asked if the attack had made her reconsider her policing policy in schools. 'No,' she replied, calling the attack on Lampron 'an incredibly horrific, tragic situation.' But she insisted that having police officers in schools was not the answer. 'All throughout the system we need - particularly in this moment coming out of the pandemic when there's been such stress, anxiety, trauma on our families - to be putting more resources into social and emotional supports, into the wraparound services that our schools should be providing,' Wu said. Kwasi Kwarteng has become the first Government minister to intervene in the controversial takeover of LV as he urged the insurer's bosses to come clean over the deal. The Business Secretary backed a call from Labour MP Gareth Thomas in Parliament yesterday for LV to disclose how much it was paying advisers on the 530million deal. His comments came as a row broke out between LV and Royal London, a rival life insurer which had hoped to buy the firm but was snubbed in favour of the buyout barons at Bain. Mr Kwarteng's intervention could put him at loggerheads with Malik Karim, the Tory treasurer and founder of City investment bank Fenchurch Advisory Partners. Fenchurch is one of LV's key advisers on its sale to US private equity firm Bain Capital, and will rake in a multi-million-pound fee for its work, the Daily Mail revealed last week. So far, LV and Fenchurch have declined to reveal how much the advisers will be paid. Other firms working on the deal include City spinners FTI Consulting and law firm Clifford Chance. Kwasi Kwarteng (pictured) has become the first Government minister to intervene in the controversial takeover of LV as he urged the insurer's bosses to come clean over the deal Addressing Mr Thomas's call for LV to reveal how much of its members' money was being spent, Mr Kwarteng said he was 'particularly interested in this deal'. He said: 'I think [Mr Thomas] is absolutely right, I think people who are shareholders, people who are customers, have every right to transparent data. I would very much support that.' Barry O'Dwyer, chief of Royal London, which has submitted a rival bid, said Bain's offer for LV has provoked 'near-universal dismay' and was unlikely to be voted through by members. LV chief executive Mark Hartigan hit back, accusing Royal London of lobbing a 'hand grenade' into the takeover and branding the firm's claims 'grossly misleading'. The sale of LV, formally known as Liverpool Victoria, has angered MPs across the political divide. The firm, set up in 1843, has always been a mutual meaning it is owned by its customers and run for their benefit. But now the firm's bosses want to sell LV to Bain, a profit-hungry US investor which would demutualise the historic business. The sale of LV, formally known as Liverpool Victoria, has angered MPs across the political divide. Pictured: Malik Karim, the Conservative Party treasurer who could net millions from the LV takeover Many of LV's 1.2million members, who will vote to decide whether the deal goes ahead, have written to the Mail voicing their dismay about the Bain deal. Last week Royal London, also a mutual, wrote to LV's board offering to revive its bid for the firm it made last year. On Radio 4's Today programme yesterday, Mr O'Dwyer said: 'The near-universal dismay which has greeted that [Bain] proposal means that I think there is a significant risk now that members won't support that proposal.' But LV released a statement yesterday slamming Royal London. It said the firm had been 'grossly misleading' in suggesting that LV would remain a mutual under the rival offer. But Royal London hit back, claiming that it was open to discussions with both LV and Bain which would allow it to buy the insurer and keep its mutual status. As the tit-for-tat battle continued, Mr Hartigan accused Royal London of launching a 'hand grenade to disrupt the process'. LV members have until December 8 to vote on the Bain deal. They can also vote at an online general meeting on December 10. A woman who struck up a relationship with a businessman while he browsed luxury cars will get to keep $87,000, a Mercedes, and jewelry. The woman, now 37, met the 63-year-old American-Australian dual citizen at an Adelaide car dealership in 2014, the South Australian Supreme Court heard. The pair then embarked on a four-and-a-half year relationship, during which the man transferred $913,051 into the woman's account to pay for her 'living expenses' and her son's school fees. A woman can keep $87,000 in cash a Mercedes and jewelry after her relationship with a much older jet-setting businessman collapsed (stock image) Owning houses in Potts Point in Sydney and Pebble Beach, California, the man would also frequently travel to Queensland and to Adelaide up to nine times a year. At one point, the woman was given a ring leading her to claim they were in a de-facto relationship, though the man argued this was merely to deter other men from approaching the woman. After their relationship broke down in 2018, he claimed that recent transfers of $87,000 in cash along with a Mercedes, furniture, and jewelry be returned to him, prompting the woman to mount a legal challenge. But the Supreme Court in South Australia ruled the woman could keep the car, cash, and jewelry. 'The applicant transferred large sums of money into the respondent's bank account, which allowed her to rent a house for herself... cut back on her hours of work, pay for her son's school fees, and lead a more affluent lifestyle,' the court ruled. The woman argued the car was a Valentine's Day gift and the cash should not be given back as the applicant had agreed to support her financially. The man gave the woman a luxury Mercedes but demanded the car be returned when the couple broke up, saying the item was a loan and not a gift (stock image) The woman tendered a letter to court she claimed backed up her claims, detailing how the man would setup a 'house account' with a few hundred thousand dollars and put a house and car under her name. 'All of this is to ensure that you never, ever, have to be concerned if something happens to us just how you would cope,' the letter reads. However, the court found the pair were never in a de-facto relationship and the woman was not entitled to any more than the disputed cash, car, and jewelry The judge found they both repeatedly lied to one another and did not introduce each other to their friends and family. The man would travel between Australia and the United States where he owned a house at Pebble Beach in California (pictured) She told him she was studying law during their relationship - a claim she repeated under oath but was dismissed by the judge. The man did not revealed to her his actual age, which she only found out during court proceedings. She also was not aware of what the man's job was. 'The applicant never explained to the respondent what he did; it appears that she never had a clear idea of how he earned his money, how much he earned, or what his major assets were,' the court ruled. The judgement concluded the couple's relationship was more 'superficial' rather than based on any long-term commitment. A gastro outbreak across Australia linked to raw seafood has forced multiple oyster farms to close as authorities scramble to track down the source. The Department of Primary Industries and Regions (PIRSA) closed production areas in South Australia's Coffin Bay on Tuesday as a 'precautionary measure'. Oyster farms are expected to remain shut until next week as an investigation gets underway into the cause of multiple gastroenteritis cases across the country. Oyster farms in Coffin Bay, South Australia, have been forced to temporarily shut while an investigation is underway into Gastro outbreaks across the country (pictured, a Coffin Bay oyster farm) No oysters are permitted to leave the area in the meantime. In SA alone, 45 Vibrio parahaemolyticus cases have been linked to raw oysters since September - a huge spike compared to zero cases last year and eight in 2019. Last Friday SA Health warned residents to avoid eating raw oysters as a result of 36 infections linked to the seafood in the last two months. 'This increase in cases reported to us in such a short period of time is very concerning, ' Acting Director of Food and Controlled Drugs Branch, Joanne Cammans said. 'Food-borne illnesses can be quite serious for more vulnerable people in our community, such as older South Australians, pregnant people and people with compromised immune systems.' Vibrio parahaemolyticus infection causes symptoms of gastro, including diarrhoea, abdominal cramps, nausea, vomiting, fever and headache. SA has recorded 45 Vibrio parahaemolyticus infections linked to the consumption of raw oysters since September (pictured, Oyster farms in Coffin Bay off the Eyre Peninsular) Ms Cammans added symptoms occur within 24 hours of eating undercooked seafood however raw oysters are often the most common cause of infections. Similar health warnings were issued in Western Australia which reported 17 linked cases and Victoria where eight infections were recorded. PIRSA Executive Director Nathan Rhodes said the department was working closely with industry leaders to ensure the best practices are used during the outbreak. SA Health has warned vulnerable residents to avoid eating oysters (pictured) while an investigation is ongoing 'The number of cases can vary substantially from year to year, and it is difficult to pinpoint the potential cause,' Mr Rhodes said. 'We are looking at potential factors that may have an influence on the recent cases, but the best international science has yet to determine a likely cause. 'Inspections by PIRSA officers have found that food safety practices are being appropriately applied on farms.' He advised to reduce the risk of infection, raw unshucked oysters should be kept at less than 10C and shucked oysters at less than 5C. Vibrio parahaemolyticus is a bacteria found in marine and coastal waters predominantly in warm tidal areas where oysters grow. The consumption of raw or undercooked shellfish, prawns, lobster, and crab can sometimes cause outbreaks of Vibrio parahaemolyticus gastroenteritis. The furious owner of a major restaurant chain has taken to social media to rant after a plain clothes cop was sent into one of his venues to ensure it was Covid-19 compliant. Rashays founder Rami Ykmour criticised the actions of officers who entered his diner in Rhodes, Sydney, in a scathing TikTok video on Tuesday. Mr Ykmour claimed the officers had compromised the mental health of his staff while they checked if his restaurant was following the proper procedures. CCTV footage of the interaction shows one male and one female officer entering the restaurant, checking in and then showing their vaccination passports. In CCTV footage of the interaction a plain clothes officer flashes his police badge to staff The man then flashes his police badge to staff who are asked to prove their vaccination status and present the diners Covid-19 safety plan. 'I don't know why it had to be so dramatic, why they had to get in the way of customers and why they had to approach the staff they way they did,' Mr Ykmour said. Mr Ykmour said his chest tightened the first time he watched the footage, revealing his staff were already under a 'tremendous' amount of pressure ensuring government regulations were maintained. He said while the interaction played out there were four front-of-house staff working in the restaurant, which was mostly empty. 'You could see the panic in the staff. They can see there's a police officer there, their heart rate is going through the roof,' the restaurant owner claimed. A NSW Police spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia: 'Police have reviewed the vision and have conducted inquiries'. 'While uniformed NSW Police officers have previously attended the premises, the person depicted on Friday 12 November 2021 is not a NSW Police officer. 'There are various government agencies that carry identification.' The family-owned restaurant chain has 30 locations across NSW, ACT and Queensland Rashays founder Rami Ykmour claimed the way police handled the interaction had compromised the mental health of his staff in the restaurant The founder added the the major chain spent over $150,000 a week on rostering extra staff to ensure the proper Covid-19 procedures were followed. Mr Ykmour said he had since spoken to one of the workers who was involved and said 'her mental health was not in a good way'. 'This is not the country we are. These are not the policies we need,' he said. 'We are putting our police force in a position we don't need to. We are putting our staff in a position they don't need to be in.' The restaurant owner said while he didn't want to come across as a 'sook' he was 'truly embarrassed for our future' and wanted to 'speak the truth'. 'It's time for the pretenders to move out of the way, it's time to stand up and fight for the people. Enough is enough,' Mr Ykmour concluded. Mr Ykmour (pictured) said he had since spoken to one of the workers involved in the interaction with police and said 'her mental health was not in a good way' It comes just days after the restaurant owner claimed he was left 'disgusted' after an officer - this time in uniform - visited the same diner to check compliance (pictured, a Rashays branch) It comes just days after the restaurant owner said he was left 'disgusted' after an officer - this time in uniform - visited the same diner to check compliance. The founder said staff were asked if they were double-vaccinated and if they were letting unvaccinated patrons through the doors. Mr Ykmour said the surrounding food court was packed with patrons who didn't have to prove they were vaccinated. 'If that isn't discriminating against small family businesses - who are dine-in restaurants, nothing is,' he said. In July, the Rashays boss was arrested after allegedly refusing to provide his details while two of his staff were fined for not wearing face masks at the company's head office at Chester Hill. Mr Ykmour claimed government regulations were discriminating against family businesses. He is pictured with wife Shannon and children (L-R) Aliyah, Zain, Amelia and Kameelah Police allege two staff members were not wearing face masks and that co-founder Rami Ykmour, 46, became aggressive and refused to provide his details Footage uploaded to Facebook shows Mr Ykmour speaking calmly with an officer at the front of the office after police were tipped off about a Covid-19 health order breach by an anonymous caller. Police allege two staff members were not wearing face masks and that the Rashays co-founder became aggressive and refused to provide his details. In footage of the dramatic arrest an officer points to several staff at the head office reception he can see who are not wearing face masks. Mr Ykmour suggests the workers might have been eating lunch or blowing their nose and claims the staff members have since put on their face masks, insisting there is no longer an issue. A staff member sitting behind reception desk begins to break down as the commotion escalates and later collapses onto the floor. The restaurant owner is told that he is under arrest before he is escorted out of the premises to the squadron of police cars parked in the driveway. In footage of the dramatic arrest an officer points to several staff at the Chester Hill head office (pictured) who he can see are not wearing face masks Mr Ykmour was arrested and issued a Field Court Attendance Notice for hinder police in July He was issued a Field Court Attendance Notice for hinder police. A NSW Police spokesperson said two staff members had been issued $200 fines for not wearing face masks. Mr Ykmour previously told Daily Mail Australia he had only being trying to support his employees, but he did not blame police for how they handled the situation. 'There's nothing that I've done wrong, except back my staff 100 per cent and I will always back my staff,' he said. 'The police were doing their job. That's the way they saw it and it is what it is. We don't want to criticise. It's not time for criticising, that's for sure.' In September, Mr Ykmour (pictured with wife Shannon) vowed he wouldn't re-open his NSW branches until all residents had the same freedoms regardless of their vaccination status In September, the founder vowed he wouldn't re-open his NSW branches until all residents had the same freedoms regardless of their vaccination status. Mr Ykmour said he didn't want workers at his 27 restaurants across the state 'facing arguments at the front door' from October 11 when fully-vaccinated patrons are allowed to dine at his restaurants. 'I'm happy small businesses can open up from October 11, including Rashays,' Mr Ykmour said in a TikTok video shared on Monday evening. 'But unfortunately we're taking a stance not to open up until December 1 because we are all about being inclusive. 'We are all about being inclusive. My staff have been trained for years to open everyone with open arms - I don't want them facing arguments at the door about who can come in because of double vaccine passports.' A woman has plunged to her death from her balcony in front of horrified cops who were called her her home. Officers rushed to her flat on Helena Street in Lilyfield, in Sydney's inner west, about 1.30pm on Tuesday after being called with a concern for her welfare. Police spoke with the 69-year-old woman when they arrived, but moments later she plunged from the balcony. Police were called to Helena Street (pictured), Lilyfield, about 1.30pm on Tuesday following concerns for welfare Despite the efforts of police and paramedics, she died at the scene. A critical incident was declared and a special team will investigate all circumstances surrounding her death. NSW's police watchdog, the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission, said it was notified of the critical incident by NSW Police. 'The NSW Police Force are investigating the circumstances of the incident and this investigation will be reviewed by the Professional Standards Command,' the LECC said in a statement. 'The LECC is independently monitoring the investigation of the critical incident under Part 8 of the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission Act 2016 to ensure public confidence in the investigation.' For confidential support in Australia LIFELINE: 13 11 14 www.lifeline.org.au. Suicide Call Back Service: 1300 659 467 A deadly crocodile has been snapped perfectly camouflaged in a pit of mud. The photo of the saltwater croc hidden in heavy mud was shared to the Australian Native Animals Facebook group as a reminder to be careful in crocodile territory. 'A reminder to be croc wise, steer clear of mud with eyes,' wrote Rodney Fischer to accompany the picture of the barely distinguishable form of an Australian saltwater crocodile covered in mud. The only indication a croc is underneath the mud is one green-gold eye peering out, which many people commenting on the post thought was a leaf or a stone. Pile of mud or disguise for one of Australia's deadliest creatures? Keep an eye out... 'Think I'll grab that cool looking green pebble lying in all that mud...' one person joked. 'I would have been lunch before I even saw it. Brilliant camouflage,' commented another. 'Shes having a facial and wondering what all the fuss is about,' a third shared. 'Salties' are the largest living species of crocodile in the world, growing to five metres in length, though specimens up to six metres are not unknown. Australian saltwater crocodiles are the largest living species of crocodile in the world, growing to around 4 or 5 metres in length, though specimens up to 6 metres are not unknown Despite the 'saltwater' description, in Australia saltwater crocodiles are frequently found in estuaries and are known to travel hundreds of kilometres inland swimming in freshwater. The species is considered a master of camouflage even without the mud. Mottled colouring and the knobbles on their backs allow them to effortlessly blend in to the colours of clear, shallow water. In the mud caused by the annual wet season, they are virtually invisible. They remain mostly submerged just below the surface of the water thanks to nostrils located on top of the end of their snouts, while their ears close while underwater, allowing them to remain still in the one position until prey comes into their orbit. It's estimated the apex predator numbers between 100,000 and 200,00 adults in Australia, distributed from Broome in Western Australia, through the rivers of the Northern Territory to Rockhampton and far north Queensland. More than 125 fans sued rapper Travis Scott for $750 million over the deadly Astroworld Festival incident that left 10 dead and hundreds injured earlier this month. The lawsuit, filed by Houston Attorney Tony Buzbee - who had previously been representing at least 35 victims from the concert - accuses Scott and festival organizers of 'gross negligence' for the chaos at Astroworld on November 5. The suit also names Live Nation, Epic Records Drake and Apple as defendants for their involvement in organizing the festival, and Buzbee plans to file another lawsuit with 100 more plaintiffs in the coming days. 'No amount of money will ever make these Plaintiffs whole; no amount of money can restore human life,' Buzbee said in the lawsuit. 'But, the damages sought in this case attempts to fix, help, or make up for the harms and losses suffered by these Plaintiffs -- nothing more and nothing less.' The lawsuit comes as W Magazine is reportedly scrambling to pull their next issue featuring Kylie Jenner and Scott on the cover after the Astroworld Festival tragedy. Rapper Travis Scott was accused of 'gross negligence' in setting up the Astroworld Festival that left 10 dead and hundreds injured on November 5 (pictured on stage) An ambulance is seen in the crowd during the Astroworld music festival as Scott's performance reportedly continued The unruly crowds were allegedly incited by Scott, who is accused with festival organizers of not putting enough safety measures in place to protect attendees Axel Acosta, 21, was crushed by the crowds and suffered a heart attack before being trampled to death. He had traveled from Washington to attend the festival - his first concert Buzbee alleges that Scott incited the crowd frenzy as he has often praised violence in mosh pits and yelled at attendees to attack one another. Buzbee claims Scott and the concert promoters and organizers failed to have protective measures in place to protect the concert goers. Among those Buzbee is representing is the family of Axel Acosta, 21, of Washington, one of the ten who died at the concert. Buzbee wrote, 'Axel was crushed by the incited, unruly and out-of-control crowd with such force that he could no longer breath; with such force that the air in his lungs was literally slowly squeezed out of him, sending his heart into cardiac arrest. 'When Axel collapsed, he was trampled by those fighting to prevent themselves from being crushed. As he lay there under a mass of humanity, dying, the music played and streamed onfor almost forty minutes.' In a statement, Live Nation said 'We continue to support and assist local authorities in their ongoing investigation so that both the fans who attended and their families can get the answers they want and deserve, and we will address all legal matters at the appropriate time.' The other defendants in the lawsuit did not immediately respond to the DailyMail.com's request for comment. Editors at W Magazine are said to be desperately attempting to recall the magazine 'before it hits store shelves,' a source told Page Six this week. Panic mode: W Magazine is reportedly scrambling to pull their next issue with Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott on the cover after the Astroworld Festival tragedy; pictured in 2019 Stressful: Editors are said to be desperately attempting to recall the magazine 'before it hits store shelves,' a source told Page Six this week 'W editors have cleared any planned coverage of Travis and Kylie from their website, but the magazine was already printed, and now they are trying to stop the delivery trucks,' an insider told the outlet. Additionally, they explained: 'In the light of what happened at Astroworld, the interview and cover lines seem inappropriate, to say the least.' DailyMail.com has yet to hear back from W Magazine for a request for comment. On Monday, Nike announced they would postpone their sneaker release with Scott after a nine-year-old boy became the latest fatality in a deadly crowd surge during his performance in Houston. The child was reportedly a big fan of the rapper music, and was sitting on his father's shoulders when the countdown to Scott's performance had began. The pair stayed near the back of the crowd because his father, Treston Blount, thought it would be calmer, he previously told ABC 13. But as soon as Scott took the stage, Treston said, people started pushing. He lost consciousness and Ezra fell to the ground, and was soon trampled on by eager concert-goers. Ezra Blount, 9, of Dallas, Texas, became the latest fatality in a deadly crowd surge during a Travis Scott performance at the Astroworld music festival in Houston on Sunday - 10 days after he was put in a medically-induced coma W editors have cleared any planned coverage of Travis and Kylie from their website, but the magazine was already printed, and now they are trying to stop the delivery trucks,' an insider told the outlet; seen in June When Treston regained consciousness, he said, he could not find Ezra anywhere, and rushed to the on-site medic tents and several hospitals. Eventually, he said, he filed a police report, and received a message from an officer with a picture of his boy. When he got to the hospital, he discovered his son incurred severe damage to his brain, kidney, and liver after being 'kicked, stepped on, and trampled, and nearly crushed to death,' according to a lawsuit his family has filed against Scott and the events organizer, Live Nation. The Blount family is seeking at least $1 million in damages. In a statement, the family's lawyer, Ben Crump, said that he was 'committed to seeking answers and justice' on behalf of the family. 'The Blount family tonight is grieving the incomprehensible loss of their precious young son,' Crump said. 'This should not have been the outcome of taking their son to a concert, what should have been a joyful celebration. Ezra's death is absolutely heartbreaking.' With Ezra's death, the death toll stemming from the crowd surge rose to 10 people. Ten dead: On Monday, Nike announced they would postpone their sneaker release with Scott after a nine-year-old boy became the latest fatality in a deadly crowd surge during his performance in Houston; pictured during 2021 Astroworld Festival at NRG Park The dead ranged from 9 to 27 years old. Hundreds more were injured. City officials are investigating what caused the pandemonium at the sold-out event attended by about 50,000 fans. Last week, Houston's police chief blamed Scott for not pulling the plug on the deadly Astroworld concert as new footage showed cops casually filming the Travis Scott show nearly 30 minutes after a mass casualty event was declared. Houston Police Chief Troy Finner refused to provide a timeline for the police response after a sizable group pushed toward the stage at NRG Park. When asked about the timing of the police response after it became apparent things had become dangerous, Finner said the police department was still in the early stages of its investigation and that he was 'not gonna discuss timelines.' Tragic: The dead ranged from 9 to 27 years old. Hundreds more were injured Many unknowns: When asked about how the concert came to an end, and why Scott was able to complete his set, the chief said investigators are still looking into the specifics during a press conference on Wednesday Video and photos obtained by TMZ shows members of the Houston Police Department calmly walking around and even pulling out their cellphones to record Scott's performance after the Fire Chief declared a 'mass casualty event' at 9:38 pm. A set of photos with the time stamps 9:57 pm shows police officers recording the rappers performance, 19 minutes after the chief's declaration, TMZ reported. TMZ also obtained video of officers casually strolling past the stage shot at 10:02 pm, 25 minutes after the mass casualty declaration. When asked about how the concert came to an end, and why Scott was able to complete his set, the chief said investigators are still looking into the specifics during a press conference Wednesday. Chaos: Around 2pm hundreds of fans stormed the festival's VIP entrance. About seven hours later the surge in front of the main stage killed nine people, but the two events appear to be unrelated 'I don't know, and that's part of the investigation,' he told reporters, adding 'We've been looking and the timelines have moved and that's why we shouldn't jump ahead of things, lets just wait. that's part of the investigation.' Finner, who said he did not have a close relationship with Scott and had only met him twice, said whether or not the show went on was not up to the police department. 'Authorities ability to end the show - we don't hold the plug, okay? But it's always in a plan, there's always discussion of how that would happen and we had those discussions with the promoters,' Finner said. 'The ultimate authority to end the show is with production and the entertainer,' he added. Gas prices jumped as much as 17 per cent in the UK yesterday after German regulators suspended approval for Russia's controversial gas pipeline into Europe. Wholesale gas was worth around 60p per therm at the start of this year. Yesterday that figure reached highs of 240p per therm though it is still below a record of 350p set in early October. Analysts at Energy Helpline said if the prices were to continue until February, energy regulator Ofgem could raise the cap on household bills on standard tariffs by 475. This would take it from the current level of 1,277 to 1,752. The move by Berlin's energy regulators came the day after Boris Johnson linked the 8billion Nord Stream 2 project to growing tensions in the East. German officials said the suspension was 'temporary' and the decision was seen as technical rather than political. Gas prices jumped as much as 17 per cent in the UK yesterday after German regulators suspended approval for Russia's controversial gas pipeline into Europe (stock image) Tuesday's jump was also driven by a reduction in flows of Norwegian gas into the UK due to an outage at the Troll gas field. And two more small suppliers Neon Reef and Social Energy Supply, with a combined 35,000 customers collapsed last night after the hike. Although the UK does not import much gas directly from Russia, it receives a lot from Europe which gets around 40 per cent of its supplies from Russia. The sky-high prices have been seen most profoundly in the UK through the sudden collapse of a string of small energy suppliers with more than 20 going bust since the start of September. Sam Peek, analyst at Cornwall Insight, said prices could keep climbing into next week if there is cold weather and periods of low wind. Concerns over the Nord Stream 2 project, which would bypass Poland and Ukraine by transporting natural gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea, have been renewed amid signs of Russian aggression on the border with Ukraine. Concerns over the Nord Stream 2 project, which would bypass Poland and Ukraine by transporting natural gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea, have been renewed amid signs of Russian aggression on the border with Ukraine (file photo) Although Nord Stream 2 is led by Russia's Gazprom, Germany's Federal Network Agency (FNA) said the Swiss-based consortium running the European end of the project would need to form a company under German law to obtain an operating licence. Until that happens, the approval process will be suspended. 'A certification for the operation of Nord Stream 2 will only be considered once the operator is organised in a legal shape compliant with German law,' the FNA said in a statement. The decision came after the Prime Minister, on Monday night, warned European leaders that there is a choice 'shortly coming' between 'mainlining' Russian fossil fuels or sticking up for Ukraine. The decision came after the Prime Minister, on Monday night, warned European leaders that there is a choice 'shortly coming' between 'mainlining' Russian fossil fuels or sticking up for Ukraine Downing Street stopped short of praising the German regulator yesterday but Mr Johnson 'underlined' the UK's opposition to the project to his Cabinet, No.10 said, asserting it 'would have significant security implications for the region'. With Mr Wallace visiting Ukraine, Downing Street said the Government will continue to speak to European allies and Kiev over the pipeline. 'Ukraine currently hosts the largest existing pipeline for Russian gas and transit fees have historically made up a large proportion of their GDP so Nord Stream 2 would divert supplies from the Ukraine that would have significant consequences for its economy,' the Prime Minister's official spokesman said. 'And it could also have significant security implications and the transit of Russian gas through the Ukraine is largely seen as a deterrent against further Russian aggression.' The Post Office has agreed to hand over secret emails from its lawyers which could explain why hundreds of subpostmasters were wrongly prosecuted for fraud, theft and false accounting, when a computer glitch was really to blame for financial irregularities. A public inquiry is under way to find out what happened, and 59 people have had their convictions overturned. Insiders estimate that the inquiry will be given tens of millions of documents, spanning over 20 years of e-mails and letters between Post Office staff and internal legal advisers, barristers and solicitors firms. Postmasters accused of theft by Post Office celebrate outside the High Court In London after they had their convictions overturned The documents will allow the inquiry to test claims made by the Post Offices former chief executive, Paula Vennells, a part-time priest, that she was led astray by her legal advisers. The Post Office does not legally have to hand over the papers but volunteered them at the request of the inquirys chairman, Sir Wyn Williams. Postmasters had argued that it would be impossible to uncover how thousands of them were targeted without considering the advice given to senior managers by their lawyers. The inquiry would have had no legal power to order the Post Office to hand over the documents if it had not voluntarily given it up, legal sources said. Former Post Office worker Janet Skinner (centre) hugs family members after having her conviction relating to the Horizon IT scandal overturned in April of this year Sir Wyn said: There is now a great deal of work to be done in organising and obtaining disclosure of relevant documents statement here. A Post Office spokeswoman said: Following the request by the inquiry chairman, the Post Office has agreed to waive relevant legal privilege for the purpose of the Inquiry to over 20 years of documentation, reflecting our desire to assist the Inquiry in obtaining the information necessary to complete their investigations. While the Inquiries Act does not compel this step, and legal privilege is an important feature of our justice system, this is the right thing to do for all those affected by the Horizon IT scandal. It has declined to waive privilege in respect of the postmasters compensation scheme, the Historical Shortfall Scheme. An attorney who initially represented Kyle Rittenhouse before they acrimoniously parted ways said on Tuesday that the teenager was always going to be acquitted, describing the case as politically-motivated 'malicious prosecution'. John Pierce, a high-profile former tank platoon commander who has made a name for himself representing multiple pro-Trump defendants - including 17 of the Capitol rioters - said that the trial was a sham. Pierce, 49, told Fox News on Tuesday: 'This case should have never been brought. 'In my view, this is blatant prosecutorial misconduct. It's malicious prosecution.' Pierce, who runs how own Los Angeles-based firm, was hired by Rittenhouse shortly after the August 25, 2020 shooting. John Pierce is pictured with Kyle Rittenhouse, his mother Wendy and sister Faith. Pierce represented Rittenhouse from August 2020 for just over three months Kyle Rittenhouse, now 18, is seen in the courtroom during his two-week trial Thomas Binger, prosecuting, shocked many in the court by brandishing Rittenhouse's gun during closing arguments on Friday On August 30, 2020, Pierce told Breitbart that the case was without merit. 'We're going to trial,' said Pierce. 'We're going to win this case. If I'm the prosecutor, I drop these charges immediately. 'I think that this is a rush of judgment, and if I was the prosecutor, I would be terrified to take this case to trial. 'I do not believe that there's a jury in this country that's going to look at these facts and is going to find him guilty for murder.' Pierce said at the time that Rittenhouse's case was 'absolute 100 percent self-defense, and we're going to prove it if we have to.' He added: 'It was legal for him to possess that weapon in Wisconsin.' Six of the 18 jurors who have heard the case were selected as alternates Tuesday morning and must remain in the courthouse while the remaining 12 deliberate in case they should be re-called Defense attorney Mark Richards is pictured on Monday, during closing arguments On Tuesday, Pierce said that he was confident his prediction over a year ago would stand. 'In a radio interview that I did on Breitbart just a few days after the shootings, I said that that charge should not have been brought, and that it was going to go away at some point,' he said. On Monday, Judge Bruce Schroeder dismissed the sixth charge, of unlawful possession of a firearm, as Pierce predicted. 'He was legally entitled to have that firearm with him,' he said. Judge Bruce Schroeder on Monday ruled that it was legal for Rittenhouse to carry the weapon. He threw out the charge, saying the wording of the law is ambiguous and confusing for even the most seasoned professionals like him, let alone for ordinary citizens 'And it's just clear as day from the evidence, most powerfully from the hundreds of angles of video evidence, that it was absolute perfect self-defense.' Pierce and Rittenhouse parted ways in December 2020, after questions were raised about his financial arrangements. Wendy Rittenhouse, Kyle's mother, told The New Yorker she had concerns about the #FightBack Foundation, the group founded by Pierce. 'Kyle was John's ticket out of debt,' Wendy said of Pierce. Wendy said she asked Pierce to return $40,000 in donated living expenses that she believed belonged to the family, a request she told the New Yorker he had refused. 'He said we owed him millions - he 'freed Kyle,'' she told the outlet. The Rittenhouse family said they grew uncomfortable with Pierce, telling the New Yorker that he drank excessively in front of Wendy's kids, called Kyle's sister a 'raging liberal,' and charged the family for time spent shopping for a shirt to wear on Tucker Carlson's show. Pierce is seen on Tucker Carlson's show in the fall of 2020, when he was representing Rittenhouse In March, Wendy told the Law & Crime podcast: 'They used Kyle to gain money, gain Twitter followers. 'I felt now they didn't care about Kyle.' Pierce now runs a private law firm and has founded the National Constitutional Law Union, or NCLU which he describes as 'the ACLU but for the rest of us.' Protesters made their feelings known on Tuesday outside the courthouse in Kenosha, Wisconsin He has vehemently denied misappropriating any funds donated to Rittenhouse's cause. Pierce on Tuesday said he was confident Rittenhouse would be acquitted, despite the fact that he 'was defamed by pretty much every media outlet and lots of politicians and celebrities as being mass murderer and a white supremacist, which is ridiculous.' Pierce added: 'The justice system, in many instances, is being weaponized for political purposes. 'I think that's one of the impacts that folks like George Soros have had in attempting to and being successful in installing many prosecutors throughout the country.' Pierce praised Judge Schroeder, saying that he had impressed him with his no-nonsense manner. Schroeder, 75, has frequently berated the prosecution and prevented them from bringing before the court detail they deemed relevant, such as Rittenhouse saying days before the shooting that he wanted to fire his gun at people. 'This judge is just unbelievably good,' Pierce said. 'He's just no bulls***, and he just goes by the law and, he is not going to be swayed one iota by anything happening outside the courtroom.' On Tuesday the 12-person jury spent their first day deliberating the five charges. If Rittenhouse is convicted, he faces the rest of his life behind bars. Many believe he will be acquitted, and the prosecution have even tried to lobby for watered-down convictions, in what is seen as a desperate bid to secure any type of conviction. Wendy Rittenhouse this week also praised the judge, and said she was hopeful her son would be freed. Former Federal Labor MP Craig Thomson has been arrested for his alleged involvement in a multi-million dollar migration fraud. The Australian Federal Police announced it had arrested a 57-year-old man from the NSW Central Coast at his home in Terrigal, on the NSW central coast. Thomson is alleged facilitated more than 130 fraudulent visa applications over four years, resulting in a $2 million windfall. The visas related to workers in the food service and regional farm industries, said the AFP. Former Federal Labor MP Craig Thomson has been arrested for his alleged involvement in a multi-million dollar migration fraud He was charged with providing false documents and false or misleading information relating to non-citizens, and breaching restriction on charging fees for immigration assistance. 'The alleged offences in this matter involved the exploitation of Federal Government programs designed to assist Australian businesses, and it is incumbent on the AFP to investigate and prosecute instances of large-scale fraud against Australian taxpayers,' an AFP statement read. The man is expected to appear before Gosford Local Court today. Mr Thomson during his time in Parliament as the Federal members for Dobell on the NSW Central Coast Former Labor MP Craig Thomson leaves the Melbourne Magistrates court with his wife Zoe in 2013. Police granted an apprehended violence order on Ms Arnold's behalf against Mr Thomson last week News of the arrest follows an earlier development where NSW police secured a restraining order to protect the wife of Mr Thomson. Zoe Arnold had defended him when he was found guilty of using trade union funds to pay for prostitutes. Ms Arnold was Mr Thomson's third wife and by the time he was sentenced they had two daughters. Police granted an apprehended violence order on Ms Arnold's behalf at Gosford Local Court on the New South Wales Central Coast on Monday. The two-year AVO prevents 57-year-old Mr Thomson going anywhere Ms Arnold lives, works or to other places listed in the order. Ms Arnold had provided a character reference for her husband to the court in 2014 in which she said mr Thomson was 'devoted to his family, his daughters and me'.' 'He has worked very hard every day as a private politician and as a private citizen, genuinely trying to make a positive impact on the local community,' the statement read. The former member for Dobell, Mr Thomson was convicted on 65 charges of using Health Services Union funds for personal benefit in March 2014. It was alleged Mr Thomson spent the money on prostitutes and restaurants during his time as the Health Services Union's national secretary between 2002 and 2007. He was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment, with nine months of the sentence suspended over two years. His conviction and sentence were later overturned on appeal, with Mr Thomson fined $25,00 and spared jail time after being found guilty on 13 counts of theft. The fine related to the withdrawals of $5650 from ATMs using union credit cards, money he was not authorised to use on himself. Mr Thomson was elected the member for Dobell on the Central Coast in 2007, taking the seat from the Liberal Party's Ken Ticehurst. He moved to the cross bench in April 2012 after the credit card allegations arose but continued to protest his innocence. After the scandal, Mr Thomson lost his seat in the 2013 Federal election. He was subsequently expelled from the Labor Party in 2014 and struck off as a practising lawyer in 2018. Australian Border Force Assistant Commissioner East and Port Operations Erin Dale said the investigation was part of its effort to stop the exploitation of foreign workers. '"Cash for visa" schemes as they are often known, target vulnerable visa holders who may not be aware of Australian laws and workplace entitlements,' Ms Dale said. A transgender university professor in Virginia has been placed on leave after defending pedophiles as 'Minor Attracted People' and saying they shouldn't be ostracized because they can't help their natural urges. Dr. Allyn Walker, who goes by the pronouns they/them, was placed on leave by Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, on Tuesday after a swell of outrage over their remarks and views. Walker has written a book that tries to destigmatize pedophilia. It encourages people to refer to pedophiles as 'Minor Attracted People' and says they shouldn't be ostracized for their urges, which they can't help. In a video to promote the book, Walker said: 'A lot of people when they hear the word pedophile, they automatically assume that means sex offender. That isn't true. And it leads to a lot of misconceptions.' They suggested pedophiles should be able to use childlike sex dolls to satisfy their urges and stop them from targeting actual children, and they 'didn't ask' to be sexually attracted to kids. The remarks sparked outrage immediately, but the university at first refused to remove Walker from their post. After a Change.org petition gathered nearly 4,000 signatures calling for their removal, the school changed course. Walker, who uses the pronouns they/them, said in a recent online interview with the Prostasia Foundation, a child advocacy group that promotes child sex doll usage for pedophiles, that pedophiles did not ask to be sexually attracted to children On Tuesday night, a spokesman said: 'Old Dominion University has placed Dr. Allyn Walker on administrative leave, effective immediately, from their position as assistant professor of sociology and criminal justice.' Walker, a tenure-track assistant professor at Old Dominion, had penned a controversial book attempting to destigmatize pedophilia titled A Long Dark Shadow: Minor-Attracted People and Their Pursuit of Dignity, published by the University of California Press. Walker's book which seeks to destigmatize pedophiles who he says shouldn't be ostracized because they can't help their desires Walker, who uses the pronouns they/them, said in a recent online interview with the Prostasia Foundation, a child advocacy group that promotes child sex doll usage for pedophiles, that pedophiles did not ask to be sexually attracted to children. Kennedy said that the online backlash had led to concerns for Walker's safety and that of the campus, and placing them on leave was the best course of action. 'Furthermore, the controversy over Dr. Walker's research has disrupted the campus and community environment and is interfering with the institution's mission of teaching and learning, she said. Old Dominion's president also issued a statement clarifying that the university did not condone any type of sexual abuse against children. 'I want to state in the strongest terms possible that child sexual abuse is morally wrong and has no place in our society,' President Brian Hemphill said. 'This is a challenging time for our University, but I am confident that we will come together and move forward as a Monarch family.' In their interview, Walker said there is no 'morality or immorality attached to attraction to anyone' because 'no one can control who they're attracted to'. 'In other words, it's not who we're attracted to that's either OK or not OK. It's our behaviors in responding to that attraction that are either OK or not OK.' Old Dominion had initially rejected the clamor to remove Walker, only distancing itself from the comments and saying it 'does not endorse or promote crimes against children' A Change.org petition calling for Walker's removal from the school's staff amassed more than 3,907 signatures before the university took action 'Pedophiles do not deserve sympathy or a platform of any sort,' wrote petition backer Kimberly Price An online petition calling for Walker to be fired attracted thousands of signatures as of Tuesday, with current students at the college branding their remarks 'gross' and 'weird.' Since it was launched three days ago, the professor has deleted their Twitter account. Before Old Dominion announced plans to place Walker on leave, an alumni said they were 'disgusted' at the university's decision to 'protect someone that is an advocate for pedophiles.' A Change.org petition calling for Walker's removal from the school's staff amassed more than 3,907 signatures before the university took action. 'Pedophiles do not deserve sympathy or a platform of any sort,' wrote petition backer Kimberly Price. 'They thrive off power structures. Giving them the opportunity to be seen and heard will only put more children in danger. This person does not deserve to teach if this is their ideals.' Walker later clarified that child sex abuse is 'never, ever OK' but said sexual urges toward minors are not necessarily immoral, as long as they are not acted upon. They said the term 'minor-attracted persons' will help destigmatize people who do not act upon their urges. They continued: 'We have a tendency to want to categorize people with these attractions as evil or morally corrupt. Walker earned their PhD at CUNY Graduate Center in 2017, according to the university's website, and specializes in mental health, court systems, queer criminology and 'resilience to offending' Walker would rather people referred to pedophiles as 'minor attracted' people 'But when we're talking about non-offending MAPs, these are people who have an attraction they didn't ask for. 'So, their behaviors are moral. But they're still being subjected to this same idea that they're bad people and they've often internalized that for themselves.' Walker's book, published in June, gives voice to 'non-offending MAPs' and consists primarily of interviews with self-identified pedophiles and vignettes from their lives, according to the book's description online. Walker's PhD thesis, titled 'Understanding Resilience Strategies among Minor-Attracted Individuals' takes another shocking stance on the treatment of pedophilia, arguing that pedophiles should be permitted to view child pornography as a 'harm reduction technique' or 'form of therapy' to help pedophiles 'maintain abstinence from sexual contact with children.' 'Among some groups of predisposed individuals, easy access to a wide variety of engrossing and high-quality child pornography could serve as a substitute for involvement with actual victims,' Walker wrote. Criminologist Evin Daly, CEO of Florida-based child advocacy agency One Child International Inc., told DailyMail.com that he felt 'the professor would be smart to readdress the terminology that they are using.' 'There is no de-stigmatization of people who are sexually attracted to children,' he said. 'Their overall theory is correct, their wish to redefine pedophiles is correct there's a difference between fantasy and behavior. But their terminology is leaning in a way that is trying to destigmatize pedophilia - how do you destigmatize wanting to have sex with children?' 'Any sexual activity with children is rape. That's like calling an adult rapist who rapes women by some soft and gentle term.' Walker's PhD thesis, excerpted above, takes another shocking stance on the treatment of pedophilia, arguing that pedophiles should be permitted to view child pornography as a 'harm reduction technique' Viewing 'engrossing and high-quality child pornography,' Walker argued, is a viable method to help those attracted to children 'maintain abstinence from sexual contact with children' As for Walker's graduate thesis, Daly didn't mince words. 'They speak about child pornography as if it's some abstract idea. It isn't,' Daly told DailyMail.com 'The generation of child pornography is a crime... Discussing viewing it even in a intellectual way is discussing how a crime will benefit a criminal - viewing it is a crime as I have said. Even conducting research would involve a crime as described.' Walker's comments were met with immense backlash after being shared on social media. 'We do not need to change the 'terminology' for pedophiles, read Dr. Walker's book, or receive lessons about giving 'pedophiles dignity,' Mikiah Everett, who identified as an ODU alumnus, said before Walker was placed on leave. A slurry of Twitter users were baffled and appalled by Walker's stance: 'Allyn Walker [thinks] it's okay to be sexually attracted to minors as long as you don't act on it,' wrote @DJDeMario1. 'This psycho must be fired and committed. Sick.' 'You've got an open pedophile pos working in your school, @ODU,' wrote @SaveTeamCasey. 'Allyn Walker promoting sexual attraction to kids... Do something.' Another user posted a picture of the professor defending their thesis, standing beside a PowerPoint presentation with the work's title: 'Understanding Resilience Strategies among Minor-Attracted Individuals.' User @ConceptualJames renamed the presentation: 'Understanding groomers and the direct connections between Queer Theory, 'comprehensive sex education,' pedophilia, and grooming in government and private schools.' Texas Senator Ted Cruz also waded into the debate, saying: 'Holy c***. What the hell is wrong with ODU?' Texas Senator Ted Cruz waded into the debate, saying: 'Holy c***. What the hell is wrong with ODU?' before the university placed Walker on leave A slurry of Twitter users were baffled and appalled by Walker's stance, and called for their resignation. Walker was placed on leave on Tuesday User @ConceptualJames renamed Walker's presentation: 'Understanding groomers and the direct connections between Queer Theory, 'comprehensive sex education,' pedophilia, and grooming in government and private schools' The professor put out a statement Saturday along with the Old Dominion University in a bid to clarify the controversial remarks. Walker said: 'I want to be clear: child sexual abuse is an inexcusable crime. 'As an assistant professor of sociology and criminal justice, the goal of my research is to prevent crime. 'I embarked on this research in hopes of gaining understanding of a group that, previously, has not been studied in order to identify ways to protect children.' The professor said they had counselled victims of sexual violence, which had helped form their views. Walker has taught at Old Dominion since 2019 and some students said they were disturbed by the comments. Jaelan Jackson told WTKR: 'Honestly it just sounds gross. Just because you're not acting on it, to acknowledge it is weird and not okay at all. It feels uncomfortable to know that someone's like that on campus.' Jonathan Mukmuye added: 'I don't think that it reflects poorly on the school, but I do think it's weird that we have a professor that would think that.' An Australian surfer who nearly lost his leg during a shark has opened up about the horror attack and shared insight into his long road journey to walk and surf again. Brett Connellan was just 22 when he was mauled by a shark 100m from the shore on March 30, 2016. He had been surfing at Bombo Beach in the coastal NSW town of Kiama when the beast lunged at him shortly after 7pm, taking three-quarters of his thigh with it. Brett Connellan (pictured) was just 22 when he was surfing at Bombo Beach in the coastal NSW town of Kiama shortly after 7pm on March 30, 2016, and was mauled by a shark 100m from the shore His quick thinking friend Joel Trist, a professional surfer, stopped him from bleeding to death as they waited for paramedics to arrive. Mr Connellan was flown by helicopter to Sydney's St. George Hospital, where he underwent multiple surgeries before being placed in an induced coma. When the surfer finally woke up, doctors told him he might never walk again. Now, Mr Connellan is sharing his story of strength and recovery and has released a sneak preview of his enthralling feature documentary titled 'Pyrophytic'. The trailer showed gruesome flashback scenes of the 2016 shark attack in black and white images. When the surfer finally awoke after multiple surgeries, doctors told him he might never walk again 'I never wanted to be defined by the incident or remembered as the guy that got attacked by a shark,' he said. 'I wanna be remembered for what I did afterwards.' The sneak peek into the film then showed a close-up of Mr Connellan's thigh and the scars left behind from the attack, as well as footage of Mr Connellan training hard at the gym, using a rowing machine and lifting weights on his inspiring road to recovery. The sneak peek into the film then showed a close-up of Mr Connellan's thigh and the scars left behind from the attack Medical professionals were amazed by Mr Connellan's determination as he exceeded their expectations in his second chance at life The trailer also featured the surfer catching huge waves at the beach as Mr Connellan showed off his passion. Medical professionals were amazed by Mr Connellan's determination as he exceeded their expectations in his second chance at life. 'The biggest issue that we had with Brett I think was trying to slow him down,' Mr Conellan's doctor said in the trailer. The teaser featured more scenes of the surfer at the beach facing massive waves as well as more clips from his training regime at the gym. Mr Connellan admitted that maybe he would have to live with wearing a brace, but then a massive breakthrough happened for the surfer where he realised he could be able to surf again Mr Connellan admitted that maybe he would have to live with wearing a brace for the rest of his life. 'I started off thinking, walking with a brace was as good as it was going to get,' he said. But then a massive breakthrough happened for the surfer where he realised he could be able to take to the ocean again with his surfboard. Honest Boys Production said the result of the film created 'is an inspiring celebration of Brett's unwavering determination to be better' 'And then it becomes well ok, how far can I push myself now?' Mr Connellan said as he is captured standing tall at dawn on a hill overlooking the beach. Honest Boys Production, who produced the documentary feature, said the result of the film created 'is an inspiring celebration of Brett's unwavering determination to be better, encouraging viewers to look at their own situation with a fresh perspective.' The inspirational film Pyrophytic is set to be released in late 2022. UK gas prices jumped 17 per cent in a day after two more energy firms collapsed, with consumers now being warned to brace for bills soaring by 475-a-year amid new fears about European supplies. Concerns of a winter energy crisis were renewed on Tuesday after a German energy regulator suspended approval for a pipeline that would carry Russian gas directly across the Baltic to Germany and wider Europe. Construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline was delayed by United States sanctions and is strongly opposed by many European countries who believe it is designed to freeze Ukraine out of transit fees for shipping Russian gas. The delay came hours after Boris Johnson told the EU it must choose between Ukraine's freedom or buying gas from Moscow when he linked the 9 billion pipeline project to growing tensions in the East. Wholesale prices subsequently shot up across Europe amid worries Russia will not increase deliveries of gas via alternative routes if the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is blocked. Wholesale gas in Britain was worth around 60p per therm at the start of 2021, but that figure reached 240p per therm on Tuesday. It remains below the record of 350p set in early October. The 750-mile Nordic Stream 2 pipeline would carry Russian gas directly across the Baltic to Germany and wider Europe Map showing points of origin and destination of the Nord Stream pipe (solid line) and Nord Stream 2 pipeline (dotted line) between Russia and Germany. Putin hoped Nord Stream 2 would be finished two years ago, allowing Russia to bypass Ukraine in the south, which carries 50% of gas from Russia out via Poland There are further fears, too, that the surge will send more fragile energy suppliers to the brink within weeks and pile pressure on heavy industry already feeling the strain. Two more small suppliers Neon Reef and Social Energy Supply, with a combined 35,000 customers collapsed after the price hike. Leading trader Trafigura has claimed Europe could face 'rolling blackouts' over the winter months due to a gas shortage. German officials have said the suspension was temporary and the decision was seen as a technical, rather than political, one. Although Nord Stream 2 is led by Russias Gazprom, Germanys Federal Network Agency (FNA) said the Swiss-based consortium running the European end of the project would need to form a company under German law to obtain an operating licence. It comes after Western politicians including Defence Secretary Ben Wallace accused Moscow of using the pipeline to deprive Europe of much-needed gas supplies and drive prices to record highs. Russia has also been accused of reducing supplies through existing routes as part of attempts to pressure Germany into granting approval. Despite fears, though, Mr Johnson maintained the UK's opposition to the pipeline citing concerns it 'would have significant security implications for the region. Russian President Vladimir Putin has been accused of using the pipeline issues to deprive Europe of much-needed gas German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Regulators suspended approval for the pipeline on Tuesday The price hike is also understood to have been driven by a reduction in flows of Norwegian gas into the UK due to an outage at the Troll gas field. Analysts at Energyhelpline said if the prices seen on Tuesday were to continue until February, the UK energy regulator Ofgem could raise the cap on household bills on standard tariffs by 475. This would take it from the current level of 1,277 to 1,752. The 750-mile Nord Stream 2 pipeline was completed in September, but is still awaiting regulatory approval. If given the green light, it would double Russia's gas export capacity to central Europe, whole also enabling Moscow to bypass Ukraine. Although the UK does not import much gas directly from Russia, it receives a lot from Europe which gets around 40 per cent of its supplies from Russia. Prices in Britain ballooned further after a fire at a subsea power cable with France shut off more electricity from the continent in September. Prime Minister Boris Johnson told the EU it must choose between Ukraine's freedom or buying gas The sky-high prices have been seen most profoundly in the UK through the sudden collapse of a string of small energy suppliers with more than 20 going bust since the start of September. Sam Peek, analyst at Cornwall Insight, said prices could keep climbing into next week if there is cold weather and periods of low wind. With Mr Wallace visiting Ukraine, Downing Street has said the Government will continue to speak to European allies and Kiev over the pipeline. Ukraine currently hosts the largest existing pipeline for Russian gas and transit fees have historically made up a large proportion of their GDP so Nord Stream 2 would divert supplies from the Ukraine that would have significant consequences for its economy, the Prime Ministers official spokesman said. And it could also have significant security implications and the transit of Russian gas through the Ukraine is largely seen as a deterrent against further Russian aggression. Hong Kong authorities have seized more than 1800kg of live lobsters and sea cucumbers believed to be bound for mainland China, months after Beijing restricted imports of the crustaceans from Australia amid escalating tensions between the two countries. Hong Kong Customs said in a statement it had seized 890kg of live lobsters and 930kg of sea cucumbers, with a total estimated value of $1.8 million during the operation on Monday. Two men, aged 40 and 45 suspected to be connected to the case were also arrested, the statement added. Hong Kong Customs seized 890kg of live lobsters and 930kg of sea cucumbers, with a total estimated value of $1.8 million on Monday (pictured) The seizures come after a recent surge in the import volume of Australian lobsters to Hong Kong following China's imposition of an unofficial ban on imports late last year. Lobsters are considered a delicacy in Chinese cuisine, and China had previously accounted for more than 90 per cent of Australia's lobster exports. The origin of the smuggled goods are still under investigation as the boxes seized were not labelled, according to Lui Siu-fai, the divisional commander of the customs' Syndicate Crimes Investigation Bureau. 'I believe that most of the smuggled goods were (to be) shipped to mainland China,' he said during a news conference yesterday. The customs' seizure of lobster comes weeks after a similar anti-smuggling operation last month saw authorities seize 5300kg of Australian lobster worth about $740,000 and arrest 13 people suspected to be connected to the case. Officials said monthly imports of Australian lobster to Hong Kong, a semi-autonomous Chinese city south of the Chinese mainland, have since more than doubled following the ban. Two men, aged 40 and 45 suspected to be connected to the case were arrested by Hong Kong authorities (pictured, a suspect smuggler is escorted by officers from Hong Kong Customs) China's lobster ban came after the Australian Government pushed for an international investigation into the origins of the coronavirus. China has since blocked trade on other Australian imports, such as wine, barley, cotton and coal. Last month Hong Kong's new Customs chief declared Australian rock lobsters smuggled into mainland China posed a national security threat for the rising superpower. Louise Ho, the territory's new Customs commissioner, pledged to crack down on the smuggling of the crustaceans. The grieving family of a Melbourne rapper say he was turning his troubled life around before he was gunned down inside his own home in a 'senseless act of violence'. Chris Habiyakare, 24, was with friends at his Sunshine North home in Melbourne's west on August 24 when he was confronted by a group of armed male intruders who forced their way into the home. Mr Habiyakare was shot during an altercation with the group before they fled and drove off in at least one vehicle. A manhunt is now underway for two men homicide detectives wish to speak to as Mr Habiyakare's heartbroken father and stepmother opened up about the devastating effect his death had on his younger siblings. Melbourne rapper Chris Habiyakare (pictured) was turning his life around and had reconnected with his family before his life was abruptly cut short Belthrand Habiyakare broke down while revealing how his eldest son, who was born in a Tanzanian refugee camp struggled with drugs and crime in the years before his death. Mr Habiyakare recently turned a corner and was on better terms with his family when his life was abruptly cut short. 'Life became so rocky that at some point I realised he was going to die, and I went into a depression,' Belthrand said. 'I lost hope and then slowly he started growing and he realised his problems, realised he needed to do something about them. 'When I had some hope ... he started repenting, calling us and apologising every week, and then all of a sudden his life ended.' He said his son's death had left him heartbroken and defeated and Mr Habiyakare's siblings were struggling to come to terms with his death. 'This event has broken me down into small pieces and I don't know how I'm going to put them back together,' he said. 'The saddest part is that, when I'm trying to reconstruct myself and make myself whole again, I see my other children crying, isolated and depressed.' 'There is not a single moment in my wildest dreams that I thought my eldest son would be tragically taken away from the very family to which he had vowed to dedicate himself.' Chris Habiyakare's stepmother Aline (left) and father Belthrand (right) wiped away tears as they opened up about his troubled past Chris Habiyakare (pictured) was shot dead during an altercation with a group of males at his Sunshine North home on August 24 Mr Habiyakare wants to know what happened to his beloved son, whom he described as 'the joy of my life for a long time.' 'I am a Christian, therefore inclined to forgive but I can only forgive once I know the whole truth,' he said. 'Whoever did it, come forward and say why you did it. I can't even sleep, I'm always on the lookout because I don't know who did it. It means I am constantly wondering if they are coming for my other sons and it is very heavy.' Mr Habiyakare answered a knock on the door when group of men armed with a range of weapons, including a gun, forced their way into the Essex Street house. Two men and three women visiting Mr Habiyakare at the time fled outside with one woman forced to smash a window to escape. Police said a fight occurred between Mr Habiyakare and the group of men and he was shot, before the men drove off. One of the friends who was visiting Habiyakare called triple-0 before commencing CPR. Habiyakare died at the scene, despite desperate attempts to revive him. Three months on, Homicide Squad detectives have released photos of two males they would like speak to as part of their inquiries. Detective Inspector Tim Day said 'significant' amounts of cash and drugs were found at the property, with a drug debt being looked at as a motive for the targeted killing. He added Habiyakare was known to police and had a history involving drugs. Aspiring rapper Chris Habiyakare (pictured) was born in a refugee camp 'Chris' death was a senseless act of violence by some callous miscreant who was intent on doing harm to him over a debt or some other issue,' he said. 'They used a firearm on a defenceless human being.' He said there was no doubt that the intruders were after Mr Habiyakare and not his friends. 'It's clear that the person who shot Chris, intended to kill Chris,' he said. Police are calling for two men in particular to come forward, one of which Det Insp Day said 'may have been the one to pull the trigger'. Investigators believe the shooting was a targeted incident but are yet to establish an exact motive. Det Insp Day confirmed a fight at the house three days earlier August 21 may be linked to the shooting. 'At this stage one of the lines of enquiry is determining if there are any links between this and the subsequent fatal shooting,' an earlier police statement read. 'At this stage this is only one, but a very important, line of enquiry for police.' Homicide detectives have released images of two men (pictured) they would like to speak to Chris Habiyakare's shattered stepmother Aline Habiyakare (left) and father Belthrand (right) joined police in a public appeal to track down his killers Detectives are keen to speak to anyone who might know these men and are also appealing for the men themselves to come forward. They're also keen to speak to anyone else who may have knowledge of the incidents or the circumstances leading up to the shooting. While a significant CCTV canvas of the vicinity has already been conducted, police urge anyone with additional footage between 5pm and 10pm on the night of August 24 to come forward. Habiyakare went by the rap name Lyr1cur7 and had just started gaining traction in the Australian hip-hop scene, with a freestyle released last year notching up a million views on YouTube. Dozens of double vaccinated Australians are still unable to get home because of an 'utterly insane' government rule. Australians are once again free to return home and travel the world as long as they are fully immunised against Covid-19, however an age limit imposed on a Chinese vaccine is causing significant problems. The Sinopharm jab, a state-owned and manufactured jab, is the second most used in China and is recognised by Australia's Therapeutic Goods Administration - but only for people aged between 18 and 60. That decision has left several Aussies, including Marijke and Steven Smit, stranded in overseas faced with a lack of available hotel quarantine for supposedly 'unvaccinated' travellers. 'It's incredibly difficult being stuck in a country and basically having to deal with a very illogical argument that you can't be considered vaccinated because you're over 60,' Ms Smit told Nine News. 'It's just utterly insane.' Marijke and Steven Smit are stranded in China unable to find a flight to come home because they are not recognised as vaccinated by the Australian government Dozens of double vaccinted Australians are still unable to get home because of an 'utterly insane' stipulation in the government's new rules The Sinopharm vaccine has been approved by 68 countries and for emergency use by the World Health Organisation. The Chinese state jab is recognised by the USA, UK and New Zealand for travel without age limits, however Australia bans vaccinated people under 18 and above 60 from entering. Retiree Judy Smith, who is also stranded in Sri Lanka, said she was hoping to come home to see her grandchildren but instead has to wait for further legislation. 'What I really want to get across is the disappointment, the rug being pulled out from under us,' she said. 'We're in a worse situation than we were two weeks ago and the government's just not offering us any hope at all.' According to WHO, the Sinopharm jab offers 'slightly lower' protection against severe illness and hospitalisation than the Australian vaccines of AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna. Retiree Judy Smith (pictured), who is stranded in Sri Lanka, said she was hoping to come home to see her grandchildren but instead has to wait for further legislation There have been increased outbreaks in countries vaccinated with the Chinese Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines, including Bahrain and Seychelles That is a result of the Chinese-led trial that was 'not designed and powered to demonstrate efficacy against severe disease in persons with comorbidities, in pregnancy, or in persons aged 60 years and above'. There have been large outbreaks in countries vaccinated with the Chinese Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines, including Bahrain and Seychelles. The result means the Smits and Judy Smith are forced to remain overseas until that mandate changes or they are immunised with other vaccines. Mrs Smit said they are having significant trouble booking flights home, aside from paying for hotel quarantine, because there are an extremely limited number of flights for the unvaccinated - despite the fact they are double jabbed. 'Since Sydney has opened up it only has 200 places. It's close to impossible to get tickets,' she said. 'I simply cannot. I've looked, believe me, I've looked at tickets, and I just cannot get anything in the next two, three, four months. 'It's literally and then, you know, at the moment, flights have two or three seats for unvaccinated people.' The McCloskeys, who made headlines last year when they aimed guns at BLM protesters on their lawn, posed for photos on Tuesday outside the Wisconsin courthouse where Kyle Rittenhouse stands trial, with two people flashing the 'OK' sign - which has been associated with white supremacists. Mark McCloskey, a candidate for the U.S. Senate in Missouri, and his wife, Patricia, were at the Kenosha courthouse for a second straight day to show support for Rittenhouse. They were among a group of people outside the courthouse, some in support of Rittenhouse and others opposed, who began to gather Monday during closing arguments. The couple gained national attention after they waved guns at Black Lives Matter protesters who were marching in their gated St. Louis neighborhood last summer. There were dozens of people outside the courthouse by Tuesday as the jury spent all day deliberating the case before ending the day around 6pm without reaching a verdict. While there, McCloskey was photographed standing next to two men with their thumb and index finger forming an O with the three other fingers splayed out. The symbol is widely regarded as a white supremacy sign, but it also means OK, which white supremacists hide behind. Mark McCloskey, center, and Patricia McCloskey, left, posed for pictures with supporters flashing the 'OK' symbol, associated with white supremacy, outside the Kenosha County Courthouse as the jury deliberated in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial on Tuesday The McCloskeys gained notoriety after they waved guns at Black Lives Matter protesters who were marching in their gated St. Louis neighborhood last summer The McCloskeys were seen among a group of people showing their support for Rittenhouse, who faces murder charges for killing two men at a Black Lives Matter rally in Kenosha on August 25, 2020. He argues he acted in self defense. McCloskey reportedly had a 'Mark McCloskey for US Senate' sign hanging from his SUV on Tuesday. When he was asked by CNN Correspondent Sara Sidner why he came to the courthouse from Missouri, he said: 'We are just here to support people's Second Amendment rights and defend themselves, especially when the government abdicates that duty and fails to protect its citizens. 'We have programs to defund the police all over the place, but you defund the police, and the government is not there to protect citizens, then citizens must protect themselves,' he explained. McCloskey also reportedly compared himself to Rittenhouse, saying they have both been prosecuted and were defending themselves from an 'angry mob.' In June, the McCloskeys pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges after they waved guns at Black Lives Matter protesters marching through their neighborhood. They were ordered to pay fines, but Mark McCloskey left the courthouse defiantly pledging to 'do it again' if faced with the same circumstances. Both McCloskeys were pardoned by Republican Missouri Gov. Mike Parson. Mark, a Republican, announced in May that he was running for the Senate seat being vacated by the retiring Roy Blunt, a Republican. He said he hopes the jury finds Rittenhouse not guilty. Mark McCloskey was one of the dozens of people outside the Kenosha County Courthouse, with some expressing their support for Rittenhouse, as others chanted 'Black Lives Matter' He and Patricia were seen posing for pictures with supporters, as he runs for US Senate McCloskey told a reporter he was at the court house to show his support for people's Second Amendment rights and the right to defend themselves The Mccloskeys just showed up outside the #KyleRittenhousetrial court. They are from Missouri so you may ask why the couple famous for pointing guns at protestors walking near their home are here in Wisconsin? All you have to do is look at the car they are in. POLITICS. pic.twitter.com/5LIsgyCc5h Sara Sidner (@sarasidnerCNN) November 16, 2021 But the McCloskeys were just some of the dozens of protesters who eagerly awaited the results of the trial on Tuesday. A group of Black Lives Matter protesters chanted 'No justice, no peace' and 'Black Lives Matter' as the jury deliberated inside, and at the center, Kenosha News reports, was Justin Blake, the uncle of Jacob Blake, whose death at the hands of police officers last year sparked nationwide protests. The pro-Black Lives Matter protesters reportedly called Rittenhouse a 'bigot' and set up a 'selfie station' with a cardboard cutout of Rittenhouse holding up the OK sign, which he was pictured doing in January. The judge in his case ruled in September against allowing that to be discussed during Rittenhouse's trial. Clyde McLemore, founder of Black Lives Matter North Chicago, also argued with Patricia McCloskey as her husband gave an interview Meanwhile, a woman was also seen holding up two cardboard signs that read 'Self-defense is not a crime' and 'BLM and Antifa are here 2 intimidate,' while others waved flags saying 'Let's Go Brandon,' a euphemism for 'F*** Joe Biden.' And across the street, at Civic Center Park, a woman who identified herself to Kenosha News as CGW, for Chocolate Goddess Warrior, got into an argument with a white man after she accused the McCloskeys of being white supremacists. The man reportedly yelled back about the high murder rate in Chicago, to which the woman responded, 'When black people commit crimes, they go to prison,' noting she believes Rittenhouse should go to prison as well. But no violence broke out outside the courthouse, Kenosha News reports, with one local Black Lives Matter organizer calling for 'being peaceful in the street today. 'We can't have infiltrators coming in and agitating,' Xavier Simmons said. He noted that he was there 'for justice for Anthony Huber and Jojo (Joseph Rosenbaum) and the other victim, Gaige (Grosskreutz).' Clyde McLemore, founder of Black Lives Matter North Chicago, argued with Patricia McCloskey as her husband gave an interview A man showing his support for Rittenhouse held a 'Let's Go Brandon' flag The crowds formed as the jury, which was randomly drawn by Rittenhouse on Tuesday, deliberated inside the courthouse. Rittenhouse faces life in prison if convicted of first-degree intentional homicide in the deaths of Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber when he was just 17 years old. In his closing arguments on Monday, Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger tried to paint Rittenhouse as an outsider who came to Kenosha, Wisconsin on August 25, 2020 to shoot down protesters who took to the streets following the fatal police shooting of Jacob Blake. He tried to portray Rittenhouse as an active shooter and claimed people in the crowd had the right to stop him. He also claimed Rittenhouse was looking for the 'thrill' of telling people what to do, 'running around with an AR-15' with 'neither the honor nor the legal right to do so.' 'These guys with the AR-15s are just wannabe soldiers acting tough, trying to manufacture some personal connection to this event, furthering their own personal agenda,' Binger argued, 'just a small part of the deluge of chaos tourists we saw here in Kenosha trying to feed off of what we were going through, despite everything we did to try and tell them, go away, stay out.' He focused largely on Rittenhouse's actions that night, trying to counter Rittenhouse's assertions that Rosenbaum was causing trouble all night, swinging a chain, demanding people shoot him, spewing racial slurs and setting fires. He described Rosenbaum as a small man, at 5-foot-4, with a 'Napoleon complex,' but was harmless. 'Oh, let me tell you all the awful things Joseph Rosenbaum did,' the prosecutor said. 'He tipped over a Port-a-Potty that had no one in it. He swung a chain. He lit a . . . Dumpster on fire . . . Oh, and he said some bad words. He said the N-word,' Binger claimed. 'If he were alive today . . . I'd probably try and prosecute him for arson. But I can't because the defendant killed him. 'But that's the way we deal with people that do these things. When you commit arson, we prosecute you. We don't execute you in the street.' Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger tried to paint Rittenhouse as a teenager looking for the 'thrill' of telling people what to do, 'running around with an AR-15' with 'neither the honor nor the legal right to do so' Rittenhouse faces life in prison if convicted of murder in the deaths of Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26 Attorneys for Rittenhouse, meanwhile, claimed he was acting in self-defense when he fatally shot Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and wounded Gage Grosskreutz, 27. Mark Richards, the attorney representing Rittenhouse in the trial, claimed Rosenbaum was 'irrational and crazy.' He said Rosenbaum chased Rittenhouse down until he had him cornered. If Rosenbaum had taken Rittenhouse's gun from him he would have shot others, Richards said. 'Mr. Rosenbaum made a fatal mistake that day, chasing Kyle Rittenhouse into the corner,' Richards argued. 'He ran as far as he could, and he shot, four times in three-quarters of a second 'I'm glad [Rittenhouse] shot him because if Joseph Rosenbaum got that gun I don't for a minute believe he wouldn't have used it against somebody else,' he added. 'Mr. Rosenbaum was hell-bent on causing trouble that night.' The jury has not reached a verdict in the case as of Tuesday night. Fox News host Jesse Watters implied that Biden may be considering removing Kamala Harris as Vice President after he said his network had heard 'whispers' of confirmation hearings in Congress. 'Our Capitol Hill Correspondent Chad Pergram tells us he's been hearing whispers suggesting there could be some new high-profile confirmation hearings on the horizon in the House of Representatives,' said Watters during the segment. 'Why is this a big deal? Because the house does not confirm normal nominees. But it does confirm vice-presidential nominees. Does this have something to do with Kamala Harris? It's been no secret she's been running out of favor with the Biden team,' he added. The host touched on reports over the weekend that the Biden-Harris post-election bliss, had worn out as aides became frustrated with her awkward laugh, 'dysfunction and lack of focus,' and low approval rate of just 28 percent. On Monday, Biden and Harris put up a united front when they stepped out of the White House together to sign the president's trillion-dollar infrastructure bill, after a CNN article on Sunday claimed that their relationship had soured. Pergram claimed he had been tipped by an email from a 'source,' but did not elaborate further. 'Our Capitol Hill Correspondent Chad Pergram tells us he's been hearing whispers suggesting there could be some new high-profile confirmation hearings on the horizon in the House of Representatives,' said Jesse Watters during the segment 'So I got a message recently from someone who knows Capitol Hill very well and they suggested I should familiarize myself with the process to confirm a vacancy for the vice president in the Senate and in the House,' Fox Capitol hill Correspondent Chad Pergram claimed On Monday, Biden and Harris had to put up a united front when they stepped together out of the White House to sign the president's trillion-dollar infrastructure bill, after a CNN article on Sunday claimed that their relationship had soured The host touched on reports over the weekend that the Biden-Harris post-election bliss had worn out due to Kamala's awkward laugh, 'dysfunction and lack of focus,' and low approval rate of just 28 percent. 'It's been no secret she's been running out of favor with the Biden team,' Watters said 'There is a lot of conjecture right now about the future of Vice President Harris and her lagging poll numbers,' Pergram said after Watters welcomed him on the segment. 'So I got a message recently from someone who knows Capitol Hill very well and they suggested I should familiarize myself with the process to confirm a vacancy for the vice president in the Senate and in the House,' Pergram added. He also mentioned that Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, who served under President Ford, was the last vice president confirmed by Congress. According to the Constitution, a sitting vice president can only be removed from office if they die, resign, or are impeached and convicted - in which case, Congress would confirm a successor. The reported growing animosity between the President and Harris could not be sufficient for Harris to be removed from office, but if tensions remain, Biden could ditch Harris if he runs for re-election in 2024. Pergram also appeared on Fox Radio's 'All-Panel Podcast', to talk about the 'whispers' on Capitol Hill that there could be new high-profile confirmation hearings. Also on Tuesday, the hosts of Fox's 'The Five' discussed rumors that Kamala would be replaced. Host Dana Perino mentioned an unusual process to confirm a new vice president in the middle of a term, although it has more commonly been used when a president dies and the VP ascends to the presidency - leaving their office vacant - or when the VP themselves die. 'And here is what I know to be true, Mr. President, you are equal parts believer and builder. 'And because you are, we are all better off. On behalf of our nation, thank you Mr. President,' Harris said 'This is one of those things where the White House is expected you to not believe what you're seeing,' Perino said. 'You can tell there's a problem here. We know it. They called a cabinet meeting for the first time in three months last Friday on the day when Kamala Harris was not even in the country,' she added. Host Greg Gutfeld also jumped in the discussion and said that Biden and Harris seemed like 'a couple who have split and they're trying to behave in front of the children.' 'They're still going to share the house. ''We won't tell the children yet, and we are going to keep smiling, and we are going to the PTA meetings,' he said. Watters then touched on the democratic party's uncertain future. 'Joe is going to be 82 when he runs for re-election, his disapproval is probably going to be at 82. He was supposed to be the bridge to the new generation, he is a bridge to nowhere. Kamala is DOA, that leaves mayor Pete. He's 5'6'', blacks don't like him,' the host said. According to CNN, Harris' aides complain that she has been set up to fail, and handed a portfolio that is not commensurate with her historic status as the first woman, and first woman of color, to hold the vice president's office. In contrast, they say the president has been more vigorous in defending Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. 'They're consistently sending her out there on losing issues in the wrong situations for her skill set,' said a former high-level Harris aide. Biden and Harris appeared together for the signing of the trillion dollar infrastructure bill Her aides also complain that on the issues that she has been given control over - such as the border crisis - she doesn't have White House backing to follow through. At the same time, Biden's staff are privately disappointed with Harris over self-inflicted controversies, like her 'awkward' laughter when asked about visiting the border by NBC's Lester Holt. On Monday however, Harris lavished praise on Biden, thanking him for the work he did to secure a trillion-dollar infrastructure bill. They walked out onto the South Lawn together in a show of unity before hugging in front of about 800 guests. Harris then walked to the podium to begin her speech when the announcer appeared to skip her and said: 'Please welcome Heather Kurtenbach.' 'In a moment,' Kamala responded with a laugh. Hours earlier, a string of insiders told CNN Biden was distancing himself from Harris because of her sliding poll numbers while the VP felt isolated. Officials tried to shrug off the claims during the day, and Harris offered her boss the thanks of a grateful nation. 'From the very start you welcomed Democrats, independents and Republicans to meet with us in the Oval Office. You welcomed ideas. You welcomed debate, all in the service of getting this bill done,' said Harris before Biden signed the bill into law. 'And here is what I know to be true, Mr. President, you are equal parts believer and builder. 'And because you are, we are all better off. On behalf of our nation, thank you Mr. President. A three-week-old baby girl is one of eight new Covid-19 cases found in the Northern Territory as the chief minister warns the virus may 'take lives' by the end of the year. The total cluster in the territory is now at 19 with all new infections recorded in Aboriginal Australians and in household contacts of known cases. Chief Minister Michael Gunner said five of the new cases were detected in the remote community of Robinson River, including a 12-year-old girl. Both Robinson River and Katherine have been locked down and will remain under stay-at-home orders until next Monday. A three-week-old baby girl is one of eight new Covid-19 cases found in the Northern Territory 'The situation of both Robinson River and Katherine is serious,' Mr Gunner said on Wednesday. 'We know how quickly Delta can spread within households, and we cannot be sure yet that it has not spread further into the Robinson River and Katherine communities, or wider in the Territory.' He urged those in the state to get vaccinated as soon as possible. 'If you waited because you didn't think Covid would get here, it's here,' he said. 'If you waited because you didn't think Covid was serious, you're wrong. It's killed 5.1 million people in the world. 'I fear it will take lives in the territory before the year is out.' The Northern Territory has not suffered any deaths as a result of the pandemic. NT Chief Minister Michael Gunner said he feared the virus would 'take lives' in the territory by the end of the year Anyone who has been in Robinson River since November 11 must get tested and isolate until given a negative result. The same direction applies to anyone who was in Katherine from November 7. All residents in the Northern Territory will also have to follow mask mandates. Katherine and Robinson River were both thrown into lockdown on Monday after two residents tested positive to the virus. Senator Malarndirri McCarthy on Tuesday revealed her unvaccinated 30-year-old sister was one of the new cases that sent the towns under stay-at-home orders. 'I'd like to say a personal message and that is that to my sister, who is the source of the Covid infection in Robinson River, our thoughts and prayers are with her and our family,' she told reporters. Senator Malarndirri McCarthy's (pictured) unvaccinated 30-year-old sister and a 43-year-old Aboriginal man tested positive to the virus on Monday, sending Greater Katherine and Robinson River into a snap three-day lockdown She also addressed some of the criticism she had seen by online trolls and encouraged residents to get vaccinated. 'The messages by people across Australia, negative messages in terms of social media that have discouraged people in particular First Nations people from vaccinating is completely disgraceful,' she said. 'It doesn't help. It never has helped and I would certainly encourage people to not listen to those messages as I have been, since this pandemic began.' Health teams have been deployed to Robinson River and surrounding communities for a testing and vaccine blitz. The Katherine Hospital and MacFarlane Primary School have both been listed as exposure sites. A woman who was raped by two men after they found her unconscious on Melbourne's Lygon Street has told a court she feels 'unable to find any joy in her days'. The woman, who cannot be named, was picked up by Harley Palise, 30, and his friend Jarrod Thomas, 26, in the early hours of a morning in June 2018. They both raped her before dropping her home at Mernda, in the city's northeast, with her underwear around her ankles. A woman who was raped by two men after they found her unconscious on Melbourne's Lygon Street has read her victim impact statement to Victoria Supreme Court on Wednesday 'I have experienced many emotions ranging from confusion and numbness, to disbelief, fear, frustration and sadness,' the woman said in a statement read out to the Victorian Supreme Court on Wednesday. 'At times I have become withdrawn from friends and family. I've felt unenthusiastic, unhappy, lacking in motivation and unable to find any joy in my days. 'My life will be impacted for the foreseeable future.' The woman, in her early 30s, also said she no longer socialises in large groups and moved house as she felt unsafe living at an address known to the pair. Thomas pleaded guilty to two counts of rape and was in 2020 jailed for a total of six years and six months. Palise fought the same charges and claimed from the witness box that the woman had initiated sex with him once she got inside the car. Harley Palise, 30, and his friend Jarrod Thomas, 26, had raped the woman in June 2018 The floor sander said he was 'just going with the flow'. But a jury in August found Palise guilty of two counts of rape. And in Wednesday's pre-sentence hearing Judge Scott Johns said he was not convinced by the 30-year-old's version of events. 'The reality is I would take some persuading accepting your client's account of how things were initiated,' Judge Johns told Palise's barrister John Kelly. 'In terms of what Mr Palise says happened in the car - I don't accept it.' Judge Johns described the woman as a 'vulnerable and helpless' person. He also said Palise did not use protection, which would have added to her humiliation. Prosecutor John Dickie described the rape as opportunistic but brazen given there was little planning involved but a high risk of being identified. 'The physical and emotional debasement ... was abhorrent,' Mr Dickie told the court. 'The men saw (the woman) as they something they could use for their own pleasure. And it is concerning that there is a degree of victim-blaming.' Mr Kelly on Wednesday said his client's offending was 'opportunistic and lacking in sophistication'. Palise has been remanded in custody and is expected to be sentenced on December 16. Sydneysider Madeleine Dow has been banned from going to her Adelaide family's birthday party without quarantining because of a bizarre quirk of Covid restrictions which locks out her under-jabbed LGA. Under South Australia's complicated re-opening plans, double-jabbed visitors from LGAs with 80 per cent-plus vaccination rates can fly straight into the state from November 23. But because Ms Dow, 33, lives in Sydney's Potts Point - where the City of Sydney LGA double-jab rate is just 73.2 per cent - she will need to go into 14 day hotel quarantine. Now her plans to fly home for the family birthday on November 27 are in tatters - despite officials admitting the low LGA vaccination rate figure is probably wrong. And if she lived just three streets away in neighbouring Woollahra LGA - where the double jab rate is 88.3 per cent - she could have skipped quarantine entirely. Sydneysider Madeleine Dow (pictured) has been banned from going to her Adelaide family's birthday party without quarantining because of a bizarre quirk of Covid restrictions Under South Australia's re-opening plans, double-jabbed visitors from LGAs with 80 per cent-plus vaccination rates can fly straight into the state from November 23 (pictured, a nurse administers a Covid vaccine jab) 'I can fly to London and back for Christmas without quarantine, but not Adelaide,' she told Daily Mail Australia. 'I'm in Potts Point but if I was just down the road in Paddington, I would be fine.' To rub salt into the wound, government statisticians have admitted that Sydney City LGA's double vaccination rate could actually be much higher than the official figure. The current figure is based on incorrect population statistics, so the actual vaccination rate could already be sitting comfortably above 80 per cent. The data includes overseas students who have since returned home during the pandemic, reducing the overall population and skewing the double jab rate figure. Ms Dow'splans to fly home for the family birthday on November 27 are in tatters - despite officials admitting the low LGA vaccination rate figure is probably wrong. (pictured, traffic at a border control in Queensland) If Ms Dow lived just three streets away in neighbouring Woollahra LGA - where the double jab rate is 88.3 per cent - she could have skipped quarantine entirely (pictured, border control in South Australia) The government has previously promised to fix the mistake, but it has yet to be addressed, despite causing havoc for some travel plans like Ms Dow's. 'I understand these are hard decisions to make but its frustrating,' Ms Dow told The Adelaide Advertiser. 'Frustrated is probably the key word, mostly because as a state, we are highly vaccinated. It's just the lack of clarity in terms of what does it actually mean. 'I understand rules need to be there, but considering as a state, we are highly vaccinated, far higher than SA, I would like them to look at those inconsistencies.' South Australia currently has a double-dose vaccination rate of 74.7 per cent of all aged 16-plus, while NSW is running at 91.3 per cent double-jabbed. The nationwide inoculation rate is 83.9 per cent. Primary school students will be encouraged to walk through the gates barefoot under a bizarre policy from next year. Inglewood Primary School, in Perth's north-east, said being barefoot helped children improve posture, develop sensory awareness, and strengthen their feet and body. But experts rubbished these claims as having no evidence to support them. Inglewood Primary School, in Perth's north-east, believe going to school barefoot helps children improve posture, develop sensory awareness and strengthen their feet and body The school is determined to push ahead with the project, adamant it would be beneficial on many levels. 'We believe that children need opportunities to explore indoor and outdoor environments without shoes,' the school's newsletter reads. 'Going barefoot is beneficial to children as it nourishes, strengthens and promotes agility in a child's growing feet, ankles, legs, knees and hips.' University of WA head of podiatric medicine and surgery Burke Hugo said there was no evidence it improved children's gait, co-ordination or balance. 'If they're in a safe environment it certainly won't hurt them, and maybe it will give them a little bit of freedom, but there's no plausible evidence that shows benefits to it over wearing well fitted shoes,' he told The West Australian. From 2022, the school will allow students from Kindergarten to Year 2 to leave their shoes at home (stock image) The school's deputy principal Jo Hart said Inglewood was handpicked as part of the WA Education Department's Leading Inspired Learning in the Early Years project. Under the project, for students in Kindergarten through to Year 2, a pupil's 'agency' - the ability to make decisions to influence events in their own lives - will be focused on. Nature Play chief executive Griffin Longley advocated allowing younger students to go to school barefoot, and urged more schools to follow suit. 'They are literally stepping out of the normal rules and rigours of school, and they are being invited to be creative,' he said. 'It is about choosing to value the kids' broader well-being.' Australian homeowners have been urged to check their fridges over food poisoning fears. Food Standards Australia took to Twitter on Wednesday to share the alert during Food Safety Week, which ends on November 20. The nation's leading food safety organisation urged households to have their refrigerators set at five degrees or lower to ensure bacteria doesn't spread. A new food poisoning warning has been issued by Food Standards Australia for homeowners to check their fridge temperatures (stock image) 'When it comes to chilling food safety, the temperature of your fridge matters,' Food Standards Australia wrote. 'It's a good idea to check that your fridge is at 5C or below.' 'Keeping your fridge cool will help stop the growth of most food poisoning bacteria - protecting your health and safety,' the organisation added. Food Standards Australia took to Twitter on Wednesday to make sure households have their refrigerators set at five degrees or lower The Food Safety Information Council reported there are about 4.1 million cases of food poisoning in Australia each year. It has resulted in 31,920 hospitalisations, 86 deaths and 1 million visits to the doctors on average every year. One-third of these cases are believed to happen in the home due to food handling blunders. The organisation said food poisoning stems from bacteria or viruses contaminating the food we eat. The Food Safety Information Council reported there are about 4.1 million cases of food poisoning in Australia each year (stock image) Bacteria like to grow in what is known the 'temperature danger zone', which is between five degrees and 60 degrees. The number of bugs can double and redouble in just a few hours, reaching dangerous levels. The Food Safety Information Council urged households to cook food properly as bacteria are killed in the cooking process, as well as to refrigerate items at five degrees or below. China's hypersonic space weapons could be used to launch a surprise attack on the US, said vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Hyten, who also admitted that Beijing has more advanced hypersonic technology. Hyten, the second-highest ranking military officer in the US, revealed that during last summer's hypersonic weapons test, China sent a missile around the world at more than five times the speed of sound, as reported by CBS News. Hyten told the news station: 'They launched a long-range missile. It went around the world, dropped off a hypersonic glide vehicle that glided all the way back to China, that impacted a target in China'. He added that also got 'close enough' to hitting its intended target, a feat he likened to 'a Sputnik moment,' when Russia launched the first manmade satellite into orbit in 1957, catching America by surprise and putting them at the forefront of the space race. Vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Hyten (pictured) said that China's hypersonic space weapons could be used to launch a surprise attack on the US and admitted that Beijing has more advanced technology China is thought to have carried out two tests of a hypersonic orbital nuke - the first on July 27 and the second on August 13 this year. Observers believe the 'weapon' is an updated version of a Soviet concept called a 'Fractional Orbital Bombardment System' (FOBS). It is designed to evade powerful US radar systems and anti-missile defenses designed to shoot down traditional ICBMs by flying in low-Earth orbit, making it harder to spot, track and destroy President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) exchanged pleasantries for the cameras at the top of their virtual summit Monday night. Xi greeted Biden as his 'old friend,' much to the annoyance of the US president who has been trying to shake the moniker for months 'From a technology perspective, it's pretty impressive,' Hyten told CBS in reference to China's June 27 around-the-world test. However, he noted that 'Sputnik created a sense of urgency in the United States, which 'the test on June 27 did not,' adding that he thinks it should have and suggesting that DC needed to take the test more seriously. But the new technology is reportedly already catching US officials off guard, particularly as the system 'defies the laws of physics' and appears superior to anything in the American arsenal. China has reportedly been working on hypersonic weapons instead of the usual intercontinental ballistic missiles, which travel in a predictable arc and can be tracked by radars, according to CBS. Meanwhile, hypersonic weapons are much harder for radars to pick up because they travel much closer to the planet's surface. Hyten referred to them as 'first-use weapons' and believes China could one day use the technology to launch a surprise nuclear attack on the US. 'They look like a first-use weapon,' Hyten said. 'That's what those weapons look like to me.' They later launched a second test on August 13 and it involved a similar 'hypersonic glide vehicle' to one launched into space on board a Long March rocket back in July. Beijing acknowledged one of the tests but claimed the country launched a 'peaceful' civilian spacecraft. Analysts believe the craft can actually be tipped with a nuclear warhead which would be able to evade missile defenses. But even government scientists are struggling to work out exactly what the new craft is capable of as one source told the Financial Times that it appears to 'defy the laws of physics' and is unlike any technology the US has. China pulling ahead in the modern arms race could also shift the balance between the US and Russia, whose equilibrium has depended on neither side having weapons to launch a successful nuclear strike China unveiled a hypersonic glide vehicle during a military parade in 2019, which is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Beijing has now used a hypersonic vehicle to test a low-orbiting weapon capable of defeating nuclear defenses China launched the dummy weapon into space on board a Long March 2C rocket (pictured) during a test in mid-August, which it did not disclose at the time and was only revealed at the end of October by security analysts assigned to work out its purpose Hyten told CBS that America is developing its own weapons of this kind, too, but at a much slower pace. The White House has refused to comment while the US Department of Defense has also declined confirming or denying the existence of any hypersonic weapons tests. Then over a virtual meeting summit on Monday night Chinese leader XI Jinping exchanged pleasantries for the camera with President Joe Biden and greeted him as an 'old friend'. From the introduction, Xi appeared to troll Biden - who has pushed back on the assertion the two were friends and called their meeting 'pure bitterness' - with the comment. Biden suggested that they should start the meeting 'more formally, even though you and I have never been that formal'. 'Let's get something straight,' the president said during a press conference back in June in Switzerland. 'We know each other well. We're not old friends. It's just pure business,' he added when speaking on Xi. China pulling ahead in the modern arms race could also shift the balance between the US and Russia, whose equilibrium has depended on neither side having weapons to launch a successful nuclear strike. However, this is far from the first test China has completed with their hypersonic missiles. Hyten revealed lsat month that the Asian country has carried out hundreds of tests while the US has done less than 10. Speaking at a Defense Writers Group roundtable in October, Hyten said China's hypersonic missile advancements is an area of concern and the public should be worried. 'What you need to be worried about is that in the last five years, or maybe longer, the United States has done nine hypersonic missile tests, and in the same time the Chinese have done hundreds,' Hyten said, according to reports. Hyten said the pace in which China is moving was 'stunning'. 'Single digits versus hundreds is not a good place,' he added, although the general did not elaborate on his concerns. It was also revealed last month that a rocket failure caused a delay in the US military's test of its hypersonic weapons system when the military scheduled a test of its Army-Navy common hypersonic glide body in Kodiak, Alaska but it was never able to launch. What is the new 'weapon' that China has tested? Intelligence sources say Beijing has tested two nuclear-capable hypersonic vehicles that flew around the planet in low-Earth orbit before coming back down. If confirmed - Beijing denies it, saying it actually tested a civilian spacecraft - then it marks a major jump in the country's nuclear programme, though the concept itself is nothing new. The idea behind China's 'new' weapon actually came from the Soviets, who developed it during the Cold War. Called a Fractional Orbital Bombardment System, or FOBS, it was designed to evade powerful US radar arrays and missile defence systems. Those systems work by detecting launches of ICBMs - very long-range missiles that can be tipped with nuclear warheads - tracking them into space and then firing at the warheads as they come down in the hope of blowing them up before they hit their targets. This is possible because ICBMs and their warheads follow a predictable trajectory that rises high above the horizon - making them relatively easy to spot and allowing defense crews to calculate where they are aimed so they can be shot out of the sky. FOBS is designed to negate these defenses by firing warheads along a much-flatter trajectory that is assisted by Earth's gravity. This means the warheads pass under the scope of many radar detection arrays and are harder to track. It also makes the warheads much harder to shoot down because their trajectory is harder to calculate. In addition, using orbit to carry the warheads makes their range potentially unlimited, meaning they can be fired at its target from any direction. This helps to avoid radar systems which are generally pointed at a fixed spot in the sky - in America's case, over the North Pole. Soviet Russia had a FOBS system - comprising, at its peak, of 18 R-36O missiles - which were active from 1969 until 1983 when it scuttled the programme in response to changes in America's missile defence systems. China now appears to be pursuing the technology anew, while coupling it with a new 'hypersonic glide vehicle' to carry the warheads. The 'HGV' is thought to make the warhead easier to manouevre while in orbit and increase its accuracy. Despite its 'hypersonic' name, it actually travels much slower than ICMB warheads - some 3,800mph compared to 15,000mph+ for 'traditional' nukes. Russia and the US are both developing HGVs of their own, though neither has put them to use in the same way as Beijing. Moscow has one that can be fitted to its latest Satan 2 ICBM, while the US is working on one that can be launched from a B-52 bomber - though two recent tests of the system have failed. Advertisement Meanwhile, China conducted a second test of a suspected hypersonic orbital missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, intelligence sources, including Hyten, have claimed. 'The pace they're moving and the trajectory they're on will surpass Russia and the United States if we don't do something to change it,' he said. 'It will happen. I think we have to do something.' Hyten's concerns echoed those expressed earlier by Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the Joints Chief of Staff. Milley called China's suspected testing of hypersonic weapons 'very concerning' during an interview with The David Rubenstein Show on Bloomberg Television. 'I don't know if it's quite a Sputnik moment, but I think it's very close to that,' he noted, adding that 'it has all of our attention'. Milley also warned that the new missile systems are just one of many things the US should be concerned about as the Chinese military expands. 'The Chinese military capabilities are much greater than that. They're expanding rapidly in space, in cyber, and in the traditional domains of land, sea and air,' he told Bloomberg. 'We're in one of the most significant changes in what I call the 'character of war.'' The technology was designed to cut off enemy supply lines in the event of a conflict and sneak attacks using underwater charges will leave large vessels like American aircraft carriers vulnerable. Underwater demolitions are a response to changing US tactics in the Pacific as Washington divides its forces between smaller locations instead of concentrating them in one place to mitigate the damage from attacks. This tactic increases the strain on logistics operations required to keep large vessels such as aircraft carriers afloat, making attacks on infrastructure such as ports and wharfs more important. 'With ports destroyed, enemy logistics support will fail and a dispersed fighting force... will also fail,' an unnamed military expert told The Times. It's just the latest move in a global arms race between Russia, China and the US that's taking place against the backdrop of mounting tensions between the superpowers in the eastern Pacific. All three countries are engaged in wholesale updates of their militaries including the development of new nuclear technology with which they can strike each other at range. Russia and China have, in recent years, unveiled new and more-powerful ICBMs which are capable of launching multiple nuclear warheads at targets many thousands of miles away. The United States, Russia and at least five other countries are also working on hypersonic technology - and last month North Korea said it had test fired a newly-developed hypersonic missile. Russia had previously tested a hypersonic cruise missile known as Zircon but it flies below the atmosphere and uses fuel to power itself to hypersonic speeds rather than the Earth's orbit. The Pentagon did not comment on China's testing of the hypersonic missile but did acknowledge China as their 'number one pacing challenge'. 'We have made clear our concerns about the military capabilities China continues to pursue, capabilities that only increase tensions in the region and beyond,' John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesperson, told Fox News. 'That is one reason why we hold China as our number one pacing challenge.' The cast and crew of the Harry Potter movies are coming together for a reunion, with one notable exception - the author, JK Rowling. HBO Max announced on Tuesday it would bring together the cast members from all eight Harry Potter films for a retrospective special entitled Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return To Hogwarts. The release said it would feature stars Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint - who have not made a public appearance together since the premiere of the last premiere of the franchise, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2, in July 2011, as well as filmmaker Chris Columbus, who directed the blockbuster film. But the release does not mention the person responsible for the creation of the characters, author JK Rowling, who has been criticized for her views on transgender people. Sources close to the project told TMZ that it will focus on the creation of the first film 20 years ago, and the central cast and crew. They said Rowling will be shown in archival footage from the creation of the first movie, but will not make a new appearance in the special. Scroll down for video. Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, and Daniel Radcliffe, (seen left to right in 2001's Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone) are among those set to reunite for the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return To Hogwarts special on HBO Max Famed author JK Rowling will not be joining the production, however Rowling has been criticized over the past few years for her views on transgender people. In June 2020, she took to Twitter to criticize an opinion piece that used the term 'people who menstruate' instead of women. 'I'm sure there used to be a word for these people,' she tweeted at the time. 'Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?' She then continued with a thread discussing biological sex. 'If sex isn't real, there's no same-sex attraction,' she claimed. 'If sex isn't real, the lived reality of women globally is erased. 'I know and love trans people, but erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives.' Rowling later clarified that she respects 'every trans person's rights to live any way that feels authentic and comfortable to them,' and went on to say she would march 'if you were discriminated against on the basis of being trans. 'At the same time, my life has been shaped by being female,' Rowling said, the Associated Press reported at the time. 'I do not believe it's hateful to say so.' Then, in September 2020, she faced renewed calls of transphobia after it was revealed the the villain in her latest book, Troubled Blood - written under Rowling's pseudonym Robert Galbraith - is a male serial killer who dresses as a woman to slay his victims. An early review of the 900-page book by The Daily Telegraph - in which the critic states the book's 'moral seems to be: never trust a man in a dress' - sparked immediate backlash online. Furious readers rushed to Twitter to share their thoughts, making #RIPJKRowling trend in the UK. The children's book author was accused of being transphobic in June 2020 after she criticized an opinion piece that used the term 'people who menstruate' instead of women, and tweeted about biological sex She was then embroiled in another controversy after it was revealed that the villain in her latest book Troubled Blood (right) is a male serial killer who dresses as a woman to slay his victims In the wake of these remarks, Harry Potter actors Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Daniel Radcliffe and Eddie Redmayne, who stars in her Fantastic Beasts films criticized the author for her remarks. And in March, Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley in the beloved film series admitted that he felt he needed to stand up for transgender people following Rowling's remarks. He said that while he was 'not an authority' on the debate, he felt he had a responsibility to speak out in support of the trans community as 'silence is louder'. In an interview with Esquire, he said: 'I am hugely grateful [for] everything that shes done. I think that shes extremely talented, and I mean, clearly, her works are genius.' 'But yeah, I think also you can have huge respect for someone and still disagree with things like that... 'Sometimes silence is even louder. I felt like I had to because I think it was important to. I mean, I dont want to talk about all that Generally, Im not an authority on the subject. 'Just out of kindness, and just respecting people. I think its a valuable group that I think needs standing up for.' The trio of stars will be joining filmmaker Chris Columbus (seen in November 2001), who directed the blockbuster original film of the franchise Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone, to celebrate the movie which premiered 20 years ago In the aftermath, Rupert Grint, who is known for playing Ron Weasley in the film series, admitted that he felt he needed to stand up for trans people, He is pictured in 2019 The 20th anniversary special will be the first time the English actors have made a public appearance together since the premiere of the last premiere of the franchise, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2, in New York City back in July 2011 Other actors that will be joining the project include Helena Bonham Carter, left, and Ralph Fiennes, right Now, the cast is set to return for the 20th anniversary special, which 'tell an enchanting making-of story through all-new, in-depth interviews and cast conversations,' according to HBO Max. Several talented actors will be joining the main three stars in the special, including Helena Bonham Carter, Ralph Fiennes, Tom Felton, Gary Oldman, Imelda Staunton, Bonnie Wright and Jason Isaacs. Casey Patterson whose production company is producing the special gushed over the cast as she said: 'Theres magic in the air here with this incredible cast, as they all return home to the original sets of Hogwarts, where they began 20 years ago. 'The excitement is palpable as they prepare to take their fans on a very special and personal journey, through the making of these incredible films.' Daniel, Emma, and Rupert are seen with David Heyman and Chris Columbus at the London premiere in November 2001 Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts is set to begin streaming on HBO Max on Saturday, January 1 Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone has grossed over $1billion over it's lifetime There will also be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren Of the upcoming special, President of Warner Bros. Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics Tom Ascheim said in the statement: 'It has been an incredible journey since the debut of the Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone film, and witnessing how it has evolved into this remarkable interconnected universe has been magical to say the least. 'This retrospective is a tribute to everyone whose lives were touched by this cultural phenomenon from the talented cast and crew who poured their heart and soul into this extraordinary film franchise to the passionate fans who continue to keep the Wizarding World spirit alive 20 years later.' Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone premiered on November 16, 2001. It has grossed over $1billion over its lifetime and is one of the top selling franchises of all time. Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts is set to begin streaming on HBO Max on Saturday, January 1. The special will later air on channels TBS and Cartoon Network in spring 2022 before the theatrical release of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. There will also be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren. White House officials insisted on Tuesday that President Joe Biden does not consider China's President Xi Jinping an 'old friend' after an interpreter said as much during their virtual meeting on Monday. 'You've heard explicitly from the president himself, that he has a longstanding relationship with President Xi,' said White House Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates on Tuesday. 'They've spent a great deal of time together. They are able to have candid discussions, be direct with each other, which helps them be productive. 'But he does not consider President Xi an old friend,' Bates told reporters. Biden and Xi spent more than three hours in a virtual summit on Monday night in an effort to ease tensions between the world's two biggest economies President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping exchanged pleasantries for the cameras at the top of their virtual summit Monday night Xi appeared to troll Biden by greeting him as an 'old friend' at the meeting - in direct contradiction to repeated denials from both the president and Press Secretary Jen Psaki. In response, Biden, who has previously pushed back on the assertion he and Xi were friends and called their meetings 'pure business', suggested that they should start the meeting 'more formally, even though you and I have never been that formal.' Over the summer, Biden responded sharply to Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy, who asked if he would call Xi 'old friend to old friend' - seeking access for World Health Organization investigators searching for the origins of COVID-19. 'Let's get something straight,' Biden replied in June during a press conference in Switzerland. 'We know each other well. We're not old friends. It's just pure business.' And before Monday's virtual meeting took place, Press Secretary Jenn Psaki clarified that Biden was by no means close friends with Xi, but said the leaders' level of rapport would allow them to have 'candid discussions.' 'Well...I can confirm...he still does not consider him an 'old friend,' so that remains consistent,' Psaki said ahead of the meeting between the two world leaders. President Joe Biden, left, had met China's Xi Jinping virtually to discuss major issues. An interpreter said Jinping had called Biden an 'old friend' much to the US president's annoyance Cabinet members including Secretary of State Antony Blinken (second from right) and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen (right) joined President Joe Biden's (left) virtual meeting Monday night with Chinese President Xi Jinping (second from left) The Chinese leader originally used the expression 'lao peng you,' which connotes fondness and shows a level of familiarity and trust, following months of tension between the US and China. Said by Xi, 68, the expression reflects a shared history that dates to August 2011, when he and Biden held hours of conversations and traveled in Sichuan province - when Xi was First secretary of the Communist Party and Biden was Vice President under Obama. Wang Huiyao, president of the Center for China and Globalization, said Xi's use of the expression is a show of genuine goodwill. During the virtual meeting on Monday night, Biden shared that he and Xi have 'always communicated with one another very honestly and candidly' and they 'never walk away wondering what the other man is thinking.' Daniel Russel, the top US diplomat for Asia under former President Barack Obama, said it was part of each leader's seeking the 'narrative high ground' at the opening. 'Xi deliberately greeting Biden as 'my old friend' - after Biden went on record this summer expressly denying that they are 'friends.' And Biden, with a toothy smile, reminding Xi that all countries - including China - 'have to play by the same rules of the road',' Russel said. Shi Yinhong, professor of international relations at Renmin University of China, noted Xi's use of the term despite the difficult state of relations. 'When we Chinese call someone an old friend, we mean we've known him for a long time. But an 'old friend' doesn't necessarily mean he is still a real friend,' Shi said. Given current diplomatic tensions, Biden may not want to be seen by US allies and his political opponents as too much of a 'friend'. The United States and China disagree on the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, trade and competition rules, Beijing's expanding nuclear arsenal and its stepped-up pressure on Taiwan, among other issues. Biden promised to address areas of concern, including human rights and other issues in the Indo-Pacific region. He told the Chinese leader he was looking forward to a 'candid and forthright discussion,' which will ensure 'simple, straightforward competition' between China and the United States. 'We need to establish some common-sense guardrails,' Biden said, adding, 'especially on vital global issues like climate change.' The meeting went 'longer than expected' a senior administration official said on a call with reporters after midnight. It lasted for about three and a half hours, broken into two sessions. 'The conversation was respectful and straight-forward and open,' the official said. 'They didn't just stick to the scripts in front of them.' Chinese officials said in advance that Taiwan would be their top issue for the talks. Tensions have heightened as the Chinese military has dispatched an increasing number of fighter jets near the self-ruled island of Taiwan, which Beijing considers part of its territory. 'The Taiwan issue concerns China's sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as China's core interest,' Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said Monday. 'It is the most important and sensitive issue in China-U.S. relations.' On the video call, Biden reiterated the U.S. will abide by the longstanding U.S. 'One China' policy, which recognizes Beijing but allows informal relations and defense ties with Taipei. The statement reiterated longstanding US policy that does not recognize Taiwan's independence but allows informal and defense ties with Taipei. According to the US official, who asked not to be identified, there was 'extended discussion of Taiwan' during the summit. President Joe Biden waves to Chinese President Xi Jinping at the top of their virtual meeting Monday night Secretary of State Antony Blinken (left) listens as President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping (right) meet virtually Monday night Tension over Taiwan in particular is threatening to escalate into dangerous new territory. China has ramped up military activities near Taiwan in recent years, with a record number of warplanes intruding into the island's air defense zone in October. The United States says it supports Taiwan's self-defense but is ambiguous about whether it would intervene to help directly. In the brief comments made in front of reporters, Xi referred to each country needing to 'run our domestic affairs' but did not mention US criticism of Beijing's saber-rattling around Taiwan, mass human rights violations or other sore points. Next year's Beijing Olympics didn't come up. There have been some calls for the U.S. to boycott the Winter Olympic Games over China's human rights abuses. Biden did talk to Xi about human rights, the senior official confirmed. 'The two leaders have had many discussions about human rights issues over the years and they've talked about it at some length,' the official said. 'It's no secret that they have a real difference in world views.' Biden was 'quite clear and quite candid' when talking to Xi about human rights, and spent time speaking about Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong, as well as human rights more broadly, a White House readout said. 'We were not expecting a breakthrough, there were none to report,' the official said more generally about the call. The White House said that the two leaders also talked about Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea. They also talked about the U.S.-China trade deal, with Biden pushing for China to fulfill its phase one commitments. The senior administration official wouldn't say if Biden and Xi talked about China's hypersonic missiles - though hinted that the president asked China to be more transparent as the world seeks answers about the origins of COVID-19. The president 'also talked about the importance of preventing future pandemics and the important role that transparency plays in addressing global health issues,' the official said. At the top of the meeting, Biden told Xi, 'We have a responsibility to the world as well as to our people.' 'That's why we believe and you and I have talked about this all countries have to play by the same rules of the road, why the United States is always going to stand up for our interests and values, and those of our allies and partners,' Biden said. ''If past is prologue, I am sure that today we'll be discussing those areas where we have concerns on human rights, on economics, to ensuring a free and open Indo Pacific.' Biden also shared that he and Xi have 'always communicated with one another very honestly and candidly.' 'We never walk away wondering what the other man is thinking,' Biden said. Before turning the program over to Xi, Biden thanked the Chinese leader for calling and congratulating him after he won the election last year, saying it was 'very gracious.' Through a translator, Xi told Biden, 'Good to see you, Mr. President and your colleagues.' 'It's the first time for us to meet virtually, although it's not as good as a face to face meeting, I'm very happy to see my old friend,' Xi said. 'Humanity lives in a global village, and we face multiple challenges together,' Xi said. 'China and the U.S. need to increase communication and cooperation,' the Chinese president also offered. The two men were meeting Monday night Washington time, while it's already Tuesday morning in Beijing. The aim of Monday's virtual summit with China is to defuse tensions over Taiwan and other flashpoints. However, both sides have signaled little appetite for compromise. 'Certainly, the president will express areas where he feels China should be taking additional action, should be behaving in a different manner that is more aligned with the rules of the road and the expectations with the United States and the global community,' Psaki said. The two leaders have spoken by phone twice since Biden's inauguration in January but with Xi refusing to travel abroad because of the pandemic, an online video meeting is the only option short of an in-person summit. Most attention in the build-up has focused on the sparring over Taiwan, a self-ruling democracy claimed by China, and Biden's aides have cast the summit as an opportunity to help prevent tensions escalating. 'We know as a responsible global leader that it's important to keep channels of communication open,' a senior administration official told reporters, adding that competition between the two countries should not lead to conflict. 'The president will also make clear that we want to build common guardrails to avoid miscalculation or misunderstanding.' At the same time, the White House sought to temper expectations, with the official saying that the summit 'is not a meeting where we expect deliverables to be coming out.' Biden, a veteran of foreign policy issues during his decades in politics, has often said phone conversations are no substitute for face-to-face meetings. Xi has not left China for nearly two years, and Biden sharply criticised his absence at the recent COP-26 climate summit in Glasgow and G20 summit in Rome. Relations between the superpowers plummeted during the presidency of Donald Trump, who launched a trade war with China while assailing Beijing over its handling of the pandemic. Biden has recast the confrontation more broadly as a struggle between democracy and autocracy. And while the day-to-day tone is more measured than under Trump, relations have worsened over Taiwan. China has ramped up military activities near Taiwan in recent years, with a record number of warplanes intruding into the island's air defense zone in October. The United States says it supports Taiwan's self-defense but is ambiguous about whether it would intervene to help directly. China is stepping up its rhetoric, warning Washington to keep out. 'Any connivance of and support for the 'Taiwan independence' forces undermines peace across the Taiwan Strait and would only boomerang in the end,' Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a weekend meeting. China's foreign ministry on Monday put the onus on Biden to improve relations. 'We hope that the U.S. will work in the same direction as China to get along with each other,' foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters. Chinese state media on Monday also portrayed Taiwan as the key flashpoint in current US-China tensions. The United States must 'take a step back from the Taiwan question,' the Global Times, a hawkish tabloid, said in an editorial. However the US administration official signaled Biden would be 'very direct' on what he called 'China's coercive and provocative behavior with respect to Taiwan.' The official also stressed that the two nations had room for cooperation in various areas, such as climate change. This virtual meeting is being held at a time when Xi continues to strengthen his grip on power. Top Chinese Communist Party leaders last week passed a resolution that is expected to help Xi shore up his power by setting in stone his vision for China and diminishing the role of previous leaders. The resolution 'further cemented' power in the hands of the Chinese president, the Washington official said. The official added, 'In our mind that just further underscores the importance of this leader level engagement.' Mark McGowan's electorate office has been closed due to worrying security risks, with staff reportedly subject to rape threats from anti-vaxxers. The Western Australian Premier said his Rockingham office had been the target of death and bomb threats since the state government announced mandatory vaccination for much of its workforce. It comes eight days after a man was prevented from allegedly planning to dump a tank at his office. It took four officers to restrain James Tioro outside his Camden Way home and take him into custody before the alleged plan could be carried out. Western Australia Premier Mark McGowan said his staff have been threatened with rape and death over the state's mandatory vaccination policy Poll DO YOU AGREE WITH MANDATORY VACCINES FOR SOME WORKERS? Yes - for health care, aged care and hotel quarantine staff Yes - for all workers No - no one should have to DO YOU AGREE WITH MANDATORY VACCINES FOR SOME WORKERS? Yes - for health care, aged care and hotel quarantine staff 1035 votes Yes - for all workers 1917 votes No - no one should have to 5885 votes Now share your opinion Just before the police intervened, Mr Tioro was standing on top of a former British Army tank known as a Ferret Scout Car, allegedly swinging a pickaxe and shouting threats, some of which were directed at Mr McGowan. Mr Tioro was reportedly angry at Mr McGowan over WA's mandatory vaccination policies. Around five hours before his arrest, Mr Tioro allegedly organised for a tow truck to take the tank to the Premier's office. Channel 7 Perth reported that when Mr McGowan's staff refused to allow the tank to be dropped off outside the office, they were abused. It also reported that material allegedly threatening the Premier had been found inside Mr Tioro's house. The tank was then taken back to Mr Tioro's home and several police cars later responded to a disturbance there. Pictured: A tank which a man allegedly attempted to have dumped at WA Premier Mark McGowan's office in Perth Mr Tioro was subsequently charged with disorderly behaviour, being armed in a way to cause fear and making an unlawful threat He said his office was subjected to constant 'threatening' and 'intimidating' messages. Mr McGowan called for those responsible to 'just stop.' After his staff got death threats in October, he said intimidation would not change the state's mandatory vaccination policy. Anti-vaxxers have been blamed for threats made against the staff of WA Premier Mark McGowan. Pictured is an anti-vax protest at the Botanic Gardens in Brisbane, Saturday, August 21, 2021. Daily Mail Australia does not suggest that anyone pictured has made threats against Mr McGowan or his staff 'What I'm doing and what the government is doing is what is necessary to keep people safe and keep our state safe, and we're not going to be deterred from that,' he said. 'People can make Facebook comments, they can say these sorts of things, but it's not going to change the approach to the government. 'We have to do what we have to do to keep the state safe. Getting people vaccinated is necessary.' His electorate office was previously evacuated last March after a suspicious package was thrown into the building. The White House won't be dropping its indoor mask requirement, despite Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser decision to lift the mandate. 'The White House follows CDC guidance which recommends masking in areas of high or substantial transmission,' White House spokesman Kevin Munoz said on Tuesday. Mayor Bowser announced on Monday that the District of Columbia will lift its indoor mask requirement starting next week, as local COVID-19 infection cases continue to trend downward. Starting Monday, November 22, masks will no longer be required in many indoor spaces, although the stipulations do not apply to federal Washington, including the White House and Congress. The White House won't be dropping its indoor mask requirement after Washington DC Mayor Muriel Bowser decision to lift the mandate The White House said Bowser's stipulations do not apply to federal Washington, including the White House and Congress, where CDC guidance will still be followed Mayor Bowser announced on Monday that the District of Columbia will lift its indoor mask requirement starting next week, as local COVID-19 infection cases continue to trend downward. Above, Bowser during a press conference in May 'We are encouraged by the numbers that have opted into vaccination now, some of them encouraged by mandates,' Bowser said. 'There may even be an increase in cases but what we haven't seen is an increase in hospitalizations and deaths. That is the promise of vaccination.' Mayor Bowser has repeatedly described mask requirements as a sort of thermostat-style dial that can be turned up or down based on shifting conditions. Washington had one of the nation's most strict mask mandate since July, as the district saw a surge in COVID-19 cases of the Delta variant. A statement from the city Health Department announced that masks will still be required in certain settings, including schools, libraries, public transportation, ride-share vehicles and group-living facilities like nursing homes, dorms and jails. The greater Washington area still remains an area of 'substantial' transmission, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Mayor Bowser has repeatedly described mask requirements as a sort of thermostat-style dial that can be turned up or down based on shifting conditions There are currently over 46 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the US. More than 750,000 have been reported in Washington. According to Health Department statistics, the current seven-day average of new cases in DC - the department's preferred metric - is higher than it was in May when the first mask requirement was lifted, but still well below the late-summer delta-variant peak in August and September Private businesses will still be able to require customers to wear masks. The nation's capital originally lifted its indoor mask requirement for fully vaccinated individuals in May, but reinstated it in late July as cases began to rise again. There are currently over 46 million cases of COVID-19 in the US, and more than 750,000 have been reported in Washington. Masks are still required indoors in counties such as Prince Georges County, Md., while Virginias Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun and Prince William counties, have just recommended mask use, The Washington Post reported. According to Health Department statistics, the current seven-day average of new cases - the department's preferred metric - is higher than it was in May when the first mask requirement was lifted, but still well below the late-summer delta-variant peak in August and September. The greater Washington area still remains an area of 'substantial' transmission, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Per CDC advice, everyone in Columbia County should wear a mask in public indoor settings as the district is a 'high transmission community.' The Tory MP who accused Boris Johnson's father of slapping her bottom nearly 20 years ago has been targeted with rape threats. Caroline Nokes MP shared some of the vicious abuse sent to her online after she claimed Stanley groped her in 2003. It comes as Labour urged the Tories to launch a probe following claims from her and journalist Ailbhe Rea over an alleged incident in 2019. Former minister Ms Nokes first accused Stanley of forcefully smacking her on the backside at the Tory Party conference in 2003, ahead of him running to be an MP. Her allegation prompted political reporter Ms Rea to say she was 'groped' by the former member of the European Parliament at the party conference in 2019. Stanley declined to comment other than to say he has 'no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all'. Meanwhile the Tories are yet to say if a probe will be launched and No 10 declined to comment on the claims against the 'private individual'. Senior Conservative MP Caroline Nokes (left), 49, and New Statesman journalist Ailbhe Rea (right) have both accused Stanley Johnson of inappropriately touching them Stanley declined to comment other than to say he has 'no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all' Ms Nokes revealed some of the vicious hate posted to her on social media last night after her claims emerged. She wrote on Twitter: 'And to [man's name] - thank you for your email tonight: ''I wish he had raped you you filthy Tory wh***.''' She added: 'That is the level of discourse women MPs have to deal with, every single day.' Ms Nokes, chair of the Commons Women and Equalities Committee, suggested the PM's father inappropriately touched her during the 2003 conference in Blackpool. At the time, she was preparing for the campaign to represent the Hampshire constituency of Romsey during the 2005 election, during which Mr Johnson stood in Teignbridge, in Devon. She told Sky: 'I can remember a really prominent man smacking me on the backside about as hard as he could and going, 'Oh, Romsey, you've got a lovely seat'. 'Stanley Johnson did that to me ahead of the '05 election, so it was Blackpool ... 2003/4. I didn't do anything and I feel ashamed by that ... now I probably would.' Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer praised Ms Nokes' 'bravery' for speaking out, and called for an investigation either by the Tories or the police. 'The allegations are serious and they need to be fully investigated, I don't think at this stage it's for me to say what should happen as a result,' Sir Keir said at a press conference on tackling sleaze in politics. 'But it takes guts and bravery to come forward to make allegations like this. They now need to be fully investigated either by the Conservative Party or by the criminal authorities.' Shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds earlier said the allegation needs to be treated 'extremely seriously and sensitively'. 'The Conservative Party clearly needs to investigate a serious allegation like that, that happened at their party conference,' he told Times Radio. Home Office minister Damian Hinds did not commit to an investigation during an appearance on the same radio station. 'If there is an investigation to be had, if that is the appropriate course of action, then of course that will happen,' he said. The comments from Ms Nokes, who has represented Romsey and Southampton North since 2010, prompted a separate allegation from Ms Rea, which the journalist for the New Statesman magazine said happened at the Manchester party conference in 2019, when Boris Johnson was Tory leader. Ms Rea wrote on Twitter: 'Stanley Johnson also groped me at a party at Conservative conference in 2019. 'I am grateful to Caroline Nokes for calling out something that none of us should have to put up with, not least from the Prime Minister's father.' Stanley Johnson lost the campaign to become an MP in 2005 but had served as a Conservative MEP between 1979 and 1984. Mr Johnson, now 81, declined to comment to the PA news agency about both of the allegations. But, regarding the initial accusation, he told Sky News: 'I have no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all. But there you go ... and no reply.' On Tuesday Ms Nokes tweeted: 'Just wanted to thank the sisterhood for the solidarity and support today. You know who you are and you're amazing.' Downing Street declined to say whether an investigation would be carried out, with the Prime Minister's official spokesman saying: 'I haven't spoken to the PM about this, it wouldn't be one for me. 'I'm not going to be drawn into specific allegations against a private individual. Of course we would want anyone in any circumstance who feels they have been a victim of any kind of harassment to come forward and report them to the appropriate authorities.' A gunman is on the loose after a woman was shot at a busy medical centre on the Gold Coast. The 29-year-old shooting victim told police she was hit with a bullet after a man dropped a gun in the stairwell of the Southport Health Precinct at about 2:15pm on Wednesday. A desperate hunt is now underway to track down the man who picked up the firearm and fled - but the injured woman is refusing to reveal his identity. A gunman is on the loose after a woman was shot at a busy medical centre on the Gold Coast. Pictured: Police arrive at Southport Health Precinct Investigators are now scouring through CCTV footage to find out what happened where he may have went. Queensland Police said although the woman was taken to Gold Coast University Hospital, she only suffered a minor arm abrasion with the wound described as 'a graze'. It is understood the gun fired when it hit the ground and ricocheted around the concrete stairwell. 'It is not a random attack. We do not believe he was trying to harm her,' Queensland Police told Daily Mail Australia. A desperate hunt is now underway to track down the man who picked up the firearm and fled - but the injured woman is refusing to reveal his identity. Pictured: Am ambulance arrives at the scene 'He and her are known to each other. She is currently assisting us. 'We are looking for him but we know who he is.' Detectives descended on the scene at about 4pm searching for the bullet shell and any other forensic evidence. The Southport Health Precinct was put into lockdown during that time and the building's High St entrance was taped off. 'Enquiries indicate there is no ongoing risk to the public,' police said. If you want an excuse to stay up late, or get up very early, then a Leonid meteor storm is a pretty good reason to burn the midnight oil. An even better reason is the spectacular display happens roughly only once every 33 years, so if you miss this one it's a long wait until the next in 2054. The Bureau of Meteorology's Space Weather Services says the meteor storm will be visible across Australian on Thursday morning, with 3am in the eastern states being the opportune time. A Leonid meteor storm over the Azrak desert, Jordan. A similar storm will be visible across Australia in the early hours of Thursday morning 'Visually, the early morning hours of November 18 may see an intensely spectacular Leonid meteor storm,' BOM's website says. Previous Leonid storms, such as one in 1966, have led to thousands of meteors per minute coming through the Earth's atmosphere - so many that they seemed to fall like rain. A meteor streaks into the earth's atmosphere in this time exposure image over Tataka on Taiwan's Jade Mountain. EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE LEONIDS The Leonids are usually one of the more prolific annual meteor showers, with fast, bright meteors associated with Comet 55P/TempelTuttle. The radiant (the point where the meteors seem to stream from) is at the head or 'sickle' of the constellation Leo the Lion, hence the name. As the comet follows its path around the sun, it leaves a path of tiny debris. The cometary debris enters our planets atmosphere at speeds of up to 43 miles (70 km) per second, vaporising and causing streaks of light. Source: Royal Museums Greenwich Advertisement BOM did not go so far as predicting a similar intensity for Thursday morning, though. 'It is more probable however, that a much less intense shower of a few hundred meteors per hour will eventuate.' In the eastern states, the best time to look to the sky is around 3am local time (2am in Queensland), 2am local time in WA, and 3.30am local time in SA and the NT. 'Rising early on this morning is probably a worthwhile activity, whatever eventuates,' BOM said. According to NASA, the Leonids are considered to be some of the fastest meteors known, travelling at speeds of 71 kilometres per second. Meteors also known as 'shooting stars' are typically either bits of asteroids leftover from the formation of the solar system or, as in the case of the Leonids, material ejected from the disintegration of a comet as it passes near the Sun. These beautiful streaks seen in the night sky can be caused by cosmic particles that are as small as a grain of sand. 'The Leonids meteor shower is named after the constellation of Leo the lion,' Royal Observatory Greenwich astronomer Anna Gammon-Ross told MailOnline. 'This is because, although meteors appear all over the sky, they all appear to emerge or radiate from a single point that lies within this constellation.' How to watch the Leonid meteor showers across Australia They are best viewed as far away as possible from city lights, as light pollution can drown out the spectacular show. No special equipment is needed, but a clear sky would be a big help. It can take up to 45 minutes for your eyes to adjust to the dark for the best view. The Leonids - so called because they appear in the sky in the region of the constellation of Leo - are a stream of minute dust particles trailing behind the Tempel-Tuttle comet, which is visible from earth every 33 years The meteors can come from any direction and will look brightest against the darkest part of the sky. Some meteors pass very quickly and faintly, while the brighter ones appear to sail across the sky for several seconds, leaving a glowing smoke trail. Lie on your back and look straight up for the best view, or get out a reclining chair if you don't fancy getting wet. And take some pictures to show your friends and family who didn't stay up for the celestial space show. After all, it's going to be a very long time before this happens again. A grandmother from Texas has reported a domestic 'terrorist threat' to the FBI after a father told a school board meeting last week he had 'over 1,000 soldiers ready to go'. Ladonna Meyers, a grandmother of two, filed the report with federal agents following a meeting on November 9 of the Fort Worth Independent School District board. During the meeting, local father Malikk Austin, who supports Critical race Theory (CRT), addressed anti-CRT protestors, telling them: 'For those who got an issue with this critical race theory equity, this is something I fight for, for my children. 'How dare you come out here and talk about the things that my daddy and my grandparents went through? The lynching, the oppression, Jim Crow and my kids are still being afflicted by this.' 'We are not our ancestors,' Austin added. 'I got over 1,000 soldiers ready to go.' Speaking about her report to the FBI, Meyers, who had been present at the school board meeting, told Fox News: 'It's their job to check in on terrorism, and this was a terrorist threat.' During a November 9 meeting of the Fort Worth Independent School District board, Malikk Austin (pictured during the meeting) got up and spoke for a minute, defending the teaching of CRT Austin said to people arguing against the teaching of CRT that he had '1,000 soldiers ready to go' School board meetings nationwide have become a flash point of controversy over the teaching of critical race theory, which critics say makes children feel guilty for being white. Supporters of CRT claim that it is vital to 'center' the experiences of black people and other minorities in educational curricula which until now has been taught predominantly through the prism of white Americans. Following his allotted one-minute period to speak, police officers escorted Austin from the room, and while being taken away he yelled: 'I'll bring my soldiers with me next time locked and loaded.' However, he previously told DailyMail.com that he has not been contacted by law enforcement and that he doesn't anticipate being arrested. Following his allotted one-minute period to speak, police officers escorted Austin (pictured, on his social media) from the room, and while being taken away he yelled: 'I'll bring my soldiers with me next time locked and loaded' He added: 'I've been to school board meetings for quite some time. I didn't threaten nobody, sir. That's freedom of speech.' In early October, Attorney General Merrick Garland set up a task force comprised of the FBI, the national security division, the criminal division, the civil rights division and others to tackle threats against school staff. Republicans said that Garland's inclusion of the national security division proved that he was targeting parents as 'domestic terrorists.' Garland testified on Oct. 21 that the Justice Department and its components were not using counterterrorism tactics to target 'concerned parents at school board meetings.' He testified that he could not 'imagine any circumstance in which the Patriot Act would be used in circumstances of parents complaining about their children, nor ... a circumstance where they would be labeled as domestic terrorists.' However, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy slammed Joe Biden's Justice Department for an 'egregious abuse of power' on Tuesday and demanded Garland testify before Congress about the counterterrorism tactics the FBI is using to investigate parents. 'In an egregious abuse of power with the potential to unfairly track Americans' activities, President Biden's Department of Justice is using FBI criminal and counterterrorism resources to target parents,' McCarthy said in a statement. 'Attorney General Garland must return to Congress to address, under oath, in detail, the discrepancies regarding the directives he issued involving investigating America's parents,' he demanded. Garland testified on October 21 that the Justice Department and its components were not using counterterrorism tactics to target 'concerned parents at school board meetings' but Republicans say they have documentation that shows differently. McCarthy also blasted Biden for going after parents instead of 'actual threats.' House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy (pictured on November 16) slammed Joe Biden's Justice Department for an 'egregious abuse of power' on Tuesday and demanded Attorney General Merrick Garland testify before Congress about tactics the FBI is using to investigate parents 'This is further proof that we have a President in the White House who is more interested in going after our own citizens, including concerned parents, than he is in going after actual threats. This raises the question that should alarm every American: if the Biden administration is using our country's top law enforcement agency to go after parents, what are the actual threats they are ignoring?,' he said. The House GOP leader was responding to the revelation the Federal Bureau of Investigation has created a 'threat tag' to flag all investigations into potentially criminal threats, harassment and intimidation of educators. Republicans argue this could be used to target parents protesting local education policies. Parents have taken to going to school board meetings to express concern about the teaching of critical race theory, transgender policies and other issues. The GOP saw education become a successful campaign issue in the 2019 Virginia gubernatorial election, where concerned parents came out in numbers to help their candidate win. The latest revelations came from an FBI whistleblower, who provided an email dated October 20 to House Republicans sent on behalf of the counter-terrorism division and the criminal division. An email, released by an FBI whistleblower, referenced Attorney General Merrick Garland's October 4 directive to the FBI to ramp up its involvement in school board threats, and notified agents of a new tag, 'EDUOFFICIALS,' to assign to any threats against school administrators, board members, staff or teachers. Pictured: File image of Merrick garland on September 9 The email referenced Garland's October 4 directive to the FBI to ramp up its involvement in school board threats, and notified agents of a new tag, 'EDUOFFICIALS,' to assign to any threats against school administrators, board members, staff or teachers to determine the scope of the problem on a national level and to provide a 'comprehensive analysis of the threat picture.' Republicans slammed the move. 'This disclosure provides specific evidence that federal law enforcement operationalized counterterrorism tools at the behest of a left-wing special interest group against concerned parents,' House Republicans claimed in a letter to Garland. The email directed agents to analyze the motivation behind the criminal activity and to identify whether there were potential federal violations that could be investigated and charged. Republicans say the FBI has inserted itself into what would usually be a local issue due to its political nature, in an effort to 'silence' parents who disagree with schools' progressive policies. A Los Angeles fraudster couple who were convicted of trying to steal more than $20million in Covid relief funds have been jailed for 23 years even though they are still on the run. Richard Ayvazyan, 43, was sentenced Monday in absentia to 17 years and his wife, Marietta Terabelian, 37, was given six years behind bars for conspiracy, bank fraud and money laundering. Ayvazyan's brother, Artur Ayvazyan, 41, was sentenced to five years. The three Encino residents were convicted of conspiracy, bank and wire fraud in June, but the husband and wife went on the run in August, cutting their ankle bracelets to flee their $3.25million home they bought with their stolen Covid funds. They left a note for the three teenage children they abandoned saying: 'We will be together again one day. This is not a goodbye but a brief break from each other.' FBI agents are pictured raiding the $3.25million home of Richard Ayvazyan and Marietta Terabelian, which they bought with stolen Covid relief funds, in November 2020 Ayvazyan (left), 43, was sentenced Monday in absentia to 17 years and his wife, Terabelian (right), 37, was given six years behind bars They had used dozens of phony or stolen identities - including those of elderly or dead people and foreign exchange students who briefly visited the United States - to submit applications for some 150 federal Covid business relief funds. They backed up the applications with false tax documents, and payroll records, officials said. Instead of going to struggling businesses during the pandemic, the millions received were used for down payments on luxury homes and to buy 'gold coins, diamonds, jewelry, luxury watches, fine imported furnishings, designer handbags, clothing, and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle,' the US attorney's office said. Days after their disappearance, they were seen on CCTV entering Ayvazyan's mother's house but they quickly left before police arrived. The FBI is offering a reward of up to $20,000 for information leading to their arrests. Four other people have pleaded guilty to various charges in the case. A fifth person awaits sentencing but has asked to withdraw her guilty plea. During the sentencing hearing, US District Judge Stephen V. Wilson said he couldn't recall a fraud case conducted in such a 'callous, intentional way without any regard for the law'. Ayvazyan, pictured outside court in June before he went on the run, was described as the ringleader of the fraud plot Sentencing was carried out in front of the couple's children who were visibly distraught upon hearing their parents' crimes, with the judge describing how legitimate businesses were deprived of the relief they needed to sustain themselves in the pandemic. Wilson singled out Ayvazyan as the ringleader and called him an 'endemic cold-hearted fraudster' with no regard for the law. He added: 'If given the opportunity, he would concoct another fraud, because the way he spoke of this fraud indicates that that is his way of life.' The judge said the 'fragrant' fraud could deter lawmakers from granting future bailouts out of fear of being ripped off again. Prosecutors sought 29 years in prison for Ayvazyan which would have been the longest sentence for anyone in the US for a federal pandemic loan fraud case. But his lawyer said he deserved no more than six years and described him as a family man, a churchgoer and legitimate businessman. The attorney also said Ayvazyan's family believes he and his wife are not on the run but were abducted. Prosecutors said there is no evidence to support this, and pointed to a recent emergency passport application for the couple's children to travel to Armenia. The FBI previously raided the home in November 2020 and Terabelian was seen throwing a bag of more than $450,000 into the bushes in their backyard. Wilson has ordered the husband and wife to pay a fine of $50,000 but has not yet decided on whether to approve the government's request for more than $16million in restitution. Tucker Carlson has claimed that jurors in the Kyle Rittenouse trial should have reached a verdict by now but are fearful of the 'pro-Biden mob' outside the courthouse threatening to 'burn, loot and destroy' if they acquit. Rittenhouse, 18, shot dead two men and wounded another when he was attacked during BLM riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August last year. Carlson said its an open-and-shut self-defense case and that 'no honest person could reach a different conclusion.' Jurors were sent home last night after spending almost eight hours deliberating on various charges including first-degree intentional homicide. The National Guard are on standby as hundreds of BLM protesters have been demonstrating outside the courthouse and threatening to shut down the city if Rittenhouse walks free. 'The average jury,' Carlson told viewers, 'reaches a verdict in just a few hours, so these jurors are taking much longer than most, but it's probably not because the evidence they have heard is confusing them.' Watch the latest video at foxnews.com Fox News Privacy Policy Tucker Carlson has claimed that jurors in the Kyle Rittenouse trial should have reached a verdict by now but were fearful of the pro-Biden mobs outside the courthouse threatening to 'burn, loot and destroy' if they acquit the teen killer Two demonstrators clash outside the courthouse in Kenosha on Tuesday Wisconsin's National Guard on standby around 60 miles away from the Kenosha courthouse where the jury are deliberating 'The question is why is it taking so long for this jury to produce a very obvious verdict?' The Fox host asked. 'Want the answer? Well, look outside the courtroom. There are hundreds of National Guard troops assembled tonight in Kenosha. Why are they there? Well, they have come in case Kyle Rittenhouse is acquitted.' 'If he is acquitted, pretty much everyone expects the usual mobs of Joe Biden voters to burn and loot and destroy,' he continued. 'Why does everyone expect this? Because people on the left are openly calling for it.' Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers has ordered 500 members of the National Guard to be put on standby, 60 miles away, in case of unrest. On Monday and Tuesday the courthouse saw demonstrators calling for Rittenhouse's conviction, and supporters demanding his acquittal. Protesters carried signs that read, 'Know justice know peace,' 'Self-defense is not a crime,' and 'Racism kills.' A man is seen outside the courthouse in Kenosha on Tuesday, chanting: 'If Kenosha don't get it, shut it down' Behind him, supporters of Kyle Rittenhouse held placards aloft backing the teenager Protesters staged a loud demonstration outside the Kenosha courthouse on Tuesday evening Activists in Black Lives Matter shirts demanded that Rittenhouse be convicted Their chants could be heard inside the courthouse. Carlson said: 'Imagine if you were a juror in this case, how would you feel about this? You're not sequestered, you know how the country feels, you know what the threats are. 'Well, you might think twice before you acquitted Kyle Rittenhouse no matter what the evidence was. 'You remember what happened after Rodney King. Remember that? They burned Los Angeles to the ground. You wouldn't want to be responsible for that, you wouldn't want to spark riots, and of course, that's the whole point of the exercise. Activists in Kenosha took a knee on Tuesday night, waiting for the jury to return on Wednesday morning and resume deliberations Supporters of Kyle Rittenhouse clash with those who want to see him convicted on Tuesday Police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, stand guard outside the courthouse on Tuesday as protesters gathered Demonstrators calling for both Rittenhouse's acquittal and conviction gathered on Tuesday outside the courthouse in Kenosha 'The mob threatens violence, the rest of us tremble and pretty soon, the mob controls our justice system.' The Los Angeles riots in 1992 came after jurors acquitted four officers from the LAPD charged with using excessive force in the arrest and beating of King who was detained following a high speed chase while drink-driving. Thousands of people rioted over six days across the city, leaving 63 people dead and more than 2,000 injured. Property damage from the carnage has been estimated at $1billion. A famous London nightclub has resorted to offering urine and drinks testing amid increasing reports of women being spiked by injection. XOYO, near Old Street Station in Islington, describes itself as 'one of London's best-loved nightclubs and live music venues' and was voted as one of DJ Mag's Top 100 Clubs. Revellers can access the urine and drink tests through a medic onsite each night. The test service has only been used once since it was introduced and that result was negative. London nightclub XOYO, which has been voted one of the 100 best clubs by an industry magazine, has introduced urine and drinks tests to reassure customers David Vickery, XOYO's general manager, said he wants to ensure all his customers feel safe and secure on a night out. 'I think it's important if you have somebody who thinks they've been spiked, whether they have or not, it should be treated as if they have,' Mr Vickery said. 'We've got that at XOYO. There's a lot of anxiety coming out of the pandemic, people are concerned and cautious about going out. 'I think if we can make people safe and feel happier, I don't see any downside to putting this in place.' Across the country, reports of suspected spikings by needle injection are on the rise. In Hull, a 27-year-old single mother claims someone was 'either trying to rape or kill her' after alleging she was spiked with an EpiPen-style injection in the course of a seven-and-a-half hour drinking session. She described later waking up during a hospital examination with no memory of how she got there. Reports of spiking by needle injection are becoming increasingly common as bars and nightclubs across the UK take steps to reassure customers Police received nearly 300 'spiked by needle injection' reports in the last TWO MONTHS Nearly 300 spiked by needle injection reports have been recorded across the UK in the last two months alone, new figures have revealed. The statistics from the National Police Chiefs' Council (NPCC) confirm fears that the new form of assault is sweeping the country. Police forces across the UK were asked to tally up how many incidents involving 'some form of injection' have been reported. A total of 274 were recorded between September and November 8, according to NationalWorld. It comes after the Girls Night In movement in October saw women and men avoid going out to bars and clubs in Manchester, Nottingham and Bristol as they demanded better safety measures. Dozens of local Instagram pages were created to spread the news of the Girls Night In campaign, with women from several university cities staying in, 'spreading awareness and challenging clubs' to keep people safe. Boycotts took place in at least 40 cities including Bristol, Brighton, Bournemouth, Belfast, Nottingham and Southampton. The number of spiking cases reported between September and November 8 relates to reported incidents, which means they may not have been confirmed yet by the police and officially recorded as crimes. Concerns over possible needle spiking were first raised in October, although opinion is divided on how likely it is that needles are being widely used in place of drink spiking. Some spiking victims have reported feeling pinches on their arms in clubs and later developing bruises, prompting fears they had been assaulted with needles. National Police Chiefs' Council lead for drugs, Deputy Chief Constable Jason Harwin, said police forces continue to work with pubs and clubs to increase searches and guidance to staff. Advertisement The woman, who is a social worker, was out in Hull city centre with her colleagues on Saturday, November 13. But she finished the night 'unable to feel her legs' before 'having 10 fits' and being rushed to Hull Royal Infirmary in an ambulance. She said she had met some work friends at around 3pm, after which they were joined by her best friend, aunt, cousin, and another friend at around 4.30pm. The woman said she tried to pace herself and stopped drinking for about an hour but started again at 6pm. The group then headed to their next bar from 9.30pm until 10.30pm, before leaving to take one of their friends home and going to a shop for snacks. Within around five minutes, the woman said she began feeling strange. She said: 'I said to my friends that my legs felt weird and I was freezing. I just kept telling them that I was cold. They told me that I then bent down to sit in the corner of the street.' Her friends called for a taxi home before things began to 'turn bad really fast'. She added: 'Everything went really quick, it happened over 29 minutes from being really cold to then my friends saying I just would not come around - I think at the time they just thought I had had too much to drink really. 'My friend said I laid back in the taxi and kept repeating that I was cold, I then looked up and said, "I think I have been spiked."' Her friends then called an ambulance and the woman woke up in hospital. She added: 'I woke up and I was naked. I didn't know what had happened, I thought I had been raped. 'The nurse then said that she had found a mark on my bum, a big red circle with a small brown centre, and said she believed I had been spiked with something like an EpiPen in my bum. 'My mum looked at it when we were home too and said there was a red ring on my bum.' She added: 'I honestly will never go out again. I don't trust anyone anymore. It's sad as I'm only 27. 'It hurts when I walk. I cant even walk properly but I am trying to hide it from my daughter. I have to be strong for her. 'I would love to be able to rest but I cant, Im a single mum. Im just trying to get on with things best as I can. 'Ive always been quite a confident person and not really scared of anything, but this has totally knocked my confidence.' A spokesperson for Humberside Police confirmed that investigations into the incident are ongoing. Ireland has become the latest European country to reimpose Covid restrictions amid a surge in cases as winter sets in. Starting tomorrow, all hospitality businesses including nightclubs and pubs will be forced to close at midnight, the use of Covid passports will be expanded, and people will be advised to work from home where possible. Household contacts of people who test positive on a PCR will also be forced to self-isolate for five days even if double-jabbed, and will only be allowed out if they test negative on three separate antigen tests. Ireland follows the lead of Austria and the Netherlands in imposing Covid curbs as Europe once again becomes the epicentre of the pandemic. Ireland will reimpose Covid restrictions from Friday amid a surge in cases, as the Taoiseach refused to rule out going further if infections keep rising Covid deaths in Ireland are still well below the highs seen during the first and second waves, but have been ticking upwards since the end of summer While Ireland's current restrictions do not go as far as Austria - whose government has been accused of 'vaccine apartheid' after locking the unvaccinated inside their homes - Taoiseach Micheal Martin has refused to rule out going further. 'It remains to be seen as to whether these measures will be sufficient to hold back the tide of infection and hospitalisation,' he said in an evening address to the nation. 'We're not ruling out any further measures, we'll keep them under review.' Ireland currently requires vaccine passports to be used at indoor hospitality venues such as restaurants and bars, but will now expand them to theatres and cinemas. New restrictions on nightclubs come just a month after they were allowed to reopen. Mr Martin also announced that the vaccine booster programme, which has only been running since November 4, will be widened to include those aged over 50. Until now, Ireland had only been offering boosters to those aged over 60 or older long-term residents of care facilities. Take-up has been low, with just 341,000 jabs given to a total population of 5million. The Health Service Executive has blamed 'substantial non-attendance' of booked appointments for the slow roll-out. Those with underlying health conditions and residents of any age inside care facilities will also be included in the expanded roll-out. Europe's Covid winter-wave first struck in the east, where vaccination rates are broadly lower, with Russia and Latvia the first two nations to enter lockdowns. From Friday, hospitality businesses in Ireland will be forced to close at midnight while the use of Covid passports will be expanded to cinemas and theatres Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins announced a month-long shutdown of his country a month ago, when the double-jabbed rate stood at just 57 per cent. The Netherlands then became the first country in western Europe to follow-suit, with non-essential retail and face-to-face services such as hairdressers forced to close from 6pm. Essential stores, clubs, bars and restaurants have to close at 8pm. Home gatherings have been limited to a maximum of four people, while all sporting matches must be held behind closed doors. Austria then followed suit with hugely controversial measures that affect only those who are unvaccinated and do not have a medical exemption. It means that roughly two million people have been barred from leaving their homes except for essential reasons, such as buying food or medicine. They had already been barred from visiting restaurants, hairdressers and cinemas. Around 65 per cent of Austria's population has been double-vaccinated, one of the lowest rates in western Europe. Germany, which also has a lower vaccination rate than the European average at 67 per cent, is now considering imposing similar measures. Micheal Martin, the Irish Taoiseach (file image), has refused to rule out imposing further restrictions including over Christmas if cases continue to rise The incoming Social Democrat (SDP) government has warned that unvaccinated people will be barred from going to work and travelling on public transport. The new government will also recommend that everyone should work from home unless they have a 'compelling business reason'. 'This is actually a lockdown for the unvaccinated,' said Dirk Wiese, the deputy head of the SPD parliamentary group. Around 14 million Germans eligible to be vaccinated have not taken up the offer. In Bavaria, and the east German states of Thuringia and Saxony, the situation is reaching a critical point amid warnings that hospitals across the country will hit capacity in the first two weeks of December. In Saxony, those who refuse the vaccine could be limited to meeting just one person from outside their household and banned from non-essential travel by Friday. Saxony and Bavaria are among a number of states that already demand proof of vaccination for entry into restaurants, bars and clubs. The Bavarian government is urging Berlin to impose the same rules across the country. At least Two bodies have been found at the site of a New Zealand coal mine explosion that left 29 dead including two Britons more than a decade ago. Police have located at least two bodies and possibly a third after a camera was sent down a newly dug hole at the Pike River mine on the west coast of New Zealand's South Island. But authorities said the main part of the site remains too dangerous to enter so they will not be able to recover the remains. Police have been investigating the disaster for years, with some family members of the miners hoping they will eventually file criminal charges. Thirty-two people were in the mine on the west coast of New Zealand's South Island when a series of methane gas explosions took place on November 19, 2010. Among the dead were two Britons, Malcolm Campbell, 25, and Pete Rodger, 40. Only two of the group managed to escape, staggering out of the mine more than an hour after the blast. Police Detective Superintendent Peter Read said they had not yet been able to identify the bodies, although they were working with forensic experts to see if that was possible. Two more bodies have been found at the site of a New Zealand coal Pike River mine (pictured, flames burn from a ventilation shaft above the Pike River mine) explosion which killed 29 workers more than a decade ago A series of blasts ignited by methane gas ripped through the Pike River Mine on the west coast of the South Island in November 2010, trapping 31 men, though two managed to escape Among the 29 who died in the explosion were two Britons Malcolm Campbell (left) and Pete Rodger (right) Pictured: 24 of the 29 miners who were killed in the methane-fueled explosion in November 2010. Top row L to R: Conrad John Adams, 43, Glen Peter Cruse, 35, Allan John Dixon, 59, Zen Wodin Drew, 21, Christopher Peter Duggan, 31, Joseph Ray Dunbar, 17, John Leonard Hale, 45, Daniel Thomas Herk, 36. Second row L to R: David Mark Hoggart, 33, Richard Bennett Holling, 41, Andrew David Hurren, 32, Jacobus (Koos) Albertus Jonker, 47, William John Joynson, 49, Riki Steve Keane, 28, Terry David Kitchin, 41 Samuel Peter McKie, 26. Bottom row L to R: Michael Nolan Hanmer Monk, 23, Kane Barry Nieper, 33, Peter O'Neill, 55, Benjamin David Rockhouse, 21, Peter James Rodger, 40, Blair David Sims, 28, Joshua Adam Ufer, 25, Keith Thomas Valli, 62 Read said the bodies were found at the far end of the mine, where methane levels remain high. He said imaging technology had improved markedly since the disaster, which helped them make the discovery. He said they had previously identified the six or eight miners believed to have been working in that area at the time. 'This is only two days away from the eleventh anniversary of the mine explosion, and we'd like to acknowledge the families of all the men,' Read said. 'It's a really stark reminder of the pain and the loss.' He said the discovery would help their investigation. Read said police wouldn't be releasing the images out of respect to the families and declined to describe the conditions of the bodies. 'It's what you might expect after 11 years, but I'm not really going into any details of what the images show,' he said. Pike River Recovery Agency, workers react after the first of the two airlock doors was opened in the Pike River Mine, near Greymouth on the West Coast of New Zealand, in May 2019 A three-man team took the first symbolic steps inside, beginning a months-long search of the 2.3-kilometre drift or entrance section in May 2019 Families of the 29 victims watch as a loader enters the Pike River mine in May 2019 as investigators regained access to the site nearly a decade after the disaster in 2010 Workers in June 2011 walk past a bouquet of flowers left for victims of a mine explosion at the Pike River mine in New Zealand's south island Emotional friends and relatives of the trapped miners gather outside the Pike River Coal Company headquarters days after the November 2010 disaster Anna Osborne, whose husband Milton was killed in the explosion, said she'd been preparing for the 11th anniversary and was initially shocked by the announcement. She wondered at first if one of the bodies could be her husband but then realized he would have been elsewhere in the mine. She said she felt some pride because the families had pushed hard for authorities to re-enter a safer part of the mine - sealed off following the disaster in 2010 - which they had finally done in 2019. She said that helped reinvigorate the police investigation. 'I think that our men deserve justice,' she said. Osborne said it was unfortunate the bodies could not be retrieved. 'They all died together and they will all stay together,' she said. The workers were presumed dead after a series of methane explosions around the mine's entrance - 5,000ft away from where they were working - trapped them underground. Among the victims were two Britons - Pete Rodger and Malcolm Campbell. Campbell's father said after the disaster his son served an apprenticeship at a Fife paper mill before emigrating to Australia in 2007, where he worked as a miner. A year later he moved to New Zealand and took the job at Pike River in the Paparoa Ranges mountains on the west coast of the South Island. The other Briton trapped is Pete Rodger, 40, from Perthshire. The former grammar school pupil moved to New Zealand two years ago to be near to his mother and sister, who emigrated many years ago. Anna Osborne from the Family Reference Group (left) and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern (right) embrace at the entrance to the Pike River Mine in May 2019 Emotional relatives of the 29 workers who were tragically killed when a mine exploded watched on as experts entered the area in the hope of recovering their remains The families of those killed have since fought a long, complex battle to have the site re-entered to find the cause of the disaster and human remains Police Detective Superintendent Peter Read said they had located at least two bodies at the Pike River mine and possibly a third after a camera was sent down a newly dug hole An earlier investigation concluded the Pike River Coal company had exposed miners to unacceptable risks as it strove to meet financial targets. The report found the company ignored 21 warnings that methane gas had accumulated to explosive levels before the disaster and that there were not enough inspectors to keep up with their workload at the time. Former New Zealand Prime Minister John Key said: 'The company completely and utterly failed to protect its workers.' The company, which went bankrupt, did not contest labour violation charges against it. Labour violation charges against former chief executive Peter Whittall were dismissed after he and the company made a financial settlement, a development that angered many of the grieving families. New Zealand's Supreme Court later ruled the settlement was unlawful. The blast caused a methane gas fireball which shot 350ft up a ventilation shaft, blackening trees and scorching equipment on the surface. The two survivors stumbled out of the mine an hour later. One of the survivors, Russel Smith, was an hour late for work and so was not deep in the mine with those who died. He and and fellow survivor Daniel Rockhouse walked out of the tunnel more than an hour after the explosion. Advertisement Boris Johnson endured another brutal day trying to quell the sleaze crisis today with Tories furious about his 'back of a fag packet' crackdown on their outside earnings. The PM has desperately tried to draw a line under the chaos by pledging to ban politicians from working as consultants on the side - something that could cost dozens of his own backbenchers significant sums. In a major shift, Mr Johnson also suggested MPs should have limits placed on the time they spend on second jobs. The dramatic intervention was intended to outflank Labour amid growing alarm that its attacks on the government over sleaze were hitting home. But it immediately threatened to descend into a shambles, with Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggesting that 20 hours on a sideline 'is fine'. 'Let's say two shifts, that would be 16 hours a week. Are we saying 10 to 20 hours a week outside your work as an MP and a parliamentarian? If that's what you chose to do as your choice, that's fine.' Ms Trevelyan also indicated that former attorney general Geoffrey Cox would not have to curb his 1million a year legal practice under the mooted changes - despite No10 claiming he would. 'Key is, is he doing a good job for his constituents? Do they think he's doing a good job for them? And, from what I've heard, no-one has stood up and said otherwise,' she said. 'But that he continues to practise what is his professional skill while he is a backbench MP, for me, is perfectly acceptable because in the same way that Maria Caulfield serves in the NHS as a nurse continues to practise her profession alongside serving her constituents is, I think, important for the NHS.' The proposals have teed up a major showdown with some Tory MPs over whether and how the rules at Parliament should be overhauled. There is muttering that many will decline to turn up for crunch votes on the changes due this evening. One backbencher told MailOnline that Downing Street had 'dreamed up' another disastrous idea that looked clever at first glance but would not stand up to any scrutiny. 'I think it's been put together on the back of a fag packet... It's the same mistake we made over Owen Paterson,' they said. Mr Johnson clashed bitterly with Keir Starmer at PMQs this lunchtime, and was grilled by the Liaison Committee, before crunch votes tonight on how to reform Commons rules. He later faced the backbench 1922 Committee in a bid to repair relations with his MPs, admitting to them: 'On a clear road I crashed the car into a ditch.' Boris Johnson (pictured at PMQs today) has desperately tried to draw a line under the chaos by pledging to ban politicians from working as consultants on the side - something that could cost dozens of his own backbenchers significant sums The dramatic intervention was intended to outflank Keir Starmer (pictured today) amid growing alarm that Labour's attacks on the government over sleaze were hitting home The government's blueprint immediately threatened to descend into a shambles, with Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggesting that 20 hours on a sideline 'is fine' How do the sleaze reform plans being pushed by the PM and Labour compare? LABOUR Labour's proposal calls for a ban on 'any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant'. Crucially, it also includes provisions requiring the Commons Standards Committee to come forward with proposals to implement the ban and guaranteeing time on the floor of the House for MPs to debate and vote on them. Although it does not feature in the motion, Keir Starmer has also said he wants to ban almost all second jobs - with only limited exceptions such as doctors and nurses. TORIES The government is trying to amend the Labour motion to push its own overhaul of the standards system. The amendment is more vaguely, describing the consultancy ban as 'the basis of a viable approach' and supporting the work of the Standards Committee to update the MPs' code of conduct. Boris Johnson has called for a ban on political consultancy work, and says he is going further than Labour with restrictions on outside work that distracts from Commons duties. However, it is unclear how broad the ban would be, and what would count as excessive outside work. Advertisement Boris rows with Speaker and Starmer during bad-tempered PMQs session Boris Johnson was today brutally rebuked by the Speaker as he tried to turn the tables on Keir Starmer during a fiery PMQs sessions. The premier repeatedly tried to grill the Labour leader over his past legal work as the pair clashed over sleaze at the weekly session. But Lindsay Hoyle demanded he stop, insisting it is questions to the Prime Minister rather than to the Opposition leader. 'You might be the PM of this country but in this House I'm in charge,' Sir Lindsay said. Sir Lindsay also warned that the bad-tempered discussion was doing nothing to restore the image of the House after the Owen Paterson debacle earlier this month. There looked to be fewer Conservative MPs cheering Mr Johnson on in the chamber this afternoon than in recent weeks. And the weekly exchanges turned nasty after Mr Johnson attempted to question Sir Keir about links with Mishcon de Reya. Sir Lindsay told Mr Johnson: 'I don't want to fall out about it, I've made it very clear it is Prime Minister's Questions, it's not for the Opposition to answer your questions. 'Whether we like it or not those are the rules of the game that we're all into and we play by the rules, don't we? And we respect this House, so let's respect the House.' After Mr Johnson attempted to ask again about the issue in a later exchange, the Speaker said: 'Prime Minister, sit down. I'm not going to be challenged, you may be the Prime Minister of this country but in this House I'm in charge.' Mr Johnson later accused Sir Keir of 'Mish-conduct', which prompted calls from the Labour benches for the comment to be withdrawn. The Speaker said: 'I don't think this has done this House any good today. I'll be quite honest, I think it's been ill-tempered, I think it shows the public that this House has not learnt from the other week, I need this House to gain respect but it starts by individuals showing respect for each other.' Despite the rollocking for Mr Johnson, at the end of the session Sir Keir was pulled up for calling the PM a 'coward'. When Mr Johnson again dodged saying sorry for his handling of the Paterson case, Sir Keir said: 'That's not an apology. Everybody else has apologised for him, but he won't apologise for himself. A coward not a leader.' Responding to a point of order, Sir Lindsay said the jibe was 'not the kind of language' for the Commons. Rising to his feet again, Sir Keir said: 'I withdraw it. But he is no leader.' Advertisement Some polls have shown the Opposition taking the lead amid the outcry over Owen Paterson's lobbying and Geoffrey Cox's lucrative legal sideline. The government wants new rules to introduced in January, assuming an agreement can be reached with Labour. But the Opposition has accused the government of 'dirty tricks' and trying to water down its rival blueprint. During the debate this evening, Shadow Commons leader Thangam Debbonaire said the government was trying to 'water down' reforms. She told MPs: 'The proposal which is in the amendment today, the only thing that is actually on offer to vote for from the Prime Minister, weakens, waters down, takes away the deadline, takes away the vote and the Leader of the House (Jacob Rees-Mogg) knows this.' The Labour MP added: 'The benches opposite need to accept that the time has now come, today is that day, they need to stand up and be counted if they want to follow through on what their Prime Minister said yesterday, they need to vote for the Labour motion today. Will they? We will see.' Commons leader Jacob Rees-Mogg told MPs that their expertise should 'not be for sale', but defended the Government's belief that parliamentarians benefit from having outside careers. Mr Rees-Mogg said: 'I have already emphasised the supremacy of an MP's parliamentary and constituency work, but we also recognise there are certain external roles that seem at odds with the jobs of a Member of Parliament, namely those that would capitalise on an insiders knowledge of Parliament and Government. 'I can confirm to the House that we believe this experience and expertise that we accrue as part of our work as MPs should not be for sale. We are elected to Parliament on a promise to work for the greater good, not ourselves.' He had earlier said: 'The Government believes that it is an historic strength of our system that MPs should have a wider focus than the Westminster bubble, that we should maintain connections to the world beyond so that we may draw on the insight and expertise that this experience offers, and that rather than a chamber replete with professional politicians with no previous career or future career other than to remain on the public payroll, we have a Parliament that benefits from MPs with a broader range of talents and professional backgrounds.' But there were clear signs of unhappiness from Tories. Sir Charles Walker complained that it had been 'a very bruising two weeks' and MPs were 'guilty until proven guilty'. He said: 'We're never happier when burning each other to a crisp, we love to skewer each other and place ourselves on the barbecue and roast ourselves pink and then serve ourselves up with a large side order of hubris. We're all guilty of doing it on both sides of the House and we need to remember that. No-one in this place is perfect.' He added: 'The one thing I've learnt is that we're not entitled to a fair hearing in this place: we're guilty until proven guilty, it's one of Newton's laws, if you're an MP you don't get a fair hearing.' Conservative former minister Sir Edward Leigh questioned how it would be determined if an MP was spending too much time on outside interests, adding: 'It should be common-sense and it should be left to the judgment of the electorate. 'If it's left to the Commissioner for Standards, however distinguished, that will give that official a degree of power never enjoyed by any official ever before over Members of Parliament. 'We are accountable not to officials but to our electorate.' Chris Bryant, Labour chairman of the Committee on Standards, also sounded negative about the idea of checking how long MPs were spending on Commons tasks. 'I think it'll be very, very difficult for the commissioner to start investigating whether an MP was devoting enough of their time to their constituents,' he said. 'Of course all our constituents want us to throw ourselves heart and soul into our work, and I think we all do many of us work many, many more hours than a normal working week, 60, 70, 80 hours.' Mr Bryant added he is 'very hesitant about going down this route of timesheets', noting he would urge his committee to 'think very carefully about this'. Ms Trevelyan got into a muddle during her interviews this morning, initially saying up to 10 hours on a second job was acceptable, before increasing the figure to 15 hours, and then 20 hours. 'You do a 40 to 50-hour week, say, as a backbench MP and you do eight to 10 hours work on something else,' she told Times Radio. 'For me that would be a perfectly reasonable balance.' On BBC Breakfast the Cabinet minister said: 'I think there is a common sense test which is if you probably do 40-50 hours a week doing your main job, doing 10 or 15 hours a week doing something else, whatever you choose to do in your spare time, whether that's paid or not paid, is something that is part of the richness of what you bring as an individual to your role as an MP.' But later in her round of interviews, Ms Trevelyan told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that longer would be reasonable. Labour's proposal calls for a ban on 'any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant'. Crucially, it also includes provisions requiring the Commons Standards Committee to come forward with proposals to implement the ban and guaranteeing time on the floor of the House for MPs to debate and vote on them. In contrast, the more vaguely worded Government amendment simply describes the consultancy ban as 'the basis of a viable approach' and supports the work of the Standards Committee to update the MPs' code of conduct. Shadow Commons leader Thangam Debbonaire said it was 'typical Tory dirty tricks' and an attempt to water down the proposals. The PM's proposals prompted an immediate backlash from Mr Johnson's own MPs, who now face losing out on thousands and in some cases millions of pounds. Before Ms Trevelyan's intervention a Whitehall source claimed the plans were likely to restrict the activities of Sir Geoffrey, who has earned more than 5.5million from his other jobs including a stint in the British Virgin Islands during lockdown. Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, treasurer of the powerful Conservative backbench 1922 Committee, warned of 'dissatisfaction' among MPs. 'Various discussions will be taking place between backbenchers today and the Prime Minister, and I've no doubt I will have an opportunity to make my views known,' he said. He added: 'I think I will have more than adequate opportunity to make my views known today.' He said Mr Johnson 'wants to get ahead of the curve' on the debate and is 'doing the right thing'. He said: 'We need to get the rules absolutely clear on what MPs can do, what they can't do, so that our constituents have an expectation of what the person representing them is going to do.' Mr Johnson declared that his proposals would ensure MPs who are 'neglecting their duties to their constituents and prioritising outside interests would be investigated, and appropriately punished by the existing disciplinary authorities'. He said it was now 'imperative that we put beyond doubt the reputation of the House of Commons by ensuring the rules which apply to MPs are up to date, effective and appropriately rigorous.' He said he would seek a 'cross-party consensus' on the issue prompting fears from some Tory MPs that Labour will ensure new rules are exceedingly tough. As the PM battled to regain the public's confidence: MPs on Parliament's liaison committee prepared to grill Mr Johnson over the sleaze row today; It emerged that MPs could also be banned from taking freebies from lobbyists and could have to declare new jobs they take after leaving Parliament; Sir Keir claimed the PM had been 'dragged kicking and screaming' to support reform by Labour's own bid to tighten the rules. The Government will try to amend Labour's anti-sleaze motion with a vote in the Commons this afternoon to reflect the PM's new plan. Mr Johnson's announcement came less than a fortnight after he tried to save Mr Paterson, who was found to have broken lobbying rules. As recently as a week ago, the PM said MPs' second jobs can 'strengthen' Parliament. But yesterday saw his predecessor Theresa May deliver a withering assessment on the Paterson debacle, saying the Government's attempt to spare the former minister had been 'misplaced, ill-judged and just plain wrong'. She added: 'Damage has been done to all MPs and to Parliament as a whole.' The new proposals could directly affect around 30 MPs who currently hold lucrative jobs advising firms. The PM has written to Speaker Lindsay Hoyle proposing a dramatic overhaul of the rules to crack down on abuses of the system - that could hit the interests of a number of Tory MPs Jacob Rees-Mogg humbly admitted he had made a 'mistake' in pushing the retrospective overhaul of the standards system, as he urged members to vote for a motion that would official scrap the changes and rebuke Owen Paterson They include former Tory chief whip Andrew Mitchell, who is paid more than 182,000 a year to advise six companies, and former transport secretary Chris Grayling, who is paid 100,000 a year as a 'strategic adviser' to a ports operator. The plan to place 'reasonable limits' on time spent on outside interests follows outcry over Sir Geoffrey, who has devoted 10,700 hours to his legal career since 2009. Yet some Tory MPs warned the PM risked going too far. 'The Prime Minister is pouring fuel on the fire just as it was starting to go out,' one senior figure said. 'What does 'reasonable limits' mean? Can you still be a minister and a constituency MP? 'Labour will have a field day with this they will end up having us clocking in and clocking out to no useful end, while the media will crawl all over everything we do.' Mr Rees-Mogg attempted to take the blame for the public backlash yesterday, telling the Conservative Home website that he had persuaded the PM to try to help Mr Paterson. The Commons Leader said he had done so out of sympathy for the former environment secretary, whose wife Rose committed suicide last year. The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, Kathryn Stone, found Mr Paterson guilty of 'egregious' breaches of lobbying rules on behalf of two firms which had paid him more than 500,000. But Mr Rees-Mogg said he felt Mr Paterson had been 'punished enough' by his tragic loss. 'It was not seen by the electorate as being merciful, it was seen as being self-serving,' he said of the attempt to block Mr Paterson's suspension. 'I must take my share of responsibility for this. I thought it was the right thing to do, I encouraged the Prime Minister to go down this route, and I was wrong.' The PM said at the weekend: 'Of course, I think things could certainly have been handled better... by me.' Advertisement Almost 10,000 extra people have died from non-Covid illnesses in England and Wales than would be expected since summer, according to official figures. Experts have demanded an urgent investigation into whether the deaths were avoidable and if the current NHS crisis and emergency care delays are to blame. There have been around 21,000 more deaths from all causes than average since July, according to Office for National Statistics data up to November 5. But about 11,500 of these involved Covid, leaving a little more than 9,000 due to other causes such as dementia, heart and lung disease and cancer. Oxford University's Professor Carl Heneghan, an eminent expert in evidence-based medicine, said he suspected many of the excess deaths were 'potentially reversible'. He told The Telegraph: 'This goes beyond just looking at the raw numbers and death certificates. We need to go back and find if these deaths have any preventable causes. This could be the fallout from the lack of preventable care during the pandemic.' Since January, there have been 46,000 more deaths than the five-year average, but nearly 77,000 were Covid-related. The above graph shows the number of fatalities from all causes compared to the five-year average. It reveals that deaths have been above expected levels since July even as vaccines have kept Covid fatalities at a fraction of their previous levels The above graph shows the number of deaths that are involving Covid (blue) and are not involving the virus (green). It reveals that deaths have been above average since July The above line graph shows all fatalities recorded in England and Wales (blue line) compared to the five-year average (blue dotted line). It reveals that fatalities have been above expected levels since the summer began The NHS waiting list for routine hospital treatment in England has reached 5.83million, official data reveals marking the eleventh month in a row that the figure has hit a record high. Some 1.6million more Britons were waiting for elective surgery such as hip and keen operations at the end of September compared to the start of the pandemic NHS boss Amanda Pritchard reveals health service is preparing for having to roll out annual programme alongside flu jabs The NHS is preparing for the concept of an annual Covid booster vaccine roll-out, the head of the health service in England said today. Amanda Pritchard said the NHS is already putting plans in place should it be required to deliver a yearly vaccine campaign similar to the annual winter flu jab programme. On Monday, the JCVI recommended that the booster programme should be extended to include all adults aged 40 and over, as well making new recommendations for second jabs for 16 and 17-year-olds. In a speech to the NHS Providers annual conference, Ms Pritchard said: 'We had the latest advice yesterday from the JCVI on extending (boosters) to the over-40s, as well as giving second doses to 16- and 17-year-olds, and I think we can expect further expansions in the future. 'We are already thinking about how we can do annual booster vaccines, if they are needed.' Ms Pritchard urged people to take up vaccination invitations 'as soon as possible' when called, highlighting that a third of people take between two and five weeks to come forward and book after they are contacted about a booster jab. Advertisement Professor Heneghan said: 'I'm calling for an urgent investigation. 'If you look at where the excess is happening, it's in conditions like ischemic heart disease, and cirrhosis of the liver and diabetes, all which are potentially reversible. 'We urgently need to understand what's going wrong and an investigation of the root causes to determine those actions that can prevent further unnecessary deaths.' Figures also show more people are dying at home than ever before. There were some 964 extra deaths in private homes in the week to November 5, the latest available, which was 40 per cent above the five-year average. There were also 548 extra deaths in hospitals, 12 per cent above average, and 155 excess deaths in care homes, seven per cent above average. It has been suggested that deaths at home have risen because more people were choosing to die there. But some experts fear it may be because terminally ill people don't want to go into hospital in case they catch the virus. The figures come as the NHS faces a crisis in routine and emergency care after thousands of appointments were shelved during the darkest days of the pandemic. A record 5.83million patients are currently waiting for routine treatment on the health service in England, including 300,000 patients who have spent a year in the queue. Some 10,000 patients have now been waiting two years to be seen for surgery such as hip and knee replacements. A crisis has also erupted in emergency care, with ambulances carrying sick patients left standing outside hospital for hours waiting for beds in A&E. Paramedic bosses say crews are currently picking up two to three patients a day, whereas normally they would collect up to eight. Calls to 999 have also hit a record, with 1.2million people making a desperate call to the service in October. But health chiefs have admitted as much as three-quarters of these are repeat callers pleading for an update on the arrival of their ambulance. NHS data for October shows the average waiting time for some emergency 999 ambulance calls has reached 54 minutes. This is triple the 18-minute target for ambulance trusts to respond to these 'Category 2' calls, which includes strokes and heart attacks. Medics have warned that A&E patients are having to wait more than 12 hours for a bed because emergency departments are so overwhelmed due to crippling staff shortages, pandemic backlogs and unprecedented demand. Shocking statistics also show more than 7,000 patients waited 12-plus hours to be seen in A&E in October more than triple the number in the same month pre-Covid. NHS England boss Amanda Pritchard warned yesterday that she expected 'things to get worse before they get better'. She suggested the health service needed more doctors and nurses not more cash to address the deepening crisis, adding that 'nothing works without staff'. Shroud-waving NHS bosses, egged on by the BBC, are a plague of every winter... Yet if there is one thing we know about our health service, it is that whatever the sums involved, they are never enough, writes Professor ANGUS DALGLEISH Alarm bells are ringing loud and long, the klaxons reaching full volume. This week we have been subjected to a barrage of grim warnings about the crisis that is beginning to engulf the NHS in the wake of the pandemic. Overstretched, short-staffed and underfunded, the health service is said to be facing the worst winter in its history, according to NHS Providers, which represents bodies such as hospital trusts and the ambulance service. Predictably, this chorus of anguish has been taken up most notably by the BBC, whose own dependence on public funding gives it a vested interest in defending another arm of the State. Presenter Martha Kearney spoke of 'hospitals beyond full stretch', a theme eagerly taken up by Chris Hopson (pictured), the chief executive of NHS Providers Indeed, the Corporation often seems only too keen to act as a voice of propaganda for the NHS, peddling scare stories about its supposed lack of resources while simultaneously praising the magnificence of its workforce. Despair That has been the pattern again in recent days. On Monday morning, BBC Radio 5 Live was dominated by discussion about the looming winter crisis, complete with the usual paeans of praise for its fortitude, juxtaposed with despair at its failings born of cheeseparing. More of the same followed on Radio 4, where the Today programme is focusing on the NHS and its future. Yesterday it was the experience of the NHS in Newcastle. From there, health editor Hugh Pym said that for local hospitals 'every week seems more hectic than the last one', adding that 'the strain will get even more intense'. Presenter Martha Kearney spoke of 'hospitals beyond full stretch', a theme eagerly taken up by Chris Hopson, the chief executive of NHS Providers. In his interview with her, he wailed that staff are 'running at full pelt' but left exhausted 'by insufficient capacity'. The NHS is now paying the price, he explained, for 'a broken workforce model' and 'the longest and deepest financial squeeze in our history' over the past decade. This brings us to the nub of the issue. With the BBC acting as collaborators, NHS managers are indulging in a crude form of political blackmail. The aim of all this shroud-waving is clearly to compel the Government to inject yet more money into the NHS. This approach has already proved effective, with record sums being handed to our beleaguered health service. Incredibly, 40 per cent of all day-to-day spending by the State now goes to the health sector. And this trend is set to be accelerated when the Government's 1.25 per cent National Insurance hike takes effect in April, generating an extra 12 billion a year for health and social care. In his Budget last month, the Chancellor also promised another 6 billion to clear the Covid backlog. Yet if there is one thing we know about the NHS, it is that whatever the sums involved, they are never enough. The NHS seems permanently on the verge of meltdown. . The impact of Covid is being cynically exaggerated for political ends, an approach epitomised by a statement from the new NHS chief executive, Amanda Pritchard (pictured) But it is this perpetual talk of doom that makes me so sceptical. I have been working in the NHS for 35 years and, as far as I recall, every coming winter has been hailed as likely to be the 'worst ever'. In fact, the proclamation of inevitable disaster is almost a traditional pre-Christmas ritual, undimmed by reality. Nigel Lawson, a Tory Chancellor for six years in the 1980s, said the NHS was the closest thing the English people had to a religion and the prospect of a Biblical-scale apocalypse features heavily in the vision shared by the most fervent adherents of this faith. But there is no justification for panic. The impact of Covid is being cynically exaggerated for political ends, an approach epitomised by a statement from the new NHS chief executive, Amanda Pritchard. A week ago, having claimed the NHS is 'running hot' with 'very real pressures on health and social care', she said: 'We have had 14 times the number of people with Covid in hospital than we saw this time last year.' In fact, the number of people in hospital with coronavirus was far lower than at the same time last year. When she spoke last week, there were 7,075 patients in English hospitals with Covid-19, compared with 11,680 on November 8, 2020. NHS England later clarified that Pritchard had been referring to admissions in August 2021, the most recent set of published monthly figures, which were 22,877, compared with 1,629 in August last year. But Ms Pritchard's highly selective use of outdated figures went completely unchallenged by the BBC. Equally unconvincing is the theory that a surge in Covid cases is set to overwhelm the NHS a threat Boris Johnson talked up at his press conference on Monday, with reference to 'storm clouds'. Decline Such language is badly misplaced. The worst of the Covid pandemic is behind us, as deaths continue to decline and the vaccine programme extends its reach. Nor do I believe there is any basis for anxiety about the threat from a new wave of flu. Those who shriek about the 'worst winter ever' should recall 1957, when the Asian flu outbreak killed 33,000 people in the UK; and the Hong Kong flu epidemic of 1968, which accounted for 80,000 lives. Yet the NHS coped then, and will do so again. In his Budget last month, the Chancellor (pictured) also promised another 6 billion to clear the Covid backlog Paradoxically, the advent of Covid has actually made life easier for the health service in one respect: by encouraging a far higher take-up of the flu vaccine, particularly among those aged over 65. As a result of this and more hand-washing, wearing of face masks and social distancing influenza rates have tumbled in Britain since the coronavirus outbreak. According to government figures, there were only nine hospital admissions in England last winter for flu, compared with 1,671 in 2019/20. One analysis by Public Health England found there were no flu cases detected at all between December 28, 2020, and February 14, 2021. Alarmism Even if there is a small rise this winter, it is unlikely that influenza will return to anything like pre-Covid levels, when in a bad year it could kill around 30,000 people. Yes, hospitals face a backlog of operations built up during the period when the NHS became the National Covid Service. But while delaying operations such as cancer surgery is not an option, some elective procedures will just have to be postponed until the spring, because it is impossible to carry on completely as normal at a time of national emergency. One of the worst aspects of the current alarmism is how it will be used to block reform in the NHS. Buttressed by sentimentality and BBC cheerleading, the health service pretends its problems can only ever be solved by more money. But the truth is, extra funding can actually worsen its inadequacies by entrenching the interests of its workforce over its patients and perpetuating flawed structures, sprawling bureaucracies and chronic inefficiencies. We could do so much better if the blind NHS-worship and incessant gloom-mongering were dropped. The cycle of manufactured crisis only lowers staff morale, leaves the public fearful and inhibits the drive for vital change. This is the shocking moment a brawl erupted inside a McDonald's restaurant as three plain-clothed officers tried to arrest a man after he allegedly refused to leave. Footage captured at the fast food branch in Wood Green, north London, shows three men, believed to be officers, attempt to wrestle the 21-year-old suspect, dressed in a black jumper, to the floor. One of the officers tells the man to 'get to the floor' before the suspect fights back and a violent brawl ensues in front of horrified customers. The Metropolitan Police have said that officers were called to the premises at around 7pm on November 14 and attempted to speak with the man who 'refused to stop and engage with them'. People queue for their food when the three plain-clothed officers try to detain the suspect at the McDonald's restaurant in Wood Green, north London, on November 14 The three officers chase the man, who is wearing a black jumper and tracksuit bottoms, as horrified customers move out of the way They said the Directorate of Professional Standards were aware of the footage and no misconduct has been identified. A 21-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of assault on police and is currently in custody at a north London police station. During the clip, people can be seen queuing for their food when the three plain- clothed officers try to detain the suspect - who is wearing a black hoodie and tracksuit bottoms. The suspect then tries to push one of the officer's away from him as another cop tries to grab him in a headlock and chairs are pushed out of the way. The agitated man can be heard making a grunting noise as the officers attempt to stop him. As the altercation ensues, one of the officer's aims a punch at the man wearing the black jumper but misses. The tussle then moves outside onto the street and the man in the black hoodie can be seen walking down the high street. A spokesperson for Metropolitan Police said: 'We are aware of a video that is circulating on social media that shows an incident inside a fast food restaurant on High Road, N22. One of the men tries to get the man in the black hoodie in a headlock before he pushes them away One of the men aims a punch at the man in the black hoodie as the altercation ensues The Metropolitan Police said that officers were called to the premises in Wood Green (pictured) at around 7pm on November 14 'Officers were called to the premises at around 19:00hrs on November 14 after receiving a report that a man inside the restaurant was refusing to leave. 'When officers attempted to speak with the man, he refused to stop and engage with them. 'A 21-year-old man was subsequently arrested on suspicion of assault on police and a public order offence. He remains in custody at a north London police station. 'The Directorate of Professional Standards are aware of the footage and no misconduct has been identified at this stage. 'Our officers understand that their actions will be scrutinised as they go about their work and that they will be held to account where appropriate. 'Any use of force must be proportionate and reasonable, and where there is any suggestion that it is not, it will be thoroughly investigated and action taken where necessary.' A coroner has demanded a university changes its exam results policy and provides more pastoral care after a student killed herself because she was wrongly told she had failed her exams. Mared Foulkes, 21, from Anglesey, north Wales, died on July 8 after falling from the nearby Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait. The Cardiff University student was in her second year studying pharmaceuticals, having worked part-time in a pharmacy for several years. An inquest in Caernarfon last month was told Miss Foulkes had received an automated email from the university hours before her death saying that she had failed her re-sit exam and would not be moving on to third year. One email stated that she had failed with a score of 39 per cent when in fact she had passed the exam with 62 per cent. The 39 per cent related to a previous exam she had failed on March 26 and not the re-sit exam she had taken - and passed - on April 24. Now, Katie Sutherland, the acting senior coroner in North West Wales, has issued a Prevention of Future Deaths report, demanding changes from the university. A senior coroner has demanded Cardiff University changes its exam results policy and provides more pastoral care after dedicated pharmacy student Mared Foulkes (pictured) killed herself because she was wrongly told she had failed her exams and could not finish her degree Witnesses described how Mared 'disappeared' from the bridge where she took her own life In the report, the coroner described the results process as 'complex, confusing and at times capable of appearing misleading'. Calling for this process to be simplified, Ms Sutherland also urged the university to ensure personal tutors were available to students who had potentially failed exams so they could help them through the 'complex and confusing assessment and results process'. Cardiff University must legally respond to the report within 56 days detailing action taken or proposed to be taken and setting out the timetable for any changes. If they fail to make any changes in response to the report, the university is duty-bound to explain why no action is proposed. The report came after an inquest found Mared had taken her own life under the belief she would not be able to progress to her third year of university. At the inquest, held last month, her mother, Iona Foulkes, said that she felt it was 'plain and simple' that her daughter's actions that day were a 'direct result' of receiving a misleading email from Cardiff University. Mared Foulkes was described as a dedicated student who would have believed 'her dreams and aspirations were finished' when she received the email telling her she could not progress Mrs Foulkes said: 'She received an automatic email - there was nothing personal - no phone call, nothing. 'She believed she had failed and the email said she could not progress with her degree. 'She was devoted to her course and to her work in the pharmacy, she would have been horrified. 'She would have felt like all her dreams and aspirations had finished with that sentence - for a 21-year-old it's unbelievable.' The mother-of-two said she felt that the course tutor should have been in contact with Miss Foulkes directly regarding the results and believes parents of students should be made aware of exam results dates. 'Parents should not have to drive by their daughter's grave on the way to and from work' In a statement shared after Mared's inquest, her parents Iona and Glyngwn Foulkes described the way the university communicated its exam results as 'wanting' and 'barely understandable'. They added: ' It has added an extra weight to our sadness. 'We are sad that the outcome could and should have been so different. 'Now we are left with memories in photograph albums, memories of her kindness and other fine qualities.' 'Parents should not have to drive by their daughter's grave on the way to and from work. 'We are learning to live without Mared but the task is heartbreaking and we remain very poor students. 'We are not the first parents to express disbelief at the poor communications of universities with students and we are sorrowful that we won't be the last. 'Our hopes for Mared matched her own ambitions. We entrusted her learning and well-being to the university. 'Since Mared's sudden death we have lived through a harrowing time of grief and mourning. The shock and aftershocks of her death remain with us. 'We never imagined that we would outlive our much-loved daughter and first-born or that her brother would become our only child.' They said they hoped the coroner's report would prevent the deaths of other students. Advertisement When the Covid-19 pandemic started Miss Foulkes had been forced to complete her studies online. The inquest heard how Miss Foulkes had gone to work at Rowlands Pharmacy in Caernarfon that morning having been for a run and had returned home to have dinner with her parents and brother at around 6pm. She then told her mother she was going to Tesco in Bangor to get ingredients to make a cheesecake the following day. Shortly after leaving the house Miss Foulkes drove to Britannia Bridge, which links Anglesey with Bangor. She was seen leaving her vehicle and walking to the side of the bridge and 'disappearing'. Mrs Foulkes said that her daughter made no mention of the fact that she was due to receive results that day or that she had received an email saying that she had not been successful. She also said that Miss Foulkes showed no signs of feeling down in the lead up to her death but had been upset by the recent death of her grandmother. Anwen Jones, who witnessed the incident while she was driving onto Anglesey with her 10-year-old son, said Miss Foulkes appeared to show 'no hesitation' in her actions. Ms Jones said: 'She just went up and over in a split second - there was no stopping and thinking. 'She just disappeared.' The emergency services were called by members of the public but sadly Miss Foulkes was pronounced dead at the scene. A post-mortem examination later revealed that she sustained a lethal head injury in the fall. Prior to taking her own life, Miss Foulkes had texted one of her housemates about the results saying: 'I did c**p.' The inquest also heard how Miss Foulkes had sought help from student support services prior to her death but at that time it was not believed that she posed a risk to herself or others. Acting senior coroner Katie Sutherland concluded that Miss Foulkes had intended death to be the outcome of her actions. Recording a conclusion of suicide, Ms Sutherland said: 'Mared had not sought any help from a GP regarding low mood and there were no suicide notes. 'She did not report suicidal thoughts when she sought assistance from student support in 2019 but did appear distressed and admitted that she was engaging in self harm. 'Evidence suggests that she put herself on the ledge and walked with determination from her car to the ledge. 'There is no clear evidence whether she jumped but I do feel she took herself off the bridge by stepping off. I don't consider this to be a cry for help. 'I do consider that she had the intent to end her life and will return a conclusion of suicide.' Parents Glyngwyn and Iona Foulkes, speaking after an inquest in Caernarfon into the death of their daughter, said they hoped the coroner's report would prevent other student's deaths In the Prevention of Future Deaths report, the coroner wrote: 'Mared had failed one Professional Skills Assessment during the second year of her degree (2019/2020) and had undertaken a re-sit during the first semester for which she had received a 'provisional pass'. 'This was not ratified in the June exam board. Instead it was to be ratified in the September exam board round in accordance with the university's policy (though that was not obviously clear at the time). 'The indication therefore to Mared in July 2020 was that she had not successfully completed the year.' Calling for action by Cardiff University to prevent further tragedies, the coroner urged the ratifying of examination results at the first available opportunity, in June, where a student has a provisional pass following a successful re-sit of an initial failed Professional Skill Assessment (or equivalent in other schools or colleges). She suggested amending wording on exam notification correspondence to students to include 'pending' results, clarifying which exam board round (June or September) would confirm the results and clarity on assessment and ratification processes. In addition, the acting senior coroner said there should be additional and ongoing training to school staff on the clarity of explanation to students of assessment processes and extra support to students where they are to receive a 'fail'. A Cardiff University spokesperson confirmed they had received the coroner's report and told MailOnline: 'The untimely loss of a family member in this way is devastating 'Our thoughts and sympathies are with the family and friends in what we know remains an extremely difficult and challenging time for them. 'As we said at the time of the hearing, we accept that lessons can and should be learnt. We have commenced the work required to do so and will report this in the formal response we make to the Coroner in January.' For confidential support call the Samaritans on 116123 or go to samaritans.org A fraudster posed as a successful businessman with 4million in investments to con a female millionaire he met on Tinder into handing him 141,000, a court heard. Richard Dexter, 37, promised victim Amrita Sebastian that he was on the verge of a 'big windfall' and 'significant sums' after telling her he had acquired the patents to valuable biopharmaceutical technology. He said major multi-nationals - including US medical firm 3M - were interested in signing a multi-million pound deal with him. On the back of his lies, executive Ms Sebastian handed over a series of payments totalling 141,000 believing they were investments, prosecutors said. But Dexter pocketed the cash for himself and came up with a series of increasingly bizarre excuses for why he couldn't pay her back. It was then that Ms Sebastian called the police, Portsmouth Crown Court heard. Dexter (pictured outside court) said major multi-nationals - including US medical firm 3M - were interested in signing a multi-million pound deal with him When officers raided Dexter's Hampshire home in April 2018 they found a document which claimed he had more than 4million invested with the financial services company Hargreaves Lansdown. But this was a 'total fabrication', the court was told, with the account actually belonging to a a friend of his whose final balance was actually 37p. Dexter is then accused of forging patent documents to try to 'wheedle out' of his alleged fraud, according to prosecutors. Robert Bryan, prosecuting, told the jury that Ms Sebastian met Mr Dexter on Tinder in 2015. He claimed he was a 'successful businessman' selling biopharma software. He persuaded Ms Sebastian, who lives in Dubai but travels to the UK twice a year, that he needed capital to start production of a piece of scientific equipment. At first she invested 40,000 then 68,000 two months later, having been assured that he could cover any losses she might make. Mr Bryan said: 'At the centre of his fraud were patents and a patent catalogue he claimed to be buying. 'Thereafter having said he had acquired these patents he said that well-known companies such as Pall Corp and 3M were interested in the patents and license deals which would bring in significant sums. Dexter pleaded guilty to seven counts of fraud and not guilty to one count of possessing an article used in fraud and to one count of perverting the course of justice 'What was required was upfront capital to begin production of a Bioreactor Paddle. She invested. 'Over the ensuing months he said he needed further funds to pay others. He told her that she wouldn't lost anything as he had more than enough to replace her investments. 'Nevertheless worried that her initial investments were at stake and when he said he needed further funds to cover the balance of things such as lawyers' fees, she advanced him more funds.' Ms Sebastian continued paying him to 'protect' the initial investments with the promise of a 'large windfall' ahead, the jury heard. Mr Brian continued: 'Towards the end of 2016, he promised her that he would repay her full investment in January 2017 at the latest. 'On that basis, she lent him the final 5,500 as he was in dire financial straits heading towards Christmas. 'He promised that he would pay her 100,000 as interest.' But Ms Sebastian received nothing with Dexter giving the excuse that the bank had closed his account and taken control of his home, the court heard. After they agreed Dexter would repay her 141,500 by April 2017, which would 'settle the debt in full', he never replied and the money did not arrive, a jury heard. Ms Sebastian then went to the police. 'Why doctor an investment report belonging to another to show you have 4million?' Mr Bryan asked the jury. 'His fraud pleas may well inform you. 'Mr Dexter does not have, nor has he had an account with Hargreaves Lansdown let alone one containing over 4million.' The court heard that, in December 2018, USB sticks were handed to police by his former partner, Maisie Evans, containing 'licensing agreements' purporting to relate to a patent. Robert Bryan, prosecuting, told Portsmouth Crown Court (file photo above) that Ms Sebastian met Mr Dexter on Tinder in 2015. He claimed he was a 'successful businessman' The court heard the UK's Intellectual Property Office could not find anything to suggest the patent referred to in the agreement was 'genuine'. And the court heard they appeared to have been created after he had been first arrested by police. But Dexter now claims Ms Evans created the documents to 'frame' him. However, Mr Brian told the jury: 'Even if she created the documents, it is still him, not her, who attempted to pass off as genuine [the documents] that were created post-interview [with the police]. 'The evidence is quite clear, it is him who created the documents to try and wheedle himself out and is a clear attempt to pervert the course of justice.' Dexter, of Southsea, Hampshire, pleaded guilty to seven counts of fraud and not guilty to one count of possessing an article used in fraud and to one count of perverting the course of justice. The trial continues. The ex-wife of a former senator and business mogul jailed in Russia for organising contract killings has been found dead in her 10million London home - sparking a call for MI5 to investigate. Irina Izmestieva - also known as Irina Ford - was discovered lifeless on the sofa of her Kensington apartment on Friday by her shocked friends. Mother-of-two Ms Izmestieva, had come to the UK in around 2007, and become part of high society and was pictured at an event with Prince Harry in 2012, along with her daughters. Her former husband Igor had been sentenced to life in a high security Russian jail over contract killings 13 years ago. Vladimir Putin had promised a leading human rights campaigner he would pardon and free him but has not as yet. This latest development in the family today prompted calls from one exile for an investigation to be launched into her death. A number of Russians have died in suspicious circumstances or faced attacks in Britain. A leading exile in London Evgeny Chichvarkin said today 'I very much hope that the UK's special services will investigate this case properly, thoroughly, and, perhaps, one day we'll learn what happened. Irina Izmestieva , 52 - also known as Irina Ford - was discovered dead on the sofa by friends Mother-of-two Ms Izmestieva was pictured at a sporting event with Prince Harry in 2012 Ms Izmestieva's former husband Igor has been sentenced to life in a high security Russian jail Irina Izmestieva, 52, smiles at an event where she went on to speak briefly with Prince Harry 'In the past few years Irina Izmestieva was an active participant of a property dispute details of which I have no right to disclose. 'At another turn of this dispute she was found dead.' Close friend in London, Miranda Mirianishvili, 49, posted on Instagram that former filmmaker Ms Izmestieva had died 'unexpectedly'. She said: 'She was coughing, they said, taking antibiotics, and had not felt well for a few days. Not Covid, 'They found her sleeping on the couch at their home in London. 'That is, they found her no longer alive.' Police were not called but London Ambulance Service attended, confirming to MailOnline: 'We were called at 7.11pm on November 12 to reports of an incident at a residential address in Cottesmore Gardens, W8. 'We sent an ambulance crew and two medics in cars. Sadly, a person died at the scene.' Inner West London Coroner's Court has not yet confirmed if the case has been passed to them. Izmestieva had been pictured at an event with Prince Harry in 2012, along with her daughters by the jailed ex-senator, who represented oil-rich Bashkortostan. Ms Izmestieva had been coughing before she died but had not contracted Covid, friends said She had been active and healthy and her sudden death has both shocked and baffled friends Ms Izmestieva, had come to the UK in around 2007, and can be seen here at Stonehenge Friends have been devastated by the news and some have called for an imvestigation Evgeny Chichvarkin said today 'I very much hope that the UK's special services will investigate this case properly, thoroughly, and, perhaps, one day we'll learn what happened.' Who is Irina's ex-husband Igor Izmestieva? Irina Izmestiev's ex husband Igor served as a senator from Bashkortostan for five years from 2001. He also had a long history working in the oil business, where he made his fortune. But in 2007 he was detained by Russian Federal Security Service at Bishkek airport. They said they suspected him of murdering the wife of one of his former business partners. Three years later he was sentenced to life in prison. The court heard he had organised a series of killings, including an attempt on then Bashkortostani President Murtaza Rakhimov's son. Inside the courtroom investigators said he had ties to the mafia in Kingisepp, outside St. Petersberg. In 2017 Putin visited Lyudmila Alexeyeva, a human rights movement, to celebrate her birthday and said he would pardon and free Izmestiev. So far he has not been freed and has been kept behind bars under high security. Advertisement Mirianishvili added: 'Please pray for the newly departed Irina, a wonderful mother to her twin girls, a sister, and daughter, a heroic wife, a faithful, magnificent friend of mine. 'Few in the world are as bright, loyal, strong, and beautiful. 'Ira (Irina) was always there when she felt that she could help, without words or requests she did exactly what was needed.' Chichvarkin - a mobile phone magnate before setting up a wine business in exile in London said Izmestyev had been close to Putin but became embroiled in murky business and politics. 'At the beginning of 2005 Putin presented him with a gold metronome,' he said. But gang members testified that he had been linked to ordering 'multiple assassinations'. Izmestyev fled to London but was lured to Bishkek, capital of Kyrgyzstan, on the pretext of a business trip, capital of Kyrgyzstan, where he was detained in a clandestine FSB operation, and flown to Russia. He had taken his fortune out of Russia and a dispute over this may have stopped his release from jail, it is claimed. He had been convicted of leading a gang that committed killings soon after the collapse of the USSR. Investigators linked him to two 'terrorist attacks' and 14 murders, and five attempted murders. A video of him appeared from inside high-security White Swan prison in Perm region. In 2018, the highly respected head of the Moscow Helsinki Human Rights Group, Lyudmila Alexeyeva, indicated that Putin had signalled he would pardon Izmestyev. Police in Vietnam have summoned a beef noodle seller who filmed himself imitating Turkish celebrity chef Salt Bae days after a top Vietnamese official was caught on camera eating gold-encrusted steak at the Turkish celebrity chef's London restaurant. Footage posted online shows Bui Tuan Lam mimicking Salt Bae by ceremoniously slicing boiled beef and flamboyantly sprinkling green onions into a bowl of noodle soup. But the 38-year-old, from the central city of Danang, was swiftly hauled in by cops and denied trying to mock anyone - insisting that it was only intended as a 'fun' advert. It came after a video of Salt Bae, real name Nusret Gokce, emerged earlier this month showing him hand-feeding a 1,450 tomahawk wrapped in gold to top Vietnamese Communist Party official To Lam. The footage, captured at the Turkish chef's Nusr-Et Steakhouse in London, sparked outrage online. Salt Bae (left) became an internet sensation after a video of him theatrically seasoning meat went viral. Bui Tuan Lam's video (right) shows him imitating the move with green onions Footage of To Lam, minister of public security in the country, seemingly enjoying the 1,450 tomahawk steak at Nusr-Et Steakhouse in Knightsbridge, London, emerged on social media last night Footage also shows Bui Tuan Lam, 38, imitating Salt Bae by ceremoniously slicing boiled beef 'The video I made was for fun and for advertising my beef noodle shop. More customers have been coming since I posted it,' said Lam, who added it was not clear if the police summons was because of his video. Police in Vietnam routinely summon activists and people publicly critical of the ruling Communist Party for questioning. Lam, who has previously criticised authorities on Facebook, said he had been 'raising his voice for a better society', and that police had previously summoned him for a meeting in April, without saying why. He described himself in a Facebook post uploaded alongside the video as 'Green Onion Bae'. Last week, Salt Bae uploaded a video of himself feeding Vietnam's Minister of Public Security, To Lam, gold leaf encrusted steak at his London restaurant, where a steak sells for up to 1,450 ($1,960). The original video was removed from Gokce's TikTok account shortly after it was uploaded, and further copies were then removed from the app for violating 'community standards', Vietnamese users told Reuters at the time. Days later, Meta, Facebook's parent company, said it had unblocked the '#saltbae' hashtag, having found the tag had been blocked globally after the footage emerged. It was not immediately clear why the video led to the tag being blocked and a Meta spokesperson declined to comment on potential reasons. While it was blocked, a search for the hashtag generated a message saying community standards had been violated. Footage shows Lam sashaying up and down behind his beef noodle stall in Vietnam as he imitates Turkish celebrity chef Salt Bae Lam, from the central city of Danang, said his intention in making the video at his beef noodle stall was not to mock any particular individual but was made as a 'fun' advert The video also appears to show Vietnamese ministry spokesman To An Xo sat next to Lam Turkish chef Nusret Gokce, better known as 'Salt Bae' cuts the steak for Lam (left), salts it in his signature pose (right), before feeding it to the official off his knife 'We've unblocked this hashtag on Facebook and we're investigating why this happened,' a spokesperson for Facebook operator Meta said, confirming the tag had been blocked for all Facebook users around the world, not just in Vietnam. In a US Congress hearing earlier this year, Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said artificial intelligence plays a major role in 'content moderation', responsible for taking down more than 90 per cent of content deemed to be against Facebook guidelines. Lam, 64, was in Britain during a visit by senior Vietnamese officials to the UN climate conference, COP26, in Glasgow. But images of him chewing on the gilded beef caused a stir both on and offline in Vietnam, with many questioning how such a high-ranking Party official allowed himself to be caught on camera indulging in food carrying such a high price tag amid a state crackdown on corruption. In one Facebook post, user Nguyen Lan Thang, with nearly 150,000 followers, changed his profile picture to a screenshot of the video, and pointed out that local media had been staying quiet over the incident. 'Security officers following this account, have you seen the video of minister To Lam eating salt-sprayed beef? Do you know how many months salary you'd have to spend for just one piece of that steak?' Thang wrote in one post. It was not clear who paid for the meal. To Lam did not respond to a request for comment, nor did Vietnam's foreign ministry, which handles foreign media enquiries. TikTok and Gokce declined to comment. Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews says the 'small, ugly mob' of protesters outside the state parliament will not stop the government's proposed pandemic laws. But the possible return of disgraced former Labor MP Adem Somyurek to parliament could derail the passage of the bill through the upper house when debate resumes on Thursday. The Public Health and Wellbeing Amendment (Pandemic Management) Bill shifts the power to declare a pandemic and impose public health restrictions from the chief health officer to the premier and health minister. Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews' wife and children have been threatened by anti-vax protestors The bill has become a lightning rod for anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination groups, who have vowed to occupy the steps of parliament as it is debated this week. Poll Do you think Victoria's proposed Pandemic Management Bill is necessary? Yes - tough times call for tough measures No - it goes too far Do you think Victoria's proposed Pandemic Management Bill is necessary? Yes - tough times call for tough measures 11 votes No - it goes too far 221 votes Now share your opinion Protesters on Monday night gathered around a wooden gallows chanting 'freedom', 'traitor', 'kill Dan Andrews' and 'hang Dan Andrews', while an inflatable Daniel Andrews doll was thrown onto the structure. Another protester was applauded by the crowd on Tuesday after she called for politicians to 'dance on the end of a rope'. Mr Andrews said he would not be distracted by the protesters, some of whom have threatened his wife and children. 'I will not be deterred from the work I'm doing to keep every family safe,' he said on Wednesday. 'It is so unfair for a small, ugly mob to be taking attention away from the more than 90 per cent of Victorians who have had a first dose and will soon have had a second dose. That's where our focus should be today.' Mr Andrews described the protesters' behaviour as 'appalling', 'disgusting' and 'potentially criminal'. The driver of the black Toyota Landcruiser seen towing the gallows has been spoken to by officers, a Victoria Police spokeswoman confirmed on Wednesday evening. The man, a 48-year-old from Badger Creek, was issued a warning for traffic offences. Protestors are seen during a demonstration outside the Victorian State Parliament in Melbourne, Monday, November 15, 2021 Meanwhile, in a heated question time, the premier repeatedly accused Opposition Leader Matthew Guy of 'sucking up to extremists', and being 'beholden to anti-vaxxers' and 'Nazis and neo-Nazis'. Mr Guy has condemned the protesters' behaviour but will not stop his MPs from attending the rally and speaking to the crowd. 'Not every single person out there is saying silly things, the majority have not,' he told reporters outside parliament, accusing the premier of seeking to divide Victorians. Liberal MP Roma Britnell met protesters on Tuesday, including one she described as a 'close friend'. Victoria's Public Health and Wellbeing Amendment (Pandemic Management) Bill 2021 has already passed the lower house and is set to be voted on in the upper house 'These people have genuine concerns. They have the right to be listened to,' she said. The government has been confident the bill will pass after making amendments to secure the support of upper house crossbenchers - the Greens' Samantha Ratnam, Reason Party MP Fiona Patten and Animal Justice Party MP Andy Meddick. But Mr Somyurek's potential return to parliament could derail the bill's passage. Mr Somyurek, who quit the party before he was expelled for leading a widespread branch-stacking operation, has not been at parliament since December 2020 and was suspended last month after he failed to provide proof of Covid-19 vaccination. Protesters stage a demonstration outside the Victorian State Parliament, in Melbourne, Wednesday, November 17, 2021 However, the clerk of the Legislative Council on Wednesday advised upper house MPs Mr Somyurek now 'complies with the order and is no longer suspended'. If Mr Somyurek voted against the bill, it would result in a tie and would mean the bill would have to be reintroduced in parliament's lower house. A protester is seen holding a placard during a demonstration outside the Victorian State Parliament Victoria's current state of emergency expires on December 15 and cannot be extended. While legal groups have been pushing for a replacement to the emergency powers, some have raised concerns the proposed pandemic laws lack independent oversight. Mr Andrews said the government did not have the 'luxury' to spend 'six months to get everybody's agreement on every single issue' in the bill. Mr Somyurek has been contacted for comment. Polish border guards thwarted two 'mass attempts' to cross the border overnight by rock-throwing migrants who tried to storm across a railway track from Belarus. Video showed guards having laser pointed shone in their eyes and being pelted with stones by a group of around 50 migrants who tried to cross the border at Czeremcha overnight, 70 miles south of where the main camp is located. Dozens of smaller attempts were also made, with the Polish border service saying a total of 161 crossings were stopped with 34 migrants forcibly deported. The situation remained tense early Wednesday with thousands of migrants still camped close to the border at Kuznica - where violent clashes erupted Tuesday - even as others were march off to an unknown location. It is thought they are being taken to temporary accommodation in warehouses nearby. Thousands more migrants were taken to similar shelters overnight. Meanwhile Mariusz Blaszczak, the country's defence minister, warned the crisis is likely to continue for months and that Poland must remain vigilant. 'I hope it will not be years,' he added. Two large groups of made 'forceful' attempts to cross the Polish border last night, guards said, including 50 rock-throwing group of migrants who marched along a railway track (pictured) Thousands of migrants remain camped close to the Polish border crossing at Kuznica today, following violent clashes with guards on Tuesday Campfire smoke rises into the morning air as thousands of migrants remain hard-up against the Polish border, waiting to cross over Belarus guards were spotted marching hundreds of migrants into waiting vans. It is thought they are being taken to nearby temporary shelters Mr Blaszczak added that plans for a permanent border wall to replace the current barbed wire barricades are also being drawn up. 'We are doing everything we can to keep the border safe,' he added. The EU accuses Belarus of manufacturing the migrant crisis by luring thousands of vulnerable people to the country and then pushing them to the border and forcing them to make illegal crossings. European leaders believe the move - being carried out with the backing of Moscow -is intended to destabilise the bloc as revenge for sanctions against dictator Alexander Lukashenko's regime. Brussels is currently readying another two rounds of sanctions against Lukashenko, including penalties for airlines and travel agents accused of helping to ferry people from across the Middle East and Asia to the country. Polish Border Guard spokeswoman Anna Michalska said today: 'Lukashenko has caused this problem on the border. Poland has no problem with the people of Belarus. It is the regime in Minsk that is the problem. 'Lukashenko has created this situation to try to destabilize Poland and the EU. He has made this problem. He has done this in response to the sanctions that the EU imposed on his regime.' Lukashenko denies the allegations, saying the migrants are legitimate asylum seekers and must be given access. The Belarusian strongman and Vladimir Putin have also expressed 'concern' at a build-up of 15,000 Polish troops on the border who were sent to hold people back. While Poland has been the main focus of migrant crossings, neighbours Latvia and Lithuania have also reported an uptick in illegal crossings in recent months. Even Estonia, which does not share a border with Belarus, has summoned extra troops amid fears migrants could be forced across from Russia. Some 1,700 reserve soldiers were summoned for unannounced drills on Wednesday that will include laying razor wire along the 25-mile Russian frontier. Hundreds of migrants spent the night in warehouses close to the border after being taken there by Belarusian guards Migrants were provided with blankets and donated clothing inside the warehouse, which is the first time they have been given shelter by Belarus Aid workers hand out temporary bedding to hundreds of migrants who were taken away from the border fence on Tuesday and brought to a nearby warehouse Young children are seen bedding down for the night in a warehouse close to the Belarus-Poland border, after being given temporary shelter 'What is happening in Poland, Lithuania and Latvia also requires the strengthening of the border infrastructure in Estonia,' said chief of Border Guard Elmar Vaher. There are also fears the Lukashenko could push migrants into Ukraine, which is not an EU member but is involved in a longstanding confrontation with Russia. The migrant crisis is playing out as Kiev warns thousands of Russian troops, tanks and artillery pieces are massing on the border in what the government claims is a coordinated attempt to fracture alliances in Europe. Following pressure from the EU, several airlines have said they will now stop transporting would-be migrants to Belarus. Iraq has also said it will start voluntary repatriations of its citizens from Belarus this week and the EU border agency Frontex is working with the Polish and Iraqi authorities on arranging charter flights from Poland as well. Lukashenko, who has crushed opposition to his rule over nearly three decades in power, discussed the crisis with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday. It was his first phone call with a Western leader since he suppressed mass protests against his rule last year. French President Emmanuel Macron also spoke to his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to try to defuse the crisis. Russia on Wednesday welcomed direct talks held between EU and Belarus officials over a migrant crisis on the Polish border. 'It is very important that contact has been made between representatives of the EU and the leadership of Belarus,' Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, days after German Chancellor Angela Merkel discussed the issue with Belarus leader Alexander Lukashenko. Mariusz Blaszczak, the Polish defence minister, has warned that the crisis is likely to last for months and could drag on for years Migrants gather in a camp near Bruzgi - Kuznica checkpoint on the Belarusian-Polish border Thousands of people have been camped out for days in freezing conditions with little access to food or water while attempting to cross into Poland Migrants gather around a campfire overnight on the Belarusian side of the Polish border Russian President Vladimir Putin had called on the West to speak directly to his ally Lukashenko, increasingly isolated since violently suppressing opposition protests last year. Merkel called Lukashenko on Monday to discuss the situation on the Poland-Belarus border, where thousands of migrants have gathered in a crisis the EU blames on Minsk. It was Lukashenko's first phone call with a Western leader since last year's protests, that erupted over an election that the EU says he rigged. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell had also discussed the crisis with Belarus foreign minister Vladimir Makei. The Kremlin said Putin and Lukashenko discussed 'possible solutions' for the crisis on Tuesday. Poland and Brussels allege that Lukashenko engineered the crisis, luring migrants from the Middle East to the EU's doorstep as revenge for sanctions against his regime over the protests. Aid groups say at least 11 migrants have died on both sides of the border since the crisis began in the summer and have called for a humanitarian response to the crisis. Visiting areas near the border on the Polish side, the Council of Europe human rights commissioner Dunja Mijatovic on Tuesday said the situation was 'extremely dangerous'. 'We need to find a way to de-escalate, to make sure the focus is really to stop the suffering,' she told reporters. Russian state television on Wednesday showed hundreds of migrants at an indoor centre set up by Belarusian authorities near the border where families with young children spent the night. The Belarusian health ministry said it had hospitalised six people, including four children, from the Bruzgi camp. Advertisement Nine Insulate Britain eco zealots will be in prison for Christmas after being jailed today at the High Court for breaching an injunction designed to prevent their M25 road blockades which caused two months of chaos. Two of the activists were jailed for three months, a further six were imprisoned for four months and the ninth - Ben Taylor, 27 - received six months after boasting he would immediately block the motorway again if not imprisoned. Ben Buse, 36, Ana Heyatawin, 58, Louis McKechnie, 20, Roman Paluch-Machnik, 28, Oliver Rock, 41, Emma Smart, 44, Tim Speers, 36, James Thomas, 47, and Mr Taylor were all jailed and could have to pay up to 91,000 in costs. The nine were imprisoned over a protest on October 8 at Waltham Cross in Hertfordshire which saw a total of 16 people arrested - but dozens more activists are set to be issued with committal proceedings in the next few days. The group and its supporters chanted 'We are unstoppable, another world is possible' as they were led to the cells through the dock by security officers at the court in London. Heyatawin and McKechnie were both jailed for three months while Buse, Paluch-Machnik, Rock, Smart, Speers and Thomas all received four-month sentences. The shorter jail term for Heyatawin was because of her medical issues, while McKechnie's was due to his younger age. The men will be at Category B Pentonville jail in Islington and the women at Category A Bronzefield in Surrey. Insulate Britain is an offshoot of Extinction Rebellion, which today described those jailed as the 'Highway Nine'. After the sentencing, Smart insisted that she would go on hunger strike in prison. Insulate Britain began a wave of protests on September 13, demanding that the Government makes plans to insulate the UK's homes. They blocked roads around London as well as in Birmingham, Manchester and Dover - causing miles of tailbacks in rush hour. The demonstrations have seen the campaigners glue themselves to the road before being removed by police. At least 174 activists have been involved on 19 days of protests so far and there have been 860 arrests. Group spokesman Tracey Mallaghan said after the case: 'The right thing to do is highlight injustice, breaking the law if needed. This is what the Suffragettes did and Martin Luther King did, and it is what Insulate Britain has done.' It comes after Taylor told the court yesterday that if he was not in jail he would 'go and block the motorway at the earliest opportunity and will continue to do so until the Government makes a meaningful statement and acts on it'. Taylor's submissions were described today by Dame Victoria Sharp as 'inflammatory' and a 'call to arms', and he was therefore given a longer sentence of six months 'to deter (him) from committing further breaches'. The judge, sitting with Mr Justice Chamberlain, said there was no alternative to jail sentences given the group's actions were so serious and they had made it clear they intended to further flout court orders. She said: 'The defendants, or some of them, seem to want to be martyrs for their cause and the media campaign surrounding this hearing appears designed to suggest this. We, however, have to act dispassionately and proportionately.' Before the group were sentenced, the National Highways barrister said the legal costs of bringing proceedings against the nine activists had reached 91,000. She argued the judges should make an order for the costs against the defendants and that, even if they are unable to pay them, such an order would be an 'important symbol'. She also said the agency had a duty to attempt to recover the costs, as they are from public funds. But Dame Victoria Sharp said she and Mr Justice Chamberlain will give their decision on costs in writing at a later date. The nine activists said they did not have the funds to pay their share of the legal costs. Taylor said he has been volunteering for a couple of years and is currently claiming Universal Credit, which has recently been cut. He added: '10,000 is a lot of money so unless there is a deadline, it will take a long time to pay off.' Smart told the court she has been working as a volunteer in wildlife conservation and climate activism, and does not have any money. Addressing National Highways' legal team, she said: 'You are claiming more for postage than I have earned in the last three years. The fact you are profiting from our stand and trying to save the lives of ... people is obscene. Take what I have, come to my house and sell my clothes because that's all I have.' Rock said he is a carpenter and was badly affected by the pandemic as he built theatre sets, while Speers said he was a full-time volunteer and claims Universal Credit. Speers added: 'I might be dead before I can pay these costs.' A further 23 protesters have also defied one or more of several injunctions granted to Transport for London and National Highways over the past two months. And Insulate Britain said it expects these 23 people to be summoned in the coming days, which would bring the total to at least 32 people who are due to face contempt of court. Lawyers representing the Government said further committal proceedings will be issued against other Insulate Britain protesters and were expected to be brought by the end of the week, relating to protests on October 27. Evidence is also being gathered to bring proceedings in relation to protests on October 29 and November 2. Raj Chada, solicitor at Hodge Jones and Allen law firm which supported the protesters, said: 'With these prison terms, the long and honourable tradition of civil disobedience is under attack again. Rather than leaving courts to imprison those that raise the alarm, it should be the Government that acts to protect us against the climate crisis.' Insulate Britain activist Ben Taylor (left, being led away in handcuffs from the High Court in London today), 27, was jailed for six months after boasting he would immediately block the motorway again if not imprisoned. Taylor is pictured shouting - and while what he said was inaudible, photographers said he appeared to be shouting encouragement towards his supporters. Meanwhile Roman Paluch-Machnik (right, also pictured today), 28, was among six of the activists jailed for four months Six of the nine Insulate Britain activists arrive at the High Court in London for sentencing this morning Insulate Britain campaigner Ana Heyatawin (left), 58, was jailed for three months; while her fellow activist Emma Smart (right), 44, was imprisoned for four months. They are pictured being led away in handcuffs from the High Court this afternoon Nine Insulate Britain eco zealots were today jailed at the High Court after admitting breaching an injunction on protesting Insulate Britain activist Tracey Mallaghan speaks to reporters outside the High Court today following the group's sentencing Insulate Britain activist Ben Taylor (left) arrives at the High Court in London for sentencing this morning Insulate Britain activist Emma Smart (left) waves as she arrives at the High Court in London for sentencing this morning Insulate Britain activist Tim Speers receives a hug as he arrives at the High Court for sentencing this morning Labour MP John McDonnell (left) talks with Insulate Britain activist Oliver Rock (right) at the High Court in London today Insulate Britain activist Ana Heyatawin arrives at the High Court in London today for sentencing this morning Insulate Britain activist Roman Paluch (right) walks into the High Court in London for sentencing today Insulate Britain activist Cathy Eastburn (right) hugs a fellow protester ahead of the sentencing at the High Court today Insulate Britain said the protesters were expected to serve at least half of their sentence. They had been facing a maximum penalty of two years in prison or an unlimited fine for contempt of court. The group has insisted it intends to continue with the protests until the Government agrees to insulate homes. Who are the Insulate Britain nine and how long were they jailed for? Ben Taylor: 6 months Defiant Taylor, 27, was handed the longest sentence for what judges called an 'inflammatory' call to arms, in which he told the court that the government must 'f****ing act' on the group's demands. He also boasted that he would immediately go out and block another road if he was not jailed.. The court therefore extended his detention 'to deter Mr Taylor from committing further breaches'. Dr Benjamin Buse: 4 months The meek University of Bristol researcher, 36, was the only defendant to have a barrister representing his interests. The court was told that Dr Buse, who has published on topics like 'microanalysis of Uranium', was a devout Christian and popular member of his local church in Cheddar. Barrister Owen Greenhall said he volunteered for charity and donated hundreds of pounds to good causes every month. Oliver Roc: 4 months The 41-year-old carpenter from south London, admitted he was 'c**pping himself' about going to jail and enjoyed drawn-out cinches with his partner before the final hearing began. He said that after feeling 'depressed' that the 2003 Iraq War march had failed, he was inspired to take up more extreme tactics, in collaboration with Extinction Rebellion, which he joined in 2019. He told the court he only earned about 10,000 a year, often making 'small stage sets'. Emma Smart: 4 months The 44-year-old, from Weymouth, announced via an Insulate Britain spokesman that she would be going on hunger strike. She told the court that the proceedings were 'obscene' and glowered at barristers representing National Highways. But Smart, a biologist, has previously been criticised for undertaking a gas-guzzling 81,000-mile drive across the globe with her partner, Andy. Louis McKechnie: 3 months The student from Weymouth, who turned 21 yesterday, was given a month off his sentence in recognition of his youth. He said his only income was his student loan, which all went on living expenses, so he would struggle to pay his share of the bill in paying the government's legal costs. Ana Heyatawin: 3 months The oldest of the defendants, the blue-haired 58-year-old from Wells, had her sentence reduced to three months, after she told the court about her litany of health issues, including a personality disorder, depression, sciatica and bad eyesight. James Thomas: 4 months The 47-year-old architect said he had previously regarded himself as an 'enlightened capitalist sort of guy', but was inspired to abandon his career and join protest movements after seeing a film about the successes won by the Suffragettes and their campaign of direct action. He said that the 'scariest part' of his time inside would be the impact on his relationship. Roman Paluch-Machnik: 4 months The 28-year-old from Ealing said that learning about the experiences of his grandparents, all four of whom escaped Poland during the war, had helped inspire his activism. An active member of Extinction Rebellion since 2018, he has travelled the country giving talks on climate change and training others how to participate in 'Non-Violent Direct Action'. Tim Speers: 4 months The 36-year-old, from east London, pontificated in court, 'in an insane world, the sane will be seen as insane'. He believes that Insulate Britain has led 'one of the most successful campaigns in history'. He was first arrested on Waterloo Bridge in 2019 at an Extinction Rebellion protest, commenting: 'I refuse sit back while greed and ignorance takes life to extinction.' Advertisement Dame Victoria told the court that police bodycam footage of the protest showed officers struggling to remove the demonstrators from the road. The court heard the activists moved towards oncoming traffic before some successfully glued themselves on the road after being told to clear. The judge said: 'The footage shows a somewhat chaotic scene with the defendants very close to traffic, and in some instances moving traffic, and the police attempting to restrain them from continuing with their protest and re-entering the road.' Dame Victoria Sharp told the activists that it is 'integral' that orders made by the court 'must be obeyed'. She said: 'In our democratic society, all citizens are equal under the law and all are subject to the law. 'It is integral to the rule of law, and to the fair and peaceful resolution of disputes, first, that orders made by the court must be obeyed, unless and until they are set aside or subject to successful challenge on appeal, and secondly that a mechanism exists to enforce orders made by court against those who breach them. 'In this jurisdiction, that mechanism is provided by the law of contempt.' Insulate Britain activists were also told by the judge that ordinary members of the public 'have rights too'. Dame Victoria Sharp told them: 'In a democratic society which recognises the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, protests causing some degree of inconvenience are to be expected and, up to a point, tolerated. 'But the words 'up to a point' are important. Ordinary members of the public have rights too, including the right to use the highways. 'The public's toleration of peaceful protest depends on an understanding that, in a society subject to the rule of law, the balance between the protesters' right to protest and the right of members of the public to use the highways is to be determined not by the say-so of the protesters, but according to the law.' The judge also said the public has an 'interest in deterring disobedience to its orders and in upholding the rule of law'. Smart, who announced her intention to go on hunger strike after being jailed, said in a statement: 'Our Government is betraying us, betraying our vulnerable people and betraying our children's future. 'I believe that my intentions are morally right, even if my actions are deemed legally wrong. This court may see me as being on the wrong side of the law, but in my heart I know I am on the right side of history. I will not be a bystander.' And Buse said in a statement: 'Care for the earth and all life requires me to act. My faith requires me to act, believing in the sacredness of creation and the demand for justice, justice for the trampled and exploited. 'Whilst acknowledging the importance of the courts, I have continued to break the injunction multiple times for we have a duty to the earth, to life, to future generations, to care and protect, this is the most important function of government, society and law. 'As we enter into the difficult years shifting to low carbon, and feeling the effects of climate change, we all need to be engaged in peaceful transformation; attempts to punish and crack down on peaceful protest opens the door to violent protest, which I deeply wish to avoid.' Speers added: 'Never before has a civilisation had the burden and the privilege to see its own collapse coming. 'In this world, those trying to avert catastrophe are vilified and criminalised, and those profiting from death are protected and rewarded. We asked for a chance to live. That's all. 'We did so in the tradition of non-violent protest upon which this country was built. In response, the Government declared it would do 'everything we can to stop them'.' 'In an insane world, the sane will be seen as insane. And in a democracy steeped in lies and corruption, good people have a duty to disobey bad laws. 'We did our duty and I await the day when a judge in a court of law is brave enough to do theirs.' An Insulate Britain spokesman said today: 'This morning our Insulate Britain supporters have been sentenced. 'We are being failed and betrayed by our government. Our nine chose not to standby and be complicit in genocide.' During yesterday's hearing, Taylor said if he was 'not put in prison' for breaching an injunction banning disruptive protests on the nation's roads, he will 'go and block the motorway at the earliest opportunity and will continue to do so until the Government makes a meaningful statement and acts on it'. He added that 'whatever sentence or sanction' he was given 'will be counter-productive and will only serve to fuel the campaign of Insulate Britain'. Taylor said: 'If you send me away to prison, ten people will step forward in my place. If you send each of us away, 100 people will step forward and take our places. If you send 100 of us away, 1,000 people will step forward to take our place. 'If you somehow manage to stop all non-violent protests, then things will only turn violent.' And Smart told the court she was there to 'ensure future survival'. She said: 'That's what it boils down to. I am proud of what I did and I stand by my actions. 'I'm asking when you consider my sentence that my actions are proportionate to the crisis we are facing, where 8,500 people die a year from cold and hunger in their own homes. 'I am doing everything I can to protect the most vulnerable people in society. We are all vulnerable in a climate crisis. No-one is immune and no-one is safe. When I see injustice I cannot stand by and watch harm to life.' Smart compared watching the climate crisis to watching a child trapped in a burning house. She said: 'I cannot stand by and watch. I would run to them.' She told the court: 'Our Government is betraying us, our vulnerable people and our children's future. 'I will not be a bystander while our Government fails and betrays its people, I will continue to do what is necessary.' Ana Heyatawin (left), 58, has been at protests and glued her hand to the road on the M25 at Thurrock on October 13 (right) Emma Smart (left), 44, is also at the High Court today after blocking the M25 at junction 31 in Thurrock on October 13 (right) Ben Taylor (left), 27, is among the Insulate Britain nine. He protested at Parliament Square in London on November 4 (right) Dr Ben Buse, a Bristol University researcher from Somerset, is at the High Court today (left) after being involved in various Insulate Britain protests - including one (right) near South Mimms at the junction of the M25 and A1 on November 2 Oliver Roc (left, at court yesterday) is pictured during the group's recent protest at Parliament Square on November 4 (right) Roman Paluch (left), 28, and Tim Speers (right), 36, are also among the nine Insulate Britain activists at the High Court today Louis McKenchnie (left), 20, and James Thomas (right), 47, are both appearing at the High Court for the hearing today The male Insulate Britain protesters jailed today will be sent to HMP Pentonville in Islington, North London (file picture) The male activists have been sent to HMP Pentonville in Islington, North London, where they will spend Christmas and beyond The women jailed over the Insulate Britain protests today will be sent to HMP Bronzefield in Ashford, Surrey (file picture) HMP Bronzefield in Ashford, Surrey, will be where the women Insulate Britain protesters will be imprisoned (file picture) Speers described the country's democracy as 'steeped in lies' and said 'good people have a duty to breach bad laws'. What life will be like for Insulate Britain's middle class mob behind bars HMP PENTONVILLE Louis McKechnie, 20, Ben Buse, 36, Roman Paluch-Machnik, 28, Oliver Rock, 41, Tim Speers, 36, James Thomas, 47, and Ben Taylor, 37, have all be taken to HMP Pentonville after being jailed at the High Court today. The Category B jail - known as 'The Ville' - in Islington, North London, houses about 1,300 men who live in a mixture of single and shared rooms across seven wings. When a prisoner first arrives they are allowed to contact one relative by phone and see a medical professional about any immediate health and wellbeing needs. They then have a four-day induction period to explain the prison rules, and education opportunities. A service provided by Novus lets them study for qualifications in subjects such as carpentry, food safety and painting. The jail also has four gym areas and a multi-faith chaplaincy service and works with the Catch 22 organisation which helps prisoners involved in gangs. Notable former inmates over the last 40 years include footballers George Best and Nile Ranger; singers George Michael and Pete Doherty; and actor Keith Allen. HMP BRONZEFIELD Ana Heyatawin, 58, and Emma Smart, 44, have both been sent to HMP Bronzefield after being jailed today. The jail in Ashford, Surrey, was Britain's first purpose-built prison for women when it opened in June 2004, as well as being the 10th privately-run prison in England. Up to 572 women inmates can be held at the Category A jail across four houseblocks which can hold about 130 women in each one. Each wing has a servery unit for women to collect their food, which they can either eat together on the wing or take back to their rooms. Telephones are also provided in each room. It has a 17-bed healthcare facility, and a mother and baby unit for 12 women and 13 babies up to the age of 18 months. When a woman arrives at the prison they will be searched and their welfare assessed by a doctor and nurse. They will also receive a meal and drink, before beginning an induction process the following day. Notable former inmates at Bronzefield include murderers Rose West and Joanna Dennehy, child abuser Vanessa George and the Labour MP Fiona Onasanya. Advertisement He said: 'In this world, those trying to avert catastrophe are vilified. On a tradition of non-violent protest, in response, the Government said they will 'do everything to we can to stop them.' 'That was from Grant Shapps, who had a second job under another name.' Paluch-Machnik told the court the injunction 'is not just in context with the crisis we're in'. He said: 'The Government would rather imprison pensioners than insulate their homes.' Mr Paluch said retrofitting homes is the cheapest way to tackle the climate crisis and added: 'We are asking for a fully funded state-operated retrofitted service, like the NHS. 'Some of those who have spoken have said they're not afraid. I'm afraid you will take away my home and me away from my friends, family and partner. 'But I'm more afraid of inaction and the climate catastrophe that has already began to crash on some of us. I stand by the action that brought me before this court, and if that sends me to prison, then so be it.' He urged the court to look at 'more than the letter of the law' and 'make the commitment to insulate Britain'. Heyatawin told the High Court she is 'traumatised' by the Government's attitude to climate change. She said she 'does not accept the morality of the injunction' and said 'it is meaningless in the context of climate collapse'. Ms Heyatawin added: 'I know how to behave. I think I'm a good person. I felt compelled to stop the world and get off. We are hurtling towards ecocide, genocide and our own suicide.' Rock invited the court to observe a minute's silence 'to imagine what the climate crisis means for the future'. He said: 'I'm proud of our actions and I stand by what we have done, we have not done this for personal gain. 'I take responsibility for my actions and I did that in an attempt to mitigate the suffering of people in this country who cannot afford to adequately heat their homes.' The only defendant to have a lawyer was Dr Ben Buse, a Bristol University researcher. Owen Greenhall told the court Dr Buse was active in his local church and a highly regarded member of the community. Myriam Stacey QC, representing National Highways, told the court the message that the defendants are 'proud of their conduct' and 'will continue to defy the injunction order made' is 'loud and clear'. She added: 'No apology has been made in relation to the breach of the order.' Ms Stacey said the group had emailed National Highways in September saying the protests would continue 'unless the Government make a meaningful statement that they will start the process of decarbonising homes in Britain'. Ms Stacey said further committal proceedings will be issued against other Insulate Britain protesters by the end of the week, relating to protests on October 27. Insulate Britain has released photographs of some of the faces among its 32 activists who face up to two years in prison for contempt of court. They are (left to right, first row): Ruth Jarman, Dr Diana Warner, Rowan Tilly, Jess Causby, Steve Gower, Liam Norton, Greg Frey, Reverend Sue Parfitt, (second row) Mark Latimer, Dr Ben Buse, Gabby Ditton, Arne Springorum, Tony Hill, Theresa Norton, Stephanie, Emma Smart (third row) Emily Brockelbank, Biff Whipster, Amy Pritchard, Paul Sheeky, Louis McKechnie (bottom row) Roman Paluch, Ben Taylor, Ana Heyatawin, David, Oliver Rock, Tracey Mallaghan and Tim Speers Supporters hold an Insulate Britain banner outside the Royal Courts of Justice after the sentencing hearing today An Insulate Britain protester speaks to the media outside the Royal Courts of Justice after the sentencing today Two Insulate Britain supporters who were not involved in the sentencing today leave the High Court after the hearing Insulate Britain activist Tracey Mallaghan speaks to reporters outside the High Court today following the group's sentencing Insulate Britain activist Tracey Mallaghan gives a statement outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London today Insulate Britain protesters (back row left to right) Tim Speers, Roman Paluch, Emma Smart, Ben Taylor, James Thomas, (front row left to right) Louis McKechnie, Ana Heyatawin and Oliver Roc pose for a photograph ahead of their High Court hearing She also said evidence is being gathered to bring proceedings in relation to protests on October 29 and November 2. All nine defendants were sentenced by Dame Victoria Sharp and Mr Justice Chamberlain. What is contempt of court and could the nine have been jailed for longer? 'Contempt of court' is an offence that normally happens when someone risks unfairly influencing a court case, which may stop somebody from getting a fair trial. It can include taking photos or shouting out in court, refusing to answer questions as a witness or publicly commenting on a court case such as on social media. Another form it takes is disobeying or ignoring a court order, which is what the Insulate Britain activists have done by breaking an injunction on their M25 protests. Those who breach the injunctions were found in contempt of court and could have faced a maximum penalty of two years in prison or an unlimited fine. In the end, they were jailed for between three and six months. The High Court has so far issued five injunctions to prevent protesters from blocking roads - four to National Highways and one to Transport for London (TfL). The hearings did not taking place in a criminal court because none of the protesters have been charged with a criminal offence by police. This is despite at least 161 activists having been involved in the demonstrations over the two months, resulting in at least 860 arrests. The protesters were instead facing contempt of court proceedings for breaching a High Court injunction, which is a civil matter but can still result in a jail term. Advertisement An emotional Mr Rock told LBC radio yesterday: 'I feel terrified - I'm c***ping myself this morning, and I feel like crying. I've got all these emotions coming out of me. It seems ridiculous that we're in this situation. 'What we're asking the Government to do is just an extremely practical no-brainer thing that they should be doing, and they're choosing instead to potentially lock us up, fine us, seize our assets. 'I'm expecting that we might get sentenced maybe today, probably tomorrow. We've been told that quite probably we'll get custodial sentences, so there's a high likelihood that by this evening I'll be in a prison cell somewhere.' The Government plans to introduce new measures to clamp down on protests, including allowing police to stop and search people where there is a reasonable suspicion they are carrying items intended to cause disturbance, such as glue. After today's sentencing a statement from the nine activists jailed was read by an Insulate Britain supporter outside the Royal Courts of Justice. It read: 'Over the last nine weeks, 174 ordinary people have held the Government to account, asking that they deliver on their most basic of duties, to protect the British people, the economy and all we hold dear in our society. 'Your Government has now chosen to act. It has chosen to imprison us for this demand. 'By imprisoning us, the Government shows its cowardice. They would rather lock up pensioners than insulate their homes. 'They would rather lock up teachers than create thousands of proper jobs. 'They would rather lock up young people than take practical steps to reduce emissions. 'They will lock us up and leave thousands to die of cold this winter. We knew we would face prison when we took this action, but we could not stand by while the Government betrays the general public.' The activists' statement continued: 'Following the widely recognised failure of our Government at Cop26, we are continuing to ask them to get on with the job - of cutting carbon emissions, of insulating cold and leaky houses, of protecting the people of this country from climate collapse - because the lives of our children and those of all future generations hang in the balance. NOVEMBER 4 -- A truck carrying insulation was blocked by Insulate Britain protesters at Parliament Square in Westminster NOVEMBER 2 -- Protesters from Insulate Britain are removed by police after they block a road near Manchester Airport OCTOBER 27 -- Insulate Britain protesters block the A40 junction with Gypsy Lane in North Acton, West London OCTOBER 25 -- Climate activists from the Insulate Britain group block a road near Canary Wharf in East London OCTOBER 13 -- Protesters from Insulate Britain block the M25 at junction 31 near to the Dartford Crossing in Thurrock, Essex OCTOBER 1 -- Insulate Britain protesters block a roundabout at Junction 3 of the M4 near London Heathrow Airport SEPTEMBER 27 -- Police officers detain a protester from Insulate Britain occupying an M25 roundabout leading to Heathrow SEPTEMBER 24 -- Police officers remove two protesters from the top of a tanker as Insulate Britain block the A20 in Dover SEPTEMBER 20 -- Police officers work to free protesters who had glued themselves to junction 4 of the A1(M) near Hatfield 'To the Government we say, you can't imprison a flood, there are no unlimited fines against a famine, you can't bankrupt a fire. How Insulate Britain made a mockery of the law over two months of chaotic demonstrations September 13 - 78 Insulate Britain protesters arrested after blocking junctions 3, 6, 14, 20 and 31 of the M25 September 15 - More than 50 protesters arrested after targeting junctions 1, 8, 9 and 23 of the M25 September 17 - 48 protesters arrested after targeting junctions 3, 9 and 28 of the M25, as well as the M3 September 20 - 29 protesters are arrested after blocking the M25 at junctions 4 and 18, as well as the A1 September 21 - Protesters risk death by running into moving traffic to block the carriageway near Junction 10. Some 38 arrests are made. National Highways obtains an injunction against further protests on the M25 September 22 - Protesters burn copies of the injunction outside the Home Office, blocking the road outside the ministry. No arrests are made September 24 - 39 protesters arrested after blocking roads at three locations in Dover. They are all released under investigation. National Highways obtains a second injunction covering Dover. September 27 - 53 protesters are arrested for blocking a slip road at Junction 14 of the M25. They are all released under investigation. September 28 - National Highways says it is taking 'legal advice' over how to enforce its injunction September 29 - 27 protesters are arrested for blocking a roundabout at Junction 3 of the M25 on two occasions September 30 - Protesters return to junction 30 at Thurrock in Essex, and nine are arrested October 1: The group block the M4 at junction 3, the M1 at junction 1 and M25 at junction 25. Some 39 arrests October 2: Third injunction bans them from obstructing traffic and access to motorways and major A roads in and around London October 4: 38 arrests after protesters block three major roads in London - the Blackwall Tunnel, Wandsworth Bridge and A40 and North Circular at Hanger Lane. October 8: 19 arrested over protest at Old Street roundabout and a further 16 on the M25 at junction 24. Transport for London gets a High Court injunction to ban them from obstructing traffic in 14 locations in London. October 13: Protesters return to the M25 at junction 31 and a nearby industrial estate, with 35 people arrested. October 25: Activists target areas around Southwark Bridge, Canary Wharf and Liverpool Street station. Some 53 are arrested. October 27: Protesters blockade the A40 in North Acton, West London, and a major roundabout next to the Dartford Crossing in Kent. Kent Police arrested 32 protesters, while the Metropolitan Police detained 17. October 29: 10 activists are arrested after walking onto the M25 between junctions 28 and 29 in Essex November 2: Police arrest 20 activists before they can even get onto the M25 at junction 23 for South Mimms, but other actions take place on the M56 in Manchester, with 11 arrests, and the A4400 in Birmingham November 4: Some 62 protesters sit down at Parliament Square in Westminster Advertisement 'To the public we say, no-one is coming to save you. In the past, when governments have failed to protect their people the right thing to do is to highlight this injustice, breaking the law if needed, this is what the suffragettes and Martin Luther King did, and it is what Insulate Britain has done. 'We call on you to recognise that you also have a duty to act, as our Government is betraying us. They can't even act to insulate Britain. 'What hope do we have of them protecting our children, our economy or our country?' The statement concluded: 'We say to those who look on in fear and denial - this will impact you and all that you love, and look at what we did. 'A few hundred people captured the country's attention for months. Think what 1,000 people can achieve? 'You have a choice. To act, to come and join us help change the tide of history, or to be a bystander and be complicit in enabling genocide. 'This tide will not come again, will you join us?' Following the sentencing, Greenpeace UK programme director Pat Venditti said: 'Jailing climate activists during a climate crisis is like silencing a smoke alarm while half the building is on fire. 'What this country needs are fewer injunctions and more insulation. Instead of cracking down on climate activism, the UK Government should crack down on cold homes. 'One will be an international embarrassment, the other a sign of real climate leadership. 'An ambitious home insulation programme funded by the Government would lower energy bills, cut planet-heating emissions and boost the UK's energy security - it's a triple win. 'Boris Johnson must show that he hasn't left his commitment behind at Glasgow Central station and he's ready to roll up sleeves and lead by example on tackling the climate crisis.' Liberty director Gracie Bradley said: 'We should all be able to stand up for what we believe, but when the means to do so are continually narrowed - whether that be at the ballot box, in the courts or in the streets - people will take to more urgent routes. 'While Insulate Britain knew that by breaching the injunction they risked jail, these sentences clearly are disproportionate and another threat to protest rights for all of us. 'For years, injunctions have been used by the powerful to stifle dissent and restrict protest rights, while demonstrators have been demonised. 'The impact has been stifling free expression, undermining the ability of all of us to stand up for what we believe in - particularly people from marginalised communities who are most cut off from the corridors of power. 'Today's sentences must be seen in the context of the expansive and oppressive powers in the Policing Bill, itself a grab for more power by a Government that despises scrutiny and accountability. 'The right to protest protects all of us and is the cornerstone of a healthy democracy. We must not allow those in power to demonise demonstrators in a cynical attempt to silence us all.' Duncan Smith, executive director of operations at National Highways, said: 'Safety is our top priority and we welcome this outcome. 'We respect people's right to protest but do not condone the actions of anyone who puts their lives, and the lives of road users, at risk. 'The judge's decision will hopefully make people think again about carrying out reckless and dangerous protests such as these and endangering people's lives. 'The injunctions remain in place and we stand ready to do what is necessary to limit the impact of any protests on the strategic road network, and to keep drivers safe and on the move.' Fantastic Beasts actor Kevin Guthrie has lost a bid to appeal against his conviction for sexually assaulting a vulnerable woman when she was unwell after a night out. The Sunshine On Leith star was jailed for three years in May after being found guilty of molesting a 29-year-old actress. Guthrie's legal team informed the High Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh days later that they intended to challenge both his conviction and sentence. Guthrie, 33, of Glasgow, has now had his appeal rejected by the court at the 'first sift' stage. The actor said he had only 'helped' the woman who was unwell but his DNA was found inside her underwear. Pictured: Guthrie outside court ahead of a sentencing hearing held in May The decision came after a single judge decided there are no 'arguable grounds' for an appeal to proceed based on legal matters and evidence. Sheriff Tom Hughes, who presided over Guthrie's trial, wrote a report on the case before the judge decided it should not proceed to a full appeal hearing. Guthrie did not request to be released on bail pending his appeal and remains in custody. He could still appeal to the 'second sift' stage where the case would be considered by two or three judges. The assault happened at the home of Still Game actor Scott Reid, who played Methadone Mick in the BBC comedy series, and Guthrie had insisted that he had only 'helped' the woman after she became unwell. However, his DNA was found on her clothing and he was found guilty of sexual assault following a trial at Glasgow Sheriff Court. Guthrie's trial was told the woman had been due to meet him and Mr Reid at a bar on the night of the alleged attack, but Mr Reid received a call from a taxi driver asking him to collect her as she appeared ill. He and Guthrie helped the woman into the flat in Glasgow's Kelvindale and put her on a bed. Kevin Guthrie (pictured in Fantastic Beasts), 33, was jailed for three years after it was found he sexually assault the woman, 29, inside the flat of fellow actor Scott Reid in Glasgow in 2017 Mr Reid called NHS 24, leaving Guthrie in the room 'to make sure she was OK'. But the woman recalled bed covers then 'being moved down my body'. Guthrie - who also starred in the Netflix series The English Game - then sexually assaulted the woman. The attack happened between September 30 and October 1, 2017 and he was unable to explain why his DNA was found on the woman's clothing. As well as his jail sentence, Guthrie was also placed on the sex offenders' register for an indefinite period. Sentencing him, Sheriff Hughes said: 'You had an educational background and worked extremely hard to get a part in acting in acclaimed films. Guthrie lost his appeal against his conviction. Pictured: Guthrie in Sunshine on Leith in 2013 'The court must show that women can be protected from domestic sexual offences. 'You committed this crime in a position of trust. She was unwell and thought her drink had been spiked elsewhere that night. 'The other man was urgently getting medical assistance and you were left in the room with her when she was not able to look after herself. 'The jury accepted that you committed these heinous crimes and the only appropriate sentence is imprisonment.' Gordon Jackson, QC, defending, told the sentencing hearing that Guthrie maintained his innocence. He said: 'If ever there was a case where something appears out of character it is this. 'The price he will pay with his own career is immense.' The High Court in Edinburgh confirmed Guthrie's appeal against conviction and sentence was refused at 'first sift'. The 'QAnon Shaman' who wore a horned head-dress during the Capitol riots could be sentenced for more than four years for his role in the attack. Jacob Chansley pleaded guilty in September to obstructing an official proceeding when he and thousands of pro-Donald Trump supporters stormed the government building in a bid to overturn the election results. Prosecutors have asked US District Judge Royce Lamberth to impose a 51-month sentence on the rioter. The 'QAnon Shaman' who wore a horned head-dress during the Capitol riots could be sentenced for more than four years for his role in the attack. Pictured climbing the scaffolding outside the government building 'Defendant Chansley's now-famous criminal acts have made him the public face of the Capitol riot,' prosecutors said. That would be the stiffest imposed on any Capitol rioter, after a former mixed martial artist filmed punching a police officer during violence was sentenced last week to 41 months in prison. Chansley's attorneys have asked the judge for a sentence of time served for their client, who has been detained since his January arrest. While in detention, Chansley was diagnosed by prison officials with transient schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety. When he entered his guilty plea, Chansley said he was disappointed Trump had not pardoned him. Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives and acquitted by the Senate on a charge of inciting the January 6 riot for a fiery speech that preceded it in which he told his followers to 'fight like hell.' Four people died in the violence. Chansley's attorneys have asked the judge for a sentence of time served for their client, who has been detained since his January arrest. Pictured inside the Capitol armed with a spear A Capitol Police officer who had been attacked by protesters died the day after the riot and four police officers who took part in the defense of the Capitol later took their own lives. About 140 police officers were injured. Defense lawyer Albert Watkins said the US Navy in 2006 had found Chansley suffered from personality disorder but nonetheless declared him 'fit for duty.' Last week, ex-MMA fighter Scott Fairlamb wept in court as he begged for mercy before being sentenced to 41 months in prison for punching an officer during the Capitol riots. Fairlamb, 44, of New Jersey was also the first person sentenced for assaulting a law enforcement officer during the January 6 Capitol riot. Judge Royce Lamberth's decision was considered a 'canary in the coal mine' by prosecutors who said that Wednesday foreshadowed what more than 120 other defendants face for attacking police that day. Scott Fairlamb, 44, (pictured with his Andrea) of New Jersey was sentenced to 44 months for two counts related to the Capitol riot - one for obstruction of an official proceeding and one for assaulting the police officer 'Had you gone to trial, I don't think there's any jury that could have acquitted you,' the judge said as he announced the sentence. According to NBC Washington Fairlamb wept in court at the 11am hearing and apologized for disgracing his family's name after his veteran father proudly served in the US military. With 'I truly regret my actions that day. I have nothing but remorse,' he said, as he asked the judge for mercy. A video from January 6 that was used in court showed Fairlamb, dressed in a camouflaged jacket, navy blue scarf and black beanie, yelling at an officer. When another cop approached Fairlamb from behind to seemingly get him to calm down, the former fighter shoved the man. Videos from January 6 showed Fairlamb punching an officer's helmet and climbing a scaffolding while holding a baton and shouting: 'What patriots do? We f***ing disarm them and then we storm the f***ing Capitol!' The gym owner and former fighter was also recorded pointing in the cop's face. At Wednesday's trial he reportedly teared up and called his behavior 'irresponsible' and 'reckless' Then, when the officer swatted Fairlamb's pointing finger out of his face Fairlamb hit him back even harder. Fairlamb pleaded guilty to two counts - one for obstruction of an official proceeding and one for assaulting the police officer. The counts carry a maximum of more than 20 years in prison but sentencing guidelines calculated by the court's probation department recommend a term of imprisonment ranging from 41 to 51 months, as reported by NBC. Lamberth was not bound by any of the recommendations but prosecutors called for a 44-month sentence. The New Jersey Herald revealed that Fairlamb was caught after four people tipped the FBI to videos of the Capitol riot where Fairlamb was recorded punching an officer's helmet and climbing a scaffolding holding a baton. 'What patriots do? We f***ing disarm them and then we storm the f***ing Capitol!' he was heard shouting in the clips. The people reportedly identified Fairlamb by a tattoo on the back of his hand and he was arrested shortly after - on January 22 at his home in Stockholm, New Jersey. He has been awaiting trial at the Hudson County Correctional Facility ever since. Based off his social media accounts, Fairlamb supported QAnon conspiracy theories and promoted claims that Trump would become the first president of 'the new Republic' on March 4, prosecutors wrote. Fairlamb, a former MMA fighter, owned a gym called Fairlamb Fit just 14 miles from his east coast home. However, the gym is listed as temporarily closed and has taken down all of its social media pages. Flybe has announced that its planes will start taking off from British airports again early next year. Having struggled for years, the airline was pushed into administration in 2020 with 2,400 job losses as the coronavirus pandemic destroyed large parts of the travel market. Thyme Opco however bought the carrier's remaining assets and has planned a relaunch for 2022, although on a smaller scale than before. It was also revealed that the renewed Flybe will be based in Birmingham. It said it will serve 'key regions across the UK and European Union', although specific routes have not been confirmed. Flybe, once Europe's largest regional carrier, will relaunch in 2022 with a new crew base and headquarters in Birmingham after it was purchased by Thyme Opco after collapsing into administration in 2020 It was based in Exeter but had a major presence at several other UK airports such as Aberdeen, Belfast City, Manchester and Southampton, and flew the most UK domestic routes between airports outside London. Its business and assets were purchased in April 2021 by Thyme Opco, which is linked to US hedge fund Cyrus Capital. Thyme Opco has been renamed Flybe Limited. Flybe said the opening of its headquarters in Birmingham is expected to create approximately 200 new jobs in the Birmingham and West Midlands region over the next three years. A further 400 are set to be created across the rest of the country. The airline's chief executive Dave Pflieger said: 'We are thrilled to be partnering with Birmingham Airport (BHX), the City of Birmingham, and the Mayor of West Midlands to make BHX the location of our new headquarters and first crew base. It was also revealed that the renewed Flybe's headquarters and crew base will be based in Birmingham and will serve 'key regions across the UK and European Union'. Pictured: Birmingham Airport 'It was an ideal choice for us due to its great people and highly skilled workforce, its central UK location, and the fact that Birmingham Airport is a global travel hub where local and connecting customers have access to over 150 worldwide destinations.' Once Europe's largest regional airline, Flybe collapsed on March 5, 2020 after months on the brink, leaving around 15,000 passengers stranded across the UK and Europe. 'Unfortunately, with the situation that has developed with (coronavirus), an already weak company, I'm afraid, just hasn't been able to survive,' Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said at the time. Emotions ran high at the time when staff learned of the collapse of the airline which flew over nine million passengers a year. One devastated member of Flybe air crew broke down on live TV as she described learning that her job was gone and 2,000-plus colleagues must also find 'something new to pay the bills'. Devastated: Former Flybe air crew member Katherine Densham, (above) broke down on-screen as she described learning that her job was gone and 2,000-plus colleagues must also find 'something new to pay the bills' Staff posted photographs and messages on social media within hours of the announcement Katherine Densham, who worked for the collapsed airline for 13 years, was visibly upset as she arrived at Exeter airport in March to say goodbye to her 'Flybe family', who were clearing their desks. She cried about the 'sad' collapse of the airline and said: 'I'm not sure what I'm going to do now. I've worked for them since leaving college'. Staff posted photographs and messages on social media within hours of the announcement the budget carrier had plunged into administration - writing how they would 'cherish all the memories' of their 'Flybe family' and 'hope we are all back in the skies where we belong.' Another anonymous staff member, who has flown with Flybe for 16 years, admitted: 'The people made Flybe. On the frontline, we were lions - lions led by donkeys.' The man, who asked to remain anonymous, said he was 'still in denial' about the news. He added: 'I still think this is a dream. I was praying for a miracle. I've not slept all night and am worrying what I'm going to do next. I'm 35 and flown in total 16 years - this is basically all I've known'. Mr Pflieger added that he would provide more details in the coming weeks and months about ticket prices, new routes and destinations. Flybe crew flooded social media with images as they shared their memories of working at the airline Andy Street, Mayor of West Midlands, said: 'It really is such brilliant news that Flybe is coming back as a commercial airline, and even better that it has chosen Birmingham to house its new headquarters. 'Not only does this mean better domestic and international connectivity for our region as well as local jobs and opportunities being created here, but it's yet another show of faith in the West Midlands with businesses choosing to commit to our region as we recover from the pandemic. 'Flybe's choice highlights the strength of the aerospace sector in the West Midlands and the talent pool available, and I wish Dave and his team all the very best ahead of their official launch early next year.' Since Flybe's collapse, several airlines including Loganair and British Airways have taken over their most viable routes, raising the possibility of a battle to regain customers. Warning of the potential impacts, UK airline schedule analyst Sean Moulton told the Independent: 'All the profitable routes have been taken. All theyll do is face competition and face a fight against airlines who have operated over the last two years. 'It wont work for them, and could cause more harm than good in terms of regional connectivity if it brings down yield and does not increase passenger numbers.' At a Transport Select Committee meeting, Tim Alderslade, chief executive of Airlines UK, said: 'If they can operate the right routes at the right time of day and they can compete, good luck to them.' Karen Dee, chief executive of the Airport Operators Association, said: 'We will always welcome additional airlines. Its good for competition, its good for routes in those areas. I wish them every success.' Mr Minhas was told that seeking to be reinstated was 'not a practical solution' A Sky employee who was dismissed after telling a colleague if two young girls wearing short skirts were raped it would be 'their own fault', has lost his bid to get his job back. Retail advisor Raja Minhas had sought his job back at a remedy hearing after being dismissed for comments about the teenagers as they walked past his Sky stand in a shopping centre in Blackburn, Lancashire. A colleague reported the 44-year-old to bosses claiming he told her, 'girls in general who wear skirts like that and then get raped, it's their own fault', the hearing was told. The alleged comments sparked a heated row with his fellow employee Mia Klemetti, who said she would 'rethink' what she would wear when she worked with him again. The tribunal heard the employees were working at the shopping centre to drum up business for Sky products in June 2019. Earlier this year a tribunal judge ruled that the dismissal was unfair and Mr Minhas, of Nelson, Lancashire, said he would be seeking his old job back. But in papers recently published he was told this was 'not a practical solution' and should instead receive monetary compensation. Raja Minhas (pictured above), 44, had sought his old job back at a remedy hearing after being dismissed for comments about the teenagers as they walked past his shopping centre stand Mr Minhas had told investigators: 'I saw two girls walking past, both girls were dressed inappropriately. 'You could see the outline of their bodies. I mentioned that if this were Pakistan, people would be looking and it's like an open invitation to be getting raped.' He later said he thought the conversation with Ms Klemetti was simply an exchange between two colleagues and 'regretted' upsetting her. A complaint was then made to his bosses and Mr Minhas said in an interview that his comment was a 'momentary lapse of judgment' which would not be repeated and which he regretted. However, he repeated that if girls 'dress like that sick people might take advantage.' Ms Klemetti said during her interview she believed a woman should be able to wear what she wanted, and that 'no one should be talking about rape on the basis that it is someone's fault because of what they wear.' She accepted their discussion had became 'heated' and confirmed it had upset her. However, she said the claimant was 'not a bad guy' and was entitled to his opinion. Mr Minhas was described as 'contrite, apologetic, and full of remorse' but was dismissed by Sky for gross misconduct and 'violating common decency'. Employment Judge Mr Robinson said: 'It is not practicable to reinstate or have the claimant re-engaged by the respondent, his remedy must be monetary compensation.' He added that any compensation must be 'uplifted' by 25 per cent because of breaches to the ACAS code but reduced by 33 per cent because of the claimant's 'contributory' fault. The tribunal heard the employees were working at the shopping centre to drum up business for Sky products in June 2019 (file photo) Both Sky and Mr Minhas were asked to raise any issues in relation to awarding a week's pay. Speaking after the original verdict, Mr Minhas said: 'At the moment I don't want to say much. But I am pleased with what the tribunal has done in ruling in my favour. 'The main thing was to show that Sky made it out to be exaggerated which was disappointing. It was something that was not nice and I am pleased it has been put right.' He said he had been hopeful over getting his old job back, but declined to comment after the latest ruling. Returning his original verdict, Mr Robinson said: 'The claimant made a foolish remark in the context of a discussion with Ms Klemetti about people's dress generally. 'The claimant had strong views about the issue and he expressed them in forceful terms to his work colleague and she vociferously opposed them. The conversation was ten to fifteen minutes long and became heated. 'He came to regret it when he realised that the matter was being taken seriously. Up to that point he thought that he was having an informal chat, which would be taken no further.' The judge said the dismissal was unfair because the two colleagues were talking to each other and not to any member of the public or indeed any other Sky employee. He said Ms Klemetti herself did not complain and, when giving evidence to the tribunal, she did not believe it would go as far as it did. But he added: 'The claimant was guilty of some misconduct because Ms Klemetti did feel that she would not dress in a certain way in front of the claimant. 'This was a heated argument between two people who had two different views of how people should dress in public. 'The incident did not require the claimant to be dismissed and such a sanction in all the circumstances of this case is outside the band of reasonable responses. 'Mr Minhas never condoned rape. He had a view as to how a certain kind of dress might effect the way some men may behave. 'Much was made by the respondent witnesses about the possibility that Sky's brand would be damaged. That was an improbable outcome. 'The discussion between the claimant and Ms Klemetti was a private one.' A teaching assistant who faked compassionate leave was spotted on Facebook relaxing in a hot tub and drinking cocktails on holiday in Rome, a misconduct panel heard. Ella Griffith, 25, told bosses at Ysgol Cybi primary school in Holyhead, Anglesey, that she needed to take two and a half days off in September last year to deal with 'a serious matter at home'. It came just days after the start of the new term following a long period of disruption due to Covid-19. But Miss Griffith was apparently caught out when her boyfriend posted pictures of them online at the Colosseum, Vatican City and the Forum during a romantic break in Italy. Colleagues reported the images to the school's headteacher, who said she spent days attempting to get a clear answer from Miss Griffith about what was going on. The ex-teaching assistant now faces five counts of unacceptable professional conduct relating to her unauthorised break and faces being struck off as a registered teacher. Miss Griffiths and her boyfriend were later spotted on Facebook posing outside the Trevi Fountain in Rome, which famously featured in the films 'La Dolce Vita' and 'Roman Holiday' The couple were pictured together in the centre of the Piazza del Popolo, posing in front of the Flaminian Obelisk Other pictures included the couple drinking in an ice bar, riding on e-scooters through the city and various sightseeing snaps When Miss Griffith (pictured on holiday) was confronted about her absence upon returning, she initially lied saying she had flown to Italy over the weekend The Education Workforce Council heard Miss Griffith was employed as a learning support assistant working 30 hours a week at the school. Headteacher Rhian Grieve said Miss Griffith had requested some time off just days after schools returned in September last year following lengthy closures due to the coronavirus pandemic. Ms Grieve said: 'She spoke with me on September 17, 2020, and asked to leave early the following day and return on September 23. 'The situation appeared critical in that Ella Griffith's family needed her and she requested compassionate leave.' Miss Griffiths had not participated in the hearing into her alleged misconduct The headteacher said she was alerted by other staff members that Miss Griffith's boyfriend had posted pictures of them posing together in front of the Trevi Fountain in Rome, famously featured in the 1960 film 'La Dolce Vita'. Other pictures included the couple drinking in an ice bar, riding on e-scooters through the city and various sightseeing snaps. She said that when Miss Griffith was confronted about her absence upon returning, she initially lied saying she had flown to Italy over the weekend. Ms Grieve said Miss Griffith was asked to provide her airline tickets as proof but then later 'confessed she'd lied at the length of time away.' The panel heard she then failed to turn up to the school for the following two days - texting bosses to say she wouldn't be in but not phoning. Miss Griffith was not at the hearing and has since left the school. She is accused of five misconduct allegations relating to her time away and the subsequent days after. Ella Griffith (pictured on holiday) asked bosses at Ysgol Cybi primary school in Holyhead, Anglesey, to take the two and a half days off to deal with 'a serious matter at home' The ex-teaching assistant (pictured on holiday) now faces five counts of unacceptable professional conduct relating to her unauthorised break and faces being struck off as a registered teacher She has not entered any pleas to the allegations and is not present. If found guilty of unacceptable professional conduct she faces being struck from the teaching register. The hearing, held via Zoom, continues. Jeff Bezos, the world's second richest man, donated $500,000 at a charity gala at the weekend - the joint-largest pledge of the evening. The world's second richest man, 57, and his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez, 51, were attending an A-lister studded fundraising dinner at the Pacific Design Center in Hollywood on Saturday night. It was hosted by the Los Angeles-based Baby2Baby charity which provides diapers, clothing and basic necessities to children living in poverty. The charity features a host of celebrity ambassadors, including Jennifer Garner, Gwyneth Paltrow, Amy Adams and Jessica Alba, among others. It was initially thought that a larger donation of $1million had been submitted at the event and Page Six claimed that Bezos' donation had been met with groans, but Baby2Baby have denied there were groans and clarified that there was no $1million pledge. The charity added that Bezos' $500,000 donation, in addition to his pre-event giving, made him the single largest donor of the event. The Amazon owner first became a billionaire in 1998, the year after Amazon went public as an online bookseller and has since increased his fortune by 12,425 per cent - now raking in more than $140,000 per minute. According to Bloombergs Billionaire Index, the increase in Mr Bezos' net worth - thought to have gone up by $75bn in 2020 - it can be calculated that he earns around $6.25bn per month, $1.44bn per week, $205m per day, $8.56m per hour, and $142,667 per minute. The world's second richest man, 57, and his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez, 51, were attending an A-lister studded fundraising dinner in Hollywood on Saturday night Jennifer Garner, Jeff Bezos, and Lauren Sanchez attend the Baby2Baby 10-Year Gala presented by Paul Mitchell on November 13, 2021 in West Hollywood, California Nearly 90 per cent of his wealth is tied up in his 10 per cent stake in Amazon - with each share currently worth $3,540.70 - with the rest of his money invested into other avenues such as Blue Origin and property. However, he has previously faced criticism for lagging behind fellow billionaires, such as Bill and Melinda Gates, and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, in his charitable donations. Despite the promise of massive donations, Bezos has given around $1.5 billion in actual funds, less than one per cent of his $203.9 billion wealth. In comparison, the Gates' have donated more than a third of their wealth, while Bloomberg has shelled out more than 10 percent. Bezos has invested his fortune into a number of different avenues, including his company Blue Origin - which earlier this year took him on a voyage to space (Bezos is picture floating inside Blue Origin's New Shepard spacecraft on July 20) Pictured: Jeff Bezos celebrates with his brother on July 20, 2021, after successfully returning home following a Blue Origin trip to space However, Bezos has asked the public how he should donate his money and said that he wants to be careful to make a donation where it can be 'at the intersection of urgent need and lasting impact.' In January, he topped the rankings made by the Chronicle of Philanthropy with a $10 billion pledge for the Bezos Earth Fund. This was a pledge and has not yet been delivered. Bezos is the second richest man in the world after Tesla owner Elon Musk who recently knocked him off the top spot with a fortune of $276.2 billion compared to Bezos's $203.9 billion, according to Forbes. Also at the gala was Kobe Bryant's widow Vanessa, who was honored with the Giving Tree Award for her longtime support of the charity. She paid tribute to the late LA Laker's player in her speech, who had also been a donor to Baby 2 Baby. Also at the gala was Kobe Bryant's widow Vanessa, who was honored with the Giving Tree Award for her longtime support of the charity 'I want to thank my husband Kobe and my daughters Natalia, Gianna, Bianka and Capri,' Bryant said. 'Without your love and support, I wouldn't have this strength to be here this evening. I love you.' Gianna was killed alongside her father in a helicopter crash in Janurary 2020 that killed seven others. Other guests at the Baby 2 Baby event included Kate Hudson, Jessica Alba, Kerry Washington, Jennifer Garner, Ciara, Nicole Richie and Mindy Kaling. Bezos and Sanchez were pictured hanging out with Garner at the glittering event. MPs have been warned that cross-party special interest groups could be the source of a new lobbying scandal without serious reform. Standards Committee chairman Chris Bryant spoke out as a new investigation found that firms have poured 30million into all-party parliamentary groups (APPGs) in the past five years. APPGs are informal arrangements with no official status within Parliament, yet there are hundreds registered covering everything from various different countries to Smoking and Health and Yoga in Society. Many do important work on serious issues, but questions have been raised over the function of others. Research by the charity Transparency International suggests 36 APPGs about countries are run by eternal bodies, with two funded by a foreign state, 23 by campaign groups and six by private businesses. Following the investigation by the BBC into private sector money, Mr Bryant said many 'now seem to have become the parliamentary arm of lobbying and PR companies'. Attacking their 'transparency and propriety' he told the broadcaster: 'These groups cannot be a back door for peddling influence or gaining access to MPs. The Parliamentary logo is not for sale.' Standards Committee chairman Chris Bryant spoke out as a new investigation found that firms have poured 30million into all-party parliamentary groups (APPGs) in the past five years. Now Speaker Lindsay Hoyle is reported to have teamed up with Commons Leader Jacob Rees-Mogg and Standards Committee chairman Chris Bryant to make them more transparent. APPGs produce reports and fund visits - often abroad - for MPs and peers involved with their work. The BBC investigation found that of that 30million total, an estimated 6.4 million was donated by companies registered as lobbyists. Tory MP Michael Fabricant said he welcomed the inquiry into the groups as 'some are thought to receive large sums of money from foreign governments and companies'. Speaker Lindsay Hoyle was reported by the Telegraph at the weekend to have teamed up with Commons Leader Jacob Rees-Mogg and Mr Bryant to make them more transparent. The Commons Committee on Standards launched an investigation into the groups in late 2020. Mr Bryant, who chairs two APPGs himself, is not calling for a ban, but wants greater transparency into their funding. The administrative functions of many groups are outsourced to special interest groups and some private firms. Earlier this year Parliament's two speakers had to intervene to ban China's ambassador to the UK from visiting Westminster after an invitation from the APPG on China. Zheng Zeguang was told by Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle and his counterpart in the upper chamber, Lord McFall, that he could not enter the estate for a talk scheduled for September. He was due to meet the APPG, which is led by Tory MP Richard Graham. But Sir Lindsay argued it would not be 'appropriate' for the ambassador to meet at the Commons while seven parliamentarians remain sanctioned by Beijing for criticising the Communist regime. Former Conservative leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith and other sanctioned politicians welcomed the 'strong principled stand' taken by the speakers. But Mr Graham expressed his 'regret' that he would have to postpone the talk. Advertisement Boris Johnson was today brutally rebuked by the Speaker as he tried to turn the tables on Keir Starmer during a fiery PMQs sessions. The premier repeatedly tried to grill the Labour leader over his past legal work as the pair clashed over sleaze at the weekly session. But Lindsay Hoyle demanded he stop, insisting it is questions to the Prime Minister rather than to the Opposition leader. 'You might be the PM of this country but in this House I'm in charge,' Sir Lindsay said. Sir Lindsay also warned that the bad-tempered discussion was doing nothing to restore the image of the House after the Owen Paterson debacle earlier this month. Mr Johnson is desperately trying to get back on the front foot by pledging to ban politicians from working as consultants on the side - something that could cost dozens of his own backbenchers significant sums. In a major shift, Mr Johnson also suggested MPs should have limits placed on the time they spend on second jobs. The dramatic intervention was intended to outflank Labour amid growing alarm that its attacks on the government over sleaze were hitting home. But it immediately threatened to descend into a shambles, with Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggesting that 20 hours on a sideline 'is fine'. There looked to be fewer Conservative MPs cheering Mr Johnson on in the chamber this afternoon than in recent weeks. And the weekly exchanges turned nasty after Mr Johnson attempted to question Sir Keir about links with Mishcon de Reya. Sir Lindsay told Mr Johnson: 'I don't want to fall out about it, I've made it very clear it is Prime Minister's Questions, it's not for the Opposition to answer your questions. 'Whether we like it or not those are the rules of the game that we're all into and we play by the rules, don't we? And we respect this House, so let's respect the House.' After Mr Johnson attempted to ask again about the issue in a later exchange, the Speaker said: 'Prime Minister, sit down. I'm not going to be challenged, you may be the Prime Minister of this country but in this House I'm in charge.' Mr Johnson later accused Sir Keir of 'Mish-conduct', which prompted calls from the Labour benches for the comment to be withdrawn. The Speaker said: 'I don't think this has done this House any good today. I'll be quite honest, I think it's been ill-tempered, I think it shows the public that this House has not learnt from the other week, I need this House to gain respect but it starts by individuals showing respect for each other.' Despite the rollocking for Mr Johnson, at the end of the session Sir Keir was pulled up for calling the PM a 'coward'. When Mr Johnson again dodged saying sorry for his handling of the Paterson case, Sir Keir said: 'That's not an apology. Everybody else has apologised for him, but he won't apologise for himself. A coward not a leader.' Responding to a point of order, Sir Lindsay said the jibe was 'not the kind of language' for the Commons. Rising to his feet again, Sir Keir said: 'I withdraw it. But he is no leader.' Boris Johnson (left) repeatedly tried to grill Labour leader Keir Starmer (right) over his past legal work as the pair clashed over sleaze at the weekly session Speaker Lindsay Hoyle demanded he stop, insisting it is questions to the Prime Minister rather than to the Opposition leader. 'You might be the PM of the country but in this House I'm in charge,' Sir Lindsay said. The government's blueprint immediately threatened to descend into a shambles, with Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggesting that 20 hours on a sideline 'is fine' How do the sleaze reform plans being pushed by the PM and Labour compare? LABOUR Labour's proposal calls for a ban on 'any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant'. Crucially, it also includes provisions requiring the Commons Standards Committee to come forward with proposals to implement the ban and guaranteeing time on the floor of the House for MPs to debate and vote on them. Although it does not feature in the motion, Keir Starmer has also said he wants to ban almost all second jobs - with only limited exceptions such as doctors and nurses. TORIES The government is trying to amend the Labour motion to push its own overhaul of the standards system. The amendment is more vaguely, describing the consultancy ban as 'the basis of a viable approach' and supporting the work of the Standards Committee to update the MPs' code of conduct. Boris Johnson has called for a ban on political consultancy work, and says he is going further than Labour with restrictions on outside work that distracts from Commons duties. However, it is unclear how broad the ban would be, and what would count as excessive outside work. Advertisement Backlash at Boris's 'back of fag packet' plan for MPs' second jobs Boris Johnson is facing another brutal day trying to quell the sleaze crisis today with Tories furious about his 'back of a fag packet' crackdown on their outside earnings. The PM has desperately tried to draw a line under the chaos by pledging to ban politicians from working as consultants on the side - something that could cost dozens of his own backbenchers significant sums. In a major shift, Mr Johnson also suggested MPs should have limits placed on the time they spend on second jobs. The dramatic intervention was intended to outflank Labour amid growing alarm that its attacks on the government over sleaze were hitting home. But it immediately threatened to descend into a shambles, with Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggesting that 20 hours on a sideline 'is fine'. 'Let's say two shifts, that would be 16 hours a week. Are we saying 10 to 20 hours a week outside your work as an MP and a parliamentarian? If that's what you chose to do as your choice, that's fine.' Ms Trevelyan also indicated that former attorney general Geoffrey Cox would not have to curb his 1million a year legal practice under the mooted changes - despite No10 claiming he would. 'Key is, is he doing a good job for his constituents? Do they think he's doing a good job for them? And, from what I've heard, no-one has stood up and said otherwise,' she said. 'But that he continues to practise what is his professional skill while he is a backbench MP, for me, is perfectly acceptable because in the same way that Maria Caulfield serves in the NHS as a nurse continues to practise her profession alongside serving her constituents is, I think, important for the NHS.' The proposals have teed up a major showdown with some Tory MPs over whether and how the rules at Parliament should be overhauled. There is muttering that many will decline to turn up for crunch votes on the changes due this evening. One backbencher told MailOnline that Downing Street had 'dreamed up' another disastrous idea that looked clever at first glance but would not stand up to any scrutiny. 'I think it's been put together on the back of a fag packet... It's the same mistake we made over Owen Paterson,' they said. Advertisement Ms Trevelyan said: 'Let's say two shifts, that would be 16 hours a week. Are we saying 10 to 20 hours a week outside your work as an MP and a parliamentarian? If that's what you chose to do as your choice, that's fine.' Ms Trevelyan also indicated that former attorney general Geoffrey Cox would not have to curb his 1million a year legal practice under the mooted changes - despite No10 claiming he would. 'Key is, is he doing a good job for his constituents? Do they think he's doing a good job for them? And, from what I've heard, no-one has stood up and said otherwise,' she said. 'But that he continues to practise what is his professional skill while he is a backbench MP, for me, is perfectly acceptable because in the same way that Maria Caulfield serves in the NHS as a nurse continues to practise her profession alongside serving her constituents is, I think, important for the NHS.' The proposals have teed up a major showdown with some Tory MPs over whether and how the rules at Parliament should be overhauled. There is muttering that many will decline to turn up for crunch votes on the changes due this evening. One backbencher told MailOnline that Downing Street had 'dreamed up' another disastrous idea that looked clever at first glance but would not stand up to any scrutiny. 'I think it's been put together on the back of a fag packet... It's the same mistake we made over Owen Paterson,' they said. The Tory WhatsApp groups have also been kicking off about the ideas coming out of the government. Backbencher Kevin Hollinrake wrote: 'Is anyone else concerned that allowing the commissioner to determine which of us 'are prioritising outside interests over their constituents' and are then 'investigated and appropriately punished' makes us subordinate to an unelected official?' Colleague Simon Hoare replied: Yes.' Mr Johnson will be grilled by the Liaison Committee later before crunch votes on how to reform Commons rules. He will also face the backbench 1922 Committee in a bid to repair relations with his MPs. Some polls have shown the Opposition taking the lead amid the outcry over Owen Paterson's lobbying and Geoffrey Cox's lucrative legal sideline. The government wants new rules to introduced in January, assuming an agreement can be reached with Labour. But the Opposition has accused the government of 'dirty tricks' and trying to water down its rival blueprint. Ms Trevelyan appeared to get into a muddle during her interviews, initially saying up to 10 hours on a second job was acceptable, before increasing the figure to 15 hours, and then 20 hours. 'You do a 40 to 50-hour week, say, as a backbench MP and you do eight to 10 hours work on something else,' she told Times Radio. 'For me that would be a perfectly reasonable balance.' On BBC Breakfast the Cabinet minister said: 'I think there is a common sense test which is if you probably do 40-50 hours a week doing your main job, doing 10 or 15 hours a week doing something else, whatever you choose to do in your spare time, whether that's paid or not paid, is something that is part of the richness of what you bring as an individual to your role as an MP.' But later in her round of interviews, Ms Trevelyan told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that longer would be reasonable. Labour's proposal calls for a ban on 'any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant'. Crucially, it also includes provisions requiring the Commons Standards Committee to come forward with proposals to implement the ban and guaranteeing time on the floor of the House for MPs to debate and vote on them. In contrast, the more vaguely worded Government amendment simply describes the consultancy ban as 'the basis of a viable approach' and supports the work of the Standards Committee to update the MPs' code of conduct. Shadow Commons leader Thangam Debbonaire said it was 'typical Tory dirty tricks' and an attempt to water down the proposals. The PM's proposals prompted an immediate backlash from Mr Johnson's own MPs, who now face losing out on thousands and in some cases millions of pounds. Before Ms Trevelyan's intervention a Whitehall source claimed the plans were likely to restrict the activities of Sir Geoffrey, who has earned more than 5.5million from his other jobs including a stint in the British Virgin Islands during lockdown. Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, treasurer of the powerful Conservative backbench 1922 Committee, warned of 'dissatisfaction' among MPs. 'Various discussions will be taking place between backbenchers today and the Prime Minister, and I've no doubt I will have an opportunity to make my views known,' he said. He added: 'I think I will have more than adequate opportunity to make my views known today.' He said Mr Johnson 'wants to get ahead of the curve' on the debate and is 'doing the right thing'. He said: 'We need to get the rules absolutely clear on what MPs can do, what they can't do, so that our constituents have an expectation of what the person representing them is going to do.' Mr Johnson declared that his proposals would ensure MPs who are 'neglecting their duties to their constituents and prioritising outside interests would be investigated, and appropriately punished by the existing disciplinary authorities'. He said it was now 'imperative that we put beyond doubt the reputation of the House of Commons by ensuring the rules which apply to MPs are up to date, effective and appropriately rigorous.' He said he would seek a 'cross-party consensus' on the issue prompting fears from some Tory MPs that Labour will ensure new rules are exceedingly tough. As the PM battled to regain the public's confidence: MPs on Parliament's liaison committee prepared to grill Mr Johnson over the sleaze row today; It emerged that MPs could also be banned from taking freebies from lobbyists and could have to declare new jobs they take after leaving Parliament; Sir Keir claimed the PM had been 'dragged kicking and screaming' to support reform by Labour's own bid to tighten the rules. The Government will try to amend Labour's anti-sleaze motion with a vote in the Commons this afternoon to reflect the PM's new plan. Mr Johnson's announcement came less than a fortnight after he tried to save Mr Paterson, who was found to have broken lobbying rules. As recently as a week ago, the PM said MPs' second jobs can 'strengthen' Parliament. But yesterday saw his predecessor Theresa May deliver a withering assessment on the Paterson debacle, saying the Government's attempt to spare the former minister had been 'misplaced, ill-judged and just plain wrong'. She added: 'Damage has been done to all MPs and to Parliament as a whole.' The new proposals could directly affect around 30 MPs who currently hold lucrative jobs advising firms. The PM has written to Speaker Lindsay Hoyle proposing a dramatic overhaul of the rules to crack down on abuses of the system - that could hit the interests of a number of Tory MPs They include former Tory chief whip Andrew Mitchell, who is paid more than 182,000 a year to advise six companies, and former transport secretary Chris Grayling, who is paid 100,000 a year as a 'strategic adviser' to a ports operator. The plan to place 'reasonable limits' on time spent on outside interests follows outcry over Sir Geoffrey, who has devoted 10,700 hours to his legal career since 2009. Yet some Tory MPs warned the PM risked going too far. 'The Prime Minister is pouring fuel on the fire just as it was starting to go out,' one senior figure said. 'What does 'reasonable limits' mean? Can you still be a minister and a constituency MP? 'Labour will have a field day with this they will end up having us clocking in and clocking out to no useful end, while the media will crawl all over everything we do.' Mr Rees-Mogg attempted to take the blame for the public backlash yesterday, telling the Conservative Home website that he had persuaded the PM to try to help Mr Paterson. The Commons Leader said he had done so out of sympathy for the former environment secretary, whose wife Rose committed suicide last year. The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, Kathryn Stone, found Mr Paterson guilty of 'egregious' breaches of lobbying rules on behalf of two firms which had paid him more than 500,000. But Mr Rees-Mogg said he felt Mr Paterson had been 'punished enough' by his tragic loss. 'It was not seen by the electorate as being merciful, it was seen as being self-serving,' he said of the attempt to block Mr Paterson's suspension. 'I must take my share of responsibility for this. I thought it was the right thing to do, I encouraged the Prime Minister to go down this route, and I was wrong.' The PM said at the weekend: 'Of course, I think things could certainly have been handled better... by me.' Advertisement One of the world's most highly acclaimed photojournalists Tom Stoddart has died at the age of 68 after a long battle with cancer, his family has announced. Stoddart spent over four decades as one of Fleet Street's finest photographers, capturing haunting scenes of war and famine around the world, as well as taking iconic images of Royal weddings and Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and David Cameron. His photographs of human catastrophes in Beirut and Sarajevo helped shape the government's response and cast a lasting public impression over the two controversial and highly politicised conflicts. In 2019, the celebrated photojournalist told the Evening Standard: 'I have seen many awful things, but I have also seen a lot of fantastic and beautiful things. 'Humans do terrible things to each other, but there is also courage and humanity. That helps me keep it all in perspective 'I've been very lucky in my career, with a ringside seat to history.' Acclaimed photojournalist Tom Stoddart, 68, (pictured here in 2014) has died at the age of 68 - his family has announced Among Stoddart's iconic images was this impromptu shot of Lady Diana Spencer, who was startled after stalling her red Mini Metro outside her Earls Court flat in 1980 just days before her engagement to Prince Charles was announced officially Stoddart moved to Fleet Street in 1978 and soon became one of the most trusted and talented photojournalists in the industry. Pictured: A family holding hands and sliding down a fairground ride in Margate, July 1983 Stoddart took this piercing image as a Palestinian boy fighter poses with his AK-47 in Chatilla refugee camp in Beirut, 1987 Stoddart's black and white images were his signature style. Pictured: Scenes at the VE Day celebrations in Hyde Park, 1995 The 68-year-old was adept at capturing the solemnity of circumstances in single images. Pictured: A soldier at the grave of Victoria Cross recipient Lt-Col H. Jones at the Blue Beach War Cemetery in Port San Carlos, Falkland Islands, October 1982 Stoddart was one of the first on scene of the Lockerbie bombing wreckage in Scotland (pictured) in 1988. The Pan-Am 747 plane was blown up by Libyan terrorists when it was en route to JFK airport in New York, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew Elephant conservationist Daphne Sheldrick plays with an orphaned elephant at her sanctuary near Nairobi, Kenya, in 1989 Tom was one of the first on the ground in Lockerbie, documenting the devastation caused by the bombing in 1988 (pictured) His work in Sarajevo during the Bosnian War in the 1990s was some of his most iconic and celebrated work, recognised for capturing the human impact of the war. Pictured: a woman hurries past graffiti in an area known as 'Sniper Alley' in 1992 Tom's family said he was known for giving a voice to those who did not have one and shone light where there was darkness. Pictured: a mother guiding her children through a line of Slovenian police at the Timovec border crossing with Croatia in 2015 In a statement shared today, his family said: 'It is with great sorrow that we announce the passing of Tom after a brave fight with cancer. 'He felt blessed that he had found true happiness with Ailsa. The family kindly ask that their privacy be respected at this time. 'Tom touched the lives of so many as a brilliant, compassionate, courageous photographer whose legacy of work will continue to open the eyes for generation. 'He gave voice to those who did not have one and shone a light where there had been darkness.' Stoddart has been on the front line of momentous and historic occasions throughout history, picturing the demolition of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the aids crisis in sub-Saharan Africa and the Bosnian War. As fate would have it, he was on a Staten Island Ferry during the World Trade Center terror attacks in 2001. He was in Beirut in 1982 when Israeli forces bombed Yasser Arafats besieged PLO base and was seriously injured while covering the siege of Sarajevo in 1992 when he was hit by Serbian artillery. Fire crews and policemen work to free the dead and rescue the injured from derailed carriages after a rail crash near Clapham Junction in London, which saw 35 people killed and over 100 people injured, pictured by Tom Stoddart in December 1988 This iconic image was captured after the IRA detonated a bomb in Canary Wharf, devastating buildings in the vicinity in 1996 Tom Stoddart wasn't just known for his exceptional coverage of global issues but also took iconic images from the biggest news stories in the UK. Pictured: Prisoners on the rooftop of Strangeways Prison, in Manchester, during a riot in April 1990 Pictured: Stoddart was on the scene during the infamous riots in the heart of Moss Side, Manchester, in June 1981 In 1997, Tom Stoddart was granted access to Labour leader Tony Blair's historic general election campaign (pictured) Born in Morpeth, Northumberland, in 1953, Stoddart began his career with the Berwick Advertiser and moved to Fleet Street in 1978. He grew to become one of the most accomplished photographers on the national news circuit and was one of the first to picture Lady Diana Spencer in 1980 as rumours abounded of her upcoming engagement to Prince Charles. He went on to picture Margaret Thatcher during the early years of her premiership, alongside The Queen and her friend and close ally US President Ronald Reagan. Stoddart was also among the first at the scene of the Lockerbie disaster in 1988 and he later captured the plight of family members desperately seeking information about their loved ones. His career reached new heights the following year as he photographed the fall of the Berlin Wall, locking many images in time as east Germans celebrated their newfound freedom. Describing the event 20 years later in 2014, he told MailOnline: 'It was a hunch, a gut feeling, that enabled me to witness history in the making that night on November 9, 1989, and in the hours that followed. 'If I'd listened to others, I wouldn't have been there, among the first photographers to see the opening of Checkpoint Charlie and the stream of humanity discovering freedom. In effect, to record the symbolic end of the Cold War. 'A few days before, I'd been in East Berlin covering the growing demonstrations against the East German regime for Time magazine. I went back to London and sent my films to its office in New York. 'That might have been that - except my instincts told me that something spectacular was about to happen in Berlin. I'm a freelance and couldn't convince any of my usual clients.' Stoddart funded his own trip back to Germany and was in a taxi when he heard the wall was going to come down. He headed straight to the wall and captured some of the most iconic images of Germans celebrating the historic moment. A rubber boat packed with jubilant refugees and migrants heads towards the shoreline of Lesbos, Greece, in October 2015 after successfully crossing the Aegean Sea from Turkey Photojournalist Stoddart was often on the frontline of historic moments like when he snapped this image of then-Presidential candidate Nelson Mandela mingling with the crowds in Durban during the South African elections in April 1994 (pictured) Melita Olmingani, 20, a young Maasai warrior with his herd of goats, in Ngorongoro, Tanzania, snapped by Stoddart in 2004 Pictured: Kurdish refugee children at a camp in the mountains near Isikveren, in south-eastern Turkey, snapped in April 1991 Stoddard was known for his ability to capture the range of human emotion in his photos as with this young boy who was overjoyed with his haul of fish caught to sell in the market from the River Ganges at the holy city of Varanassi in India in 1990 Stoddart was in Sudan in 2012 when fighting was taking place between the Sudanese People's Liberation Army and government troops. Pictured: SPLA soldiers lie wounded in a Bentiu men's hospital ward in Unity State, South Sudan Stoddart's images of the the famine in Sudan resulted in a spike in charity donations after they were published. He went back in 2012 and documented people who fled fighting between Government troops and the Sudanese People's Liberation Army Pictured: A man gives thanks to Allah after landing on the Greek Island of Lesbos in a crowded rubber dinghy in 2015 Stoddart was often credited with using his images to shine a light on the suffering of others in countries across the world. This image shows a boy snapped on the Greek island of Lesbos after crossing with his family to see a better life in Western Europe In line with his penchant for shining a light on injustices, Stoddart photographed Adi Roche (pictured), an Irish woman who set up the Chernobyl Children's Project International to help those children affected by the Chernobyl Nuclear disaster Stoddart's coverage of the Bosnian conflict included some of his most tragic and celebrated works. His image of 'Sarajevo woman' Meliha Varesanovic in 1994 walking defiantly in front of gun-toting Serbian soldiers while wearing pearls, high heels and clutching her handbag was among his most iconic photographs and a favourite of actress and United Nations envoy Angelina Jolie. The image was featured as part of an open air exhibition set up to run during the London Olympic Games in 2012, an event which attracted more than a quarter of a million visitors during its run. In total, more than 70 of his most iconic images were included in the display created with the participation of the International Committee of the Red Cross ICRC, to highlight their Health Care in Danger campaign. Stoddart said: The worlds nations are joined together in a wonderful sporting festival whose motto is "swifter, higher, stronger". 'I hope that people visiting the exhibition will leave with a greater determination to understand and help those with little access to clean water, food and medicines who, through no fault of their own, cannot run more swiftly, jump higher or be stronger. The display also featured stunning but disturbing photographs taken by Stoddart of young Chinese gymnasts in training in four major cities. Stoddart was often invited to the forefront of UK politics and regularly snapped then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (1985) After moving to Fleet Street in 1978, Stoddart quickly garnered a reputation as one of the UK's most dedicated and talented photojournalists. Pictured: British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on a plane during the 1985 election campaign Always on the front line: Often at the heart of contemporary issues, Stoddart captured this image of police officers surrounding the British Steel Coking Plant in Orgreave, South Yorkshire, during the UK miners strike back in May 1984 British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher alongside her friend and ally US President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy in 1989 Glenys Kinnock (centre), wife of then-Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock, demonstrates against the deployment of nuclear cruise missiles at RAF Greenham Common near Newbury, Berkshire, which was photographed by Stoddart in December 1983 Stoddart was behind this candid snap of actress Joanna Lumley with Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama in India back in 2004 Royal visit: Tom Stoddart was responsible for this snap of Queen Elizabeth II during a visit to Nepal in February 1986 Iconic: Stoddart was behind this image of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge sharing a kiss on the balcony at their wedding Two British soldiers of the 7th Armoured Brigade, patrolling in football shirts after their arrival in Saudi Arabia, during the Gulf War, 1990 The award-winning photographs captured the gruelling training regimes the promising young gymnasts were subjected to, taken away from their homes their parents can see their children as little as once a year and put into strict training camps, sharing accommodation and working on repetition exercises for hours each day. The haunting photographs taken in the 1990s capture perfectly the lengths the training programmes go to in order to create Olympic champions and the apparent pain the youngsters endure. Another notable project was his coverage of the famine in Sudan in 1998 where his image of a man stealing maize from a starving child became a symbol for the strife that was unfolding in the country at the time. The images were run in the UK, offering an unflinching glimpse at the extent of the famine and resulted in a spike in donations to charity. Excited gamblers cheer on their favourite horses at the finishing post during the 2009 Royal Ascot race meeting Another of Stoppard's pictures shows children wearing yellow sunglasses playing outside their apartment block homes on a Glasgow estate in March 1990 An elderly man was caught on camera by Stoppard while struggling to walk home from the market in the southern city of Basra in Iraq in March 1994 Stoddart took this early picture of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Queen Elizabeth II at a ball to celebrate the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference in Lusaka, Zambia, in October 1979 Stoddart captured this female leopard relaxing in the branches of a dead tree in the Kruger National Park, South Africa, in 2007 An aid worker in Abathok village in South Sudan oversees Red Cross supplies of seeds, agricultural tools and food parcels after some 15,000 people were displaced by fighting in May 2011 Stoddart captured this shot of Italian movie legend Sophia Loren from the backseat of her car in London in 1981, as she launched her fragrance 'Sophia' Metropolitan policewomen photographed during a break in duties near the Libyan Embassy, St James's Square during the 11 day siege after WPC Yvonne Fletcher was fatally shot in 1984 A sunday morning scene taken by Stoddart in 1989 at Mutemwa Leprosy Settlement in Zimbabwe as lepers William Padzuru and Maria Majhu pose for the camera together after their wedding In 2011, Stoddart took this image of US President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel deep in conversation during the G20 Summit in Cannes, France Tributes have been paid to the legendary photographer after news of his death broke earlier today. Fellow photographer David Levenson wrote: 'Deeply shocked and saddened to learn of the death of my dear old friend Tom Stoddart. 'One of the greatest photographers of his generation. A compassionate man who achieved so much, and gave so much help to others too RIP Tom. Missing you already.' Nigel Atherton, editor of Amateur Photographer, wrote: ' Despite the number of truly great images that he created Tom remained modest and down to earth, a man motivated not by the desire for personal glory or self-aggrandisement but by an interest and curiosity about the world and a desire to shine a spotlight on its injustices. Stoddart's work 'gave voice to those who did not have one and shone a light where there had been darkness,' his family said Hard at work: Tom Stoddart photographed in Serbia while on assignment for Annenberg Space for Photography A city gent preacher gets across his message to skeptical Metropolitan police officers on a London street in January 1980 Women at the Jamam refugee camp in South Sudan in March 2012, where 36,500 people fled across the border to escape the ongoing fighting between Khartoum's government troops and the Sudanese People's Liberation Army That morning-after feeling for a group of student revellers in Fellows' Garden, after the Magdalene College May Ball in Cambridge, 2009 The war memorial in the abandoned village of Besed, situated in the lethal purple zone, in Belarus in 2006 Special Forces after burning a cocaine-processing lab in the heart of the Colombian jungle in November 1996 A lone dog walks through a devastated street during the seige of Sarajevo in November 1994 A girl plays with her dogs in a Sarajevo street during the siege of the city in July, 1992 'He was truly humbled when in 2020, Amateur Photographer gave him our Exceptional Achievement in Photography award (having already won our Power of Photography award back in 1999 for his Sudan images) but it was really no less than he deserved. 'Tom will be remembered as one of the all-time greats of photojournalism, and one of the true gentlemen of his profession. It was a privilege to have known him.' Richard Baker, also a fellow photographer, said: 'I am heartbroken to hear that my friend, the photojournalist Tom Stoddart has passed away. 'I simply cannot accept that this most gentle, selfless, compassionate and funny man has left us. His legacy is a lifetime of photographs that have shocked us and changed ideas. RIP dear Tom.' Sales of second hand tractors are continuing to soar as farmers turn their attention to used equipment amid long delays for new machinery, a leading auctioneer has revealed. Cheffins, one of the leading agricultural auctioneer firms in the country, have revealed its sales have doubled over the last six months with one director saying that the company is 'the busiest it has ever been in sales'. The firm has seen a huge spike in demand for second hand tractors and other farming equipment, a trend mirrored across the industry. It has grossed over 40 million in sales this calendar year and is expecting to see the number soar further. Last year, it reported a record 35 million. Oliver Godfrey, head of the Machinery Auction Division at Cheffins, told MailOnline that the pandemic accelerated sales of second hand goods, particularly as consumers face long delays for new machinery. However, he added: 'There's only so much kit. The more we sell each month the harder it is to sell next month. I think this environment could continue for a long time.' 1983 County 1474 'Short nose' - sold by Cheffins in a private collection auction in Essex in July for 210,112 2017 Fendt 939 Vario - tractor was sold by Cheffins in a recent farm dispersal sale in Kent for 116,117 He said: 'We have seen a surge in the sale of second-hand machinery which mirrors the second-hand car market. 'Farmers are looking at second-hand as they face rising costs and delivery times for equipment for new machinery. It's not just tractors but also other machinery like combine harvesters. 'The pandemic accelerated online sales and it's the busiest we've ever been in sales. We've had as many sales in the last six months as we'd have in 12.' Mr Godfrey also pointed to Brexit and staff and component shortages as reasons behind the increase in delays to new farming equipment. This, he explained, helped aid the surge in popularity of second-hand goods. Another factor was the coronavirus lockdown, which led to a rise in people with free time. This time allowed them to indulge in hobbies, which led to a rise in the sales of vintage machinery. In 2020, Cheffins sold more than 4,500 tractors and plant items throughout the year, amounting to 35 million. A second hand 1983 County 1474 tractor with an estimated sale price of 60,000-70,000 was sold by Cheffins for 210,112. A 2017 Fendt 939 Vario tractor was sold for 116,117 and a 2019 Valtra T234 tractor sold for 85,704. Away from tractors, the firm sold a 2016 Horsch Leeb PT330 sprayer for 120,090 and a 2016 Horsch Sprinter 12SW seed drill for 84,662. This 2019 Valtra T234 tractor was sold by Cheffins this year for 85,704.50. It is one of several sold by the auctioneers The 66 plate JCB 4220 Fastrac, 25-year limited edition, which sold for 75,000 by Cheffins Tractors aren't the only popular second hand machinery. This 2016 Horsch Leeb PT330 sprayer sold for 120,090 Meanwhile, Cheffins also sold this 2016 Horsch Sprinter 12SW seed drill for 84,662 Bill Pepper, director at Cheffins, said earlier this year: 'With sales totals increasing regularly, we can really see that both the UK and export market for second-hand machinery is booming. 'The cocktail of rising prices for new tractors, lack of new tractor registrations, a shortage of stock for dealers and a drop in trade-ins has really brought the UK dealers back to our market.' Earlier this month, Stags, another auctioneer firm, revealed it had also seen a surge in the sale of secondhand equipment. Its latest online auction saw a 2011 Deutz Agrotron M625 4wd tractor sell for 29,000 and a 2005 New Holland TS100A 4wd tractor with 3,570 hours sell for 22,500. It comes as a report revealed that cars up to a year old are selling for more than they cost new. The average price of second-hand vehicles has risen 24 per cent in 12 months as record numbers change hands. Data from Auto Trader shows that around 10,000 used vehicles registered in the past year 17 per cent of the total are on sale for more than the showroom price. Some used models are being sold for up to 7,000 more than where customers buy them new. The boom is being driven by problems in rolling out new cars because of critical shortages of semiconductor chips. Advertisement The first images of British actor Laurence Fox portraying Hunter Biden passed out on a woman with white powder on his nose from the upcoming film My Son Hunter have been revealed for the first time. The photos showing Fox as President Biden's son smoking a cigarette and indulging in his new favorite pastime, painting, have been exclusively obtained by DailyMail.com from the set in Serbia before it wraps up production. The scenes are in line with damning photos, emails and text messages from Hunter's laptop that exposed his history of drug use and addiction and the thousands he blew on suspected prostitutes and hookers. They also invoke Hunter's past admission that he 'spent more time on my hands and knees picking through rugs, smoking anything that even remotely resembled crack cocaine' and 'smoked more Parmesan cheese than anyone you know'. Anti-woke campaigner Fox, who comes from a dynasty of British TV and stage stars, celebrated the release of the images and said there is 'much work to be done to put an end to #CancelCulture and the monochromatic boredom of political correctness.' Fox said in 2019 that he has been 'totally radicalized' by watching YouTube videos about 'woke culture' and 'political correctness' and in September 2020 created a new political party called Reclaim. He prides himself on being 'anti-woke.' In March 2021, Fox announced he would run for mayor in London to 'fight against extreme political correctness', but finished in sixth place with just 1.9 per cent of the vote. New pictures from the set of My Son Hunter show British actor Laurence Fox (second left) portraying Hunter Biden passed out on the breast of a woman on set with white powder on his nose Photos exclusively obtained by DailyMail.com showHunter Biden taking images and videos of himself having sex with prostitutes He took video of himself having sex with a Russian prostitute Another image from the set of the movie shows Fox painting an abstract piece in a nod toward the president's son's recent artistic endeavors Fox smokes a cigarette on the set of My Son Hunter he made the above image his new profile picture on Twitter. Several selfie images from Hunter's hard drive show him with cigarettes in his mouth A series of compromising images from Biden's laptop were released just weeks before the 2020 presidential election. One showed him passed out with a crack pipe hanging out of his mouth (left) and in several others he was shirtless smoking a cigarette (right) The actor changed his profile picture on Twitter to the image of him smoking a cigarette while portraying the junior Biden. 'Last few days of @MySonHunter,' Fox tweeted on Wednesday. 'It's been such a joy to act again and work with such wonderfully talented people.' 'I'll be sad to go back to my cancellation,' the actor continued, 'but there is much work to be done to put an end to #CancelCulture and the monochromatic boredom of political correctness.' Fox, 43, also shared a tweet Monday aimed at his costar John James, 65, who is portraying Joe Biden in the movie from conservative Irish filmmakers and married couple Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney. 'I love you dad,' Fox tweeted along with an image of James portraying Biden on set in Serbia. The actor also tagged President Biden's non-government Twitter handle in the post. DailyMail.com shared an exclusive first look of James playing Biden on Monday. The veteran daytime soap opera star is most known for his 1980s role of Jeff Colby in Dynasty, which ran from 1981-1989, and its spin-off series The Colbys, which ran from 1985-1987. The crew flew out to Serbia at the end of October to start four weeks of filming for the biopic aimed at showing the partying lifestyle and dodging business dealings of the president's son, which the filmmakers say is widely ignored by the media. Fox posted a risque image from set in October donning a white loin cloth, orange scarf and sunglasses and nothing else in an outfit indicative of one of the photos found on the president's son's hard drive. 'Everything is fine. I'm in a really good place,' Fox sarcastically posted in the image from the set where he was holding up a peace sign alongside a woman in lingerie. There have been ethics concerns and questions from critics over worries of buyers intending to gain influence over the president by buying his son's art pieces for high prices. The pieces which are featured at exhibits at the Georges Berges Gallery in New York and Los Angeles. Laurence Fox in the spotlight: The British actor with movie pedigree who has taken on the woke mob, vaccines for kids and 'extreme political correctness' Laurence Fox announces in a video clip his role playing Hunter Biden in the upcoming film My Son Hunter Laurence Fox was born into a family of actors, became a household name in the UK with a string of TV and stage appearances, hit the spotlight during his marriage to pop star Billy Piper and has now turned his attention to taking down the woke mob and political correctness. At the height of the pandemic, he encouraged Brits to disobey the British governments social distancing guidelines and public health restrictions and was dropped by his acting agency for saying Meghan Markle was not the victim of racism during an interview in January 2020. Born in 1978, his father James was the son of Robin Fox, a theatrical agent who married daughter of the playwright Frederick Lonsdale. Two of Fox's four siblings, his brother-in-law, his uncle and two of his first cousins are also actors. Another uncle is a theatrical and film producer. Fox attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) where he graduated in 2001. His first break into film was the 2001 horror-thriller The Hole and appeared in Gosford Park the same year. In March 2020, Fox was dropped by his managers at Authentic Talent and in November of the same year was then dropped by talent agency Artists Rights Group after comments he made on the BBC program Question Time TV. Appearing as a panelist in January 2020, Fox said that Meghan Markle was not a victim of racism and called an audience member racist for saying he was a "white privileged male". Fox, 43, has taken a hiatus from acting the past few years to focus on political ambitions, including creating in September 2020 the Reclaim Party in the United Kingdom and running for mayor of London. The actor and father of two said he is coming out of retirement for the time being just to play President Joe Biden's son in the upcoming film My Son Hunter from conservative Irish filmmakers and married couple Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney. In a 2019 interview, Fox said he has been 'totally radicalized' by watching YouTube videos about 'woke culture' and 'political correctness'. He prides himself on being 'anti-woke.' In March 2021, Fox announced he would run for mayor in London in order to 'fight against extreme political correctness', but finished in sixth place with just 1.9 per cent of the vote. Fox has lamented and made frequent jokes about being another actor canceled by the 'woke mob'. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Fox frequently criticized government's response and encouraged people to go against social distancing and other public health rules. In March 2021, he participated in anti-lockdown protests leading to a visit from police for allegedly breaking rules in the midst of campaigning. 'If the NHS can't cope, then the NHS isn't fit for purpose,' Fox said of the response to the pandemic during an interview on Good Morning Britain. In his career, Fox has appeared in several television series and films. Some movies include Island at War; The Last Drop, Deathwatch, Ultimate Force, Colditz, Whatever Love Means, Becoming Jane and Lord Chancellor of England in Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Previous television roles for Fox included on ITV shows Lewis, A Room with a View and Victoria. Advertisement Laurence Fox tweeted from filming in Serbia that it's been 'such a joy to act again', claiming he will continue to work to end cancel culture Fox tweeted an image of costar John James portraying President Joe Biden and said: 'I love you dad' Biden's latest endeavor is art. In October, at least five of his prints from an exhibit at the Georges Berges Gallery in New York sold for $75,000 each The art selling for such a high price points has critics wondering if the buyers could be trying to gain influence over President Joe Biden through purchasing his recovering drug addict son's paintings Conservative filmmakers and married couple Phelim McAleer (left) and Ann McElhinney (right) said when announcing the film earlier this year: 'The truth deserves to be told and it needs to be seen by as many people as possible. An entertaining and enjoyable movie is the best way to [do that]... If the media won't do their jobs, we'll do it for them' The gallery and White House have vowed that all buyers will be kept confidential from Biden and his father as well as everyone at the White House to avoid any perception of influence. At least five of Biden's prints have sold for $75,000 each from his New York City show in October, but critics have claimed the work is not worth that and just at a premium because he is the president's son. James sustained a head injury Saturday while in Serbia filming the biopic, DailyMail.com revealed this week. The actor's injury involved a lot of blood, a trip to the hospital, stitches and a bit of clumsiness as he slammed his head into a door while off-set at a restaurant in Belgrade. 'I was walking into a Belgrade restaurant and I collided with the side of a glass door,' James said of the incident. 'I had a large cut above my eye and there was a lot of blood on the footpath.' He detailed: 'I was pretty stunned and went back to the Metropol Hotel where I'm staying and the manager Nicholas Kalogeras took over and personally rushed me to a hospital.' Despite a packed Serbian emergency room, James said he received 'top class treatment.' 'I received top class treatment and a couple of stitches and will be back on the set on Monday,' he said. 'The show must go on.' Photos of the incident show James with a cloth around his head. Hunter Biden blew tens of thousands of dollars on prostitutes, drugs and luxury cars. He was desperate to avoid jail for $320k in unpaid taxes and threatened to take money from his daughter's college fund Fox shared a photo on Twitter from set in October showing him donning a look the president's son was seen wearing in a photo leaked from his hard drive Actor John James, who is playing Joe Biden in an upcoming movie, sustained an off-set head injury on Saturday while in Serbia for filming James , 65, detailed that he walked into a door while eating at a restaurant on Saturday that resulted in a bloody mess requiring stitches on his forehead but persisted: 'The show must go on' Fox, a British politician and actor, announced in September that he signed on to play the U.S. president's son. The actor-turned-leader for the United Kingdom's conservative Reclaim political party said he is being 'un-canceled' by McAleer and McElhinney to play Biden. 'Hello, I have some really good news or really bad news depending on which side of the ever-widening political divide that you sit,' Fox said in a straight-to-camera video first obtained by DailyMail.com. 'I have been temporarily un-canceled and asked to don my acting shoes again. Why? To play Hunter Biden in a new independent film called My Son Hunter.' 'It's a brilliant, surreal and funny script,' he said of the film, adding: 'Basically because it's true.' 'The Hunter story fascinates me so much, especially the vigor with which the mainstream media continue to try and suppress it,' Fox continued in his taped comments. 'I couldn't resist the offer to enter his world and tell his truth. So on one level we are both being un-canceled Hunter's story and Hunter's truth can finally be told.' Fox then looked off camera and said to himself: 'I wonder if I can still act. About to find out.' While filming, Martin Daubney, deputy leader of the Reclaim Party, will temporarily take over. 'Don't worry friends and foes well I don't have any foes, I love you all I'm not stepping back from my day job as leader of the Reclaim Party,' the politician said in the short clip announcing his new role as Hunter earlier this fall. 'But for a few weeks I will be juggling two jobs at the same time and therefore, the ever-valiant Martin Daubney will be keeping the ship steady until I return,' he added. Joining the team as director is Bond villain Robert Davi also known for his roles in The Goonies and Die Hard. 'One of my biggest concerns was in the casting of Hunter,' Davi said. 'For Hunter we needed someone who is not just a great actor, but a brilliant mind.' 'Joe Biden has repeatedly said Hunter is the 'smartest man' he knows,' Davi continued. 'We also needed someone with the pedigree, edge, emotional range and deep sensitivity. One may think there are many who could play him and that is so. But how many could brilliantly play him?' He added: 'I'm thrilled that Laurence Fox will be Hunter Biden.' McAleer and McElhinney are Irish filmmakers and authors who have produced several films mostly backed by crowdfunding targeting conservative viewers and My Son Hunter is no exception. Some films include 'Gosnell: The Trial of America's Biggest Serial Killer', which is a true crime drama based on abortionist Dr. Kermit Gosnell; and 'FrackNation', which addressed what they called misinformation about hydraulic fracturing or 'fracking'. Advertisement The Queen was seen standing unaided today as she held a face to face audience at Windsor Castle, in her first official engagement since missing Remembrance Sunday at the Cenotaph after spraining her back. The monarch, 95 - dressed in a green, orange and white floral dress and wearing a string of pearls - was pictured sharing a brief conversation with General Sir Nick Carter, Chief of the Defence Staff. Prince Charles was asked about the Queen today on his trip to Jordan. He said: Shes alright, thank you very much. Once you get to 95, its not quite as easy as it used to be. Its bad enough at 73! The last comment was a reference to his own birthday on Sunday. The military audience in Windsor's Oak Room - a sitting room that doubles as a private office - was Her Majesty's first in-person audience since she hosted a global investor summit at Windsor on October 19. Sir Nick walked through the door to be greeted by one of the Queen's dorgis, before approaching the monarch for a chat. Her Majesty described his upcoming retirement as 'rather sad', to which he replied, 'eight years, it's a long time', before mentioning that his only predecessor to have served long was Lord Mountbatten, the Queen's cousin. The general added that he thought 'the time had come to move on and do other things.' Reacting to the scenes, royal expert Dickie Arbiter tweeted that it was 'good to see The Queen at work.' Her Majesty was also left unable to attend the Church of England's national assembly yesterday, for the first time in her 69-year reign. Prince Edward, her youngest son, read out a speech on his mother's behalf at the Church of England synod yesterday. Her statement read: 'It is hard to believe that it is over 50 years since Prince Philip and I attended the very first meeting of the General Synod. 'None of us can slow the passage of time; and while we often focus on all that has changed in the intervening years, much remains unchanged, including the Gospel of Christ and his teachings.' Her Majesty also spoke remotely to delegates at COP26 in Glasgow, urging world leaders to reach decisive climate change deals as she warned 'none of us will live forever'. The monarch 95 - dressed in a green, orange and white floral dress and wearing a string of pearls - was pictured standing as she greeted to Gen Sir Nick in Windsor's Oak Room Today's meeting was the first in-person audience the monarch has held since an investor summit at Windsor on October 19 Sir Nick walked into the room to be greeted by one of the Queen's dorgis, before approaching the monarch for a chat Yesterday, monarch reminded the church of its 'weighty responsibilities' in making 'difficult decisions' about the future of the church. 'In some areas, there will, of course, be differing views and my hope is that you will be strengthened with the certainty of the love of God, as you work together and draw on the Church's tradition of unity in fellowship for the tasks ahead,' she said. The Archbishop of Canterbury told the Earl that the church 'draws great comfort' from the Queen's prayers. Her Majesty's speech also touched on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic had on all faiths. 'Of course, in our richly diverse modern society, the well-being of the nation depends on the contribution of people of all faiths, and of none. 'But for people of faith, the last few years have been particularly hard, with unprecedented restrictions in accessing the comfort and reassurance of public worship. 'For many, it has been a time of anxiety, of grief, and of weariness. 'Yet the Gospel has brought hope, as it has done throughout the ages; and the Church has adapted and continued its ministry, often in new ways, such as digital forms of worship.' The General Synod is the national assembly of the Church of England which passes legislation. It was the first full in-person meeting of Synod since February 2020 before the coronavirus pandemic. Prince Edward delivers the Queen's speech on her behalf at the General Synod on Tuesday after the Queen missed the event for the first time in its 51-year history Her youngest son Edward Earl of Wessex (pictured) who read the head of state's speech to bishops and clergy, praised the institution for offering 'hope' during the pandemic LAST SEEN -- The Queen is photographed leaving Wood Farm on the Sandringham estate in Norfolk on Tuesday last week Since pulling out of the Remembrance Sunday service, the Queen had been due to carry out virtual audiences later this week. She has no major public engagements planned for the rest of the year. Concern for her health has increased given her age and due to the number of major engagements she has missed in recent weeks. She cancelled a two-day trip to Northern Ireland, and pulled out of attending the Cop26 climate change summit, the Festival of Remembrance, Remembrance Sunday and the Synod. The Queen's husband the Duke of Edinburgh died in April age 99. Saturday marks their first wedding anniversary to pass since Philip died. The Queen and the Duke would have celebrated 74 years of marriage. The Earl of Wessex has told the General Synod 'you probably understand why' the Queen was not present to deliver her address. Edward, addressing the Church of England's national assembly on behalf of his mother in Westminster on Tuesday, said the Queen sends her 'sincere and deep apologies that she cannot be here today'. He added: 'I think you probably understand why, and she regrets that deeply.' (From left) Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall; Kate, Duchess of Cambridge; and Sophie, Countess of Wessex stand on the balcony of the Foreign Office in Westminster during the Remembrance Sunday service where the Queen would have been present The Duchess of Cornwall and the Duchess of Cambridge stand on the balcony at the Remembrance Sunday service The National Service of Remembrance service, pictured on Sunday, is one of the Queen's most important events of the year Prince Charles and Camilla are currently on a tour of Jordan, and were pictured yesterday joining Queen Rania for a private dinner at the Al Husseiniya Palace. Earlier in the day they dipped their fingers in water from the holy River Jordan, which is used to baptise royal babies. Meanwhile, the palace is facing fresh turmoil over Prince Andrew, this time over his finances. Yesterday, it emerged he had a loan from a major Tory donor's private bank extended to 1.5million to cover his 'living expenses' just days before the tycoon transferred a similar amount of money into his account. Businessman David Rowland, 76, wired the money to a London bank account held by the Duke of York - a long-term friend of his - in December 2017, it was claimed. The prince's account was with Banque Havilland SA - a Luxembourg based private bank owned by Mr Rowland and his family. The transfer to Prince Andrew's account was earmarked for a repayment of a 1.5million loan from Banque Havilland, according to documents reportedly seen by Bloomberg News. The unsecured loan had, according to reports, been increased 11 days earlier by 250,000 to cover the Prince's 'working capital and living expenses' - despite concern that it was 'not in line with the bank's risk appetite'. But, according to Bloomberg, bank staff approved the extension, having noted that the loan opened up 'further business potential with the Royal Family'. Representatives for Prince Andrew described any transfer of funds between the pair as a 'private', while Havilland Bank denied any wrongdoing. Six New South Wales clubs have banned unvaccinated staff and customers until at least February, even after it becomes legal for the un-jabbed to enter hospitality venues. Currently, only the fully-vaccinated can visit non-essential services such as pubs, clothes stores and restaurants, with the unvaccinated finally allowed to join the party on December 15. While the measure has been credited by many for supercharging NSW's vaccine rollout, it has also provoked staunch criticism from others. Five of the clubs opting to keep the rule in place are within the Northern Beaches council area of Sydney and the sixth is in Mosman on the city's leafy north shore. State Premier Dominic Perrottet said he expects such bans will be 'rare' and that businesses which extend bans on the unvaccinated must ensure they do not break the law. The strict 'vaccine passport' rule, which is only in place in a handful of countries worldwide, has been credited for supercharging the state's vaccine rollout during the brutal second lockdown (pictured, Sydneysiders on Freedom Friday on October 15 when lockdown ended) Critics have said the measures exclude those who do not want to get vaccinated, with hardliners calling it a 'two-tiered society' (pictured, protesters in Sydney on November 7) Poll DO YOU AGREE WITH MANDATORY COVID VACCINES? YES NO DO YOU AGREE WITH MANDATORY COVID VACCINES? YES 980 votes NO 2633 votes Now share your opinion 'The NSW government expects the majority of businesses will open their doors to all customers from December 15,' he told the Daily Telegraph. 'Some may choose to exercise additional measures of caution for their patrons and staff, which is permissible providing they meet all relevant legal obligations.' Originally, the freedom date for the unvaccinated was December 1, before being pushed back by a fortnight. The extended ban of the unvaccinated by some clubs has been backed by health minister Brad Hazzard, whose electorate of Wakehurst is in the Northern Beaches. The Mosman Club (pictured) in Sydney is one of six clubs extending a ban on unvaccinated customers NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet (pictured) says he expects clubs extending the ban on unvaccinated staff and customers will be 'rare' Mr Hazzard is a member for one of the clubs extending the ban and said the club's decision is 'very sensible'. 'My view as health minister is we are still smack in the middle of a worldwide pandemic and businesses have to make sensible decisions to protect their staff and their patrons,' he said. Mosman Club chief executive Gerard Boyle said his staff are 'unequivocally passionate' about keeping the ban in place until February. Grant Easterby, the CEO of Dee Why RSL, said his club extended the policy based on 'an overwhelming number of requests' from staff and members. Dee Why RSL (pictured) on Sydney's Northern Beaches has extended a ban on the unvaccinated due to requests from staff and members VACCINATION RATES: NSW Ages 16 and over First dose: 94.2 per cent Second dose: 91.3 per cent Source: NSW Health Advertisement Currently in NSW, 91.3 per cent of people over the age of 16 are fully-vaccinated, with 94.2 per cent having received one dose. The strict 'vaccine passport' rule, which is only in place in a handful of countries worldwide, has been credited for accelerating the state's vaccine rollout during the brutal second lockdown, which saw Greater Sydney shut down for 106 days. Similar measures are also in place in Victoria and will soon be in other states when their hard borders come down, leaving unvaccinated people essentially still living in lockdown and unable to access many services. But critics have said the measures exclude those who do not want to get vaccinated, with hardliners calling it a 'two-tiered society'. The mandates have led to angry protests, particularly in Melbourne, with vaccine-sceptics furious at the measures. New York's mayor-elect Eric Adams has gotten his first taste of the extortion tactics that the city's anti-cop radicals will use against him once he takes office. Last week, a leader of New York Black Lives Matter threatened 'riots . . . fire . . . and bloodshed' should Adams deliver on a campaign promise to revive a contested undercover unit of the New York Police Department. Adams brushed off the threat. But the argument that BLM leader Hawk Newsome made against the unitthat it has a disparate impact on blackswill come up repeatedly if Adams carries through on his anti-crime platform. Ironically, Adams himself lodged that disparate impact argument against the NYPD in previous years. He now better be prepared to meet and rebuff it. (Left) Co-founder of Black Lives Matter (BLM) of Greater New York, Hawk Newsome at a New York City protest. (Right) NYC mayor-elect Eric Adams speaks at his victory party, promising to drive down gun violence and crime A police officer watches a crowd as a police vehicle burns near Fort Greene Park in the Brooklyn borough of New York after protesters rallied outside Barclays Center over the death of George Floyd, a black man who died Memorial Day while in police custody in Minneapolis The most powerful statistic in his arsenal will be the disparate impact of crime on blacks. In 2020, blacks made up nearly 74% of all shooting victims and 65% of all murder victims, though they are less than 22% of the city's population. Not one of those victims of civilian shootings, including young children, was protested by New York Black Lives Matter. The now-defunct Anti-Crime Unit was one of the last entities within the NYPD to forthrightly practice proactive policing. Its members were tasked with spotting and intervening in suspicious behavior in gang-plagued neighborhoods before that behavior ripened into a full-fledged crime. Anti-Crime officers used their lawful powers to stop and question suspects (and possibly to frisk them if the officer had reason to think that a suspect was carrying an illegal weapon). The unit had an exemplary record of getting guns off the street and of deterring crime. On June 15, 2020, however, NYPD Commissioner Dermott Shea announced that he was disbanding the Anti-Crime Unit. The announcement came in response to the riots that had erupted in New York after the arrest-related death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in late May 2020. For days, thugs had crashed SUVs into stores and cleared the businesses out of merchandise; they had firebombed police cars and torched public property. Over 400 officers were injured by bottles, rocks, glass, and cement blocks. Shea and Mayor Bill de Blasio were desperate to show their sympathy with the anti-cop forces. The Anti-Crime Unit became the sacrificial lamb. Though stopping and questioning suspects short of making an arrest is a constitutional power, Shea labelled such stops 'brute force.' The fall-out from Shea's announcement was immediate. Shootings jumped 205% in the two subsequent weeks, from 38 incidents over that timespan in 2019 to 116 incidents in 2020. Gunshot injuries rose 238%. June 2020 became the most violent month in terms of gunfire in 24 years. Gangbangers knew that their chances of getting stopped with a gun had dropped enormously. Police officers had gotten the message as well: whether you are in anti-crime or not, proactive policing is unwelcome. In the month following the disbanding of the Anti-Crime Unit, narcotics arrests fell 85% city-wide, gang detectives made 90% fewer arrests, subway and housing arrests dropped by comparable amounts, and gun arrests dropped 67%. Through early December 2020, arrests were down 36%. Gun arrests had started rebounding, but they couldn't keep up with the increase in guns on the street and with the emboldening of criminals. The year ended with a nearly 100% surge in gun violence and a 44% increase in homicides, a surge that continued well into 2021. The arguments for disbanding the Anti-Crime Unit were specious. It was true, as was widely reported after Shea's decision, that Anti-Crime officers were involved in a disproportionate number of police shootings. What was not reported was how low that number of shootings was. In 2019, there were 25 incidents in which NYPD officersnot just from Anti-Crime but from across the entire force -- intentionally shot criminal suspects. Those 25 incidents represented the second lowest number of officer-involved shootings since records were first kept nearly fifty years ago. Fifty-four members of the NYPD were involved in those 25 shooting incidents, of which 19, or 35%, were from the Anti-Crime squad. By comparison, the roughly 600 Anti-Crime officers were 1.6% of the total NYPD sworn force. Those 25 shootings incidents resulted in 11 civilian fatalitiesalso a historically low number. All the civilians killed by NYPD officers in 2019 appeared to be threatening officers with potentially lethal force; seven had loaded guns. In 2019, the 36,397 members of the NYPD responded to over 6.4 million calls for service. Over 64,000 of those calls involved weapons. Twenty-five shootings and 11 fatalities are remarkably few, given the size of New York and of the NYPD. Three percent of Anti-Crime officers discharged their weapons at suspects in 2019; that number, too, suggests restraint rather than brutality. The likelihood of an officer's use of force is a function of how often he interacts with violent suspects. Confronting armed, violent, and resisting suspects was virtually the unit's job description. There was no evidence, therefore, that the Anti-Crime Unit was trigger-happy or prone to excessive force. The other charge against itthat it (and other members of the NYPD) unfairly singled out minorities for stops--was equally groundless. That 'racial profiling' charge has bedeviled not just the NYPD but all American policing for decades. It requires a willful ignorance of the reality of crime. In 2020, black subjects made up 56.6% of all pedestrian stops conducted by the NYPD. (The department does not separate out stops conducted by Anti-Crime or other policing units.) Whites made up 9.1% of all NYPD stops. By contrast, as mentioned above, blacks were under 22% of the city's population in 2018 and whites nearly 32%. Based on that disparity alone, cop critics allege that NYPD officers discriminate in their policing practices. But the relevant benchmark for judging police activity is not population data but crime data, since policing today, especially in the NYPD, is data-driven. Officers are deployed to where crime is most intense, and that is in minority neighborhoods. Blacks, it turns out, are understopped compared to what their crime rates would predict, and whites greatly overstopped. In 2020, blacks were over 72% of all shooting suspects; we know that from victim and witness descriptions. Whites were 1.4% of all shooting suspects, again, based on victim and witness descriptions. A black New Yorker is roughly 50 times as likely to commit a shooting as a white New Yorker. Blacks were 63.4% of murder suspects; whites, 6.3%. (That white share of homicide suspects represents domestic violence incidents, not street crime. It is only the latter that generates street stops for likely gang activity or illegal gun carrying.) Given these disparities in criminal offending, the police cannot enforce the law without having a disparate impact on blacks, as measured by population ratios. Eric Adams, a former NYPD sergeant, used to lodge the same demagogic racial profiling charges against the NYPD during his years leading the rabble-rousing organization, 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care. He gave patently false testimony against NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly in a 2015 lawsuit that aimed to shut down the department's stop practices. Now Adams has recast himself as a defender of the proactive policing that he denounced for years. Safety-minded New Yorkers are eager to take him at his word. But if he is to succeed in driving fear from the public square, it will not be enough to reconstitute the Anti-Crime Unit. New York's next mayor will have to relentlessly beat back the charge that the NYPD is racist for trying to protect black victims. Doing so will mean speaking the uncomfortable truth about black crime. Heather Mac Donald is the Thomas W. Smith fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of The War on Cops The number of airline passengers traveling for Thanksgiving this year is expected to rebound to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels, but the Transportation Security Administration says it is ready to handle the surge. Administrator David Pekoske said Wednesday he expects agency staffing to be sufficient for what's traditionally TSA's busiest travel period. Pekoske said he didnt think a vaccine mandate going into effect for TSA agents Monday would have any effect on staffing for Thanksgiving next week. 'In fact, implementation of the mandate will make travel safer and healthier for everyone,' he said. 'So, we see quite a significant increase in the number of our officers that are vaccinated, and I'm very confident that there will be no impact for Thanksgiving.' Last month, TSA revealed that only about 60 percent of its employees are at least partially vaccinated with about a month to go before the November 22 deadline for federal employees to be double-jabbed. If the problem persists, then that could mean extra-long queues at airport security checkpoints during Thanksgiving week. Transportation Security Administration administrator (TSA) David Pekoske Two airplane pilots pass by a line of passengers while waiting at a security check-in line at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago 'We are prepared,' Pekoske told ABC's 'Good Morning America.' He said travelers should expect long lines at airports and plan to spend a little more time getting through security. In 2019, a record 26 million passengers and crew passed through U.S. airport screening in the 11-day period around Thanksgiving. But that plummeted in 2020 as the pandemic kept people at home. The TSA expects that number to be at around 20 million in 2021. AAA predicts more than 53million Americans are going to travel for the Thanksgiving holiday, a rise in 13 percent from last year, bringing travel volume to almost pre-pandemic levels. About 48million are slated to travel by car, with 4.2million flying, according to projections. About 49.9million drove and 4.6million flew in 2019. Only 44.5million people went by car during Thanksgiving week in 2020, while just 2.3million chose plane travel, a decrease of 50 percent. AAA predicts that more than 53 million Americans will travel for the Thanksgiving holiday, pushing travel back to just 5 percent lower than pre-pandemic levels in 2019. More than 4.2 million travelers will take to the skies this Thanksgiving holiday. This volume represents an 80 percent increase over 2020. This years forecast marks the highest single-year increase in Thanksgiving travelers since 2005, bringing travel volumes close to pre-pandemic levels in 2019. More than 90 percent of people plan to travel by car as their preferred mode of transportation. Although the car is still the most popular choice for travelers, a greater share will opt to travel by air and other modes such as bus, train or cruise this year The total travel volume is forecasted to just be 5 percent below the 2019 figure and air travel is expected to increase by 80 percent compared to 2020, bringing it to just 9 percent below 2019. This year, the Thanksgiving holiday period starts Wednesday, November 24 and lasts until Sunday, November 28. However, a winter storm is set to wallop central and eastern US next week, wreaking havoc on roads and flights as more than 53 million Americans make their way home for Thanksgiving - after many were forced to skip last year's gatherings due to Covid The National Weather Service's Weather Prediction Center warned the storm could be 'potentially significant.' Weather models are forecast the storm will form in the central plains next Sunday then move northeast into Canada while dumping snow across parts of Minnesota, north Wisconsin and northern Michigan. The storm could result in 'heavy accumulations' from northern Indiana and Michigan to Maryland next Monday through Wednesday, meteorologists said. 'We could be looking at a huge mess and a real wrench in holiday travel,' said AccuWeather chief meteorologist Jon Porter. The storm could also trigger heavy rainfalls along the east coast, possibly hitting New York City, Boston and Chicago on Monday and Tuesday, potentially leading to flooding and disrupted ground travel, AccuWeather said. Scroll Down For Video: The storm could also trigger heavy rainfalls along the east coast, possibly hitting New York City, Boston and Chicago on Monday and Tuesday AccuWeather meteorologists say one weather scenario involves 'heavy accumulations' from northern Indiana and Michigan to Maryland next Monday through Wednesday. The storm could also trigger heavy rainfalls along the east coast Another weather scenario could cause a spinoff storm along the mid-Atlantic coast Monday, moving into the Northeast on Tuesday Pekoske told NBC's 'Today' on Wednesday he remains 'very concerned' about the issue of unruly passengers as incidents on airplanes have continued. 'The level of unruly behavior is much higher than I've ever seen it,' he said. The Federal Aviation Administration says it has referred 37 cases involving unruly airline passengers to the FBI for possible criminal prosecution since the number of disruptions on flights began to spike in January. Through November 1, there have been 5,033 reports of unruly passenger incidents, including 3,642 related to pandemic face covering regulations. 'Let this serve both as a warning and a deterrent: If you disrupt a flight, you risk not just fines from the FAA but federal criminal prosecution as well,' said FAA Administrator Steve Dickson. Americans who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 can enjoy the upcoming holiday season 'the way we've traditionally done it all along,' Dr. Anthony Fauci announced Sunday morning. 'I believe strongly that particularly in the vaccinated people, if you're vaccinated and your family members are vaccinated, those who are eligible, that is obviously very young children and not yet eligible, that you can enjoy the holidays,' the immunologist said during an interview on This Week ABC. 'You can enjoy Halloween, trick-or-treating, and certainly Thanksgiving with your family and Christmas with your family.' Fauci argued that celebrating together is one of the main reasons health experts emphasized the importance of getting vaccinated. His holiday recommendations come just two weeks after he said it was 'too soon' to say whether Americans can gather for Christmas. Dr. Anthony Fauci announced Sunday that Americans who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 can celebrate the holidays together 'the way we've traditionally done it all along' At that time, President Joe Biden's chief medical expert previously voiced cautious optimism about the country's COVID-19 numbers going down however warned that the country needed to remain vigilant. 'It's just too soon to tell,' Fauci said on October 3. 'We've just got to keep concentrating on continuing to get those numbers down and not try to jump ahead by weeks or months and say what we're going to do at a particular time.' Now, after the Center for Disease Control (CDC) released guidance Friday with recommendations on how to safely celebrate the holidays, Fauci is singing a different tune. 'It's so important to get vaccinated, not only for your own safety, for that of your family, but also for the good of the community, to keep the level of infection down,' he told Martha Raddatz on Sunday. 'When you do that, there's no reason at all why you can't enjoy the holidays in a family way, the way we've traditionally done it all along.' The CDC's holiday recommendations include wearing a mask indoors in areas with higher infection rates, avoiding crowded places, and staying home if you are ill are ways to help curb the spread of the virus. They also offer special considerations for Americans who may suffer from conditions or take medicines that weaken their immune systems. To avoid road congestion this year, AAA recommends drivers to hit the roads after 9pm on November 24, the day before Thanksgiving, while it warns them to leave before 11am or noon on the Thanksgiving Day until Sunday November 28. In its Thanksgiving travel forecast, AAA revealed that it expects to respond to over 400,000 calls for help over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. The most common calls are for dead batteries, flat tires, and lockouts. Gas prices are also averaging about $3.42 per gallon this year, which is up about $1.30 from last year and about 80 cents from 2019. For those who plan multi-day road trips, mid-range hotel rates have increased about 39 percent, with average nightly rates ranging between $137 and $172 for AAA Approved Hotels. Daily car rental rates have also increased 4 percent compared to last Thanksgiving at $98. Other than travel by air or by car, other transportation means (including train, bus and cruise) will also increase to 1.02 million, nearly tripling the 2020 volume but still remain 31 percent lower than 2019 levels. Despite gasoline costing over a dollar more per gallon than this time last year, 48.3 million Americans are expected to travel by car, an increase of 8.4 percent from 2020. This total is higher than volumes seen as recently as 2019 Travel by other modes (including train, bus and cruise) will increase to 1.02 million, nearly tripling the 2020 volume but still remain 31% lower than 2019 levels Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently released its recommendations for holiday gatherings and related travel, saying that the best way to minimize COVID-19 risk is to get vaccinated if eligible. AAA urges those who remain unvaccinated to explore safer options such as road trips with few stops and direct flights. Traveling with unvaccinated children, who have recently become eligible to get their vaccines, will also no longer be a consideration for many families. 'This risk is not so much the travel itself but what you do at the destination,' said Dr. Leana Wen an emergency physician and professor of health policy and management at the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health. Trips involving visits to crowded indoor attractions and restaurants are higher risk. 'Travel itself can be made very safe, especially if the younger children are able to mask. If they're unable to mask, that is a major barrier,' Wen told CNN, where she also works also a medical analyst. As of November 8, the U.S. opened its borders to fully vaccinated international travelers. The CDC has since updated its guidance to reflect these changes. When traveling within the U.S., fully vaccinated travelers do not need a negative viral test or to self-quarantine. For international travel, a negative COVID-19 test is needed before traveling to the US, regardless of vaccination status. The Archdiocese of New Orleans has agreed to pay back $1million after claims it fraudulently used government disaster relief money following Hurricane Katrina, despite filing for bankruptcy over sexual abuse allegations. Robert Romero, a former project manager for AECOM engineer firm, filed a whistleblower lawsuit in 2016, saying the church received $46milllion from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2005. Romero accused the firm of inflating estimates for repairs for the archdioceses, among others, such as Xavier University of Louisiana - which is Catholic, but is run by an independent Board of Trustees - and Dillard University, a Methodist school. He accused the California-based company and former employee Randall Krause of gaming the system to get larger payments after FEMA hired the company following the storm. The lawsuit claimed the religious institution received $10million extra for St. Raphael's school cafeteria building and $36million extra for two assisted living buildings in Villa St. Maurice in the Holy Cross area of the archdiocese. The Archdiocese of New Orleans (pictured: admin office) has agreed to pay back $1million in relief fund money from Hurricane Katrina to the government after a whistleblower filed a lawsuit in 2016 alleged the church received $46million in extra money. Former project manager for AECOM - who was hired by FEMA after the hurricane - claimed former employee Randall Krause inflated repair costs for the church, as well as Xavier University The archdiocese claimed catastrophic flood damage on the upper floors of the assisted living buildings, when it only sustained wind damage, The New York Times reported. It is unclear if St. Raphael's school was damaged. With the help of Krause, who created fraudulent paperwork reflecting the inflating cost of repairs and shrinking his estimate of replacement costs, the church got large sums of disaster relief money, according to the suit. The diocese said in a statement in June 2020 that it 'relied upon the knowledge and expertise of FEMA and their designated agencies and field representatives.' 'We deny the allegation that the Archdiocese of New Orleans knowingly conspired to submit false information,' it said. Katrina wreaked havoc on the city of New Orleans, leaving behind severe flooding and immense damages. The church allegedly claimed one of its school cafeterias and two of its assisted living homes had more damage than it did. They received $10million more than they should have for the school cafeteria and $36million more for the assisted living People were walking in waist-high water after the event and many buildings suffered damages. The church claimed their assisted living building had flood damage, when in reality it only had wind damage. It agreed to pay back $1million in the settlement, which did not include an admission of fraud. The agreement was approved by a federal judge as part of the bankruptcy proceedings, which the church filed following sexual abuse allegations The archdiocese agreed to a settlement with the government, which did not require the institution to admit fraudulent activity, and will pay back $1million. The archdiocese claimed the funds went toward restoration efforts. 'The questions surrounding this issue arising over a decade later were surprising to us. Every dollar of FEMA funds received has gone back into the restoration of parish, school and other properties to serve the people of the Greater New Orleans community,' the diocese said in 2020. The agreement was approved by a federal judge as part of bankruptcy proceedings for the archdiocese, after roughly 400 people accused the archdiocese of sexual assault and sought compensation in court. More than 70 clergy members in the archdiocese were accused of assault over seven decades and survivors had a deadline to file an abuse claim. Anyone who filed past March 1, 2021, would not be able to sue the church ever for abuse. 'There is no question that the archdiocese is using Chapter 11 as ashield to prevent survivors from being able to come forward,' the survivors' lawyer Jeff Anderson told nola.com. 'They [would] face so many more claims in time.' The bankruptcy lawsuit did not include the number of abuse cases the diocese settled out of court before the bankruptcy claims. The diocese filed for bankruptcy for significant financial distress from settlement negotiations and litigation, nola.com reported. In addition to the Katrina relief fund, Xavier University also had to pay back $12million, with $2.3million going to Romero and his lawyers. University officials allegedly claimed damages to the basement that didn't exist and Krause provided photos of a different building that wasn't in New Orleans. The government did not seek repayment from Dillard University, which received an estimated $15million extra for building damages, nor did the Department of Justice intervene with Krause, according to nola.com. The DOJ did not give a reason to why it would not be seeking repayment. However, Dillard said in 2020 that the DOJ performed an 'independent investigation' and decided not to seek payment, nola.com reported. DailyMail.com contacted the Archdiocese of New Orleans for comment but has not received a response. NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea says bail reform is to blame for the Big Apples unrelenting crime wave One suspect, who stabbed an officer six times in 2008, attacked an officer on Sunday and was issued supervised release instead of bail Isus Thompson randomly bashed Officer Kyo Sun Lee in the head with a backpack filled with a metal safe, a DVD player and a number of adult videos Queens Officer Demitrios Raptis, the cop who Thompson attempted to kill in 2008, has called it insane that his attacker is back on the streets Felony assaults, rape and robberies in New York City are all on the rise in NYC New York Citys top cop is warning that a steep drop in the inmate population at Rikers Island is fueling an unrelenting crime wave in the Big Apple. He also slammed bail reform laws after a criminal who attacked a cop on Sunday was released just hours later. ADVERTISEMENT An officer who was nearly killed in 2008 by the same man called his release 'insane.' NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea noted that the number of suspects being released is evident in the decline in inmates at Rikers Island as there are about 5,400 inmates currently, while there were almost 6,100 a month ago, he told the New York Post. Shea also slammed bail reform laws for permitting more suspects to roam the streets after committing crimes. He specifically referenced Isus Thompson, 38, who on Sunday randomly bashed Officer Kyo Sun Lee in the head with a backpack filled with a metal safe, a DVD player and a number of adult videos. Unprompted, Thompson approached Lee, 30, on East 194th Street in The Bronxs Fordham Manor neighborhood around 1.30am before assaulting him from behind. Thompson, who was also found in possession of a metal box-cutter at the time of his arrest, was given three separate assault charges, weapon possession, harassment and resisting arrest, court records show. One of his assault charges was listed as a felony, which grants judges discretion to set bail, but Thompson was instead set free on supervised release, meaning that he is just required to periodically check in with the court. NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea says bail reform is to blame for the Big Apples unrelenting crime wave. He is pictured at a memorial ceremony at One Police Plaza on November 15 Shea noted that fewer criminals are being held at Rikers Island, pictured Isus Thompson, who stabbed an officer six times in 2008, attacked an officer on Sunday and was issued supervised release instead of bail Following his release, Shea tweeted, Arrested in 08 for the attempted murder of a police officer, the same man was again arrested Sun. for attacking a #Bronx cop from behind. Late last night, this violent criminal was released without bail. Do we have to wait for him to kill someone before this is taken seriously? ADVERTISEMENT Meanwhile, Queens Officer Demitrios Raptis, 42, the cop who Thompson attempted to kill in 2008, has called it insane that his attacker assault a fellow officer and nothing is being done to keep him away from the public. Thompson pleaded guilty in 2008 to second-degree attempted murder for stabbing Raptis six times in the ride side of the stomach. Most of the blows were absorbed by Raptiss bulletproof vest, but he also suffered stab wounds and still has a scar. Raptis approached Thompson at 10.30pm on June 6 of that year when he saw the suspect smoking marijuana in the Ehrenreich-Austin Playground at Austin Street and told him that he couldnt be there after sunset. Raptis walked with Thompson to his police cruiser and told him to put his hands on the car, but Thompson pulled out a knife and started stabbing him before running off. He was finally arrested after a three-block chase, according to court records. Thompson randomly bashed Officer Kyo Sun Lee in the head with a backpack filled with a metal safe, a DVD player and a number of adult videos Unprompted, Thompson approached Lee, 30, on East 194th Street in The Bronxs Fordham Manor neighborhood around 1.30am before assaulting him from behind. I could have died that night, Raptis told the New York Post. I think the guy should be locked up, shouldnt be let out. He could have killed this officer too. He should be behind bars.' Raptis added, These guys are violent criminals, and theyre being let out with no bail, nothing. Everybodys in and out, thats the problem. Nobody goes to jail anymore. These criminals know, Im not going to jail. Im going to Central Booking. Im going to get a ticket, Im going to do it again. They know theres no consequences. ADVERTISEMENT After the stabbing, Thompson was sentenced to five years in prison beginning in 2010 and was released two years later on parole, which expired in 2015, corrections records show. It is not clear whether the prosecutor in Thompsons most recent offense was aware of his prior conviction. After Thompsons attack on Sunday, Officer Lee was taken to North Central Bronx Hospital for evaluation for suffering non-critical injuries, sources told the New York Post. He told the news outlet that the attack was totally unexpected and said, I saw him approach and we didnt make direct eye contact. He saw me and I saw him. It seemed like he was very determined, his focus was straight ahead. Lee continued, He seemed like he was going to walk across the street I was looking at him from an angle and turned to see my partners back. As I turned on an angle, thats when he came about here, Lee noted, gesturing to his neck. Thankfully there were enough officers there to get him into custody. Bodycam footage from the arrest shows Thompson refusing to be handcuffed as he scuffles and kicks at the officers trying to apprehend him. Asked by the New York Post about how he feels about Thompsons release, Lee said, Im not sure how I should feel about it. I was just performing my duty as any officer would. Harry Zucker, 77, a white-haired man with a fondness for fondling himself in front of today's youth, has exposed himself a whopping five times since April 27 Zucker's house (at left) is mere feet from PS 199's schoolyard, and he is often seen lounging outside in a lawn chair, leering at unsuspecting students with his penis out Police Benevolent Association President Pat Lynch told the New York Post in a statement that This case is more proof that our broken criminal justice system needs a complete overhaul. Our legislators, prosecutors and judges all need to stop pointing fingers and passing the buck, because theyre putting both cops and our communities at risk. In September, Shea slammed outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasios plan to prematurely release dozens of Rikers Island inmates as part of his administrations efforts to reduce the amount of detainees there. Shea said at the time, My position would be the people that are in Rikers Island worked awfully hard to get in there. And Im worried about the people in New York City on the street, so my position would be people that are in there deserve to stay in there. This Tuesday, the mayor was on the same page as Shea and told the New York Post that things that need to be fixed and Thompsons case shows that weve got to do better to keep the city safe. Referring to bail reform, he said, Weve got to fix the parts of this bill that arent working, we got to preserve the parts that are working. There are some profoundly good reforms, but an episode like this points out this is just not the way to keep people safe. We got to do better. A suspect who allegedly bludgeoned a New York City subway passenger with a hammer for looking at him the wrong way' was released without bail after police said he stole a chain from a teenage boy in a Manhattan train station Jamar Newton, 41, was previously arrested in April on five misdemeanor charges, including menacing, petit larceny, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of stolen property, but was released without bail, court records show Also in September, a serial pervert who was caught masturbating in front of children on five separate occasions was released for a fifth time because of the bail reform law that prevented a judge from imposing bail on his charges, which were all classified as misdemeanors. Harry Zucker, 77, lives mere feet away from PS 199's open schoolyard in Brooklyn and had exposed himself to students a whopping five times since April 27, according to court records. The school went as far as to hang up netting to block the fence separating Zucker's home from the school's play area, obscuring Zucker's gross gazebut that still wasn't enough to dissuade the deviant. And in August, a suspect who allegedly bludgeoned a New York City subway passenger with a hammer for looking at him the wrong way' was released without bail after police said he stole a chain from a teenage boy in a Manhattan train station. Jamar Newton, 41, was previously arrested in April on five misdemeanor charges, including menacing, petit larceny, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of stolen property, but was released without bail, court records show. Meanwhile, felony assaults, rape and robberies in New York City are all on the rise with felony assaults spiking by 8.4%, rapes rising by just under 2% and robberies increasing by just under 3% between last year and this year through November 14, the NYPDs most recent data. Overall crime climbed by just under 2% in the same duration, while murders dropped by 1.4% and shootings dropped by less than 1%. Police are searching for two suspects this week in separate crimes throughout the Big Apple. a man bursting into a kosher bagel store in Queens and demanding that it take down its Israeli flags and close, or hed burn the building down, as violence continues to plague the city. Surveillance footage, which does not include audio, released Tuesday by the NYPDs Hate Crime Task Force shows a man bursting into a kosher bagel store in Queens and demanding that it take down its Israeli flags and close, or hed burn the building down. The suspect faces aggravated harassment charges and police are offering a $3,500 reward to anyone with more information. Click here to resize this module Police are also seeking a trio of muggers who killed one man and injured another in a sidewalk hold-up, as violent crime continues to wrack the city. The cold-blooded murder occurred at around 4.50pm on Saturday in the Mount Eden section of the Bronx, where three unidentified men stuck up Jonathan Pena, 32, and a 46-year-old man. Two of the muggers pointed pistols at the victim, one augmented with a green laser sight and another with what appears to be a high-capacity drum magazine, surveillance video shows. The third stickup man then rushed over to the victims, who raised their hands in the air, and ripped a gold chain away from Pena. As the robbers were distracted with the chain, the other victim tried to flee inside a nearby restaurant. The muggers then opened fire with both guns, shooting wildly on the 1400 block of Macombs Road and hitting both victims. The trio of crooks was last seen fleeing northbound on Macombs Road in a black Mercedes-Benz sedan. ADVERTISEMENT Pena was transported by private means to Bronx Lebanon Hospital where he was pronounced dead police said. Paramedics transported the 46-year-old male victim to Lincoln Hospital in stable condition. New York Citys top cop is warning that a steep drop in the inmate population at Rikers Island is fueling an unrelenting crime wave in the Big Apple. He also slammed bail reform laws after a criminal who attacked a cop on Sunday was released just hours later. An officer who was nearly killed in 2008 by the same man called his release 'insane.' NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea noted that the number of suspects being released is evident in the decline in inmates at Rikers Island as there are about 5,400 inmates currently, while there were almost 6,100 a month ago, he told the New York Post. Shea also slammed bail reform laws for permitting more suspects to roam the streets after committing crimes. He specifically referenced Isus Thompson, 38, who on Sunday randomly bashed Officer Kyo Sun Lee in the head with a backpack filled with a metal safe, a DVD player and a number of adult videos. Unprompted, Thompson approached Lee, 30, on East 194th Street in The Bronxs Fordham Manor neighborhood around 1.30am before assaulting him from behind. Thompson, who was also found in possession of a metal box-cutter at the time of his arrest, was given three separate assault charges, weapon possession, harassment and resisting arrest, court records show. One of his assault charges was listed as a felony, which grants judges discretion to set bail, but Thompson was instead set free on supervised release, meaning that he is just required to periodically check in with the court. NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea says bail reform is to blame for the Big Apples unrelenting crime wave. He is above at Memorial Ceremony at One Police Plaza in New York on November 15 Shea noted that less and less criminals are being held at Rikers Island Isus Thompson, who stabbed an officer six times in 2008, attacked an officer on Sunday and was issued supervised release instead of bail Following his release, Shea tweeted, Arrested in 08 for the attempted murder of a police officer, the same man was again arrested Sun. for attacking a #Bronx cop from behind. Late last night, this violent criminal was released without bail. Do we have to wait for him to kill someone before this is taken seriously? Meanwhile, Queens Officer Demitrios Raptis, 42, the cop who Thompson attempted to kill in 2008, has called it insane that his attacker assault a fellow officer and nothing is being done to keep him away from the public. Thompson pleaded guilty in 2008 to second-degree attempted murder for stabbing Raptis six times in the ride side of the stomach. Most of the blows were absorbed by Raptiss bulletproof vest, but he also suffered stab wounds and still has a scar. Raptis approached Thompson at 10.30pm on June 6 of that year when he saw the suspect smoking marijuana in the Ehrenreich-Austin Playground at Austin Street and told him that he couldnt be there after sunset. Raptis walked with Thompson to his police cruiser and told him to put his hands on the car, but Thompson pulled out a knife and started stabbing him before running off. He was finally arrested after a three-block chase, according to court records. Thompson randomly bashed Officer Kyo Sun Lee in the head with a backpack filled with a metal safe, a DVD player and a number of adult videos Unprompted, Thompson approached Lee, 30, on East 194th Street in The Bronxs Fordham Manor neighborhood around 1.30am before assaulting him from behind. I could have died that night, Raptis told the New York Post. I think the guy should be locked up, shouldnt be let out. He could have killed this officer too. He should be behind bars.' Raptis added, These guys are violent criminals, and theyre being let out with no bail, nothing. Everybodys in and out, thats the problem. Nobody goes to jail anymore. These criminals know, Im not going to jail. Im going to Central Booking. Im going to get a ticket, Im going to do it again. They know theres no consequences. After the stabbing, Thompson was sentenced to five years in prison beginning in 2010 and was released two years later on parole, which expired in 2015, corrections records show. It is not clear whether the prosecutor in Thompsons most recent offense was aware of his prior conviction. After Thompsons attack on Sunday, Officer Lee was taken to North Central Bronx Hospital for evaluation for suffering non-critical injuries, sources told the New York Post. He told the news outlet that the attack was totally unexpected and said, I saw him approach and we didnt make direct eye contact. He saw me and I saw him. It seemed like he was very determined, his focus was straight ahead. Lee continued, He seemed like he was going to walk across the street I was looking at him from an angle and turned to see my partners back. As I turned on an angle, thats when he came about here, Lee noted, gesturing to his neck. Thankfully there were enough officers there to get him into custody. Bodycam footage from the arrest shows Thompson refusing to be handcuffed as he scuffles and kicks at the officers trying to apprehend him. Asked by the New York Post about how he feels about Thompsons release, Lee said, Im not sure how I should feel about it. I was just performing my duty as any officer would. Harry Zucker, 77, a serial pervert who was caught masturbating in front of children on five separate occasions was released for a fifth time because of the bail reform law Zucker's house (at left) is mere feet from PS 199's schoolyard, and he is often seen lounging outside in a lawn chair, leering at unsuspecting students with his penis out Police Benevolent Association President Pat Lynch told the New York Post in a statement that This case is more proof that our broken criminal justice system needs a complete overhaul. Our legislators, prosecutors and judges all need to stop pointing fingers and passing the buck, because theyre putting both cops and our communities at risk. In September, Shea slammed outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasios plan to prematurely release dozens of Rikers Island inmates as part of his administrations efforts to reduce the amount of detainees there. Shea said at the time, My position would be the people that are in Rikers Island worked awfully hard to get in there. And Im worried about the people in New York City on the street, so my position would be people that are in there deserve to stay in there. This Tuesday, the mayor was on the same page as Shea and told the New York Post that things that need to be fixed and Thompsons case shows that weve got to do better to keep the city safe. Referring to bail reform, he said, Weve got to fix the parts of this bill that arent working, we got to preserve the parts that are working. There are some profoundly good reforms, but an episode like this points out this is just not the way to keep people safe. We got to do better. A suspect who allegedly bludgeoned a New York City subway passenger with a hammer for looking at him the wrong way' was released without bail after police said he stole a chain from a teenage boy in a Manhattan train station Jamar Newton, 41, was previously arrested in April on five misdemeanor charges, including menacing, petit larceny, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of stolen property, but was released without bail, court records show Also in September, a serial pervert who was caught masturbating in front of children on five separate occasions was released for a fifth time because of the bail reform law that prevented a judge from imposing bail on his charges, which were all classified as misdemeanors. Harry Zucker, 77, lives mere feet away from PS 199's open schoolyard in Brooklyn and had exposed himself to students a whopping five times since April 27, according to court records. The school went as far as to hang up netting to block the fence separating Zucker's home from the school's play area, obscuring Zucker's gross gazebut that still wasn't enough to dissuade the deviant. And in August, a suspect who allegedly bludgeoned a New York City subway passenger with a hammer for looking at him the wrong way' was released without bail after police said he stole a chain from a teenage boy in a Manhattan train station. Jamar Newton, 41, was previously arrested in April on five misdemeanor charges, including menacing, petit larceny, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of stolen property, but was released without bail, court records show. Meanwhile, felony assaults, rape and robberies in New York City are all on the rise with felony assaults spiking by 8.4%, rapes rising by just under 2% and robberies increasing by just under 3% between last year and this year through November 14, the NYPDs most recent data. Overall crime climbed by just under 2% in the same duration, while murders dropped by 1.4% and shootings dropped by less than 1%. Police are searching for two suspects this week in separate crimes throughout the Big Apple. a man bursting into a kosher bagel store in Queens and demanding that it take down its Israeli flags and close, or hed burn the building down, as violence continues to plague the city. Surveillance footage, which does not include audio, released Tuesday by the NYPDs Hate Crime Task Force shows a man bursting into a kosher bagel store in Queens and demanding that it take down its Israeli flags and close, or hed burn the building down. The suspect faces aggravated harassment charges and police are offering a $3,500 reward to anyone with more information. Police are also seeking a trio of muggers who killed one man and injured another in a sidewalk hold-up, as violent crime continues to wrack the city. The cold-blooded murder occurred at around 4.50pm on Saturday in the Mount Eden section of the Bronx, where three unidentified men stuck up Jonathan Pena, 32, and a 46-year-old man. Two of the muggers pointed pistols at the victim, one augmented with a green laser sight and another with what appears to be a high-capacity drum magazine, surveillance video shows. The third stickup man then rushed over to the victims, who raised their hands in the air, and ripped a gold chain away from Pena. As the robbers were distracted with the chain, the other victim tried to flee inside a nearby restaurant. The muggers then opened fire with both guns, shooting wildly on the 1400 block of Macombs Road and hitting both victims. The trio of crooks was last seen fleeing northbound on Macombs Road in a black Mercedes-Benz sedan. Pena was transported by private means to Bronx Lebanon Hospital where he was pronounced dead police said. Paramedics transported the 46-year-old male victim to Lincoln Hospital in stable condition. A 'loyal and respectful' son was left out of his tycoon father's 100m will, despite offering him one of his own lungs to save his life. Bill Reeves, 47, was left almost nothing when his property tycoon father Kevin rewrote his will to leave the majority of his vast fortune to his sister. Former hairdresser daughter Louise, 35, was left to inherit her father's Rolls Royce and assets worth up to 80m, while Bill got only a clutch of personal effects worth about 200,000. She claims their father wanted her to inherit the fortune as he saw her as the heir to his business empire. But Bill is now challenging the will at the High Court, accusing Louise - who he says 'likes money and flash things' - of bullying their father to get her hands on most of his wealth. He claims he had always had a good relationship with his father and that they were so close he had actually offered to donate a lung to Kevin, who had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Earlier, Mr Justice Michael Green heard that Kevin had, from humble beginnings, created a vast personal fortune through a Southampton property empire now worth up to 100m. Louise is locked i n a High Court row with her brother Bill (pictured), who claims she bullied their ailing father into changing his will and leaving her the vast majority of his riches Louise Reeves (pictured), who could get 80m under her father's will, has been accused of 'coercing' Kevin Reeves into leaving her most of his fortune as she is allegedly 'materialistic' He had been left as an orphan to a convent as a child and left school at 12, but through his 'ingenuity and hard work', made himself rich. He had four children - Bill and Louise, estranged elder son Mark, and Lisa Murray, who did not know her dad until she was in her 20s. Kevin, who died aged 71 in 2019, had previously intended to split the bulk of his estate equally between Bill, Louise and Lisa, but in 2014 rewrote his will to almost entirely leave Bill out. Under the new will, Bill got personal possessions worth about 200,000, but the rest of the 100m fortune went to his daughters, with Louise getting 80m and Lisa 20m. But the will is now under challenge in court, with Bill claiming Louise 'coerced' their dad into making it because she 'likes money and power' - disparaging Bill to get Kevin to cut him out. However, Bill's barrister Constance McDonnell QC insisted that the move made no sense as Kevin had been proud of his son, who had turned a 20,000 investment into his own property and business empire, worth 20m. They had been so close that Bill had moved into an annexe next to Bill's 2.5m home in the New Forest, while Bill had offered him a lung when he was declining with COPD. 'Kevin's affinity with Bill manifested itself in a decision in 2011 to move into the annexe immediately adjoining Bill's home, where Kevin lived until his death,' she said. Property tycoon Mr Reeves (pictured) had four children but left 80 per cent of his 100million fortune to his youngest daughter, Louise, 35, when he died aged 71 in 2019, the court heard 'Kevin's relationship with Bill continued to be very close; they saw each other at least every few days - and usually more frequently - and went on holiday together to California and Las Vegas within a few weeks of the date of signing the 2014 will. 'The closeness between them is further illustrated by the fact that Bill was prepared to donate one of his lungs to Kevin and to fund the necessary surgery.' Ms McDonnell - who claims Louise exercised 'undue influence' over Kevin - said nothing had happened to make Kevin change his mind and reduce his son's inheritance from as much as 26.6m to only 200,000. 'Kevin and Bill had not fallen out about land and deals, and the suggestion that Bill did not lift a finger for Kevin was obviously untrue,' she argued. 'Bill had at his own cost constructed the annexe at his home for Kevin's use and to Kevin's specification, funded its outgoings, insured his father's cars including a valuable Bentley which Bill had given to Kevin, and was a loyal and respectful son to him. 'Such a change was startling in the context of Kevin's family and relationships, and those who knew him well aver in their evidence that the provisions of the 2014 will are completely out of character and inexplicable.' She said Kevin had been in poor health at the time he was 'coerced' into making the 2014 will, suffering from COPD and finding it difficult to walk up inclines or stairs. But for Louise - who earlier denied coercing her dad or being money-oriented - Thomas Dumont QC denied that Kevin had been so ill that he was vulnerable to the influence of his daughter. 'That Kevin was not in good health is not in dispute, and that much can be gleaned from his clinical records,' he said. 'However, there is no clinical material linking any of Kevin's physical health issues to his mental wellbeing or any suggestion of vulnerability to influence. 'And he was healthy enough to take Louise on the back of his quad bike, for instance to see his horses, and even to ride on horseback himself, around the time he made the 2014 will.' Kevin was a 'tough' man who was not capable of being influenced into doing anything he did not want to do, he told the court. And he had had five years after making the 2014 will in which he could have changed it if it was the product of Louise's bullying and against his wishes. He continued: 'There is no undue influence. Instead there is a sense of grievance felt by Bill, and those he has gathered around him, that they have not received the inheritance they feel they are so deserving of.' Bill's challenge to the 2014 will is being supported by Ryan McKinnon, 24, a son of Kevin's estranged son Mark who would inherit a share of his grandfather's estate worth up to 10m if the 2014 will is ruled invalid. Lisa Murray - who would inherit as much as 26.6m under the 2012 will, but up to 20m under the disputed will - is nevertheless supporting her sister Louise in court. The trial continues. Gunman Travis McMichael broke down in court as he testified about the 'life or death situation' when he and Ahmaud Arbery wrestled over the shotgun before he shot the jogger dead. McMichael took to the stand on the eighth day of the trial where defense attorneys are expected to present evidence tried to prove that he shot the black jogger in self-defense as he, his father, Gregory McMichael and neighbor, William 'Roddie' Bryan Jr, attempted to conduct a citizen's arrest of Arbery under their suspicion that he committed a burglary at a nearby property. 'I want to give my side of the story,' Travis McMichael, 35, said at the start of his testimony. The former Coast Guard petty officer said he was in a 'life or death' battle with Arbery in the roadway as the pair tussled for control of his shotgun, before he finally pulled the trigger. 'I was thinking of my son,' he told the jury. 'It sounds weird, but that's the first thing that hit me.' Travis McMichael took to the stand the day after the jury was shown graphic post portem photos of Ahmaud Arbery The prosecution presented evidence it said showed the McMichaels and neighbor William 'Roddie' Bryan wrongly assumed the worst about Arbery Gregory McMichael told investigators after the shooting that the three defendants had Arbery 'trapped like a rat' with their pickup trucks Arbery was shot three times and medical examiner, Dr. Edmond Donoghue, determined his cause of death was the result of multiple shotgun wounds Donoghue told the jury the shot that struck Arbery's his left chest and armpit alone was enough to kill him 13 shotgun pellets exited his back and 11 more were recovered from his wounds Meanwhile, defense attorney Kevin Gough openly opposed the presence of black pastors at the trial, arguing that civil rights icons like Rev. Al Sharpton and Rev. Jesse Jackson were influencing the jury Gough has motioned for a mistrial four times, however the judge denied has request Travis McMichael took to the stand on the eighth day of the trial where defense attorneys are expected to present evidence to prove that he shot the black jogger in self-defense as he, his father, Gregory McMichael and neighbor, William 'Roddie' Bryan Jr, attempted to conduct a citizen's arrest of Arbery under their suspicion that he committed a burglary at a nearby property Travis McMichael then started to tear up as he said: 'I was thinking of my son, it sounds weird but it's the first thing' His voice tailed off as he fought back sobs. Asked by his attorney Jason Sheffield what he did next, McMichael said: 'I shot him. He had my gun. He struck me. It was obvious that he was attacking me, that he would have got the shotgun from me, it's a life or death situation He confirmed he and father Gregory, 65, had followed Arbery in his white pick-up truck after suspecting him of being behind thefts in their neighborhood. Arbery, 25, had switched back three times and the pair had interacted as Travis said he had repeatedly asked him to stop, at one point yelling. Eventually Arbery went out of sight around a dogleg bend in the mainly-white community of Satilla Shores in Brunswick, Georgia, the court heard. Travis McMichael parked his pick-up, which his father in the flatbed, telling jurors at that point he did not want to 'escalate' the situation. But just then Arbery ran back into sight and towards the younger McMichael, jurors heard. The defense for one of the white men accused in the murder of Ahmaud Arbery (pictured) has asked the judge for a fourth time to declare a mistrial. The judge, again, denied the request He said: 'He turns and he's on me.. in a flash. He grabs the shotgun and I believe I was struck on that first instance that we made contact.' Travis McMichael then started to tear up as he said: 'I was thinking of my son, it sounds weird but it's the first thing' His voice tailed off as he fought back sobs. Asked by his attorney Jason Sheffield what he did next, McMichael said: 'I shot him. He had my gun. He struck me. It was obvious that he was attacking me, that he would have got the shotgun from me, it's a life or death situation. 'I wanted to stop him from doing this so I shot him.' Asked if Arbery stopped when he was shot, McMichael replied: 'He did not.' Earlier, McMichael said there had been thefts in Satilla Shores, his neighborhood outside the small coastal Georgia city of Brunswick, that put residents on edge. He continued: 'I know that I got hit I got struck, I got hit on the top of the head. And he had the weapon in his hands so I pushed and pulled. Still getting hit.' Sheffield: 'Did you get it free from his grip?' McMichael: 'I don't believe I did. I don't know if and when and where he continued grabbing but we were together, we were locked up. He was on that shotgun. Asked about the positions of each man at the time, McMichael said: 'I didn't know where I was at but I knew that he was on me. I knew that I was losing this. 'I knew that if I was getting tripped, or he would have got a lucky strike on my head, or if I would have lost that grip on that shotgun that I would have been shot or in serious trouble. 'I knew that he was overpowering me. But I didn't know which direction or what mechanics he was doing to overpower me.' He continued: 'I thought I shot twice until later on speaking with the investigator that I realized it was three shots. The first shot, I knew I shot. 'But then the second shot, I shot again because I was still fighting, I was still ... he was all over he, he was still all over the shotgun. And he was not relenting. So I shot again to stop him.' The trial in the February 2020 fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery entered its ninth day of testimony on Wednesday (Pictured: Body camera footage of the scene following the shooting) The defense is expected to present evidence to prove that Travis McMichael shot the black jogger in self-defense (Pictured: McMichael and Arbery fighting before shots were fired as captured on William 'Roddie' Bryan's cellphone) McMichael said after the third shot 'he (Arbery) disengaged'. He added: 'At that point he let go, he turned and continued to run down Satilla (Drive). I was in shock. I turned around, I don't know where I was going. My dad came out and he was yelling that he's (Arbery) has got his hand under him. 'I turned around, we got over there and pulled his hand out from under him and realized that he was deceased. The police were right there. I stood up, realized that I got a gun here and that he has passed away. So I walked over to the side and put my shotgun down. 'After that it was a blur.' Earlier, Travis McMichael said he'd had a prior encounter with Arbery on the night of February, 11, 2020, less than two weeks before the Sunday afternoon shooting that killed Arbery. That night, he said, he saw Arbery outside an unoccupied, half-built house in the neighborhood. Prosecutors said Arbery was an avid runner out for one of his regular jogs. McMichael said Arbery, was 'creeping through the shadows' and then seemed to put his hand in the waistband or pocket of his shorts. 'It freaked me out,' he said. 'I'm under the assumption that he's armed.' He ran home to grab his gun and called the police, but Arbery had vanished by then. McMichael testified that he believed Arbery might have stolen fishing equipment that had been reported missing by the owner of the half-built house and was returning on Feb. 11 to take more things. No evidence has emerged that Arbery took anything from the house. The property owner has previously said through a lawyer that Arbery may have stopped at the construction site to drink from a water faucet. Arbery had nothing on him besides his running clothes and shoes the day he was shot. McMichael said he had considerable law enforcement training while in the US Coast Guard, which included extensive drills on de-escalating potentially dangerous situations such as boarding suspect vessels. This included a specific program that went from level one, which would be entirely verbal, to level six which was deadly force. The former veteran who told jurors I carry a weapon everywhere described how the tragedy began to unfold. He said he lived with his parents in Satilla Drive and his father Gregory had come into the house in a frantic state saying: The guy who has been breaking in has run by the house. The court has already heard Arbery was filmed on home security video on night-time visits to a partly-constructed home two houses away being built by Larry English, 51 who believed he was having items stolen from it. Defense lawyers have also painted a picture of Satilla Shores being an community on edge, fearful of an increasing crime wave sweeping over it. Arbery was spotted at the unfinished house again at lunch time on that fateful Sunday, with neighbor Matt Albenze calling the non-emergency police line to report him. Travis, who had his two-year-old son staying with him for a weekend visit, said his father grabbed a weapon - which the jury has been told was a Magnum .357 handgun. Travis picked up a shotgun. He said he went outside the family home 'to see what was going on' and Albenze made an arm gesture down the road in the direction Arbery had run. Then Gregory McMichael came out of the house and he and his son set off. Travis wedged his shotgun in a crease in the truck's bench front seat, with the barrel facing down, with his dad sitting next to him. Grainy video footage of Ahmaud Arbery roaming around a partly-constructed home on five occasions in the months before he was shot dead last year was played in front of the jury Thursday The above map shows Ahmaud Arbery's approximate path and locations of the events that occurred on February 23, 2020 They proceeded fairly slowly down Satilla Drive and eventually came across Arbery in adjoining Burford Road. 'When I first see him, I'm trying to see if I recognize him,' Travis told jurors. Both McMichaels had seen videos in the English property. 'He's running, he's got long strides, he's athletic,' added Travis. 'I continued to drive up to him as I get closer I recognize his haircut. At that point I was probably riding the brake. I got closer to him. 'At this point I'm realizing this is most likely the same guy I saw. I watched his hands, make sure he's not armed. I don't know what I'm going to be into. If this is the same guy I have suspicions he may be armed.' McMichael said he pulled alongside and definitely recognized Arbery from the videos. He said he told the jogger: 'Hey, what are you doing, what's going on? I'm coasting, I'm staying with him, he's right there at my door. I'm trying to de-escalate. I know this can go any way.' The accused said he repeated his request for Arbery to stop, telling him 'I want to talk to you at this point he is still running but I notice he looks very angry. It wasn't what I expected for just coming up and talking to him. Clenched teeth, closed brow. He was mad. Which made me think, something's happened. 'I ask him again, hey will you stop for a second. He turns and starts jogging back. I back up and match up with him again. As I come up to him, I started asking what's going on? He turns and runs.' McMichael said he and Arbery 'made eye contact' the first time he asked the jogger to stop. 'Second time, I'm not sure, I was watching his hands,' he said, emphasizing that he never tried to block Arbery with his truck. The Coast Guard veteran said he followed and was 'trying to figure out what was happening, watching his demeanor'. He added: 'I decided to come up to him again and try one more time. The 25-year-old is seen above at the same home on February 23, 2020 - the day he was chased and killed 'I want to talk to you, I want to know what's going on. And he finally stops. He never says anything to me this could be volatile. He's not squaring up, he's just standing. And I said hey, the police are on the way. As soon as I said police, he turned and ran straight back down Burford (Road) towards Holmes (Road) sprinted.' McMichael said at no point during these interactions with Arbery did he brandish the shotgun, which remained in the truck cab Bryan who would eventually take the shocking video of Arbery's death then comes into play. McMichael, who said he did not know Bryan before this incident, next spotted his black Chevrolet Silverado shadowing the young black man. He said at one point it appeared Arbery was trying to get into the vehicle and thought: 'Why is he attacking a truck?' He added he was thinking: 'Once again this is getting out of hand. Looks like this guy is trying to get in this vehicle. Eventually Arbery and Bryan in his truck headed in McMichael's direction as they dodged back and forth among the neighborhood roads. Arbery split away and ran past McMichael's passenger side. Then he and Bryan vanished around a dogleg in the road. McMichael parked, saying he was under the impression the police were on their way and 'this guy, he seems dangerous to me I can give them a good description of what's happening'. He said he got out of his truck and asked his father 'where are the police?' Gregory McMichael's answer indicated he hadn't called them. Travis continued: 'I go to reach for my phone and look back and I see Mr Arbery running back towards me. 'I yell at him to stop, stop where you're at. He's continuing. He's getting closer and I'm thinking he's not looking left, he's not looking right not a sprint not a jog. I need to do something about this. 'I'm at my truck, the door's open, I'm on the inside of my door. I see he's coming and I go to grab my shotgun. As soon as I turn to get my shotgun, her turns.. about 10ft form the back of my truck. My dad yells at him and he runs back. My action going into my truck is what made him turn.. back down Satilla (Drive). 'I pulled the shotgun out and I started going down there to see what's happening.' McMichael then decided against it, adding 'I need to stay where I'm at. My dad's up here in the back of the truck. 'I put the shotgun right back, pick up the phone, call 911. As I dial, the phone up to the ear, I see Mr Arbery come back (down Holmes Road). 'He was like a running back, ready to bolt. He was focused on me. This is that moment. I am pretty sure that he is going to attack his eye contact on me.' McMichael had his shotgun in his hands again and this time raised it, jurors heard. 'He was closing in. At this point I had yelled at him to stop several times,' he said. 'He is focused in on me. I wouldn't have time to react if he wanted to get on me, or to pull the gun. This is when I needed to show him, to deter him, to state 'do not come at me'.' He said he knew this because of his previous Coast Guard training. 'Mr Arbery is running at a pretty good clip, he's directed at me. He sees that I have a weapon, I'm yelling at him to stop. And he's continuing. I had the weapon down at this point.' McMichael then raised the weapon, the court heard. 'As soon as I drew a weapon on him, you can see in the video, that he darts to the left, darts to the right.' He added he would have been happy for Arbery to run across a nearby yard to clear out of the area at that point. 'At this point I know the police are coming now. But Arbery returned in the direction of the truck, with McMichael's father in the open on the flatbed. 'At this point I am a little past my door,' he said. 'I don't know what he's going to do. I moved to the front of my truck this is the point that is critical.' Travis said he feared Arbery could get in his truck or put his father in peril. 'Still under the impression that he might be armed, he's close to my father,' said McMichael, who said he had his shotgun pointed downwards. 'I was going to get to the front, the center of the vehicle. By the time I get to the front of the truck he is at the front quarter panel on the right hand side. 'And he turns and is on me.. in a flash.' William 'Roddie' Bryan Jr (left), who filmed the pursuit on his cellphone, was sworn in Wednesday. Gregory McMichael (right), was also sworn in Wednesday to possibly testify. Their attorneys have not disclosed if they will take the stand or not Earlier on Wednesday, before the defense started their opening arguments, they defense filed several motions Wednesday morning, including a request for a mistrial, a verdict of acquittal on the malice murder charge, and a request to limit pastors from the courtroom. Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley denied all motions. All three of the accused were sworn in to possibly testify in their defense. It's not clear whether all three men will testify in their defense. The prosecution closed its case Tuesday saying the men assumed the worst of Arbery and were not attempting a valid citizen's arrest, which required that someone have 'reasonable and probable' suspicion that a person is fleeing a serious crime they committed. Bryan's attorney, Kevin Gough, delayed making an opening statement at the start of the trial so that he could address the jury after the prosecution rested. He attempted to disprove the prosecution's argument that the defendants assumed the worst about Arbery, painting his client as an innocent man who was unaware of what was going on. Prosecution vs. Defense: The arguments in Ahmaud Arbery's murder trial Gregory McMichael, Travis McMichael and William Bryan are all charged with malice and felony murder in the February 2020 shooting death of black jogger Ahmaud Arbery. The McMichaels armed themselves and jumped in a pickup truck to pursue Arbery after he ran past their home from a nearby house under construction. Their neighbor, Bryan, joined the chase in his own truck, telling police that he tried to run Arbery off the road and then recorded cellphone video as Travis McMichael fired three shotgun blasts before Arbery fell facedown in the street. The defendants also face charges of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony. During the trial, the prosecution aimed to prove that the defendants wrongly assumed the worst about Arbery. The state also sought to rebut arguments that the defendants were attempting a valid citizen's arrest, which required that someone have 'reasonable and probable' suspicion that a person is fleeing a serious crime they committed. The defense argues that Travis McMichael shot Arbery three times in self-defense, as the McMichaels and Bryan attempted to conduct a citizen's arrest of Arbery under their suspicion that he committed a burglary at a nearby property. They also argued that the chasing of Arbery was justified under Georgia's 19th-century citizen's arrest law that was repealed after an outcry over the killing. Advertisement Gough said Arbery never asked Bryan for help as he ran by his home and, similar to how the state argues Bryan assumed worst about Arbery, he claimed the jogger assumed the worst of Bryan too by not asking for help. 'Mr. Arbery has the opportunity before Mr. Bryan even figures out what's going on, [to yell] help, call 911, there's crazy people chasing after me. He does not do that,' Gough stated. 'The evidence would suggest Mr. Bryan hasn't assumed the worst about anyone. Mr. Arbery has assumed the worst about Mr. Bryan.' He also argued that Bryan did not know the McMichaels well and was not pertinent to the surveillance footage alleging showing Arbery at the nearby property. Gough says Bryan recorded the incident to provide evidence to authorities and has been fully cooperative with authorities. 'Mr. Bryan has a rifle in his house. He leaves it. He walks out the house with a cell phone. That speaks volumes about the intentions of Mr. Bryan,' the attorney argued. In court Wednesday, attorney Franklin Hogue - who is representing accused Gregory McMichael - asked for a directed verdict of acquittal on the malice murder charge for McMichael and his son, Travis McMichael. He alleged the charge includes specific intent to kill, which doesn't apply to the defendant. Hogue contends that asking the jury to find an individual guilty of malice murder, which is intentional, and of felony murder, which is unintentional, is 'inconsistent'. Prosecutor Linda Dunikoski argued that 'but for' the defendants actions, Arbery would still be alive. Gough also filed his fourth motion for a mistrial in the case - his second this week - under the grounds that the presence of high-profile civil rights leaders, including Rev. Jesse Jackson, and the atmosphere inside and outside courtroom haven't allowed for fair trial. The judge, again, denied the request. Defense attorney Robert Rubin also asked Judge Walmsley to keep an eye on juror 12 whom he alleges has 'nodded off' repeatedly throughout the trial and is seemingly struggling to keep her eyes open. The judge said he would he address the jury about being attentive. Defense attorney Kevin Gough (pictured) made his opening statements on Wednesday after, for a second time, filing a motion for mistrial - which was denied Before the trial resumed Wednesday, clergy members and faith leaders gathered outside Brunswick Superior Court for a prayer vigil Rev. Jesse Jackson sat with Arbery's parents in the back row of the courtroom Wednesday for the second time this week. Attorneys for the defendants have said Jackson's presence and that of others who have spoken out in support of convictions in the case could unfairly influence the jury. 'They represent part of a national conversation' on racial injustice that has advocated for 'conviction of the defendants,' said Jason Sheffield, an attorney McMichael. 'And for that reason I do not think they should be present in the courtroom.' In an interview outside the courthouse, Jackson said that by bringing up the issue of his attendance and that of other Black pastors who have supported the Arberys, the defense attorneys are 'looking for a diversion.' 'They don't want a trial,' he said. 'They want a mistrial.' Before the trial resumed Wednesday, clergy members and faith leaders gathered outside the courthouse for a prayer vigil. Participants sang songs and offered up prayers for the Arbery family, asking the Lord for mercy and justice. 'We gather this morning to pray for peace, love, and justice,' said Rev. Dewayne Cope. 'We're creating a space where you can unload your burdens.' 'We know the whole world is watching us. We know they're watching to see if we as a community can pull together beyond this moment,' Rabbi Rachael Bregman echoed. 'We're here to hold on to the pain and to hold each other through it. This is hard and we're doing it together.' Prosecutors rested their case Tuesday afternoon eight days of testimony from 23 witnesses. The jury was shown images of Arbery's clothing on Tuesday, torn apart by bullet holes, for a second day in a row According to the medical examiner's testimony, the shot that struck Arbery's left chest and armpit (pictured) alone was lethal enough to kill the jogger. An x-ray image presented to the jury Tuesday showed Arbery's injuries Walmsley told the disproportionately white jury that defense lawyers for the three men would begin presenting their cases Wednesday morning at the Glynn County courthouse in the port city of Brunswick, where prominent civil rights leaders have joined Arbery's parents in the gallery. Father and son Gregory and Travis McMichael armed themselves and jumped in a pickup truck to pursue Arbery after he ran past their home from a nearby house under construction Feb. 23, 2020. Their neighbor, William 'Roddie' Bryan Jr, joined the chase in his own truck, telling police that he tried to run Arbery off the road and then recorded cellphone video as Travis McMichael fired three shotgun blasts before Arbery fell facedown in the street. Prosecutors allege jury in Arbery trial is 'disproportionately white' Prosecutors claim the jury seated for Ahmaud Arbery's murder trial is disproportionately white. Of the 12 members, one juror is black while the other 11 are white. Defense lawyers struck all but one black person from the jury panel, drawn from a county where about a quarter of residents are black, but told the court the strikes were for reasons that had nothing to do with race. Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley previously said he found that 'intentional discrimination' by defense attorneys appeared to have shaped jury selection, but argued Georgia law limited his authority to intervene. He also alleged that the defense had race-neutral arguments for dismissing those potential jurors. 'They have been able to explain to the court why besides race those individuals were struck from the panel,' Walmsley said. Summons were sent to 1,000 potential jurors and attorneys questioned these individuals for more than two weeks before selecting the current panel. Advertisement The McMichaels told police they suspected Arbery was a burglar because security cameras had recorded him several times in the unfinished house on their street. Defense attorneys said Travis McMichael opened fire in self-defense after Arbery attacked him by throwing punches and trying to grab his gun. Prosecutors sought to rebut arguments that the defendants were attempting a valid citizen's arrest, which required that someone have 'reasonable and probable' suspicion that a person is fleeing a serious crime they committed. They showed the jury multiple security-camera videos of Arbery walking around a half-built house on an unoccupied, unfenced property near the McMichaels' house. They also showed police body-worn camera video of a police officer telling the McMichaels that no one knew who the young Black man walking around the property was, but that nothing was ever taken on the days he was seen there. Additionally, they had the defendants' own words to investigators read aloud in court, in which they said they did not see Arbery before he ran past their driveways and did not know what he had been doing before. McMichael also said he shouted out a graphic threat mid-chase that he would shoot Arbery's head off if he did not stop. Jurors were also shown graphic video and photographs of two gaping shotgun wounds in Arbery's chest. The trial began on Oct. 18 in Glynn County Superior Court with nearly three weeks of jury selection, resulting in a jury that prosecutors complained was disproportionately white. Defense lawyers struck all but one black person from the jury panel, drawn from a county where about a quarter of residents are black, but told the court the strikes were for reasons that had nothing to do with race. Arbery, 25, had enrolled at a technical college and was preparing to study to become an electrician like his uncles when he was killed. Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, is yet to fire Allyn Walker, a professor who defended pedophiles and said they shouldn't be ostracized, instead placing them on administrative leave temporarily The refusal of a Virginia university to fire a transgender assistant professor who defended pedophiles and said they should be given child sex dolls has outraged students, alumni, politicians and the school's LGBTQ board, who say it is proof of a double standard that protects woke staff. Allyn Walker, 34, is an assistant professor of sociology and criminal justice at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. The non-binary teacher claimed in a recent interview to promote their new book that pedophiles shouldn't be ostracized, that they can't help who they are attracted to and that they should be given child-like sex dolls to satisfy their urges. Walker, formerly known as Allison, made the comments in an interview to promote their book Long Dark Shadow: Minor Attracted People and their Pursuit of Dignity. They believe pedophiles should be referred to as Minor Attracted People, and that they don't 'choose' who to be attracted to so shouldn't be considered 'immoral'. 'I want to be extremely clear that child sexual abuse is never ever okay,' they said, before saying pedophiles should be offered 'help' and aren't' 'destined' to act on physical urges. There was immediate and intense outrage among students, who said the professor was using a 'blanket' term for pedophilia and was an apologist for criminals. The university's own Trans Advisory Board released a statement to call Walker's remarks 'reprehensible', damaging to the victims of pedophilia and not reflective of the views of the trans community at large. But Old Dominion is standing by Walker. At first, the school said they didn't agree with them, but that they would keep their role. Then On Tuesday, the university - which charges $31,000 per year for out-of-state students - partly buckled to public outrage and placed Walker on leave, saying it was for their own safety. Students and others - including nearly 5,000 people who signed a Change.org petition- think Allyn deserves to be fired and they are demanding to know why the university won't end their employment. When presented with those questions, a university spokesman told DailyMail.com: 'Your questions address private personnel matters that it is our policy not to discuss publicly.' Walker would rather people referred to pedophiles as 'minor attracted' people. They think that while child sex abuse is 'never okay', there should be more help for pedophiles to stop them from harming kids and that child-size sex dolls should be legalized Walker earned their PhD at CUNY Graduate Center in 2017, according to the university's website, and specializes in mental health, court systems, queer criminology and 'resilience to offending' Students tell DailyMail.com that it's not enough and that they're both 'saddened and baffled' by a double standard, when other, more conservative professors at different schools have been fired, ostracized or vilified by the media for far less. Walker's book which seeks to destigmatize pedophiles who he says shouldn't be ostracized because they can't help their desires 'It saddens me that other professors and students have been kicked off campus for less and hopefully ODU will take the correct course of action. 'I'm still confused on why this double standard exists. 'I am baffled and disappointed that an individual with those beliefs would even be allowed to have a job on our campus where children interact frequently,' Grant Rimmer, a human services major and junior, told DailyMail.com on Wednesday. 'It is okay to research, it is okay to find out this information. It is not okay to sympathize and create a term to blanket what pedophilia is,' student Geni Piatkowski told WAVY, a local news outlet at a campus protest on Tuesday night. Nearly 5,000 people have signed a Change.org petition demanding that Walker be fired permanently for their comments. They say that putting them on leave is not enough. I am baffled and disappointed that an individual with those beliefs would even be allowed to have a job on our campus Grant Rimmer, a junior at ODU 'I noticed that it did not state unpaid leave. This person is a danger to society and should never be given the opportunity to to promote this perverted agenda,' said one person who signed it.' In a statement, ODU's Asterisk Trans Advisory Board said their comments were 'reprehensible'. 'Walkers choice to use [the term people who self-identify as minor attracted] in their work and appropriate exclusively queer experiences to further contextualize their argument is reprehensible. Brian Hemphill, the university's president, said 'as a father', he was concerned by the 'narrative' but he refused to fire Walker 'The second chapter of their book, Leading a Double Life: Staying Closeted and Coming Out as a MAP, is grossly misappropriating the traumas that LGBTQIA+ people exclusively endure as a natural part of their lived experience because of stigma. 'To liken these traumas to the holistically unrelated experiences of pedophiles, there are no words to describe the violations and damage Walkers irresponsible choice in words have done to their community writ-large and specifically at ODU.' 'The LGBTQIA+ community has long fought against the stigma that so wrongly aligns us with notions of sexual deviance. We have fought against this stigma while also bearing the increased vulnerability to and prevalence of experiencing sexual and emotional trauma that being a sexual and gender minority brings. 'Walkers misappropriation of exclusively queer experiences in their book has reignited the ignorant assumption of LGBTQIA+ individuals as sexual deviants and unfounded association with pedophilia. Many were outraged that the university has only placed the teacher on leave and not fired them 'In a year with the highest number of lives lost, it is with incredible disappointment and sadness that we as trans* student leaders are forced to respond to a controversy that has innately included and simultaneously maligned us without our consent,' the board's statement read. The university's president, Brian O. Hemphill, issued a letter to students last night where he called the views worrying, but he didn't say anything about whether or not the professor would be fired. 'Many individuals have shared with me the view that the phrase minor-attracted people is inappropriate and should not be utilized as a euphemism for behavior that is illegal, morally unacceptable, and profoundly damaging. 'It is important to call pedophilia what it is. As a father, I am troubled by this narrative and its potential consequences for my children and that of future generations,' he wrote. Students protested against the professor's remarks at Old Dominion University campus in Norfolk, Virginia, on Tuesday night Some of the protesting students told DailyMail.com that the university has taken a step in the right direction by putting Walker on leave, but that they should be fired It has stunned many, who point out the cases of conservative professors at other schools who have been marginalized for far less offensive remarks. Peter Boghossian, a professor at Portland State University, quit his position earlier this year after being vilified by faculty and students for sharing anti-woke views. 'There's a particularly powerful mind virus... there's a suite of beliefs within an ideology and those beliefs literally exist to rip down western civilization,' he said of his resignation. Portland State University professor Peter Boghossian says he was marginalized for his right wing views. He quit his role eventually. Dorian Abbott, a lecturer, was canceled from speaking at MIT after saying kids should be rewarded on academic merit and nothing else 'Our institutions can sustain only so much and they're being attacked from the inside on multiple levels from people who have been -- there's no polite way to say it -- they've been indoctrinated within the academies and indoctrinated to beliefs that are completely untethered to reality.' Dorian Abbott, a lecturer, was recently canceled by MIT in Michigan for suggesting students should be rewarded for their academic merit and nothing else. 'This is not a partisan issue. Anyone who is interested in the pursuit of truth and in promoting a healthy and functioning society has a stake in this debate. Speaking out now may seem risky. But the cost of remaining silent is far steeper,' he said, writing for Bari Weiss' Common Sense newsletter, last month. Walker lives in Norfolk with Vanessa Panfil, a fellow teacher at the university who has written her own books, including one called The Gang's All Queer: The Social Worlds and Identities of Gay Gang Members. Walker has not commented on the controversy surrounding their remarks. For the first time in the United States' 245-year history, American women could be required to sign up for the Selective Service with legislation expanding the draft expected to get the green light from Congress, a report out Wednesday stated. A measure changing the requirements for the Selective Service from male-only to 'all Americans' could pass the Senate as early as this week, according to Axios. The question of who should be compelled to serve has been debated in the US for years. Now it looks likely to pass with a bipartisan coalition of support, despite fury from some Republicans saying it is part of a row over political equality. Earlier this month, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley introduced an amendment to strip the gender-neutral Selective Service language out of the NDAA. It's not clear if the bill gained much traction. Republican Rep. Vicky Hartzler of Missouri spoke out against the measure on Wednesday morning. 'Using women as a chess piece in a political equality argument is not only misguided but is insulting to our female population,' she wrote on Twitter. 'Claiming their inclusion in the draft would prove equality is ridiculous.' Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas told reporters Tuesday, 'God bless that woman if she wants to go serve in the military and is prepared to fight. That that is a choice that is available to her. But I'm the father of two daughters. The idea that the government would forcibly draft them, and put them in a place where they would be engaged in combat against a man who the statistics demonstrate is likely to have significantly more body mass and significantly more body strength? That's not fair.' Conservative groups have also stood against the reform. 'There is nothing hindering womens ability to volunteer and serve in the military, so there is no need for this dangerous and unnecessary draft mandate contained in the NDAA,' public policy organization the Family Research Council tweeted Tuesday. Republican lawmakers are speaking out against the reform, though it's likely to still pass Republican House members like Reps. Chip Roy (left) and Vicky Hartzler (right) are urging their Senate colleagues to vote no The provision is included in the latest National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives by a 316 - 113 vote in September. If passed, all US citizens aged 18 to 26 would be required to sign up regardless of gender identity. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York wrote to colleagues in a letter on Sunday, 'it is likely that the Senate considers the NDAA this upcoming week.' GOP Rep. Chip Roy of Texas eviscerated his fellow Republicans who plan to vote in favor of the bill in an op-ed published Wednesday morning. 'To the many Republicans poised to make a devastating decision again, just know that I will not be able to vote for you for any officeincluding speaker, leader, president, or otherwiseif you vote for this,' Roy said. He attacked the lawmakers willing to pass the bill 'without any serious debate.' 'This is not a question of whether women can serve in the military. Thousands of women serve admirably in the United States Armed Forces, and we are all thankful for their service and their sacrifice,' the Texas Republican wrote. 'The question is whether we, as a country, will force the possibility of the horrors and strains of combat upon our wives, our sisters and our daughtersand worse, do so without so much as a moment of debate or legislative amendment on the House floor.' Wednesday's report notes the backers include veterans, feminists and even traditional Republicans - lawmakers ranging from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to Democrat Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth have said it's time to expand the draft to women. Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell has voiced support for the Selective Service to be expended to women, a measure that's part of this year's military spending bill. Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer told colleagues on Sunday that it'll likely be voted on this week Opposition has been relatively scant in the upper chamber - about a dozen Republican senators have stood against the measure. Lawmakers who oppose the Selective Service in general could also vote against the bill. The change would be mostly symbolic - the government hasn't drafted men for combat since the Vietnam War. But should it ever need to be used again, Democratic Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania warned, an expansion would allow the military to tap into a broad range of necessary experiences. 'God forbid, if we're in that place where we need to call on everybody to help us, we will need all kinds of skills,' Houlahan, an Air Force veteran, told Axios. 'Cyber-related skills, as well as other sorts of skills that we don't necessarily currently think of when we think of the Selective Service.' 'It seems to me given that women are playing every single possible role in the military,' Maine Senator Susan Collins told Huffpost on Wednesday. 'The registration should apply to both men and women.' In July the Senate Armed Services Committee passed the NDAA with just two Republicans - Senators Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Hawley - and Democrat Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts voting against it. Female servicemembers in Congress have been some of the primary forces driving the recent draft reform push. Conservative groups like the Family Research Council oppose the military reform GOP Iowa Senator Joni Ernst, the first woman combat veteran elected to the upper chamber, highlighted the importance of all Americans serving their country in Wednesday's report. 'We are now competing in the space of combat arms, and I think it's important that we all serve to the best of our capacity,' she said. Her fellow combat veteran Duckworth, who lost both her legs when her helicopter was hit by a grenade in Iraq, is also known to support expanding the draft to women. New York Democrat Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said 'so much of the trajectory for women in the armed services is based on what experience they're able to accrue, particularly combat experience.' And McConnell, the most powerful Republican in Congress, threw his weight behind women entering the draft as early as 2016. He said in May of that year that 'given where we are today, with women in the military performing virtually all kinds of functions, I personally think it would be appropriate for them to register just like men do.' It's not clear how he intends to vote on the annual military funding bill that includes the provision. DailyMail.com has reached out to McConnell's office. A half-dozen Republican senators mounted a bid to block it in August. They introduced a resolution titled 'Don't Draft Our Daughters.' The effort was spearheaded by Hawley, Florida Senator Marco Rubio and Utah Senator Mike Lee. Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma, Steve Daines of Montana and Roger Wicker of Mississippi also signed on. 'Most Americans say if a woman wants to serve that's wonderful - and by the way, women have been absolutely central to our war efforts since we have been a country, in many different ways, including of course fighting,' Hawley said on Fox News earlier this month. A report commissioned by the federal government in May 2020 proposed expanding the selective service to women 'But the idea that they be forced into compulsory service, I just think it's crazy.' Congress has tried in the past to amend the Military Selective Services Act to include women in the draft, but opposition mainly led by Republicans have stopped those efforts. Under a proposal from Senate Armed Services Chair Jack Reed, the existing legislation's text would be changed to 'all Americans' and remove the male reference. The latest version of the bill would swap 'male person' for the gender-neutral 'person' and replaces the phrase 'race or color' with 'race, color, sex, or gender.' But the Republicans' resolution cited data that states 'only a small subset of women are able to meet the physical fitness requirements for combat roles' in their evidence against the measure. It also points to the disparity between men in women in completing the Army fitness test ever since it became gender-neutral in 2018. 'United States Army data has demonstrated a fail rate ranging between 65 percent and 84 percent for women and between 10 percent and 30 percent for men on the Army Combat Fitness test since its inception,' the resolution reads. Military research also reflects enlisted women having a six-time higher injury rate than men. But the argument for enlisting women in the Selective Service comes from a recent study by the National Commission on Military, National and Public Service, published in May 2020. 'This is a necessary and fair step, making it possible to draw on the talent of a unified Nation in a time of national emergency,' the commission wrote. Video footage released by border agents captured the moment they reunited a migrant mother with her five-year-old daughter who was abandoned by smugglers on an island in between Mexico and the United States. U.S. Customs and Border Protection said the Venezuelan woman noticed her daughter was missing a short while after she and a group of migrants had reached the shore of the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass, Texas, last Friday. Agents from with U.S. Border Patrols Eagle Pass Station related the information to a unit that was patrolling the waterway and later located the girl with nine other undocumented migrants on the island. The migrants were ferried across the Rio Grande and into Texas before an agent recorded the child running up to her distraught mother and sharing a hug. A distraught mother from Venezuela approaches her five-year-old daughter after U.S. Border Patrol agents rescued the child and nine other migrants who were left behind by smugglers on an island between Mexico and the United States near Eagle Pass, Texas U.S. Customs and Border Protection said the mother approached border patrol agents moments after she was ferried from Mexico to a town near Eagle Pass, Texas, via the Rio Grande and asked them for help in recovering her five-year-old daughter, who had been left behind by smugglers on an island located between Mexico and the United States All of the migrants were medically screened and none presented signals of distress. They were transported to a local station where they were processed accordingly under U.S. immigration law. Human smugglers are cold and calculated, often separating families for their own convenience or to gain compliance, Del Rio Sector chief patrol agent Robert Danley said in a statement. Thankfully our agents acted quickly and were able to locate the young girl and reunite her with her mother without incident. A Venezuelan mother reaches for her daughter after U.S. Border Patrol agents from the Eagle Pass Station rescued the five-year-old child and nine other migrants from an island between Mexico and the United States on the Rio Grande last Friday According to CBP's monthly report released Monday on southwestern border encounters with migrants, U.S. Border Patrol agents registered fewer interdictions with individuals who were taken into custody for unlawfully crossing the United States-Mexico border for the third consecutive month. Data noted there were 164,303 encounters reported in October, a 14 percent decrease compared to September. Border officers registered 192,001 encounters in September and 209,840 in August after a record-high 213,593 interdictions were reported in July, the peak of the southern border crisis facing the Biden administration. CBP data showed southern border interdictions increased in each of former President Donald Trump's last eight full months in office, and the crisis has unraveled in President Joe Biden's first six full months at the White House The Del Rio Sector, which has 10 stations including the Eagle Pass Station that are in charge of surveilling 245 border miles, reported 28,111 interdictions in October, second-most among among the U.S. Border Patrol's nine sectors. Of the 42,726 family units that were encountered by the Border Patrol in October, Del Rio Sector agent sectors registered the third-most interdictions with 6,005. 'We continue to work diligently to identify and dismantle transnational criminal organizations that smuggle contraband and migrants into the U.S.,' CBP acting commissioner Troy Miller said in a statement. 'CBP's workforce continues to work with partners across the federal government and throughout the hemisphere to disrupt the smugglers intent on exploiting vulnerable migrants for profit.' This undated photo from the Mississippi Department of Corrections shows David Neal Cox, 50. In September 2012, Cox pleaded guilty to shooting his wife, Kim, in May 2010 in the town of Sherman, sexually assaulting her daughter in front of her, and watching Kim Cox die as police negotiators and relatives pleaded for her life A man who killed his estranged wife and terrorized their family is scheduled for lethal injection Wednesday evening in Mississippi, the first person executed in that state since 2012. Prosecutors said David Neal Cox, 50, shot Kim Kirk Cox in May 2010 and let her bleed to death over several hours while he sexually assaulted his stepdaughter three times in front of her dying mother. Following his arrest, Cox relinquished all appeals and filed court papers, saying he was 'worthy of death.' His execution is scheduled for 6pm CST at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman. Among the people scheduled to witness the execution are Cox's stepdaughter, 23-year-old Lindsey Kirk. She was 12 on May 14, 2010, at her aunt's house, where she was staying along with her two brothers and mother. They had been granted a restraining order against Cox. Her mother was in the back of the house filling the bathtub for her little brother. 'A gunshot came through the screen door, and he ran in and told me not to move,' Kirk said of her stepfather, who chased her aunt, Kristie Salmon, out of the house. Kirk was not in the room when her stepfather shot her mother in the arm and abdomen, but he soon took her back there. 'Mama was laying on the floor. She was bleeding,' Kirk said. Kirk's brother 'was balled up in a closet.' Her stepfather then sexually assaulted her three times in front of her dying mother - even as police surrounded the home and tried to get Cox to release Kirk, along with her two brothers. Lindsey Kirk, 23, was 12 years old when her stepfather, David Neal Cox, terrorized her family, sexually assaulted her, and killed her mother, Kim Kirk Cox, in May 2010 at a home in Sherman, Mississippi. The Mississippi Supreme Court set Cox's execution date Wednesday after he said he wanted to surrender all appeals Kim Kirk Cox in an undated picture provided by daughter Lindsey Kirk. Kim was short in the arm and in the abdomen in 2010 by Cox, days after bumping into him at an intersection The entrance of the Mississippi State Penitentiary, where Cox has been jailed for the past 11 years On the same day, Cox's father, Benny, and stepmother, Melody Kirk, were three hours from home at a track meet with one of their children. Salmon called and told them Cox had shown up at her house and started shooting. The Kirks immediately started driving back, and Cox called while they were on the way. Kirk said he talked to his daughter, Kim, who already had been shot. 'I told her we was coming just as quick as we could get there,' Benny Kirk said. 'And she said, "Daddy, I'm dying.''' Kirk said Cox blamed him, his wife and Lindsey Kirk: 'He told me over the phone that he meant to kill all of us.' Melody Kirk said Cox was refusing to talk to officers by the time they had arrived at Salmon's house, so she took the role of negotiator, trying to persuade him to let the family go. The ordeal lasted more than eight hours before officers got the three children out, recovered Kim's body and arrested Cox. Authorities said their last confirmation of Kim Cox being alive was after midnight May 15. Lindsey Kirk told the Associated Press she misses her mother every day. To remember her, she has two tattoos: her mom's birthdate in Roman numerals and a dolphin, her mother's favorite animal. Lindsey Kirk shows a tattoo on her neck that commemorates her late mother's favorite animal, a dolphin Lindsey Kirk shows a tattoo commemorating her late mother's birthday of Jan. 12, 1970 Lindsey Kirk shows childhood photographs of herself and her late mother Kim Kirk Cox Lindsey Kirk also said that prior to the murder, Cox was collecting disability checks after injuring his back when he was working as a commercial truck driver. Back then, he used methamphetamine in front of Kirk, who said that her stepfather sexually assaulted her 'for a few years' when the family was still living under the same roof when her mother would leave. She said she was afraid to tell anyone because 'he always told me that he'd kill us' if she told on him. However, while staying with her grandparents in the summer of 2009, Lindsey texted her mother and told her of the assaults. Soon after that, Cox was arrested and charged with statutory rape, sexual battery, child abuse and possession of methamphetamine. He was released in April 2010, but then-wife Kim Cox already had a restraining order against him and had moved to her sister's home with her children. But, one day, Kim Cox saw him at an intersection from afar. She told relatives that he held his hand up like a gun and pointed it at her three times. Within a couple of days, he had killed her. Kim Cox's father and stepmother describe her as a caring mother who was generous toward others. They said they didn't know David had been abusive or her children until Lindsey spoke up. Adding on to that, Benny Kirk said simply: 'He's evil.' Kim Cox (left) poses with her father Benny Kirk (right) in an undated picture Questions also remain about whether Cox was involved in the disappearance of his brother's wife, Felicia Cox, who was last seen in a neighboring county in 2007. Her daughter, Amber Miskelly, recently told WTVA-TV that David Cox was the last person to see her mother alive. Lindsey Kirk said her mother and Felicia Cox were close friends. Benny and Melody Kirk said they wonder if Cox will confess to his sister-in-law's death before he is executed. The Kirks raised Lindsey and her two younger brothers. Lindsey calls them Mamaw and Papaw, and they said she's their angel. The boys are now 18 and 19 years old. The couple said the younger son does not like to talk about his mother's death or his father's impending execution, and the older son is still fearful his father might come back and hurt him. 'I've told him,' Melody Kirk said, 'a dead person can't hurt anybody.' Meanwhile, Mississippi and other states have had difficulty finding lethal injection drugs because pharmaceutical companies began blocking the use of their products to carry out death sentences. The Mississippi Department of Corrections revealed in court papers earlier this year that it acquired three drugs for the lethal injection protocol: midazolam, which is a sedative; vecuronium bromide, which paralyzes the muscles; and potassium chloride, which stops the heart. Mississippi Corrections Commissioner Burl Cain said on Tuesday that the drugs listed in the court records are the ones planned for use in the execution. He would not say where the department obtained them. 'The law said that we don't have to disclose it,' Cain said. Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves said he won't be granting Cox last-minute clemency or a delay of execution States have had difficulty finding lethal injection drugs because pharmaceutical companies began blocking their use for carrying out death sentences. A court filing this year showed Mississippi had acquired three drugs for its lethal injection protocol. Pictured: The lethal injection room at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman, Mississippi Republican Governor Tate Reeves has no intention of granting clemency or delaying the execution, his spokeswoman said Tuesday. Death Penalty Action, which opposes executions, had petitioned Reeves to step in. 'David Cox is waiving his appeals & inviting his execution. This amounts to state-sponsored suicide,' the group said in a petition. 'It's not about him. It's about us. In what other circumstance in Mississippi does a prisoner dictate his punishment?' A spiritual adviser will be available for Cox before the execution, the commissioner said. Mississippi carried out six executions in 2012. The state does not have any others scheduled after Cox's, though more than 30 people are on death row in the state. Ex-Maryland cop Robert Vicosa, 42, was suspected to have taken his daughters in a stolen vehicle on Tuesday morning after holding his estranged wife hostage at the family home in Windsor, Pennsylvania Pennsylvania cops have launched a manhunt for two young sisters who were kidnapped by their father and say they may be in danger. Aaminah, 6, and Giana Vicosa, 7, were last seen in Windsor, Pennsylvania on Tuesday morning at 11:49am with their father Robert Vicosa, 42 - a former Maryland police officer. Police uncovered the kidnapping on Sunday after Vicosa's estranged wife told police that he had held her hostage in their family home and allegedly violently assaulted her. Vicosa, who is believed to be with another Baltimore cop, then left with the children before crashing the car he was driving into a canal. Shortly after the crash, he then held a stranger at gunpoint and demanded the keys to her 2014 Volkswagen Jetta and her cellphone before fleeing with the children. The car and missing cellphone have since been recovered. Police said that the children are believed to be in extreme danger. 'I want to plead to Mr. Vicosa, 'Sir, you are, at one time, you were a police officer. In your heart, you know that what you are doing is not right,' York Area Regional Police Lt. Ken Schollenberger said at a news conference Wednesday morning. 'You are a father. You are a father to these two young ladies. We're asking you, we're pleading with you, take them anywhere that you can. Drop them off at a Sheetz, at a Rutter's, at any convenience store. Take them anywhere where there's a responsible person inside that they can go in and call 911. 'Do the right thing Robert. Bring them back.' A manhunt has been launched for two missing girls Aaminah, six, and Giana Vicosa, seven, after they were kidnapped by their father on Sunday Police have warned the public not to approach the former cop who was fired from the Baltimore County Police Department in August for sleeping on the job and insubordination. A warrant for Vicosa's arrest was issued on Tuesday with charges of kidnapping, simple assault and robbery. Police say they believe he could be driving a black 2013 Lexus G350 with Pennsylvania state license plate number KPK2076. Vicosa's wife had reported the assault to police on Sunday and claimed that there were multiple guns in the home and that drug use was involved. After obtaining a warrant to search the Monday, police found the home to be in disarray and vacant with only a malnourished dog on the property. The children were been taken by Vicosa in a black Acura that belonged to a relative of Sergeant Tia Bynum, a former work friend of his. Police tracked Vicosa's location to Bynum's home on Monday and were denied the opportunity to search her residence. Vicoas then allegedly stole another vehicle on Tuesday after he crashed the Acura into a canal. He and the two children then spent a night in a vacant camper. The female owner of the camper had come to the property the next day where she was held at gunpoint by Vicosa. Vicosa was reportedly last seen driving a 2013 Black Lexus G35 with Pennsylvania license plate number KPK2076 The girls have been featured on a missing and endangered persons alert by state police with the kidnapping date listed as Sunday He took the keys to her silver Volkswagen Jetta as well as her cellphone before heading off with the girls. Police later tracked the location of the vehicle only to discover it was empty. The woman had both her vehicle and cellphone returned to her after it was found. Cops then tracked Vicosa to Bynum's home, and after obtaining a search warrant they entered the home only to find it empty. Bynum and her black Lexus are both missing. It is unclear whether Bynum is with Vicosa and his children or not. At a press conference on Wednesday, an officer read a statement from the girls' mother. York Area Regional Police Lt. Ken Schollenberger spoke at a press conference on Wednesday and begged Vicosa to bring his daughters home to safety 'I am anxiously awaiting their return,' the letter had read. 'I miss them and love them and need them home.' An Amber Alert has not yet been issued for the girls because officers need to have a clear idea of what car Vicosa is driving. 'We were seconds away from issuing an Amber Alert,' Schollenberger said. 'Unfortunately, we found the car that he was in, and he was not located in it. 'At this point, the Amber Alert typically attaches to a vehicle or registration plate. We don't have a vehicle or registration plate now because the last one that he was in, he abandoned.' The girls have been featured on a missing and endangered persons alert by state police with the kidnapping date listed as Sunday. Aaminah has been described as being three feet and eight inches, 50 pounds, with green eyes and brown hair. Giana is four feet and three inches, 60 pounds, with both brown eyes and hair. 'We're going to use anything to our availability regardless of what his job is to bring this to a safe resolution,' Schollenberger told CBS 21. 'Of course, if he does have some specialized training we're looking to make sure we can counter that by any means necessary.' Italy is considering a lockdown of the unvaccinated, the latest European state to follow the medical apartheid imposed by Austria. Vienna on Monday ordered two million people who have not been fully vaccinated to stay at home for all but essential reasons, threatening fines of up to 1,237 for rule breakers. And Germany's incoming government has said that it wants unvaccinated people to be barred from going to work and travelling on public transport amid what Angela Merkel calls 'dramatic' infection levels. Now five Italian governors are backing the same approach amid a ferociously accelerating fourth wave of the virus in the EU's worst affected country - Italy's Covid death toll stands at more than 133,000. There were 7,815 new coronavirus cases in Italy on Tuesday and 74 new deaths, increases of 28 per cent and 9 per cent respectively on the same day last week. 'Eventual new lockdowns should not have to be suffered by those who are vaccinated. Restrictions should only apply to those who are not immunized,' said Massimiliano Fedriga, governor of Friuli-Venezia Giulia in the country's northeast. The governors of Tuscany, Calabria, Liguria and Piedmont agree with Fedriga. 2: A nurse assists a Covid-19 patient, in the new ward to deal with the Covid-19 emergency set up in the Fiera del Levante, on November 12, in Bari, Italy There were 7,815 new Covid-19 cases in Italy on Tuesday, an increase of 28 per cent on the same day last week There were 74 new deaths in Italy on Tuesday, a rise of 9 per cent on the same day last week Italy has one of the best vaccination rates in Europe, with 84 per cent of the population double-jabbed, however seven million have refused to take it. They also have a vigorous anti-vaxx movement within the country which has been rocked by protests against the Green Pass, a vaccine passport which is required to dine indoors, visit museums and cinemas and for long-distance public transport. But a growing number of Italian politicians are adamant that Rome must push ahead with a lockdown for the unvaccinated. Former prime minister Matteo Renzi tweeted: 'You're not vaccinated? Then stay at home.' It comes as Merkel today branded Germany's Covid situation 'dramatic' and called for harsher measures to curb the pandemic even as more states lockdown their unvaccinated citizens. Mrs Merkel warned 'we are in such an emergency', and called for new laws that would automatically trigger tough lockdown measures in any state that hits a certain threshold for Covid hospital admissions. The incoming Social Democrat (SDP) government on Tuesday warned that unvaccinated people will be barred from going to work and travelling on public transport. The new government will also recommend that everyone should work from home unless they have a 'compelling business reason'. 'This is actually a lockdown for the unvaccinated,' said Dirk Wiese, the deputy head of the SPD parliamentary group. Around 14 million Germans eligible to be vaccinated have not taken up the offer. State leaders are already rushing to implement their own lockdown measures which largely targeted the unvaccinated - making it harder for them to access public spaces and services without having a jab. Thirteen of the country's 16 federal states now have or are planning to implement rules that restrict the activities of people based largely on their vaccination status. So-called 2G rules restrict access to various buildings and spaces to people who have either been double-jabbed or previously infected with Covid. It is a stricter form of the 3G rule, which allows un-jabbed people to enter provided they have tested negative for the virus. Angela Merkel has called for tougher lockdown measures in Germany and an extension of the state of emergency as Covid cases soar to record levels Cases are rapidly rising across the country and have hit record levels in recent weeks as a relatively low jab rate and slow booster drive combined to speed up infections Exactly which locations unjabbed people are barred from entering varies state to state. In Baden-Wuerttemberg the passes are required to access most public buildings, including cinemas, restaurants, theaters, and galleries. In Lower Saxony, the 2G rules only apply to indoor events with more than 1,000 people, though tougher measures are being planned. Germany has seen Covid infections soar to record levels in recent weeks, as a relatively low double-jabbed rate of 67 per cent combined with a sluggish booster drive led infections to spread rapidly. Health Chief Jens Spahn has come in for criticism by a lockdown-weary public who have accused him of failing to prepare for winter months, when respiratory illnesses such as Covid are known to spread faster. Newspapers such as Bild and Suddeutsche Zeitung blasted Spahn for removing free Covid tests for most people, while also closing some vaccination centres after the spring wave had subsided. Deaths are nowhere near the levels seen during the first and second wave of Covid, but have started to climb rapidly amid fears they could soon top the previous peaks Germany is now reopening some jab hubs in an effort to boost its vaccine drive, but many will not be operational until January or February. The German lockdown measures come off the back of Austria, which this week confined some 2million unvaccinated people to their homes amid soaring cases. Branded 'vaccine apartheid' by critics, it has never-the-less led to record queues to get jabs according to The Telegraph. While many told the newspaper they were unhappy at the new rules, they never-the-less appeared to be achieving the desired result. Some 462,000 came forward for jabs yesterday, the highest number since the summer. Meanwhile Slovakia and Greece said they are considering a similar lockdown, though have no plans to activate one yet. Gabriel Attal, the French government spokesman, also noted Wednesday that his country's outbreak is also being driven largely by those who have not been jabbed - but said no new measures will be put in place for now. The Czech Republic and Slovakia reported record daily numbers of new coronavirus cases on Wednesday, a day before the governments of the neighbouring nations plan to approve new restrictions in response to rising infections. The Czech daily tally soared to 22,479 new cases, eclipsing the previous record set on January 7 by almost 5,000 and nearly 8,000 more than a week ago. Austria has locked down its unvaccinated citizens, with people now forced to carry vaccination papers so they can leave their homes Austria is battling a brutal fourth wave of Covid that has seen its infection rate soar to one of the highest in Europe (pictured, a patient is treated in hospital) The country's infection rate rose to 813 new cases per 100,000 residents over the past seven days, up from 558 a week earlier. Czech prime minister Andrej Babis said the government was considering several options, including following neighbouring Austria in ordering a lockdown for unvaccinated residents. Slovakia reported 8,342 new virus cases, surpassing the previous record of 7,244 set on Friday. The Slovakian government is planning new restrictions on unvaccinated people as the country's hospitals become overwhelmed with Covid-19 patients. Slovakian prime minister Eduard Heger said his Cabinet would vote on Thursday on recommendations from an advisory group of medical experts. And in Hungary, the number of daily Covid-19 deaths and new officially recorded cases on Wednesday climbed to highs not seen since a pandemic surge last spring. Government figures showed 178 daily deaths and 10,265 new cases in the country of fewer than 10 million people. The latter figure approached record pandemic highs set in March, while daily deaths were the highest since May 1. The numbers reflect a worsening pandemic situation in the Central European country, which in spring had the highest Covid-19 death rate per capita in the world. The mother of the teenage girl who was raped by a boy in a skirt in a Virginia school bathroom says she and her husband were pressured to remain silent about the incident, and had no idea their daughter's attacker had been allowed back in school until last month. 'We were silenced for many months,' Jessica Smith told DailyMail.com, in her first interview since her daughter was sexually assaulted by a 15-year-old classmate at Stone Bridge High School in Loudoun County in May. 'We were told not to say a word that could jeopardize our daughter's case.' The Virginia school district was thrust into the national spotlight earlier this year over accusations that it had covered up the attack. The story exploded when her husband Scott Smith was dragged out of a school board meeting with a bloodied mouth after cops intervened when the furious dad confronted an audience member on June 22. After the teen was arrested in July, school officials quietly transferred him to another high school in the district, even keeping the victim's parents in the dark. In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Jessica Smith (pictured right with husband Scott) claimed they were pressured to stay silent on their daughter's rape at a Virginia school bathroom earlier this year. The mom also revealed they had no idea the girl's attacker had been allowed back in school until last month Scott Smith, the father of the first female victim, was pictured with a bloody mouth, being dragged out of a school board meeting on June 22 - a month after the attack - after listening to school officials say no one had been sexually assaulted in the bathrooms when that's what his daughter had reported the previous month The boy, whose name is being withheld by DailyMail.com because he's a minor, would be once again arrested in October for allegedly assaulting a second girl at Broad Run High School. 'When I learned there was a second victim, I was dumbfounded,' Jessica told DailyMail.com in Leesburg, Virginia on Monday. 'I didn't believe it because I was under the impression that he was at home with an ankle monitor, not at school.' 'We felt like this was our responsibility, what happened to this second victim,' the mom added, her eyes tearing up as she requested a tissue. 'The pain that we had on May 28 came back. All the hurt, the anger, the frustration, everything came back. I felt so horribly for the second victim and her family. This should have never happened. They shouldn't have put him back in school.' Jessica revealed she was meeting with lawyers after the interview to finalize a major lawsuit her family is planning to file this week against the school district. A GoFundMe campaign was also organized to help raise money for the parents' court expenses. After months of keeping quiet, she said she and her husband, with the support of other parents and activists, will attempt to hold school officials responsible for failing to protect their daughter and other students from a boy who, it turns out, had a history of issues going back to elementary school. 'That's the problem, that we were silenced,' she continued. 'We were not allowed to go to rallies. We were not allowed to go to meetings with other groups. It didn't matter what it was. Because we were under this microscope.' 'This is not about politics,' she added. 'This is about sexual assault and how we need to make changes in our schools in order to protect victims, get them the help they need sooner, and believe them. And don't allow a perpetrator back into another school.' The 15-year-old was formerly a student Stone Bridge High School where he was accused of raping a female classmate in the girl's bathroom in May A skirt-wearing teenage boy who was last month found guilty of raping a female classmate was later in May, pleaded no contest on Monday to sexually assaulting a second girl at Broad Run High School (pictured) in Ashburn, Loudoun County, Virginia, in October Earlier on Monday, Jessica accompanied her daughter to a hearing in Loudoun County juvenile court where prosecutors revealed details of the second attack, during which the boy allegedly dragged another girl into a classroom and touched her breasts. The teen pleaded no contest to the charges, clearing the way for him to be sentenced next month for both crimes. Jessica sat in the back row near her daughter, purposefully keeping her out of the teen's line of sight. She wanted to prevent a repeat of last month's hearing on the rape case, when the attacker stared back at his victim before he was found guilty. 'I made sure that he could not see her because the last time he did turn around and view her, which I felt was extreme intimidation,' Jessica explained. She praised her daughter's strength for even showing up Monday. 'Our daughter did not have to be in court,' the mother said, noting how the teen has struggled to cope with the rape, receiving therapy and medication. 'She was there for the second victim to show support for her. Our daughter will stand tall, stay strong and get through this.' The mom said that even after the rape took place, she had no idea the boy had prior incidents at the school. The victim's family blasted commonwealth attorney Buta Biberaj (pictured on Monday) who prosecuted the boy, for publicly defending his transfer to another school by falsely declaring he had no prior history of troubling behavior The Loudoun County teenage student pleaded no contest Monday to sexually assaulting a classmate at Broad Run High School in October in a case that has generated a political firestorm locally and nationally She only learned of his troubled past when DailyMail.com earlier this month revealed that in fifth grade the boy had sent nude photos of himself to a female classmate, prompting an investigation but no arrest. The boy had also been repeatedly suspended for fist fights and other misbehavior. 'There should have been more done to help, not a coverup,' Jessica said of the fifth-grade incident and May assault. The rape took place on the Friday before Memorial Day. The victim admitted she'd previously had sex with the boy in the bathroom and that they'd arranged to meet there again that afternoon. He followed her into a stall, where she told him she was not in the mood for sex, but he threw her on the floor and forced her to perform sex acts. Last month, the boy's mother, in an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, defended his actions as that of a hormonal teen who had consensual sex with the girl twice before, and, 'Just wanted to have sex in the bathroom, with someone that was willing.' Jessica said she was upset by the mom's remarks, but admitted: 'I do not walk in her shoes. I don't need to bash anybody.' She said her daughter had never mentioned the boy before the rape, and that it did not matter whether or not they had sex prior to the incident. The case became the searing tip of a raging debate in Loudoun County over transgender students' rights and parents' freedom of speech 'Just because you know somebody doesn't mean that every time it's going to happen,' she said. 'She said no. No means no, plain and simple.' The case is one that hits close to home to Jessica who revealed to DailyMail.com that she too had been a victim of a sexual assault, stating: 'I'm a survivor myself.' 'It was hard, it is hard,' she said, 'but we are fighters. We're survivors and we will get through this.' 'It's just sad, it's really sad. This should have not happened, at all.' Jessica also found the issue of the boy's attire a side show. The skirt became a focal point of coverage after her husband labeled the boy 'gender fluid' and challenged transgender bathroom policies that let students select bathrooms based on their gender identity. From rape to sentencing: Timeline of teen boy in skirt May 28: Teen, 15, wearing a skirt allegedly rapes female classmate in girl's bathroom. She reports it to the principal. Superintendent Scott Ziegler sends an email to colleagues confirming that it had been reported June 22: Scott Smith, the father of the rape victim, was dragged out of a school board meeting with a bloodied mouth and arrested after listening to school officials say no one had been sexually assaulted in the bathroom after his daughter had reported the rape July 6: Detectives call the boy's mother to report his imminent arrest. She drives him down to the station herself and he spends the next couple weeks at the juvenile detention center in nearby Leesburg October 6: The 15-year-old changes schools and allegedly drags another a girl into a classroom and inappropriately touches her. Police are called and he is arrested the same day October 25: Teen is found guilty for the May 28 sexual assault at Stone Bridge High School. The judge 'substantiated' charges of forcible sodomy and forcible fellatio, the juvenile equivalent of a conviction October 26: Students stage a walkout of their classrooms in a show of 'solidarity' for the victim. Some stood in front of their school, chanting: 'Loudoun County Protects Rapists!' November 15: Skirt-wearing teen pleads no content to sexual assault of a fellow student December 13 : Sentencing scheduled for both cases Advertisement She said she opposes the policy, but believes schools should accommodate transgender students, possibly by creating a third bathroom classification. 'I found it odd that a boy was wearing a skirt,' she said. 'But it wasn't relevant. The relevance is that there was a boy in the girl's bathroom who attacked my daughter. There was no relevance to what he was wearing. That's not what we're here for.' 'All our kids need to be safe at school,' she said. 'And this is not happening right now.' She said parents in her community have been harshly criticized for speaking out. She blasted commonwealth attorney Buta Biberaj, who prosecuted the boy, for publicly defending his transfer to another school by falsely declaring he had no prior history of such behavior. Jessica noted the National School Boards Administration, in September, went so far as to label her husband and other parents who voice opposition at school board meetings 'domestic terrorists.' 'Scott is far from being a domestic terrorist,' she said. 'He is the papa bear. And all he wants is what's best for our community.' On June 22, Scott was dragged out of a school board meeting where officials justified the district's transgender bathroom policies and denied there had been any incidents in girls' bathrooms. Jessica was at the meeting with her husband and their daughter. She said Scott got into an argument with a female activist who was harassing him and expressed doubts that his daughter had been raped. 'My husband said our child was sexually assaulted in the bathroom and the woman said that did not happen,' Jessica recalled. 'I believe that's when he called her a something. He responded verbally, then the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office took him down to the ground unlawfully. 'I could not believe that they were taking down my husband, the father of a rape victim,' Jessica continued. She went on to accuse district officials of continually lying about the rape case. Hours after the attack, the superintendent emailed school board members to acknowledge the incident, just as the girl was being taken to the hospital to undergo a rape kit, the mom said. 'Then fast forward, the superintendent told the public he knew nothing about it,' she said. 'They lied. That's all they do is lie, lie to us about what is going on in our school, blatantly lied that nothing ever happened. They all knew.' The saga garnered worldwide attention as details were leaked. Irate parents accused the district of a coverup, questioning how a teen with a pending rape case was allowed to stay in the district to commit another sex crime. Amanda Shallant (pictured) spoke during a school board meeting last month as she held a sign that read: 'LCPS protects rapists' But Jessica kept out of the fray. 'It's been very hard for our family as we see the news play over and over and over again,' she said. 'It was very devastating to be reminded every day that May 28 occurred.' But now that there is attention, her family is hoping to harness it for reform. That's what the lawsuit is about, she said. 'People were trying to point to us as being political. But this is not political. 'This is about sexual assault and victims' rights and keeping our kids safe at school. So hopefully now, we'll be able to express ourselves more.' 'All we want is change,' she said. 'We want all our kids to be safe in school. This is what we're standing for. We're standing for everyone's kid at school. No matter what you are, every child at school needs to be safe and that's our plan.' Meanwhile, she plans to attend the boys' sentencing in court on December 13. 'This boy needs rehabilitation, he needs therapy, he needs whatever the commonwealth can provide him to understand what he did was wrong, and to learn from that,' she said. 'That takes time. So I hope they give him enough time to rehabilitate himself in order to one day be a successful community member.' Sen. Kyrsten Sinema insisted in a rare interview that came out Wednesday that she would not leave the Democratic Party, though bashed progressive activists for 'unfairly and illegally' following her into the bathroom to protest her stance on Biden's Build Back Better bill. Politico interviewed the Arizona Democrat, who pledged she wouldn't switch parties, despite complimenting Republican Leader Mitch McConnell's wit: 'He has a dry sense of humor, it's underrated,' Sinema said. Sinema also complained about the coverage her sometimes outlandish outfit choices receive. 'It's very inappropriate,' the 45-year-old freshman senator said. 'I wear what I want because I like it,' she said. In a new interview with Politico, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema complained about the coverage of her sometimes outlandish outfit choices: 'I wear what I want because I like it,' the 45-year-old Arizona Democrat said During the pandemic, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema wore colorful wigs, standing in solidarity with people who were practicing social distancing and thus not going into the salon to get their roots colored 'It's not a news story, and it's no one's business,' she continued. 'It's not helpful to heave [coverage] be positive or negative. It also implies that somehow women are dressing for someone else.' During her time in the Senate, Sinema has sported colorful wigs - in a show of solidarity for those practicing social distancing, and thus not getting their roots done at the hair salon. She also sported a 'F**k Off' ring in April. Sinema sported the band after voting against raising the federal minimum wage to $15, a move that received criticism from the left flank of her party. On issues like bumping up the minimum wage - as well as passing the Build Back Better bill with its original $3.5 trillion pricetag, election reform and changing the filibuster - Sinema suggests to Politico that she believes her party overpromised voters. 'You're either honest or you're not honest,' she said. 'So just tell the truth and be honest and deliver that which you can deliver.' 'There's this growing trend of people in both political parties who promise things that cannot be delivered, in order to get the short-term political agenda,' she continued. 'And I believe that it damages the long term health of our democracy.' Sinema was followed into a bathroom at Arizona State University, where she teaches, by Living United for Change in Arizona activists, who questioned her resistance to Biden's Build Back Better bill - as well as her stance on immigration. Democrats had originally wanted to tuck an immigration provision into the bill, which will be passed through the Senate using reconciliation, but plans have so far been thwarted by the Senate parliamentarian. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema told Politico she would not be changing parties, though she also complimented Republican Leader Mitch McConnell's wit: 'He has a dry sense of humor, it's underrated' Sen. Kyrsten Sinema also complained about progressive activists who followed her into the bathroom to protest, saying the move was unfair and illegal During the interview, Sinema stayed coy about a number of things - including whether she would ultimately support the Build Back Better bill. 'If you're in the middle of negotiating things that are delicate or difficult ... doing it in good faith directly with each other is the best way to get to an outcome,' she said. 'I'm still in the process of negotiating the second provision of the president's agenda and I don't negotiate in the press.' She did offer that she 'will not support tax policies that have a negative impact on our economic climate.' Sinema didn't want to see taxes raised on corporations and some wealthy Americans to pay for Biden's Build Back Better social spending bill. She added that the bill's climate change provisions are the 'most important part of what is under discussion.' Again playing coy, Sinema also refused to say whether she would run for re-election. She's not up until 2024. And she wouldn't comment on Rep. Ruben Gallego, another Arizona Democrat, suggesting he could primary challenge her. Cassava CEO Remi Barbier denied allegations that the company manipulated research The US Securities and Exchange Commission is reportedly investigating claims that Alzheimer's drug developer Cassava Sciences manipulated research results using Photoshop to alter images in a scientific paper. Cassava, based in Austin, Texas, revealed in a regulatory filing on Monday that it is 'cooperating' with 'certain government agencies' that have asked it to provide corporate information and documents. The SEC is one of those agencies, according to a Wall Street Journal report citing people familiar with the matter. The unusual claims against Cassava were first brought forward in August, when two doctors who had bet against the company's stock filed a citizen petition with the Food and Drug Administration claiming an article in the Journal of Neuroscience had been manipulated. Cassava furiously denounced the allegations, which CEO Remi Barbier called false and financially motivated. Two doctors who had bet against the company's stock were the first to claim that 'western blot' images such as this one in a research paper had been altered with Photoshop An SEC spokesperson and Cassava executive did not immediately respond to inquiries from DailyMail.com on Wednesday morning. Cassava, which began trading under its current name in 2019, has no commercial drugs and hasn't reported any product revenue since 2013. Nevertheless, it has been one of the hottest stocks of 2021, rising as much as 1,570 percent from the beginning of the year before the allegations first emerged and the shared plunged. Hoau-Yan Wang co-authored the research papers in question The company's stock was down 25 percent in morning trading on Wednesday, but still up more than 550 percent year-to-date. Cassava's experimental drug, called Simufilam, aims to restore a protein called filamin A that is misshapen in the brains of Alzheimer's patients, according to the Journal. The company claims that in its contorted state, the protein triggers a toxic buildup of another protein called amyloid, which is a classic hallmark of Alzheimer's. The allegations against the company were first made by two physicians who disclosed they had shorted the company's stock: David Bredt, a biotech entrepreneur and former neuroscience research chief at Johnson & Johnson and Eli Lilly, and Geoffrey Pitt, a cardiologist and professor at Weill Cornell Medicine. The two doctors claimed that Cassava, in research articles authored by Hoau-Yan Wang, a Cassava adviser and CUNY associate medical professor, manipulated images depicting western blots. David Bredt (left) and Geoffrey Pitt (right) took positions against Cassava's stock before going public with their allegations against the company Cassava's stock soared before the claims were made public in August. It is still up more than 550 percent so far this year Western blots are a common lab technique for detecting proteins in samples of tissue or blood, and typically appear as a series of parallel bars or bands, separated by their molecular weights. An internal review by the Journal of Neuroscience found an instance of duplicated images in the paper, and issued a correction on November 10, which said the error didn't affect the article's conclusions. However, other independent reviews claim to have discovered evidence of image manipulation. Elisabeth Bik, a microbiologist and image-manipulation consultant who says she doesn't have any position in Cassava stock, said in a Medium post that she agrees with concerns raised about the company's research. Bik pointed out an number of unexplained irregularities in research papers that Wang had authored for Cassava. Elisabeth Bik, a microbiologist and image-manipulation consultant, pointed out images that she says show telltale signs of alteration, marking bands that appear identical above 'At least five other articles from the Wang lab at CUNY appear to show image concerns as well,' wrote Bik. 'These papers might not be directly related to Simufilam research, but they are still indirectly connected to Cassava Sciences or its drug candidates.' Barbier, the Cassava CEO, has denied the allegations in multiple public statements. 'I've never doubted the integrity of our people or science,' Barbier said on November 4. 'We remain focused on conducting a Phase 3 clinical program of simufilam in people with Alzheimer's disease. It's an important endeavor, notwithstanding pundits who may be louder than they are learned. We'll stay the course until our job is done,' he added. Bik and other scientists noted that it's possible that Cassava's drug candidate may still be effective, even if the research was manipulated. 'The drug might work great,' Bik told the Journal. Children should wait at least 12 weeks after catching Covid to get their jab, Britain's vaccine advisory panel recommended today. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) said there is evidence the longer gap reduces the risk of myocarditis, a type of heart inflammation reported in a small number of children after vaccination. Today's change to the guidance only applies to healthy children aged 12 to 17, who previously only had to wait a month after infection to get jabbed. The four-week gap remains the advice for adults over the age of 18 and children extremely vulnerable to Covid. Twelve to 15-year-olds are still being offered just one dose of Pfizer's vaccine while officials monitor myocarditis rates in other countries. But as of this week, 16 and 17-year-olds can now come forward for the second jab after the UK's regulator decided the benefit of the jabs 'clearly' outweighed the risk. So far, more than half of older teenagers have come forward for a first dose and nearly a third of 12 to 15-year-olds have had the initial jab. Fifteen-year-old Quinn Foakes receiving a Covid-19 vaccination at Belfairs Academy in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, in September Families who have recently had a child vaccinated shortly after infection were told not to worry, and that the new approach is 'highly precautionary'. The UK Health Security Agency, which announced the move today, admitted that it would slow down the rollout of the national vaccine programme. But it insisted it should not have a major impact on the epidemic because children still have high levels of natural immunity. The UKHSA estimates half of secondary-aged pupils have already had the virus. Two doses of Pfizer's vaccine wane after six months no matter what age you are Covid immunity wanes within six months of Pfizer's second vaccine no matter how old you are, a study has found as the NHS gears up to roll out annual boosters at a cost in the region of 1billion to taxpayers. People who finished their two-dose course in January had a 51 per cent increased risk of catching the virus by July than those who were jabbed later, according to the research on more than a million Israelis. Scientists claimed the increased risk of getting infected was visible among people of all ages, although the elderly remain face much higher odds of becoming severely ill. The study by Israeli researchers using medial data from 1.3million adults in the country is the first to confirm that younger people also see their immunity against the virus wane within months. There was hope that protection would hold-up better in younger groups because they typically have stronger immune systems. Israel, which has led the charge on vaccines throughout the pandemic, is already offering boosters to over-16s so long as five months have passed since their second dose. The researchers said it was too early to tell how quickly immunity wanes after a booster jab but it could last longer. In the UK, top-up doses were approved for all over-50s, health and care home workers and severely ill patients in September and ministers expanded the programme to people in their forties this week. Vaccine advisers in Britain have admitted that they could be given to younger adults but they are waiting on more conclusive evidence on their safety and efficacy. Advertisement The agency, which replaced Public Health England last month, said natural infection provided good protection against re-infection for three to six months. A major study in Israel today found that protection from two doses of Pfizer's vaccine lasts a similar length of time. Immunity from a single dose, however, wanes more quickly. Dr Mary Ramsay, head of immunisations at UKHSA, said: 'The Covid vaccines are very safe. 'Based on a highly precautionary approach, we are advising a longer interval between Covid infection and vaccination for those aged under 18. 'This increase is based on the latest reports from the UK and other countries, which may suggest that leaving a longer interval between infection and vaccination will further reduce the already very small risk of myocarditis in younger age groups. 'Young people and parents should be reassured that myocarditis is extremely rare, at whatever point they take up the vaccine, and this change has been made based on the utmost precaution.' 'We keep all advice under constant review and will revise it according to the latest data and evidence.' UK Government data justifying today's update shows nine in every million under-18s in the UK will get myocarditis after a single dose of Pfizer's Covid jab, the same as around one per 110,000. But for every million doses of the vaccine administered to children, they will prevent around 150 hospitalisations from Covid. The JCVI held off on recommending second doses for children because data from Israel and the US suggested the myocarditis risk is as high as one in 10,000. But real-world UK data in slightly older adults - who also saw above normal rates of myocarditis in other countries - was not higher after the second jab. This is thought to be because the dosing gap between doses here is 12 weeks, whereas it's between three and four weeks in the US and Israel. The JCVI believes that 12-week gap might also be the sweet spot for getting a jab after natural infection in young people, which prompted today's tweak to the guidance. There is also evidence that rates of myocarditis in Britain are similar in 16 and 17-year-olds and 18 to 29-year-olds, after the second jab. This is why the JCVI recommend two jabs for healthy older teens earlier this week. But it is still weighing up the evidence on younger children. It is unclear why the longer space between vaccination or natural infection reduces the risk of myocarditis yet. This gap might give the immune system time to calm down from the reaction to the first dose or infection. During Covid infection or immunisation, the body produces cells to fight the virus. If the disease-fighting cells enter the heart, they can inflame the muscle. Construction of a luxury building next door triggered the collapse of an already fragile Florida condominium that killed 98 people in June, according to a new lawsuit. The lawsuit, filed late Tuesday on behalf of Champlain Towers South victims and family members, contends that work on the adjacent Eighty Seven Park tower damaged and destabilized a building in dire need of major structural repair. Champlain Towers, the lawsuit claims, 'was an older building in need of routine repairs and maintenance, but it was not until excavation and construction began on the luxury high-rise condominium project next door' that the building became unsafe. 'The collapse was entirely preventable,' the lawsuit says. Champlain Towers was in the midst of its 40-year structural review when it collapsed without warning in the early morning hours of June 24, killing 98 people in one of the deadliest building failures in US history. A new lawsuit claims construction of a luxury building next to Champlain Towers South triggered the collapse of an already fragile Florida condominium. Pictured: Eighty Seven Park tower beside the land where the partially-collapsed building was located Champlain Towers was in the midst of its 40-year structural review when it collapsed without warning in the early morning hours of June 24, killing 98 people The collapse triggered multiple federal and state investigations, and a flurry of lawsuits by victims, families and condo owners. The cause of the Champlain Towers South collapse has not been determined. The lead investigating agency is the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST), which recently estimated its probe could take as long as two years. The lawsuit contends that excavation, pile-driving and other work at Eighty Seven Park between 2016 and 2019 caused vibrations that weakened the shaky structure next door. In addition, groundwater was funneled from the new building to the Champlain Towers property basement after developers bought a small road separating the two, the lawsuit says. Pictured: Search and rescue teams look for survivors at the Champlain Towers South residential condo, Tuesday, June 29, 2021, in Surfside, Florida The latest 169-page lawsuit was filed November 16 on behalf of Champlain Towers South victims and family members and could become a class action lawsuit This latest 169-page complaint is a potential class action that could represent all victims and their families. It was filed as part of an existing case in Miami-Dade County Circuit Court that also involves the planned sale of the Champlain Towers property to benefit victims. The lawsuit does not cite a specific amount of damages but could run into the hundreds of millions of dollars, according to attorneys involved in the case. The nine defendants include developers of Eighty Seven Park, an engineering firm, the Champlain Towers South condo association and a Miami law firm. The defendants denied that construction of Eighty Seven Park was responsible for the building collapse. The 18-story building is located in Miami Beach immediately south of the Champlain Towers site in Surfside. 'As numerous media reports have documented, Champlain Towers South was improperly designed, poorly constructed, significantly underfunded and inadequately maintained and repaired,' said attorney David B. Weinstein, who represents 8701 Collins Development LLC. 'We expect a full review of the facts - and the ongoing investigation by NIST - will affirm our position,' Weinstein said in an email. Video footage released in August by the US Department of Commerce's NIST showed various problems with the building's structure. Densely packed steel reinforcement in multiple areas and an alarming amount of corrosion in one specific section where a column was connected to the foundation are visible. 'The corrosion on the bottom of that column is astronomical,' Dawn Lehman, professor of structural engineering at the University of Washington, told The Miami Herald. 'If there's that amount of corrosion, this should have been fixed.' Video released by the US Department of Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) shows evidence of the Champlain Towers South building failures as United States Army Corps of Engineers inspect the debris A video from the NIST shows 'severe corrosion' at the base of a pillar at Champlain Towers South which Dawn Lehman, professor of structural engineering at the University of Washington describes as 'astronomical' She explained that the level of corrosion should have been obvious and documented in the building's 40-year inspection, which was taking place at the time of the collapse. Modern building projects treat steel reinforcements to protect against corrosion but those treatments may not have been used when Champlain Tower South was built in 1982. Lehman said the video shows multiple elements of the building, including beams, walls and columns, that appear to be overcrowded with steel reinforcement, which points to potential weaknesses in those structural elements. 'There is no reason there should be that kind of bar congestion,' she said. She explained that overcrowding wide-diameter steel reinforcement which is seen in the video hinders proper concrete placement and weakens the bond of the steel to the concrete. This defeats the purpose of the concrete putting uncalculated stress on the steel. This weakening would have been intensified in places where the densely packed steel reinforcements overlapped. Most building projects utilize a technique of overlapping steel reinforcements and wiring them together to secure against displacement when concrete is poured, called 'lap splice.' Structural drawings of the building show evidence of 'lap splice', Abieyuwa Aghayere, a Drexel University engineering researcher explained to the Herald after watching the video. 'It's already congested as it is,' Aghayere said. At the splice regions, it would have been 'even further congested,' he said. Judith Mitrani-Reiser will lead the NIST investigation to direct the collection and preservation of the debris in order to piece together and pinpoint the building's failure and make recommendations to improve building codes, standards, and practice 'We are trying to understand how the building failed. We would like to reconstruct this failure and in order to do that we need as much information as possible,' Mitrani-Reiser said as she explained her team's purpose NIST has conducted four previous investigations with the power granted to it by the National Construction Safety Team (NCST) Act of 2002. Under the law, the NIST can take control from the local authorities to lead investigations into major building failures in the US. The law grants the federal team primary access to investigate the site of a building disaster, access key pieces of evidence, and collect and preserve evidence from the site. It can determine the technical cause of the collapse and make recommendations to improve building codes, standards, and practices guided by findings to improve the structural safety in general. It cannot determine whether there was a criminal act or violations of a federal requirements, or state or local codes. It does not determine any associated culpability; that is determined in court. The NIST video introduces the department's investigative lead, Judith Mitrani-Reiser. The engineer announced that the team that will conduct a five-pronged investigation of the disaster. 'We are trying to understand how the building failed. We would like to reconstruct this failure and in order to do that we need as much information as possible,' she said. A report revealed that Champlain Towers' contractor lost his license amid fraud and negligence claims and that the architect had previously been suspended after a structure he built collapsed One report suggested the Champlain Towers South was doomed from the start. The contractor lost his license amid fraud and negligence claims, the developer was charged with tax evasion, and the architect had previously been suspended after a structure he built collapsed, the Miami Herald reported. Weisbrod was fined three times and threatened with suspension for various offenses, which forced him to surrender his license in 1998, Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation records show. The licensing agency filed three administrative claims accusing Weisbrod of completing specialized work without the proper permits, licenses, and inspections, and of failing to complete the contracted work, mismanagement, incompetence and fraud throughout the 1980s and 90s, according to the Herald. An investigation to determine the cause of the collapse of the residential building is underway Contractor Alfred Weisbrod surrendered his license three years after the towers were finished after years of complaints and lawsuits against him Many families want a memorial to be constructed on the grounds of the building's South tower, but their plans were foiled when the property was sold for $120million. A total of 55 apartments in the 136-unit condo complex collapsed, with around 80 percent of the building reportedly being occupied. Officials said at the time they believed the building had been 'substantially full.' Grieving relatives said last month that they want officials to continue searching the rubble for remains of their loved ones, saying they received just trace amounts of remains after the complex collapsed. Friends and family of New Yorker Estelle Hedaya, 54, said they received so little of the victim's remains that they could easily lift her casket. 'I could have lifted it with my pinkie,' her best friend Lisa Shrem told the Washington Post. After the initial recovery effort at the site was complete, officials moved the rubble to a location 14 miles from the condos, near Miami International Airport. The rubble has been separated into two piles, based on supposed value of the evidence it might hold. The portions that crews have determined to contain possible remains are moved inside a warehouse, while the rest is left outside. So little of New Yorker Estelle Hedaya's remains were found in the collapse of the Surfside condo in Miami. Her best friend Lisa Shrem said: 'I could have lifted it [her casket] with my pinkie' Authorities searched the rubble four times and have now requested a judge to allow them to dispose of any debris they haven't declared to hold any evidence The county has requested a judge's permission to dispose of debris they consider irrelevant to the investigation. 'It's very sad to hear how Miami-Dade County wants to throw everything away in the trash and make us forget and move past this,' said Martin Langesfeld, 24, who lost his twin sister, Nicole, and her new husband, Luis Sadovnic, 28, in the collapse. 'They were people with families and emotions. And they cannot be thrown away with trash.' Many families aren't convinced all the remains have been found. Throughout the four searches, crews continued to produce more and more remains. In addition, the heat wave in Miami all summer has compromised remains and could have made some indistinguishable to an untrained eye. 'We have very small percentages of loved ones,' Langesfeld told the Washington Post. His family has only received around 50 percent of Nicole's remains. Langesfeld said sifting through the rubble four times wasn't enough if there is still a chance remains could be found. 'I'm telling them to search one more time at least, because we have very small percentages of loved ones,' he said. 'If it takes a hundred times or a thousand times, then that's what needs to happen.' A mother accused of murdering her newborn baby was 'shocked and distressed' when she was told she was too far into her pregnancy to have an abortion, a court has heard. Silipa Keresi is accused of the murder of Maliki Keresi by abandoning him wrapped in a bath towel in woodland near to her home in Hythe, New Forest, Hampshire, on March 5, 2020. The 38-year-old from Fiji faces an alternative charge of infanticide, which states she was responsible for the death while her 'mind was disturbed' following the birth. Keresi, who worked at a launderette with her husband, Dharma Keresi, denies both charges. The trial at Winchester Crown Court heard that Keresi, who is married to a former Commonwealth soldier in the British Army, was, at the time Maliki died, stressed by the process of applying for permission to stay in the UK. She also said she was facing financial difficulties after her husband left the military. Jenni Manley, a midwife with the British Pregnancy Advisory Service - a charity which facilitates terminations - told the court the defendant attended an appointment on November 19, 2020. She said Keresi believed she was 12 to 14 weeks pregnant but an ultrasound scan showed she was at 26 weeks and five days, past the legal limit of 24 weeks for an abortion. Silipa Keresi, 38, is accused of the murder of Maliki Keresi, who was found dead wrapped in a towel in woodland near to her home in Hythe, Hampshire. Pictured, Keresi arriving at Winchester Crown Court on Tuesday morning Ms Manley said: 'She was very shocked. I was talking to her the whole time explaining the findings. 'When I explained how many weeks she was, she got off the bed and wanted to leave.' Describing the defendants reaction, she said: 'It was quite shocked and she looked to be quite distressed. 'I did explain to her it was very important that she was to seek antenatal care from her GP. 'She asked what her due date was, I quickly worked out it would be March 2020. She then left.' Ms Manley said she contacted the community midwife team and Keresis GP out of concern for her welfare. The court has heard that several attempts were made by the midwife service to contact the defendant during her pregnancy, including a visit to her home, but she failed to attend appointments. A jury was told baby Maliki was first found by Michael Dorsett, who had been walking his dog in the secluded woodlands near his house in the rural town where Keresi also lives, in March last year. The trial previously heard a post-mortem examination found Maliki died within 24 hours of being born and would have suffered hypothermia. Police forensics at the scene back in March 2020 where the baby was found dead in woodlands in Hythe, near Southampton, Hampshire The court heard Maliki's body was found by Michael Dorsett, who called police, before leading officers through the forest to Maliki, who was wrapped 'carefully' in the towel with his umbilical cord still attached The tests showed Maliki had no abnormalities or injuries and the cause of death was given as 'omission of care'. Keresi, who has two children living in the UK and two in Fiji, told a social worker that she was 'in a bad situation and stressed with life' and she had 'snapped'. Kerry Maylin, prosecuting, said the family were living in a hotel at the time and added: 'She explained she tried to keep things good for her family but felt under a lot of pressure since her husband left the army. 'There was also an uncertain immigration status and she didnt know what to do.' The trial continues. The Los Angeles Police Department trialed an artificial intelligence program designed to pinpoint users likely to commit crimes using their friends lists, location data and analyses of their social media posts. A trove of internal LAPD documents obtained by the Brennan Center for Justice reveal that the department tried out Voyager Labs' software in 2019, and considered a long-term contract before the four-month trial ended in November of that year. The software was used to surveil 500 social media accounts and sift through thousands of messages during that period, according to The Guardian. Police said that data was used to get 'real-time tactical intelligence,' 'protective intelligence' for members of local government and the police department and to investigate cases related to gangs and hate groups. A sales pitch sent to the LAPD by the firm lays bare the capabilities of the software, which can rapidly amass a suspect's social media posts into a searchable interface, use AI to gauge whether those posts show indicators of extremism or criminal activity and surveil thousands of associated accounts. Voyager Labs claims that their software can go further than scanning text for keywords. Using AI, their programs can gauge a user's conviction to their ideologies using what they call 'sentiment analysis' and determine whether an individual with extremist views has the 'passion needed to act on their beliefs.' A sales pitch for the program to the Los Angeles Police Department used a search run by an unidentified police department using the software on New York City-based activist Bahgat Saber, who urged social media followers to spread COVID to Egyptian government officials in a March 2020 video. It is unclear whether data obtained using the program led to Saber's arrest The service also has a function that would allow officers to 'log in with fake accounts that are already friended with the target subject,' on Facebook, Instagram and Telegram. Facebook's privacy policy prohibits fake accounts, and has previously deactivated accounts used by members of law enforcement. Regardless, the LAPD has a written policy for 'online undercover activity,' which allows officers to 'use social media in either a covert or clandestine capacity' with the permission of the commanding officer. Among the 10,000 documents obtained by the Brennan Center is an instructional video showing officers how to preserve information from social media which encourages them to set up 'dummy accounts.' Officers with the department's homicide division expressed interest in developing Voyager software that would let law enforcement spy on WhatsApp groups using an 'active persona' or 'avatar,' implying the usage of a fake account. An officer whose name was redacted called the in-process function a 'need-to-have' feature. It is unclear which Voyager Labs services the department used during the trial period. Although the department said that it was 'currently using' Voyager and hoped to invest $450,000 in additional technology from the firm in a September report, an LAPD spokesperson told The Guardian this week that the software isn't currently in use. She did not respond when asked when the department ceased using its services and whether the LAPD was still pursuing a contract with Voyager, the outlet said. The LAPD has long been scrutinized for asking officers to take down the social media handles of criminals - and even witnesses who haven't committed crimes themselves - on incident reports. Officers have been encouraged to ask for this information since 2015. Although Facebook's privacy policy prohibits fake accounts, and has previously deactivated accounts used by members of law enforcement, the LAPD has a written policy for 'online undercover activity' An LAPD field interview card, used for interviewing suspects but also innocent witnesses and citizens. On the back, it has a space for the interviewee's social media accounts However, the surveillance company takes social media investigation a step further - one officer expressed concern that some of the program's features were 'very close to "active monitoring."' Another had reservations about its capabilities, citing public outcry after the department's usage of similar software Geofeedia. In September, the Center released documents revealing that GeoFeedia was used to monitor hashtags and 'keywords' related to the Black Lives Matter movement, like #sayhername and 'officer involved shooting.' Activists compared the practice to 'stop and frisk' policies on the grounds that it is a vehicle for racial profiling. In internal messages with Voyager sales reps in September, members of the department said that the program was a helpful tool to quickly analyze social media data obtained using warrants, and in investigating 'street gangs' who networked online. 'Voyager has helped with some "smoking guns" - not necessarily generating The Big Lead that cracks a case wide open, but certainly in surfacing details about guns, murders etc.,' wrote an officer, whose name was redacted, to the company. 'Voyager has helped with some "smoking guns" - not necessarily generating The Big Lead that cracks a case wide open, but certainly in surfacing details about guns, murders etc.,' wrote an officer, whose name was redacted, to the company Records in the just-released cache show that the department had access to some elements of the software after their November 2019 trial ended, and that negotiations for a long-term partnership between the law enforcement agency and the surveillance company went on for over a year. The company also tested out the monitoring programs Geofeedia, Skopenow and Dataminr between March of 2016 and December of 2020. It is unclear how many different monitoring services the LAPD has considered. In promotional materials, the company boasted that its AI could have predicted that Adam Alsahli, 20, a Syrian-born Islamic Fundamentalist who carried out a terrorist attack at a Texas naval base in 2020, would pose a serious threat. The VoyagerCheck function of the firm's software was able to cross-reference Alsahli's Facebook, Instagram and Twitter posts and connections in 'mere minutes,' the department wrote in an analysis to the LAPD in Spring of 2020, while they were courting the agency for a contract. 'The majority of his posts deal with Islam... he expressed his support for the mujahidin in many of his posts. The indirect connections of [his] two Twitter accounts to... Islamist accounts [identified by Voyager] shows heavy overlap between his Twitter universe and that of other Islamic fundamentalists,' the company wrote. Meredith Broussard, a New York University journalism professor and AI expert, told The Guardian that the social media probe of Alsahli's account was 'religious bigotry embedded in code.' 'Just because you have an affinity for Islam does not mean youre a criminal or a terrorist. That is insulting and racist.' As an example, the company maintains that its AI could have predicted that Adam Alsahli (pictured), a Syrian-born Islamic Fundamentalist who carried out a terrorist attack at a Texas naval base in 2020, would pose a serious threat using his 'prolific presence on social media.' In another example, Voyager shared with the LAPD an unidentified police department's success with the program to scan the friends lists of New York City-based Muslim Brotherhood activist Bahgat Saber. The program determined that Saber, who urged Egyptian nationals to infect staff at Egyptian embassies and Consulates with COVID-19 'if [they wanted] the state to care about Coronavirus' in March of last year, had two friends on social media who claimed to work with Egyptian government agencies. It also weeded out many accounts among the activist's 4,000 friends that were friends with users that the program identified as 'extremist threats,' determined how many of those friends had placed geotags within New York City, located his second 'ghost' Facebook profile and collected his 3,663 public posts into a searchable, filterable database. 'Theres a basic guilt by association that Voyager seems to really endorse,' said Rachel Levinson-Waldman, a deputy director at the Brennan Center, to The Guardian of the study. 'This notion that you can be painted with the ideology of people that youre not even directly connected to is really disturbing.' Voyager did not specify whether the threat posed by Saber turned out to be legitimate, or whether the monitoring tool had led to his apprehension. 'We don't just connect existing dots,' read a promotional document for the service. 'We create new dots. What seem like random and inconsequential interactions, behaviors or interests, suddenly become clear and comprehensible.' 'The majority of his posts deal with Islam... he expressed his support for the mujahideen in many of his posts. The indirect connections of [his] two Twitter accounts to... Islamist accounts [identified by Voyager] shows heavy overlap between his Twitter universe and that of other Islamic fundamentalists,' the company wrote The program determined that Saber, who urged Egyptian nationals to infect staff at Egyptian embassies and Consulates with COVID-19, had two friends on social media who claimed to work with Egyptian government agencies Voyager's program also weeded out many accounts among the activist's 4,000 friends that were friends with users that the program identified as 'extremist threats,' determined how many of those friends had placed geotags within New York City, located his second 'ghost' Facebook profile and collected his 3,663 public posts into a searchable, filterable database Police departments in Boston, New York City, Baltimore and Washington D.C. also use third-party software to monitor social media, according to the Brennan Center. Opponents of the practice argue that the programs lead to the unfair targeting of minorities and activists, violate first-amendment rights and aren't scientifically based. 'This is hyperbolic AI marketing. The more they brag, the less I believe them,' Cathy ONeil, a data scientist and algorithmic auditor, told The Guardian. 'Theyre saying, We can see if somebody has criminal intent. No, you cant. Even people who commit crimes cant always tell they have criminal intent.' Police precincts in Michigan and Massachusetts came under fire last month for their usage of ShadowDragon's Social Net program, which analyzes more than 100 platforms, from Facebook and Instagram to Pornhub and Amazon, for key names and terms. 'People shouldn't be afraid to voice their political opinions or speak out against the police themselves because they fear the police are watching them,' Kade Crockford, director of the Technology for Liberty program at the ACLU of Massachusetts, told NBC 10 in Boston. A soldier has been jailed for over five years after taking a woman back to his barracks and raping her while she slept. Lance Corporal Aidan Hackett, 27, met the woman in a nightclub in Oxford in June 2019 and they travelled in a taxi back to his room at St David's Barracks in Bicester, Oxfordshire. The victim, also aged in her twenties, told Hackett she did not want to have sex but just listen to music together. She fell asleep and awoke to find her clothes had been removed by Hackett. Lance Corporal Aidan Hackett, 27, has today been jailed for five years and three months after pleading guilty to raping a woman as she slept at his barracks in July, 2019 After fleeing the scene, she called police and Hackett was arrested the following day. Thames Valley Police charged him with rape on August 4 of this year. Hackett, originally from Leeds, West Yorkshire, pleaded guilty to rape at the first opportunity and appeared today at Oxford Crown Court where he was sentenced to five years and three months' imprisonment. Detective Constable Tania Wasilewski-Norman, of Oxford CID, said: 'This was a shocking example of a man taking advantage of the victim's trust and he raped her while she was asleep. 'The victim awoke to this attack and contacted the police immediately and Hackett was arrested. 'The victim underwent medical examinations as a part of this investigation, which helped us to prove that Hackett had raped his victim. 'Given the weight of evidence against him, Hackett has, at least, spared the victim the ordeal of this case going to trial by a guilty plea, and he has now been sentenced to prison as a result. 'Taking advantage of a woman who was sleeping, and therefore in a vulnerable position, is completely unacceptable. 'The victim was asleep, and it is absolutely clear that there was no consent whatsoever in this case. 'We will always take reports of rape seriously and support victims of such offences and endeavour to bring offenders to justice.' LCpl Hackett met the woman in an Oxford nightclub and took her to St David Barracks (entrance pictured here) in Bicester, Oxfordshire Detective Constable Nikki Lawton, based at Aylesbury police station, is specially-trained in victim support and she helped guide the victim throughout two year investigation. She said: 'The victim in this case has been a true inspiration to me, and I hope she will be for other victims of this type of crime. 'She simply wanted to listen to music and talk with Hackett when she took a taxi back to his barracks, and Hackett completely abused this trust. 'Over the course of the last two years, the victim has missed out on a lot of opportunities while we brought Hackett to justice. 'I would like to offer my personal thanks and praise to the victim for her support of our investigation and understanding of the time it has taken to secure this conviction. 'I can assure any future victims of crimes such as this that they will always be listened to, believed and supported, and it is never acceptable to suffer this kind of offence. Please report it and we will conduct thorough investigations.' Hackett will also sign the sex offenders register for life. An Army spokesman said: 'We can confirm that Lance Corporal Hackett was convicted of rape at Oxford Crown Court. He was sentenced to five years and three months imprisonment and ordered to sign the sex offenders register for life.' Advertisement Cancelling Christmas plans is a 'responsible decision', Ireland's top medic claimed today as fears grow that the exploding crisis in Europe may force Britain into imposing curbs this winter. Starting tomorrow in Ireland, all hospitality businesses including nightclubs and pubs will be forced to close at midnight, the use of Covid passports will be expanded, and people will be advised to work from home where possible. The country took the decision to increase restrictions because of a surge in infections, with Europe once again becoming the epicentre of the pandemic. Both Austria and the Netherlands have already reimposed curbs, and Germany is considering tightening restrictions. Dr Tony Holohan, Ireland's chief medical officer, said it would be up to business and individuals to decide whether to hold Christmas parties or meet up in the festive period. Asked if people should cut down socialising, he said: 'People are making these kinds of decisions as ways of reducing their own risk and ways of reducing the risk to their loved ones and their friends and family and so on. 'These are responsible decisions. Decisions that nobody wants to be taking it this time of the year, of course. We all understand the value of Christmas, particularly in this country. To me, those are responsible decisions now that people are making.' No10 has repeatedly rejected pleas to implement its Plan B, which would see similar measures to what are being levied on Ireland. But Boris Johnson has admitted a full-blown lockdown could still be on the cards if cases spike. Speaking at a press conference on Monday, the PM warned of 'storm clouds that are gathering over parts of the continent' and warned the country cannot become complacent. Ireland will reimpose Covid restrictions from Friday amid a surge in cases, as the Taoiseach refused to rule out going further if infections keep rising Covid deaths in Ireland are still well below the highs seen during the first and second waves, but have been ticking upwards since the end of summer Cancelling Christmas plans is a 'responsible decision', Ireland's chief medical officer Dr Tony Hoolahan (right) claimed today as the storm of cases in Europe prompted fears Britain may follow suit in imposing curbs this winter. Speaking at a press conference on Monday, Boris Johnson (pictured today, left) warned of 'storm clouds that are gathering over parts of the continent' Ireland took the decision to increase restrictions because of a surge in infections, with Europe once again becoming the epicentre of the pandemic. Both Austria and the Netherlands have already reimposed curbs, and Germany is considering tightening restrictions WHAT ARE THE NEW RESTRICTIONS BEING REIMPOSED IN IRELAND? Ireland has become the latest European country to reimpose Covid restrictions amid a surge in cases as winter sets in. Starting tomorrow, all hospitality businesses including nightclubs and pubs will be forced to close at midnight, the use of Covid passports will be expanded, and people will be advised to work from home where possible. Household contacts of people who test positive on a PCR will also be forced to self-isolate for five days even if double-jabbed, and will only be allowed out if they test negative on three separate antigen tests. Ireland follows the lead of Austria and the Netherlands in imposing Covid curbs as Europe once again becomes the epicentre of the pandemic. While Ireland's current restrictions do not go as far as Austria whose government has been accused of 'vaccine apartheid' after locking the unvaccinated inside their homes Taoiseach Micheal Martin has refused to rule out going further. 'It remains to be seen as to whether these measures will be sufficient to hold back the tide of infection and hospitalisation,' he said in an evening address to the nation. 'We're not ruling out any further measures, we'll keep them under review.' Advertisement Mr Johnson said: 'A new wave of coronavirus is steadily sweeping through central Europe and is now affecting our nearest neighbours in western Europe. 'We don't yet know the extent to which this new wave will wash up on our shores but history shows we cannot afford to be complacent.' Speaking about how people should act on top of the new restrictions in Ireland today, Dr Holohan said cancelling office Christmas parties would be the 'responsible' thing to do. He told RTE News at One: 'An organisation, looking at itself and looking at the kinds of measures that it now needs to take, when we're advising people to stay at home as much as possible and work from home, those would be responsible decisions, if they were to be taken.' The CMO said he understood this was difficult for people to hear, but warned that the country's Institute of Public Health modelling projects there could be more than 200,000 cases of Covid next month. 'What we're trying to prevent is potentially 200,000 maybe double that people over the course of the month of December picking up this infection,' he said. 'I stress, none of those people are infected yet. If we have 200,000 people infected in December, 4,000 of them will end up in hospital at Christmas. 'We will see 200,000 people being asked to self-isolate over the Christmas period, where they can't meet up with or shouldn't meet up with friends, family or anybody else that are important to them. 'These are huge impacts that will be placed on the population at this time of the year, if we don't find it within ourselves to improve our collective adherence. 'And so, taking those measures around workplaces, to my mind would be very simple measures to cut down discretionary social contact.' Education Minister Norma Foley urged parents not to organise birthday parties or play dates for their children in the coming weeks. She said the chief medical officer had said 'very clearly that we need to minimise our social interactions'. Ms Foley said: 'We have seen the return to play dates and birthday parties and things like that. 'I think there's a call now that we would minimise (that) and we would draw down again and revert to what we have done in the past.' Ireland currently has around 85 Covid cases per 100,000 people, compared to around 57 per 100,000 in Britain. It overtook the UK at the start of the month, with cases rising consistently in the country since. In contrast, Britain saw a sustained dip in infections from the end of October until mid-November, with cases seeing a slight uptick in the last six days. But ministers fear the rise in cases on the continent in general could force the Government to follow other European countries in reintroducing some measures if it causes a further increase in infections on home shores. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell continues to talk up the bipartisan infrastructure bill that President Joe Biden signed into law Monday saying it is 'extremely good' for his home state of Kentucky. McConnell skipped the Monday pep rally and signing ceremony that Biden oversaw at the White House although senior Republican Rob Portman of Ohio, who helped negotiate the deal and who is retiring attended. 'I've watched each of the two previous administrations struggle with the issue of how to meet the infrastructure needs of the country,' McConnell told reporters in the Senate Tuesday acknowledging former President Donald Trump's failure to push through an infrastructure bill. 'I'm proud of my vote,' Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said of his support for the infrastructure legislation that President Joe Biden signed into law Monday 'Seventy-five percent of the American people support infrastructure, unlike the other issues we are talking about,' he said, in a dig at Biden's 'Build Back Better' plan. 'I joined 18 other Senate Republicans feeling like now is the time to address it. The infrastructure bill did not raise taxes. It did not revisit the 2017 tax bill,' he said, in reference to the Trump tax cuts. 'From the Kentucky point of view it is extremely good for our state,' he continued. 'I'm proud of my vote, and members are obviously free to choose how they wanted to vote. And in the Senate, 19 Senate Republicans felt it was the right thing to do for the country,' he added. McConnell's defense of the law came on a day Biden flew to New Hampshire to tout its funds for roads and bridges. He flies to Detroit on Wednesday to sell provisions to build electric vehicle charging stations and and lower greenhouse gas emissions. It is also expected to steer billions to Kentucky and Ohio, with funds helping build to ease congestion at the Brent Spence Bridge across the Ohio River by building a companion bridge. Former President Donald Trump attacked McConnell for backing a bill he called a 'socialist infrastructure plan' The infrastructure law will steer billions to Kentucky and Ohio, with funds expected to help ease congestion at the Brent Spence Bridge across the Ohio River by building a companion bridge Trump has repeatedly gone after McConnell for allowing the bill to clear the Senate McConnell essentially green lit GOP negotiators to make the deal. 'Old Crow Mitch McConnell voted for a terrible Democrat Socialist Infrastructure Plan,' Trump fumed, using a personal attack he has deployed repeatedly against McConnell, who denounced him after the Jan. 6th riot but voted to acquit him during both impeachments. His support for the bill wasn't enough to get him to the White House Monday. 'No, I've got other things I've got to do other than go to the signing ceremony,' he told WHAS radio in Kentucky. A Louisiana board on Wednesday granted parole to Henry Montgomery, whose Supreme Court case was instrumental in making freedom possible for hundreds of people sentenced to life in prison without the chance for parole when they were juveniles. Montgomery, 75, was convicted in the 1963 killing of East Baton Rouge sheriff's deputy Charles Hurt, who caught him skipping school and approached him in plain clothes. Montgomery was 17 at the time. He was initially sentenced to death, but the state's Supreme Court threw out his conviction in 1966, saying he didn't get a fair trial. The case was retried, Montgomery was convicted again but this time sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He served decades at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. Henry Montgomery (pictured) was seen leaving the Louisiana State Penitentiary on Wednesday after 57 years in prison for the murder of police office Charles Hurt in 1963 He was arrested and sentenced to life without parole at the age of 17 (seen here in 1964) Charles Hurt (with his wife) approached Montgomery in plainclothes after catching the then teen skipping school A three-member board voted unanimously in favor of parole. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the meeting was held on Zoom with Montgomery appearing on camera from the state prison where he has spent his entire adult life. 'He's been in prison for 57 years. He has an excellent...disciplinary record. He is low risk by our assessment. He's got good comments from the warden. He has a very good prison record,' said board member Tony Marabella as he voted to approve Montgomery's release with certain conditions including a curfew and that he have no contact with the victim's family. Montgomery's release goes back to two specific Supreme Court cases. In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in Miller v. Alabama that sentencing juvenile offenders to life without parole was 'cruel and unusual' punishment. Montgomery (pictured in 2016 in his prison bed) told Dateline at the time that he thought he deserved to receive parole as he was 'not the same guy' He also said he was 'mature enough to know I ain't going to do that again' It didn't settle the question of whether that decision applied retroactively or only to cases going forward. Justice Anthony Kennedy said at the time that the decision did not automatically grant parole, but opened up the option for a parole review. In 2016, the Supreme Court took up Montgomery's case and extended its decision on such sentences to people already in prison. The decision ushered in a wave of new sentences and the release of inmates in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arkansas and beyond. But, until Wednesday, Montgomery remained in prison. Montgomery (pictured in a 1963 newspaper clipping) was denied parole in 2019 after the parole board cited he killed a police office and the victim's family said he shouldn't be released After the Supreme Court decision, he was again denied parole, 54 years after he was imprisoned. The parole board denied him parole because he only took two classes and the victim's family had asked for him not to be released, according to UPI. 'In 54 years of incarceration, all you've taken were two classes,' Louisiana Parole Board member Kenneth Loftin told Montgomery at the time. 'You're only doing exactly what you can to get by.' He was later resentenced in 2017 to life with parole and the state judge who resentenced Montgomery called him a 'model prisoner' who appeared to be rehabilitated. But then the parole board rejected his application two times, most recently in 2019. It also was cited at his 2019 parole hearing that he attacked a police officer. Montgomery said he was in the 'segregated South' and was 'scared' when Hurt approached him. 'An attack on a police officer is an attack on the very fabric of society,' Hurt's grandson JP, who is now a police officer, told Dateline in 2019. 'There's no parole for Charles Hurt. His life sentence is permanent.' JP also told Dateline that Montgomery's life in prison is 'equal justice' to Hurt's life being taken away. However, Montgomery said he 'should be' granted parole in 2019. 'I should be,' he told Dateline's Lester Holt in 2019, 'At my age, I'm not the same guy. I'm 55 years older, you know, and I'm mature enough to know I ain't going to do that again.' Montgomery will be released into the care of the Louisiana Parole Project, and will have a curfew and will not be allowed to contact the victim's family. The Louisiana Parole Project was created in 2016 by Andrew Hundley, a former juvenile lifer, to assist people who have served long prison sentences - generally 20 years or more - reenter society. The organization helps former inmates with housing, signing up for health care or medications, getting an ID card and learning how to navigate society. Hundley spoke during the hearing, with a number of the former juveniles lifers who have gone through his program sitting in a room behind him. When the unanimous decision was announced they applauded. Montgomery (pictured in 2019) expressed remorse for his crimes and said he was 'sorry' and was 'going to have to live with this all of my life' During the hearing Hundley and others spoke of what Montgomery had accomplished in prison including his years of work at the prison's silk screen shop and the length of his stay. 'There is nothing left for him to accomplish at the Louisiana State Penitentiary,' Hundley said. 'It is time for Henry to come home.' His release was not without opposition. Hurt, the sheriff's deputy who Montgomery killed, was married and had three children. Two of his daughters have met with Montgomery in prison and forgiven him, but family members have opposed his release. A prosecutor from the area where Montgomery's crime occurred spoke against his parole as did one of the deputy's daughters, Linda Hurt Woods. 'I do not believe that he should be released at this time,' said Woods, saying that the decision shows deep disrespect to law enforcement officers. 'He made a decision at 17 years old. You know right from wrong at 17. I did.' Montgomery himself said little during the roughly half-hour hearing. According to his lawyer Keith Nordyke, he is extremely hard of hearing, and Nordyke often had to repeat questions from the board members. At times Montgomery said he was struggling to find words to express himself. 'I'm really sorry that I, that this happened,' Montgomery said. 'I am going to have to live with this all my life, the rest of my life.' Since the court's Montgomery decision, about 800 people who had been sentenced to life without parole as juveniles have been released, according to the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth. 'The decision to grant Mr. Montgomery parole today is long overdue,' said Jody Kent Lavy, the organization's co-executive director in a statement. 'It's a grave injustice that he has served over 57 years in prison for a crime he committed as a teenager, despite evidence he was rehabilitated long ago.' Ten months ago, the bare-chested US Capitol rioter nicknamed the 'QAnon Shaman' became the face of the January 6 attack when he thundered into the Senate chamber in his horned fur hat and brandishing a spear, but at his sentencing on Wednesday there was no sign of the ferocious insurrectionist. Instead, a humbled Jacob Chansley, 34, expressed remorse and spoke at length about his willingness to take responsibility for his actions - 'like Gandhi'- before a federal judge sentenced him to 41 months in prison. Prosecutors had asked US District Judge Royce Lamberth to impose a longer 51-month sentence on Chansley, who pleaded guilty in September to obstructing an official proceeding when he and thousands of supporters of then-President Donald Trump stormed the building in an attempt to stop Congress from certifying President Joe Biden's election. The sentence matches one imposed by a judge on a former mixed martial artist Scott Fairlamb, who was filmed punching a police officer during violence, who was sentenced last week to 41 months in prison. Chansley is expected to receive credit for the roughly 10 months he has spent in jail, which would reduce his prison sentence to about 31 months. When given a chance to speak, Chansley launched into a wide-ranging, often rambling speech, in which he talked about his feelings of guilt and remorse, reported CNN. 'I admit to the world, I was wrong. I have no excuses. My behavior was indefensible,' he said. Chansley, however, insisted that he is not a violent man, a domestic terrorist or a 'white supremacist.' As part of his impassioned 30-minute-long monologue, Chansley quoted Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Jesus, and the prison break film The Shawshank Redemption. 'The hardest part about this is to know that I'm to blame. To have to look in the mirror and know, you really messed up, royally,' Chansley said. He said he was wrong to break the law - a decision that landed him in solitary confinement. 'I should do what Gandhi would do and take responsibility,' Chansley added. 'There's no ifs, ands or buts about it, that's what men of honor do.' He promised to never have to be jailed again. Lamberth was seemingly taken aback by the defendant's remarks, which he said were 'akin to the kind of thing Martin Luther King would have said.' Capitol rioter Jacob Chansley, known as the 'QAnon Shaman,' was sentenced on Wednesday to 41 months in federal prison. Pictured inside the US Capitol armed with a spear Chanlsley was one of thousands of Trump supporters who stormed the US Capitol building on January 6 to stop the certification of President Joe Biden Lamberth said he believed Chansley, who made a lengthy speech before he was sentenced, had done a lot to convince the court he is 'on the right track.' Chansley's defense lawyers petitioned for a sentence of time served, citing their client's multiple mental health problems Chansley's attorneys asked the judge for a sentence of time served for their client, who has been detained since his January arrest. He appeared in court in a dark green prison jumpsuit, with a beard and shaved head. 'He made himself the image of the riot, didn't he?' Lamberth said to Chansley's lawyers. 'For good or bad, he made himself the very image of this whole event.' Prosecutor Kimberly Paschall played in court several video clips showing a bare-chested Chansley in his horned fur hat and face paint barging into the Capitol and yelling on the US Senate floor. Chansley has acknowledged using a bullhorn to rile up the mob, offering thanks in a prayer while in the Senate for having the chance to get rid of traitors and scratching out a threatening note to Vice President Mike Pence saying, 'It's Only A Matter of Time. Justice Is Coming!' Before his sentence was announced, Chansley described a difficult childhood and said he had taken responsibility for his behavior. 'I thought I was going to get 20 years solitary confinement,' he said, adding: 'This trauma has done something to me ... I have the white hairs to prove it ... on my chest ... on my arms... I should not have white hairs your honor.' The judge said what Chansley had done on January 6 was so 'horrific' nd 'terrible' that he could not go below the federal sentencing guidelines. The judge presiding over Chansley's hearing said that his conduct inside the Capitol was so 'horrific' that he could not impose a lighter sentence on him Protestors storm inside the US Capitol, Washington DC. January 6, 2021 While in detention, Chansley was diagnosed by prison officials with transient schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety. When he entered his guilty plea, Chansley said he was disappointed Trump had not pardoned him. Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives and acquitted by the Senate on a charge of inciting the January 6 riot for a fiery speech that preceded it in which he told his followers to 'fight like hell.' Four people died in the violence. A Capitol Police officer who had been attacked by protesters died the day after the riot and four police officers who took part in the defense of the Capitol later took their own lives. About 140 police officers were injured. Defense lawyer Albert Watkins said the US Navy in 2006 had found Chansley suffered from personality disorder but nonetheless declared him 'fit for duty.' Chansley became the face of the failed insurrection when he appeared on the US Senate floor semi-nude, sporting body paint and a horned fur hat (pictured) The image of Chansley holding a flagpole topped with a spear tip and looking as if he were howling was one of the most striking to emerge from the riot. He previously called himself the 'QAnon Shaman' but has since repudiated the QAnon movement, which is centered on the baseless belief that Trump was fighting a cabal of Satan-worshipping, child sex trafficking cannibals. Chansley's attorney, Albert Watkins, asked the judge for a sentence of time served, citing his client's lack of criminal history and mental health issues He is among 650 people charged in the riot. More than 120 defendants have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanor charges of demonstrating in the Capitol that carry a maximum of six months in prison. In the year before the Capitol riot, Chansley appeared in costume at pro-Trump events, protests over face mask requirements and at a gathering of Trump supporters in November 2020 outside an election office in downtown Phoenix where votes from the presidential race were being counted. His attorney, Albert Watkins, has said Chansley was 'horrendously smitten' by Trump and believed like other rioters that Trump had called him to the Capitol, but later felt betrayed after Trump refused to grant him and others who participated in the insurrection a pardon. Watkins has said Chansley had been under pressure from family members not to plead guilty because they believed Trump would be reinstated as president and pardon him. After spending his first month in jail, Chansley said he reevaluated his life, felt regret for having stormed the building and apologized for causing fear in others. He twice quit eating while in jail and lost 20 pounds until he was given organic food. Prosecutors had recommended a 51-month sentence for Chansley as a deterrence to 'future rioters' Videos from January 6 showed Fairlamb punching an officer's helmet and climbing a scaffolding while holding a baton and shouting: 'What patriots do? We f***ing disarm them and then we storm the f***ing Capitol!' Last week, ex-MMA fighter Scott Fairlamb wept in court as he begged for mercy before being sentenced to 41 months in prison for punching an officer during the Capitol riots. LONGEST CAPITOL RIOT SENTENCES: Jacob Chansley : Chansley, 34, from Arizona, known as the 'QAnon Shaman,' was sentenced on November 17 to 41 months in prison for storming the US Capitol while armed with a spear. Scott Fairlamb : the 44-year-old former MMA fighter from New Jersey was sentenced to 41 months in prison for assaulting a police officer during the January 6 riots. Troy Smocks : the 58-year-old Dallas resident was sentenced to 14 months in prison for posting threats against the US Congress on Parler, even though he did not enter the Capitol. Paul Hodgkins : the 38-year-old Florida crane operator was sentenced to 8 months in prison for walking onto the US Senate floor while carrying a red 'Trump 2020' flag. Advertisement With 'I truly regret my actions that day. I have nothing but remorse,' he said, as he asked the judge for mercy. A video from January 6 that was used in court showed Fairlamb, dressed in a camouflaged jacket, navy blue scarf and black beanie, yelling at an officer. When another cop approached Fairlamb from behind to seemingly get him to calm down, the former fighter shoved the man. Fairlamb, 44, of New Jersey was also the first person sentenced for assaulting a law enforcement officer during the January 6 Capitol riot. Judge Royce Lamberth's decision was considered a 'canary in the coal mine' by prosecutors who said that Wednesday foreshadowed what more than 120 other defendants face for attacking police that day. Then, when the officer swatted Fairlamb's pointing finger out of his face Fairlamb hit him back even harder. Fairlamb pleaded guilty to two counts - one for obstruction of an official proceeding and one for assaulting the police officer. More than 650 people have been charged in connection with the riots. Paul Hodgkins, 38, a Florida crane operator (left), was sentenced to 8 months in prison for walking onto the US Senate floor while carrying a red 'Trump 2020' flag. Troy Smocks (right), a black man from Dallas, was sentenced to 14 months in prison on after admitting he posted threatening social media messages online the day after the riot The pilot of a tourist helicopter that crashed into a fireball in the Grand Canyon killing five Britons had failed an earlier safety check, an inquest heard. Jonathan Udall, 31, and his 29-year-old wife Ellie died along with Rebecca Dobson, 26, her boyfriend Stuart Hill, 29, and his brother Jason Hill, 31, when their helicopter crashed and burst into flames. The group lost their lives after a strong tailwind knocked the Airbus EC130 B4 out of control, causing it to crash shortly before sunset in February 2018. As it hit the ground hard it exploded in a fireball with five of the seven occupants suffering fatal burn injuries. Rebecca, Stuart and Jason died in the subsequent blaze while Jonathan and his new wife Ellie survived but died of their injuries a fortnight later at the University Medical Centre in Las Vegas. A sixth friend, 39-year-old Jennifer Dorricott, a solicitor, survived but suffered life-changing injuries in the crash. Pilot Scott Booth of tour operator Papillon lived but had to undergo a double leg amputation after suffering catastrophic injuries. The inquest at West Sussex Coroner's Court today heard Mr Booth was fully-qualified but had failed an earlier check on his landing abilities during turbulent conditions. He failed his first test on his ability to handle a helicopter in gusty wind conditions, manoeuvre and deal with a loss of power. Rebecca Dobson, 26, her boyfriend Stuart Hill (both pictured above), 29, who lost their lives after a strong tailwind knocked the Airbus EC130 B4 out of control, causing it to crash Jonathan Udall, 31, and his 29-year-old wife Ellie (both pictured) who died of their injuries a fortnight later at the University Medical Centre Hospital in Las Vegas A survivor (lower right) walked away from the scene of the deadly tour helicopter crash along the jagged rocks of the Grand Canyon in Arizona Scott Booth was piloting a Papillon tour helicopter when the aircraft crashed, killing five of the six passengers Sandra Hill, mother of the two sons (pictured above) who died, said: 'We represent every parent's nightmare, to cease to be a mum and dad and to have no-one to care for. We were so blessed with Jason and Stuart' 'The loss cannot be put into words': Families' statements in full The inquest also heard the families read out their statements. Becky Dobson's mother, Jane, said: 'Our Becky, we miss you so much. You were such an amazing daughter, sister and an incredible auntie. You had so many friends who loved everything about you. 'Your raging smile could light up any room. Your lovely funny ways would always make us laugh. Our lives will never be the same but Becky you will always stay in our hearts forever.' Sandra Hill, mother of the two sons who died, said: 'We represent every parent's nightmare, to cease to be a mum and dad and to have no-one to care for. We were so blessed with Jason and Stuart. They were very active from the start and never stopped a moment they were awake. 'We did lots of things together. Each took a very different path as Jason went on to a career in law. Stuart was more practical and went over to New Zealand. He made friends wherever he went. Some of them we're still in touch with today. 'What's it like now they're gone? Well, after nearly four years, we still expect them to turn up. I still can't go into a card shop, as if I see a card with the word 'son' written on it I break down. I haven't been able to put up a Christmas tree since their deaths.' Reverend David Hill, father of the two brothers, quoted a line from the Fast and Furious movie series in his tribute. He said: 'No matter where you are, whether it's a quarter-mile away or halfway across the world, you'll always be with me. And you'll always be my brother.' Speaking on behalf of Ellie's parents, Terry and Maggie Milward, Sarah Stuart read their statement to the coroner, saying 'The loss to our family cannot be put into words.' Philip and Marlene Udall's statement said: 'John was only 31 when tragedy struck on that fateful day in 2018. We had recently celebrated the wedding, a truly momentous occasion when in 2018 our world came crashing down around us and we were left devastated at the loss of our son. 'Jonathan was a kind and caring person. A young man we are so proud of the man he became. We held on to the memories we have of watching him grow into that young man. 'We will never again get to see his face, hug him, or to see him laugh. Thirty-one years of Jonathan was simply not enough.' Advertisement Mark Jarvis of the Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) told the inquest hearing the annual check is designed to test the pilot's ability. But he said Mr Booth had failed his first test on his ability to handle a helicopter in gusty wind conditions, manoeuvre and deal with a loss of power. Mr Booth retook the check 'days later' and passed and was fully qualified to fly the flight on February 10, 2018. An investigation was launched by the US National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) who concluded the accident happened when the pilot lost control of the aircraft in turbulent, high winds. Mr Jarvis said the report showed the helicopter was mechanically sound but was not fitted with a crash resistant fuel system. Three Australian airmen witnessed the accident alongside another passerby who was attending a wedding function in the Grand Canyon area, the inquest heard. They scrambled over the rocky terrain to help provide first aid to those who managed to free themselves from the wreckage. The coroner heard a statement from Joel Trembath, an avionics technician, who said: 'I noticed Jon and Ellie were staring into the distance and in shock. 'They were sitting next to each other on a rock and at that time they were both able to talk unhindered.' He added: 'I observed Sgt Daniel Johnson and LAC Mitchell Wood applying first aid to three survivors, Jennifer, and a male I later identified as Jon and a female I later identified as Ellie. 'At that stage, the helicopter was still on fire and fiercely burning. A young-looking male Papillon pilot was yelling at us to turn around and go back. I identified myself as Australian Air Force and said we had first aid kits. However, the Papillon pilot replied that he didn't care and told us to turn around. 'We ignored him and continued down to deliver first aid kits and then we ran back up to the landing for water. Once we got back to the crash site with water, I started applying first aid to Jennifer. She was yelling her partner's name, Jason, and I attempted to calm her down. 'The first aid I applied included some bandaging, washing of burns and and chemicals with water, and application of antiseptic. Jennifer was very animate whilst I was applying this first aid and she was understandably inconsolable.' The inquest also heard the families read out their statements. Becky Dobson's mother, Jane, said: 'Our Becky, we miss you so much. You were such an amazing daughter, sister and an incredible auntie. You had so many friends who loved everything about you. 'Your raging smile could light up any room. Your lovely funny ways would always make us laugh. Our lives will never be the same but Becky you will always stay in our hearts forever.' Sandra Hill, mother of the two sons who died, said: 'We represent every parent's nightmare, to cease to be a mum and dad and to have no-one to care for. We were so blessed with Jason and Stuart. They were very active from the start and never stopped a moment they were awake. Ellie Milward and her husband Jonathan Udall (pictured left on their wedding day) died in hospital after a helicopter crash that killed their friends Becky Dobson and Stuart Hill (right) in the Grand Canyon in 2018. The pilot told investigators the crash was caused by a 'gust of wind' Becky Dobson's mother, Jane, said: 'Our Becky, we miss you so much. You were such an amazing daughter, sister and an incredible auntie' (Becky pictured) 'We did lots of things together. Each took a very different path as Jason went on to a career in law. Stuart was more practical and went over to New Zealand. He made friends wherever he went. Some of them we're still in touch with today. 'What's it like now they're gone? Well, after nearly four years, we still expect them to turn up. I still can't go into a card shop, as if I see a card with the word 'son' written on it I break down. 'I haven't been able to put up a Christmas tree since their deaths.' Reverend David Hill, father of the two brothers, quoted a line from the Fast and Furious movie series in his tribute, explaining the two brother's relationship. He said: 'No matter where you are, whether it's a quarter-mile away or halfway across the world, you'll always be with me. And you'll always be my brother.' Reverend David Hill (pictured above), father of the two brothers, quoted a line from the Fast and Furious movie series in his tribute, explaining the two brother's relationship Speaking on behalf of Ellie's parents, Terry and Maggie Milward, Sarah Stuart read their statement to the coroner, saying: 'The loss to our family cannot be put into words.' Philip and Marlene Udall's statement said: 'John was only 31 when tragedy struck on that fateful day in 2018. 'We had recently celebrated the wedding, a truly momentous occasion when in 2018 our world came crashing down around us and we were left devastated at the loss of our son. 'Jonathan was a kind and caring person. A young man we are so proud of the man he became. We held on to the memories we have of watching him grow into that young man. We will never again get to see his face, hug him, or to see him laugh. Thirty-one years of Johnathan was simply not enough.' Emergency crews arrived at the scene 20 minutes after the crash, due to the difficulty of getting around the mile-deep canyon. A post-mortem examination report concluded that Stuart, Becky and Jason all died from multiple injuries as a result of thermal injury and smoke inhalation. Jonathan and Ellie both died in Universal Medical Centre Hospital, Los Angeles, due to complications from thermal injuries. The inquest continues but was expected to conclude this afternoon. A Georgia grand jury indicted six deputies on murder charges in connection to the 2018 death of an inmate at the Fulton County jail. The three current and three former deputy sheriffs from the jail's 2018 Direct Action Response Team where indicted on five charges on Tuesday including felony murder, aggravated assault, battery and violation of oath of office. The officers named in the criminal case are Arron Cook, Guito DeLa Cruz, Omar Jackson, Jason Roache, Kenesia Strowder and William Whitaker. Antonio May, 32, was booked on a misdemeanor charge at the Fulton County jail on September 11, 2018 after being arrested for throwing rocks at the American Cancer Society building when the officers allegedly declared it was 'Taser Tuesday.' Guito DeLa Cruz (left), Arron Cook (center), Kenesia Strowder (right), Omar Jackson, William Whitaker, and Jason Roache were indicted on five criminal charges including felony murder on Tuesday in connection to a Fulton County Jail inmates death Guito DeLa Cruz, Arron Cook, Kenesia Strowder, Omar Jackson (left), William Whitaker (center), and Jason Roache (right) were indicted on five criminal charges including felony murder on Tuesday in connection to a Fulton County Jail inmates death The phrase came from inmates and employees at the jail, attorneys for May's family said, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The father of three was placed in a general holding cell despite having amphetamines in his system and being ruled suicidal by a medical technician, a wrongful death lawsuit filed by his family states. May, whose family claims struggled with mental health issues, began to undress exposing himself to the guards when six deputies, rushed into his cell. During the 'confrontation,' all six deputies 'repeatedly' tasered, beat and pepper-sprayed the inmate, the lawsuit alleges. According to court papers, some of the deputies placed their stun guns near May's genitals and around his buttocks. 'The detention officers beat Mr. May with closed fist strikes and sprayed pepper spray in his face,' court documents state. They then allegedly set May in a restraining chair and placed a 'spit mask' over his head as they attempted to wash the pepper spray from his face with a hose, according to the lawsuit. May was dead 'laying in a pool of his own blood' a few minutes later, the lawsuit claims. His lawyer, Michael Harper, said May died of cardiovascular collapse due to physical restraints. Antonio May (left) was pronounced dead at the Fulton County jail on September 11, 2018 May was allegedly repeatedly tased, beaten and pepper-sprayed in his cell and pronounced dead several minutes later. His family filed a wrongful death lawsuit in 2019 that is still ongoing His family filed the wrongful death civil case against Fulton County jail and its healthcare provider Naphcare, Inc. in May 2019. The civil case been tied up in court with nine officers and Naphcare Inc. filing motions to dismiss the case citing a lack of evidence. The Fulton County Sheriff's department did not respond to DailyMail.com for a comment. 'As opposed to putting Mr. May in the Special Medical Observation Unit at the Fulton County Jail and giving him detoxifying chemical sedation, due to his mental health issues and due to him testing positive for amphetamines, the medical professionals at NaphCare, Inc. released Mr. May to the jail deputies to place Mr. May in a general holding cell,' the lawsuit claims. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation took up the case when the lawsuit was filed. The GBI found that May had been combative with the staff prior to the altercation when the deputies tased and pepper-sprayed the inmate. A GBI spokeswoman confirmed to AJC at the time that May died at the jail after being washed of the pepper-spray. The case was investigated by the Fulton District Attorney's office for three-years before DA Fani Willis took office earlier this year promising to dig into the backlog of 11,000 cases stalled by the pandemic and inaction of her predecessor Paul Howard. Many of these cases include use of force involving law enforcement. On Tuesday, the DA's office presented the results of its three-year investigation into May's death. DA Willis released a statement following the indictment: 'It is now the duty of my office to prove these charges beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury at trial. My staff and I will continue to work to ensure that justice is done in this case.' Harper and Teddy Reese, who represent May's family, stood beside two of May's sons Za'Kobe and Jordan Rickerson, who held up family photos, and other family members during the press conference Tuesday afternoon, AJC reported. 'This is not an anti-police moment,' Reese said. 'This is an accountability moment. This is holding people responsible for taking a man's life in cold blood murder.' Harper told DailyMail.com hopes that the indictment will push the judge ruling over the wrongful death case to deny the motions to dismiss the case and move it forward. He insist the indictment: 'goes to show that times have changed and society are beginning to uphold these law enforcement officers accountable for murder.' May's grandmother, April Myrick, told WSB-TV that the indictment proves that her grandson 'mattered.' 'Thank God this is being done,' Myrick said. 'Thank God. He mattered. Everybody mattered.' A UK F-35B Lightning II stealth jet has crashed into the Mediterranean sea while on patrol with the UK's flagship HMS Queen Elizabeth. The pilot ejected from the jet before it crashed into the ocean and has been safely returned to the aircraft carrier, as the MoD launches a full investigation. This is the first time the UK has lost one of the 100m fifth-generation stealth jets, which are on board the 3 billion warship HMS Queen Elizabeth. The next-generation RAF F35 jet is understood to still be in the sea and has yet to be recovered after the crash at 10am this morning. The aircraft was one of eight UK fast-jets onboard the Royal Navy's flagship, along with 10 US aircraft. HMS Queen Elizabeth is returning to the UK after leaving Britain on her maiden voyage seven months ago. Jets from the vessel previously participated in strikes against the remnants of ISIS in Iraq and Syria. A British F-35B Lightning II stealth jet has crashed into the Mediterranean sea while on patrol with HMS Queen Elizabeth (file photo of a jet above the carrier) The jet was on board the 3 billion warship HMS Queen Elizabeth The F35s can hover as the come into land meaning the need a smaller flight deck. Pictured, an F-35B fighter jet prepares to land on the flight deck of HMS Queen Elizabeth in the Arabian Sea, off Mumbai's coast on October 21 According to the MoD: 'A British F35 pilot from HMS Queen Elizabeth ejected during routine flying operations in the Mediterranean this morning. 'The pilot has been safely returned to the ship and an investigation has begun, so it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time.' The attack jets are Big Lizzie's air wing flying missions over the past seven months in the Mediterranean, Pacific and Indian Oceans. The stealth jet's pilot will be debriefed, but investigators will want to test the aircraft's complicated computer systems and high-tech control surfaces to see if these contributed to the crash. Several US F35s have been involved in crashes, with one Marine Corps jet clipping a refuelling aircraft. The 65,000-tonne Royal Navy flagship is returning to the UK from its maiden deployment, which included exercises with the Indian military. It was part of the carrier strike group's deployment to the Indo-Pacific amid heightened tensions with China in the region. The jets are operated by the renowned 617 Squadron, also known as the 'Dambusters' squadron. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss spent time on board the vessel last month on the final day of her two-day visit to India. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss spent time on board the vessel last month on the final day of her two-day visit to India Boris Johnson today finally apologised for failing to wear a mask during a visit to a hospital last week - but insisted he broke the rules for 'barely 30 seconds'. The Prime Minister was criticised after he was photographed without a face covering during a trip to Hexham General Hospital. He insisted on Monday this week that he wears a mask wherever he is required to under coronavirus guidance as he declined to apologise. But the premier did say sorry this afternoon as he was grilled by Parliament's powerful Liaison Committee. Boris Johnson today finally apologised for failing to wear a mask during a visit to a hospital last week - but insisted he broke the rules for 'barely 30 seconds' The Prime Minister was criticised after he was photographed without a face covering during a trip to Hexham General Hospital It emerged that Mr Johnson had to be reminded by NHS staff last week to put on a mask after he posed with nurses without a face covering. Mr Johnson was questioned on the issue by senior Labour MP Yvette Cooper and he said: As for not wearing a mask in Hexham hospital, which you wrap up into my general litany of crime, can I just say that actually it was barely 30 seconds when I wasnt wearing a mask. I walked out of a room, mistakenly not wearing it. I then put it on as soon as I realised I had made that mistake. I apologise for it. But most pictures of my visit to the hospital will show that I was duly masked throughout the remainder of the visit and I was masked on the way into the visit and I thank you for giving me the opportunity to clear that up. Speaking at a Downing Street press conference on Monday, a croaky Mr Johnson, who is suffering from a cold, said adhering to mask rules was 'the responsible thing to do'. 'I wear a mask wherever the rules say I should and I urge everyone else to do the same,' he said. 'People have actually seen me wearing face coverings quite a bit more regularly as we have seen the numbers (of infections) ticking up in the UK. 'I think that is the responsible thing to do and I am going to continue to do it.' After Mr Johnson went to Northumberland last week Chronicle Live reported that staff had to remind him to replace his mask. Mr Johnson had to be reminded by NHS staff last week to put on a mask after he posed with nurses without a face covering He is believed to have taken it off to do television interviews before the pictures were taken. Hospital management insisted that he had 'followed strict measures, including wearing a mask, in each clinical area he visited.' But rules for visitors posted on the hospital's website tells them to 'wear a face covering when you enter the hospital until you leave'. Personal belongings found with the soldiers allowed specialist researchers to identify seven of the soldiers Bodies of the nine British soldiers were discovered in 2018 during engineering works in De Reutel, Belgium Fallen servicemen were given full military honours at a poignant burial service at Tyne Cot Cemetery, Belgium Advertisement Nine British soldiers who were killed in the First World War have finally been laid to rest, more than a century after their deaths. The fallen servicemen were given full military honours at a poignant burial service at Tyne Cot Cemetery in Belgium. The nine soldiers, seven of whom have been identified, now rest alongside the graves of thousands of their comrades who fell during heavy fighting around the town of Ypres. The seven men served together in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, and died within days of each other during the bloody Battle of Passchendaele in October 1917. Their bodies were only discovered in 2018 during engineering works in De Reutel in Belgium. Personal belongings found with the soldiers allowed specialist researchers to identify seven of the soldiers. More than a century after their deaths, they were laid to rest at a service attended by family members of the identified soldiers and the Duke of Kent. Nine British soldiers who were killed in the World War I have finally been laid to rest, more than a century after their deaths More than a century after their deaths, they were laid to rest at a service attended by family members of the identified soldiers and the Duke of Kent (right) The nine soldiers, seven of whom have been identified, now rest alongside the graves of thousands of their comrades who fell during heavy fighting around the town of Ypres The Duke of Kent arrives for the funeral service of nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War The seven men served together in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, and died within days of each other during the bloody Battle of Passchendaele in October 1917 Pictured left to right: 2nd Lieutenant Leslie Wallace Ablett, Lance Corporal Stanley Blakeborough and Private Harry Miller, three of nine British soldiers who lost their lives in the First World War The names of the seven identified servicemen who have been laid to rest 2nd Lieutenant Leslie Wallace Ablett 2nd Lieutenant Leslie Wallace Ablett Ablett who was killed in action aged 20 while fighting in the Third Battle of Ypres in 1917. Ablett, who was born in Manchester and later lived on Eardley Road in Streatham, enlisted in the British Expeditionary Force as a rifleman at the outbreak of the First World War in October 1915. He was commissioned less than a year later and joined the 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, the second largest Regiment in London. Ablett, who was born in Manchester and later lived on Eardley Road in Streatham, enlisted in the British Expeditionary Force as a rifleman at the outbreak of the First World War in October 1915. He was commissioned less than a year later and joined the 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, the second largest Regiment in London. During his career in the British army, he was deployed to France and Flanders where he was involved in a number of major operations. Ablett, who was described as 'bright, cheerful and of good tone', was killed on 15 October 1917 as the British Expeditionary Force slowly advanced towards Passchendaele during the second phase of battle. He is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial in West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. 2nd Lieutenant Edward Douglas Bruty 2nd Lieutenant Edward Bruty died aged 21 during the bloody battle in Belgium in October 1917 Bruty, from Dulwich, was a railway clerk before he enlisted in the army in September 1914 as a Rifleman in the Queen Victoria's Rifles. He subsequently moved his through the ranks, transferring to the Army Cyclist Corps and being promoted to Sergeant. He was later commissioned in February 1917 and joined 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, before his death in October 1917. Lance Corporal Stanley Blakeborough Lance Corporal Stanley Blakeborough Lance Corporal Stanley Blakeborough was born in Pateley Bridge, Yorkshire on 17 August 1896, the son of Harry and Mary Blakeborough. Stanley had five brothers and two sisters. His two brothers, Charles and Donald also both fought during the First World War. Sadly, Donald was killed less than three months after Stanley. Unfortunately, Stanleys military records have not survived, but it is known that he served in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers for the majority of the war, being promoted to Lance Corporal. He died aged 21. Sergeant Thomas Feasby Serjeant Thomas Feasby, from Eston, Yorkshire, who died aged 32. Feasby had worked as a Tram Conductor with his brother George and by 1911 he was working as a Foreman at the local Steelworks in Eston. Unfortunately, his military records have not survived, but he served in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers for a majority of the war, being promoted to Sergeant. He died aged 32. Private Joseph Patrickson MM Private Joseph Patrickson was one of the nine children of Robert and Lucy Patrickson. He was born in Gateshead, Durham on 12 October 1893. Before enlisting, Joseph was an errand boy for a fruit retailer. Although his military records have not survived, he was was awarded the Military Medal (MM) for his bravery during the fighting in October 1917. He died aged 24. Private Harry Miller Private Harry Miller Private Harry Miller born in Cockerton, near Durham on 21 November 1888, one of eight children of James and Anne Miller. Harry married Melita Florence Birkett on 22 May 1909 and they had four children: Annie, James, Minnie and George. Harry was a farm labourer, and lived with his family in Burton Leonard, Yorkshire. His military records have not survived, but it is known that he served in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers for a majority of the war. He died aged 26. Private Arnold Sanderson MM Private Arnold Sanderson MM, from Darlington, Co Durham was also among the servicemen laid to rest. He worked at the local Railway plant and lived with his parents Thomas and Emily Sanderson and six sisters. Although Arnolds military records have not survived, he was awarded the Military Medal (MM) for his bravery during the fighting in October 1917, whilst working as runner for the officers. A letter written to his mother by 2/Lt J.S. Youll VC, stated that he was thought of a great deal by the officers and men. He was described as a good soldier who always did his duty. He died aged 26 in World War One. Advertisement What started as a grey and rainy morning broke into sunshine as the coffins were carried into the cemetery, draped in Union flags. Leading the service, reverend Gary Watt paid tribute to the nine men who gave their lives more than a century ago. He said: 'Today we remember with thanksgiving these brave men whom, alongside so many others, answered the call of their country, served with honour and gave their lives in the service of their nation. 'In so doing let us commit ourselves anew to remember their courage. 'For by so doing we honour their memory and we reflect upon that sacrifice.' One of the unidentified servicemen, who was found to be closely linked with the seven named servicemen, was honoured as an 'Unknown Soldier of the Northumberland Fusiliers'. The eighth serviceman was buried as an 'Unknown Soldier of the Great War'. Among the seven identified servicemen was 2nd Lieutenant Leslie Wallace Ablett who was killed in action aged 20 while fighting in the Third Battle of Ypres in 1917. Ablett, who was born in Manchester and later lived on Eardley Road in Streatham, enlisted in the British Expeditionary Force as a rifleman at the outbreak of the First World War in October 1915. He was commissioned less than a year later and joined the 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, the second largest Regiment in London. During his career in the British army, he was deployed to France and Flanders where he was involved in a number of major operations. Ablett, who was described as 'bright, cheerful and of good tone', was killed on 15 October 1917 as the British Expeditionary Force slowly advanced towards Passchendaele during the second phase of battle. He is commemorated on the Tyne Cot Memorial in West-Vlaanderen, Belgium. The second is 2nd Lieutenant Edward Douglas Bruty, who died aged 21 during the bloody battle. Bruty, from Dulwich, was a railway clerk before he enlisted in the army in September 1914 as a Rifleman in the Queen Victoria's Rifles. He subsequently moved his through the ranks, transferring to the Army Cyclist Corps and being promoted to Sergeant. He was later commissioned in February 1917 and joined 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, before his death in October 1917. A third serviceman identified is Serjeant Thomas Feasby, from Eston, Yorkshire, who died aged 32. Feasby had worked as a Tram Conductor with his brother George and by 1911 he was working as a Foreman at the local Steelworks in Eston. Unfortunately, his military records have not survived, but he served in 11th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers for a majority of the war, being promoted to Sergeant. Their bodies were only discovered in 2018 during engineering works in De Reutel in Belgium. Personal belongings found with the soldiers allowed specialist researchers to identify seven of the soldiers The coffins of nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War, lay in wait in the chapel before they are laid to rest More than a century after their deaths, they were laid to rest at a service attended by family members of the identified soldiers and the Duke of Kent Nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War, are laid to rest 2nd Lieutenant Leslie Wallace Ablett is carried to his final resting place at the Tyne Cot Cemetery near Ypres in Belgium Leading the service, reverend Gary Watt paid tribute to the nine men who gave their lives more than a century ago The Duke of Kent visits the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing in Ypres, Belgium, which is dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient of World War I and whose graves are unknown As the service drew to a close, the famous line from Laurence Binyon's poem For The Fallen - 'We will remember them' - was read out and echoed by military and civilian guests Passchendaele: An Allied victory for barely any military gain The Battle of Passchendaele became notorious not only for the sheer number of casualties, but also for the horrendous fighting conditions the men were forced to endure. British general Douglas Haig had long wanted the allies to launch an offensive on German positions in Flanders Fields to break through to the Belgian coast. A church ablaze during the Battle for Messines Ridge in 1917, which immediately preceded Passchendaele On July 31, after two weeks of sustained shelling which had seen more than 4.5 million shells dropped on German positions, the allies launched their infantry attack. But the plan was a disaster from the get-go. The shelling had not destroyed the German defenses, and within a few days some of the heaviest rains for 30 years had turned the battlefield into a quagmire, trapping thousands of men and horses. The attack resumed on August 16 but to little effect, and both sides remained at a stalemate until September 20, when an upturn in the weather allowed allied forces to win three key battles at Menin Road Ridge, Polygon Wood and Broodseinde in the space of two weeks. These victories eventually led to British and Canadian forces taking what was left of the village of Passchendaele on November 6, but the capture came after an estimated 325,000 allied casualties. Advertisement Private Arnold Sanderson MM, from Darlington, Co Durham was also among the servicemen laid to rest. He worked at the local Railway plant and lived with his parents Thomas and Emily Sanderson and six sisters. Although Arnolds military records have not survived, he was awarded the Military Medal (MM) for his bravery during the fighting in October 1917, whilst working as runner for the officers. A letter written to his mother by 2/Lt J.S. Youll VC, stated that he was thought of a great deal by the officers and men. He was described as a good soldier who always did his duty. Many of their surviving family members attended the touching ceremony, laying wreaths and flowers as they paid their respects. The Duke of Kent was also in attendance, alongside members of The 1st Battalion of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers who honoured the fallen soldiers with a gun salute. As the service drew to a close, the famous line from Laurence Binyon's poem For The Fallen - 'We will remember them' - was read out and echoed by military and civilian guests. In the surrounding hills, no longer scarred by trenches and covered in barbed wire, farmers ploughed their fields. The bodies of the nine men, like those of so many of their comrades who died on the battlefields of the First World War, had been missing for a century. But thanks to extensive research combined with knowledge gleaned from a small number of personal belongings found with them, experts were able to identify seven of the nine servicemen. The 'War Detectives', as the Ministry of Defence's Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre (JCCC) team are known, were able to track down surviving family members to complete the identification with DNA testing. The Duke of Kent lays a wreath during the funeral service of nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War The Duke of Kent arrives for the funeral service of nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War The coffins of three of nine British soldiers who served and died in battle of Passchendaele during the First World War, arrive to be laid to rest. The Duke of Kent arrives for the funeral service of nine British soldiers (right) Soldiers carry wreaths, servicemember hats and the British flag during the burial in Belgium on Wednesday Steven Willis-Feasby, the great nephew of Sgt Feasby, said the whole experience had been 'really emotional'. He added: 'I always had a feeling that maybe there was some family history on this side because my paternal grandfather from my mother's side, he was in the First World War as well and survived, but obviously Thomas didn't. 'I think that his mother wouldn't have known where Thomas fell or what happened to him and I'm privileged that I've come here to represent our family. He's back with us now.' Rachel Fixsen attended the ceremony to pay her respects to 2nd Lt Ablett, her first cousin three times removed. She said: 'For me personally looking into his history... and also reading accounts about how these soldiers fought, what it was like for them on the front line and behind the front line, that's really brought it home to me what happened and what they went through, and ultimately died. 'I thought the service was beautiful, it was meticulously organised and carried out and just the best way to honour these men.' Claire Horton, director general of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC), said: 'The CWGC is honoured to have worked alongside the JCCC in the recovery and identification of these men and to now be caring for them in perpetuity in Tyne Cot, CWGC's largest cemetery. 'The fact that so many of them have been positively identified is testament to the collective dedication that continues to this day, to remember our fallen.' A charity that allowed a director to keep his trustee role despite admitting to paying for sex with a child says he has now left the organisation after a public outcry. Former UKIP candidate Ken Lowry, 48, remained a trustee of CERT UK despite receiving a two-year community order for the offence, which can carry a five-year prison sentence. On Tuesday, November 16, the ex-soldier, who also runs a company called Homeless Birmingham, paid 120 for sex with a 'vulnerable' 16-year-old who he later said was a 'sex worker'. CERT UK founder Kerryanne Wilde also described the young victim as a 'prostitute' when initially defending the charity's decision. However, she has now announced that Lowry has been removed from the charity. She told MailOnline: 'Following our Trustees Meeting we would like to reiterate our position. Mr Kenneth Lowry has been removed from the Charity as a Director, Trustee and Volunteer as of November 15 2021.' She also revealed that Lowry's company Homeless Birmingham was no longer a part of CERT and is in the process of going independent. It is unclear if Lowry is still part of that organisation. Ms Wilde added: 'We are in talks with the volunteers to determine if they would like to come back under the CERT (UK) umbrella. We will advise all of their decision once this has been agreed. 'The actions of one individual are not the sum actions of the Charity and those who volunteer with us.' Ken Lowry, 48, who was a director and trustee of the national CERT UK charity and also runs his own company called Homeless Birmingham, admitted to a charge of 'paying for sex with a child' in December last year Lowry, was sentenced in February for paying for sex with the 16-year-old girl. His court appearance came just weeks after the former soldier was nominated for a Lord Mayor's special recognition for helping those living on the streets during the pandemic. As well as the two-year community order, he was also ordered to complete 40 days rehabilitation order and was also hit with a month's curfew. His victim went public because of what she saw as a lenient sentence and the fact Lowry had been allowed to continue in his role with CERT UK. The now 17-year-old claimed she was 'vulnerable and unstable mentally' when she agreed to have sex with Lowry for 120 in 2020, with the offence taking place at his home. She said: 'Kenneth was charged with paying for the sexual services of a child. He paid 120 to have sex with me while a relative of mine sat and watched. My relative had wanted the money to go to a party.' Lowry claimed the girl had been a sex worker who had replied to his advert for 'legal age sex' placed on the Craigslist website. He said: 'I believed she was over 18 at the time because it was an over-18 site that she was on, Craigslist. My advert was for sexual services and she actually contacted me, not the other way around. 'My ad asked for legal age sexual services. 100 per cent those words were in. It wasn't specific to any age, it had to be over the legal age because I've seen other ads on that site that didn't specify an age.' What is the charge of 'paying for sex with a child' in UK law and what is the punishment? 'Paying for the sexual services of a child' is an offence under the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Introduced in 2014, the law is sometimes confusing because it covers offences involving victims who are aged 16 and 17 - which is above the legal age of consent for sex in the UK. But the law is there specifically to protect under 18s from paid sex work. The charge only applies to paid sex work for those aged 16 and 17. Anyone paying someone younger than 16 would be charged under the usual charge of 'sexual activity with a child'. Those paying someone younger than 13 would be charged with 'rape of a child'. For those paying for sex with victims between the ages of 16 and 17, sentences range from a community order - a non custodial sentence - and a maximum prison sentence of five years. Advertisement Speaking of his regret at the offence, he added: 'Oh, I'm absolutely disgusted, I'm at loggerheads with myself. I'm disgusted. 'Again, to be clear, she was over the age of consent. It's the fact that she was over the age of consent is what actually happened. And if money had not changed hands there would have been no issue. 'If no money changed hands then there would have been no criminal activity whatsoever.' He was initially given the backing of CERT UK by its founder and director Ms Wilde. She said: 'Kenneth's admitted that he had sex with a prostitute, she was 16, so he paid for sex with a prostitute at the end of the day she was 16 and it was consensual at the time. 'As an organisation, we've put measures in place so that Kenneth could come back and continue the amazing good work that he's done in Birmingham, the thousands of families and individuals that he's helped and supported and built Homeless Birmingham over the years.' She had added: 'We put measures in place that Kenneth wasn't allowed to be with anyone under the age of 18 on his own, he was always to be with any vulnerable individual with another member of the team there and we review that on a regular basis. 'We've done our due diligence as an organisation, we've done our safeguarding and we've put in place measures for that. 'As an organisation we're in a bit of a rock and a hard place. We say in our constitution and we say in everything that we do we support all the vulnerable, ex-offenders and whatever else. 'If we had turned our back on Kenneth it wouldn't have looked good on us because we weren't supporting him as an ex-offender.' In the UK, it is illegal under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 to pay for the sexual services of anyone under the age of 18. Sentencing guidelines for the offence of paying for the sexual services of a child if a victim is aged 16-17 can range from a community order to a five year prison sentence. A West Midlands Crown Prosecution Service spokeswoman confirmed that Lowry pleaded guilty to an indictment containing one count of paying for the sexual services of a child, contrary to s.47(1) of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Kerryanne Wilde, founder and director of CERT UK, has now announced that Lowry has been removed from the charity The particulars of the offence were that Lowry 'intentionally obtained for himself the sexual services' of the victim, 'a child under the age of 18 years, that is 16 years, not reasonably believing that she was of or over the age of 18, and before obtaining those services he promised payment for those services to' the victim. West Midlands Police confirmed a 21-year-old woman had been arrested on suspicion of causing or inciting sexual exploitation of a child and was later released without charge. After avoiding a jail sentence, Lowry stood as a UKIP candidate in May's Scottish Parliament elections, having previously stood for the party in local elections in Northfield. He was also given the green light to continue in his director and trustee role with Cert UK Ltd (Community Emergency Response Team UK), but with 'safeguarding measures' in place. The charity was initially set up to help people affected by the damage caused by Storm Desmond in December 2015 and as CERT (UK) Ltd expanded to help former military personnel, victims of natural disasters, homelessness and domestic violence. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will not be returning to the UK for Christmas despite being invited to join the rest of the royal family at Sandringham, sources have claimed. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who are currently living in a $14million mansion in California, are also expected to miss the Queen's annual Christmas lunch for her extended family, which is usually held at Buckingham Palace. The lunch is expected to be held at Windsor Castle this year, as the Queen continues to recuperate from a bad back which forced her to miss the Remembrance Sunday service at the Cenotaph. It's thought that Harry and Meghan turned down the invite because they want to avoid the media coverage that would follow a visit to the UK. A royal source told Page Six: 'There's a lot that goes into the logistics and the planning of the family Christmas, so of course, staff know that Harry and Meghan are not coming. If they were, they would have communicated it to their family by now. 'But this is Her Majesty's first Christmas without her husband, so one would have hoped they would want to be with her.' Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex attend the 2021 Salute To Freedom Gala at Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum in New York. They are said to have turned down an invite to celebrate Christmas with the royals Over Christmas, the Queen is usually joined at Sandringham by Prince Charles, Camilla, Prince William and Kate Middleton, who accompany her to a church service This year is the Queen's first Christmas without Prince Philip after his death in April. The monarch, 95, has also suffered with several health problems which forced her to miss events recently and even triggered a short hospital stay. The last time Harry and Markle were at Sandringham for Christmas was in 2018, a year before Megxit. Over Christmas, the Queen is usually joined at Sandringham by Prince Charles, Camilla, Prince William and Kate Middleton, who accompany her to a church service. Buckingham Palace refused to comment on the report. MailOnline has contacted representatives for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. It comes as Meghan made a surprise appearance on the Ellen show in her first major TV interview since her notorious Oprah tell-all alongside Prince Harry amid fears she may be about to drop more bombshells about the Royal Family. In a clip released ahead of the broadcast in the US tomorrow, the Duchess of Sussex reminisced about being a struggling actress who would arrive for auditions in a bashed up second hand car. Meghan, wearing a white 1,991 Oscar De La Renta blouse and black trousers, said the Ford Explorer had 'a life of its own' and broken front doors that she couldn't afford to fix so she had to climb 'out of the trunk'. Her new TV appearance came as a shock today. It was long rumoured that the Duchess would give her first interview to Ellen after she and Harry emigrated in January 2020. But in the end the Sussexes chose their neighbour in Montecito, Oprah Winfrey. The clip will raise fears in Buckingham Palace that she may be about launch a fresh attack on the royals, who the Sussexes have previously accused of racism towards Archie and allegations they ignored Meghan when she claimed to be suicidal while pregnant and living in London. Meanwhile, the Queen was seen standing unaided today as she held a face to face audience at Windsor Castle, in her first official engagement since missing Remembrance Sunday at the Cenotaph after spraining her back. Meghan Markle, 40, reminisces about being an actress during an appearance on the Ellen show which is set to air tomorrow The monarch, 95 - dressed in a green, orange and white floral dress and wearing a string of pearls - was pictured sharing a brief conversation with General Sir Nick Carter, Chief of the Defence Staff. The military audience in Windsor's Oak Room - a sitting room that doubles as a private office - was Her Majesty's first in-person audience since she hosted a global investor summit at Windsor on October 19. Sir Nick walked through the door to be greeted by one of the Queen's dorgis, before approaching the monarch for a chat. Her Majesty described his upcoming retirement as 'rather sad', to which he replied, 'eight years, it's a long time', before mentioning that his only predecessor to have served long was Lord Mountbatten, the Queen's cousin. The general added that he thought 'the time had come to move on and do other things.' Her Majesty was also left unable to attend the Church of England's national assembly yesterday, for the first time in her 69-year reign. Prince Edward, her youngest son, read out a speech on his mother's behalf at the Church of England synod yesterday. Her statement read: 'It is hard to believe that it is over 50 years since Prince Philip and I attended the very first meeting of the General Synod. The Queen was seen standing unaided today as she held a face to face audience at Windsor Castle, in her first official engagement since missing Remembrance Sunday at the Cenotaph after spraining her back. The monarch 95 - dressed in a green, orange and white floral dress and wearing a string of pearls - was pictured standing as she greeted to Gen Sir Nick in Windsor's Oak Room 'None of us can slow the passage of time; and while we often focus on all that has changed in the intervening years, much remains unchanged, including the Gospel of Christ and his teachings.' Her Majesty also spoke remotely to delegates at COP26 in Glasgow, urging world leaders to reach decisive climate change deals as she warned 'none of us will live forever'. Prince Charles was asked about the Queen today on his trip to Jordan. He said: Shes alright, thank you very much. Once you get to 95, its not quite as easy as it used to be. Its bad enough at 73! The last comment was a reference to his own birthday on Sunday. Advertisement The protests outside Kenosha courthouse continued on Wednesday with the arrival of an armed man calling himself 'Maserati Mike', as jury deliberations entered a second day in the case of Kyle Rittenhouse. 'Mike' arrived in the black sportscar where he takes his nickname, carrying a megaphone and wearing thin-rimmed glasses and a bow-tie. 'Black Lives Matter is a terrorist organization,' he chanted, before being told by cops to put his gun away. 'That subject was talked to by officers, and the situation was resolved. The man put his rifle away voluntarily. We did not take any further action,' Kenosha County Sheriff's Department told DailyMail.com. He complied, then left the court in his sportscar. There were only a handful of others there, including a woman holding an American flag, but more are expected throughout the day. On Tuesday, BLM protesters clashed with Rittenhouse fans who made white power signs on the courthouse steps. Rittenhouse faces life behind bars if found guilty of the charges the jurors are now deliberating - attempted murder, murder and recklessly endangering public safety. At noon on Wednesday, the jury asked to re-watch portions of video evidence. The defense yesterday submitted a motion for a mistrial that the judge is yet to read. They asked the judge if they had to watch it in private, or in the courtroom again in front of Rittenhouse, lawyers, the media and the public. On Tuesday, the jury asked for more copies of jury instructions. Scroll down for video 'Maserati Mike' gets out of his black Maserati at Kenosha courthouse on Wednesday. He was the first protester there and chanted through his megaphone 'Black Lives Matter is a terrorist organization' 'Mike' was wearing a shirt, bow-tie and slacks, as well as a bullet proof vest. He was carrying an assault rifle and megaphone Sheriffs deputies rushed to tell him to put his gun away because he was within 1000ft of a school, which he complied with The activist is one of many who has turned up at the courthouse to support Rittenhouse, who is on trial for murder There is heightened security at the courthouse both from law enforcement and private security guards hired by media organizations A protester outside Kenosha County Court House on Wednesday morning as jury deliberations entered a second day Mike is shown back to his Maserati after chanting through a megaphone. There is increased angst surrounding the trial and verdict, which is expected at any moment this week A woman waving an American flag outside Kenosha Court House on Wednesday morning as jury deliberations entered a 2nd day Jacob Blake's uncle, Justin, returned to the courthouse for a second day. It was Blake being shot by a cop that sparked the riot Rittenhouse attended. Blake was armed with a knife when he was shot by a cop who'd been called there by the mother of Blake's children who said 'he's got my kid!' Rittenhouse is pictured drawing the names of the jurors who will either convict or acquit him from a drum inside the court on Tuesday Protesters outside Kenosha County Courthouse on Wednesday afternoon as the jury entered its second day of deliberations A Kyle Rittenhouse supporter wearing a '45' hat in reference to 45th President Donald Trump outside the courthouse on Wednesday The case has divided the nation and brought back to the surface the debate that tore through cities last summer; Rittenhouse, then 17, shot dead two BLM protesters during a riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin, that was triggered by the police shooting of Jacob Blake. He considers himself a vigilante and won a swell of support from around the country by others who labeled him a hero for defending the city against a BLM 'mob'. Prosecutors tried to paint the teen as a blood-thirsty, trigger-happy, privileged white boy who was given a soft touch by the local cops. The trial itself even replicated the issues that were being argued over. Judge Bruce Schroeder has been dubbed a 'racist' by public spectators who think he is biased towards Rittenhouse. When he allowed him to pick jurors' names at random from a barrel, that claim caught fire on social media with some labeling it a 'shameful' example of white privilege on display. Rittenhouse's fans include Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a St. Louis couple who last year found themselves at the center of the debate when they chased BLM protesters off their property by waving their own guns. They posed with people on the courthouse steps yesterday who were making the hand gesture that's known to represent 'white power' - a favorite among white supremacists. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki weighed in on the case on Monday, saying the country should 'never' have 'vigilantes' on the streets. Judge Schroeder on Monday told the jury not consider anyone's opinion - even that of the President - who called Rittenhouse a 'white supremacist' last year, before he'd been elected president. Protesters demanding that Judge Bruce Schroeder be recalled. The judge has been inundated with complaints that he is racist TUESDAY: Protesters clashed on the steps of the courthouse on Tuesday, with around two dozen activists on each side there Tuesday: Mark McCloskey, center, a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Missouri, pose for photo with supporters of Rittenhouse, one of whom did an 'OK' sign that is commonly used by white supremacists to signify 'white power' Tuesday: Police take security measures as BLM protesters and Kyle Rittenhouse supporters are gathered outside of the Kenosha County Courthouse awaiting verdict in Kyle Rittenhouse trial in Kenosha, Wisconsin A bartender saved a choking server's life by performing the Heimlich to dislodge a chicken sandwich from his throat at a Wisconsin restaurant. Joseph Reinhart, 33, was making a pitcher of sweet and sour for the bar when a server named Ashton, 22, began choking on a large piece of a chicken sandwich at Daly's Bar and Grill in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, in a video released Tuesday. The event happened in August. Ashton, who does not want his last name revealed, began furiously shaking his head and gesturing to his throat as Reinhart, dressed in yellow, immediately put down the pitcher and spun him around to begin the Heimlich - a maneuver he has never had any training on, he told DailyMail.com. 'I never took any classes,' he told DailyMail.com. 'You don't have a whole lot of time to think. I had a high sense of anxiety of not knowing what happened and having to do something you've never done.' He admitted to DailyMail.com that he 'went into adrenaline mode,' but within a few thrusts, Reinhart managed to dislodge some of the sandwich from Ashton's throat, but not all of it. Joseph Reinhart, 33, (pictured in yellow) immediately started to perform the Heimlich maneuver on the teen. Within a few thrusts, he was able to dislodge a part of the sandwich from Ashton's throat Newly released footage shows the 22-year-old server being saved by a bartender at a Wisconsin restaurant after he choked on a chicken sandwich in August He slapped the Ashton's back a few times to make sure it was all out, but the server later shook his head, gesturing that some of the sandwich was still blocking his airways. Roughly 20 seconds later, Reinhart managed to get the rest of it dislodged He gave a few hard slaps to the man's back, but the Ashton continued to shake his head to indicate it wasn't all out. 'You can see I stopped a few times to see if he got it all out,' he told DailyMail.com. Upon noticing that Ashton was still struggling to breath, he began again. As Ashton continues to choke, Reinhart becomes more forceful, applying more pressure to his abdomen and lifting him off his feet to get better leverage. Ashton's mother - who also works at the restaurant, becomes more and more distressed as her son chokes. The security system did not pick up sound. Joseph Reinhart, 33, (left) saved 22-year-old Ashton's life after he choke on a chicken sandwich. Ashton (right) is reportedly fine and eating chicken sandwiches again Reinhart (pictured left) is a bartender at Daly's Bar and Grill in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, and went back into the kitchen to make sweet and sour for the bar when he noticed Ashton was holding his hands to his throat and choking Afterward, Ashton collapsed on the floor in distress, covering his face with his arm and hugging his knees (pictured) while Reinhart offered him comforting words Ashton's mother (pictured center) appeared to be screaming throughout the event as she helplessly watched her son choke. Another server (left) was seen calling 911 and nervously shook her hand while talking to the police Another server can be seen calling 911 near the fridge and shakes her hand nervously as she talks on the phone. Reinhart eventually manages to dislodge the rest of the chicken sandwich around 20 seconds after the first chunk. The pair work at Daly's Bar and Grill in Wisconsin He gives the server's back a few more pats to ensure his airways are clear before rubbing the clearly distressed Ashton's back and appears to give him words of encouragement. The server eventually collapses on the floor, as he appears to become emotional following the distressing ordeal. The 22-year-old covers his face with his arm and hugs his knees. The video cuts off with Reinhart cradling his coworker and appears to be saying comforting words to him. Ashton is reportedly doing fine and is eating chicken sandwiches again, Viral Hog reported. Boris Johnson today read the riot act to social media firms as he said they must do more to tackle extreme pornography posted on their networks. The Prime Minister said 'people are coarsened and degraded by this stuff' and 'it is time the online giants realised that they cannot simply think of themselves as neutral pieces of infrastructure'. Mr Johnson told senior MPs on the Liaison Committee this afternoon that the firms 'are publishers and they have responsibility for what appears on their systems'. Meanwhile, the premier also backed calls to make cyber flashing a criminal offence. Cyber flashing refers to when a person is sent an unsolicited sexual image on their mobile device by a stranger nearby through AirDrop, a file-sharing function on iPhones. Boris Johnson today read the riot act to social media firms as he said they must do more to tackle extreme pornography posted on their networks The Government is bringing forward an Online Safety Bill, previously known as the Online Harms Bill, which is designed to make tech firms more accountable for user-generated harmful content hosted on their platforms. Caroline Nokes, the chairman of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, told Mr Johnson that 'one of the cultures underpinning male violence against women is the easy access to extreme, violent, degrading pornography'. She asked: 'Can we have any confidence that the online harms legislation that you have said we are going to get to vote on before Christmas will do anything to address that?' Mr Johnson replied: 'It is clear that people are coarsened and degraded by this stuff and we will see what we can do. 'The technological difficulties are quite extreme but it is up to the online giants to make sure that they don't have this stuff on their systems. 'We will take the steps necessary to hold them to account and that is what the Online Harms Bill is designed to do.' Asked if the new legislation will force companies to take action against such material, the PM said: 'It is time the online giants realised that they cannot simply think of themselves as neutral pieces of infrastructure. 'They are publishers and they have responsibility for what appears on their systems and the Online Harms Bill is designed to give effect to that distinction.' The new laws could see executives held criminally liable for safety breaches on their platforms. Currently those sanctions could be introduced two years after the legislation is implemented but there are calls for the Government to move more quickly. Mr Johnson told senior MPs on the Liaison Committee this afternoon that the firms 'are publishers and they have responsibility for what appears on their systems' Mr Johnson told Julian Knight, the chairman of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, he shared 'anxiety about the deferred sanctions that we are currently looking at and let me take that away'. He added: 'I think that we want the strongest possible deterrent and the strongest possible sanctions against people who run online companies who are allowing a torrent of hateful stuff to appear on their networks.' Mr Knight also asked the PM if he believes cyber flashing should be made illegal. Mr Johnson replied: 'I don't care whether flashing is cyber or not it should be illegal.' Asked if the Online Safety Bill will be updated to reflect that, the PM said: 'If you can draft something that will capture it, let's have a look at it.' Rust script supervisor Mamie Mitchell, the first person to call 911 after Halyna Hutchins was accidentally shot by Alec Baldwin on the film's set last month, broke down in tears today as she announced she is filing a lawsuit against Alec Baldwin and other producers of the low-budget Western movie. The suit names names 22 defendants associated with the film including Baldwin, Rust producers, six production companies - El Dorado Pictures, Thomasville Pictures, Short Porch Pictures, Brittany House Pictures, 3rd Shift Media and Streamline Global - armorer Hannah Gutierrez Reed, First Assistant Director David Halls and others. Mitchell was standing close to the Director of Photography, Halyna Hutchins, when the bullet fired from Baldwin's gun killed her and then injured the director Joel Souza. The suit claims assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and deliberate infliction of harm. It also states that the scene being shot did not require a gun to be fired. 'I ran out and called 911 and said 'Bring everybody, send everybody,'' Mitchell said during a press conference. 'This woman is gone at the beginning of her career. She was an extraordinary, rare, very rare woman.' Mitchell said she was standing less than four feet away from Hutchins when she was shot and was hit by residue from that bullet. 'I will never forget what happened on the set of Rust that day,' she said. 'I relive the shooting and the sound of the explosion from the gun over and over again.' Mitchell said she was left depressed and 'frightened of the future'. 'This violent tragedy has taken away the joy in my life,' she added. She said she wants to prevent what happened on the set from happening to anyone else. Rust script supervisor Mamie Mitchell, the first person to call 911 after Halyna Hutchins was accidentally shot by Alec Baldwin on the film's set last month, broke down in tears today as she announced she is filing a lawsuit against Alec Baldwin and other producers of the low-budget Western movie Mitchell and Allred laid out their lawsuit - which alleges assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and deliberate infliction of harm Mitchell was standing close to the Director of Photography, Halyna Hutchins, when the bullet fired from Baldwin's gun killed her and then injured the director Joel Souza Gloria Allred (L) puts an arm around Rust script supervisor Mamie Mitchell as they walk from a press conference after filing the lawsuit Allred alleged that live ammunition was brought to the set, that the assistant director improperly handed Baldwin the gun; Baldwin knew that the gun should've never been given to him and that he could not rely on any statement by the AD about whether or not the gun was safe to use. 'I relive the shooting and sound of the explosion from the gun over and over again,' Mitchell - a 40-year industry veteran - said, in tears recalling her memory of the incident. 'Alec Baldwin intentionally, without just cause or excuse, cocked and fired the loaded gun even though the upcoming scene to be filmed did not call for the cocking and firing of the firearm,' Allred said. 'Mr. Baldwin chose to play Russian Roulette with a loaded gun without checking it and without having the armorer do so.' 'Mr. Baldwin cannot hide behind the Assistant Director to attempt to excuse the fact that he did not check the gun himself,' continues the complaint from Mitchell, who was in the church location on the Bonanza Creek Ranch when Baldwin's 'quick draw' rehearsal turned tragic. The attorney added that Baldwin should have assumed the gun was loaded until it was checked that it was not loaded. Allred said last month that her client has evidence which will be 'helpful in this investigation' and has been interviewed by law enforcement and that even if the assistant director told him the gun was fine, he should not have used it based on that advice. 'I will never forget what happened on the set of Rust that day,' Mitchell said. 'I relive the shooting and the sound of the explosion from the gun over and over again.' Svetnoy shared the final photo of Halyna Hutchins (pictured holding the camera) on set in the church just moments before she was shot dead Director Halyna Hutchins on the set of Rust Actor Alec Baldwin is one of several producers named in the lawsuit and specifically called out by Allred 'We are conducting our own investigation of what happened because there are many unanswered questions,' Allred said at the time. 'Mamie has been interviewed by the Sheriff's Department. She has information and evidence which she believes will be helpful in this investigation. The lawsuit claimed that the actions that led to the shooting 'do not constitute simple negligence' by the producers and Baldwin. She also accuses Baldwin of being careless and ignoring industry norms by not checking the gun; and that Baldwin ignored safety protocols. All guns and ammunition are supposed to be secured throughout the production and the armorer is supposed to stay around all guns; instead, Allred said, ammunition and guns were left unattended by the armorer. In a statement, Allred said Mitchell was standing near Halyna Hutchins and director Joel Souza when they were shot and immediately ran out of the church. 'Halyna was a friend and close colleague of Mamie,' Allred said in a statement late last month. 'She is devastated by the loss of her friend who was an extraordinary woman. Mamie recently attended the vigil for Halyna and her heart goes out to Halyna's husband and son to whom she has spoken.' Allred said her client as 'traumatized' and said they are conducting their own investigation into what happened. The experienced crew member also sued 24-year-old armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed (left) and the movie's assistant director David Hall (right), who told Baldwin that the gun was cold Hutchins' October 19, 2021 Instagram post showed cast members and staffers, including Baldwin alongside Hutchins herself and armorer Gutierrez-Reed (circled left to right) on the set of Rust in Santa Fe, New Mexico Baldwin, near his Vermont property on November 1 (left), and on the Rust set before the shooting (right) The head of lighting on the film filed a lawsuit on Wednesday, alleging negligence that caused him 'severe emotional distress' that will haunt him forever. Serge Svetnoy said in the suit that the bullet that killed his close friend Hutchins, narrowly missed him, and he held her head as she died. 'They should never, ever, have had live rounds on this set,' Svetnoy's attorney Gary A. Dordick said at a news conference Wednesday. The lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court names nearly two dozen defendants associated with the film including Baldwin, who was both star and a producer; David Halls, the assistant director who handed Baldwin the gun; and Hannah Gutierrez Reed, who was in charge of weapons on the set. It is the first known lawsuit of what could be many stemming from the October 21 shooting. It was the ninth film that Svetnoy and Hutchins had worked on together, and he had taken the job at low pay because she asked him to. 'She was my friend,' Svetnoy said at the news conference. He said he had seen guns sitting unattended in the dirt a few days earlier in the shoot, and had warned the people responsible about them. On the day of the shooting, he was setting up lighting within 6 or 7 feet of Baldwin, the suit says. 'What happened next will haunt Plaintiff forever,' the suit says. 'He felt a strange and terrifying whoosh of what felt like pressurized air from his right. He felt what he believed was gunpowder and other residual materials directly strike the right side of his face.' Then, with his glasses scratched and his hearing muffled, he knelt to help Hutchins, the suit said. The lawsuit seeks both compensatory and punitive damages to be determined later. It was filed in Los Angeles County because the plaintiff and most of the defendants are based there. Svetnoy (left), held dying Halyna Hutchins (right) in his arms after she was shot Attorneys and representatives for the defendants did not immediately respond to email and phone messages seeking comment on the suit. Gutierrez Reed's lawyer Jason Bowles said in a statement Wednesday that 'we are convinced this was sabotage and Hannah is being framed. We believe that the scene was tampered with as well before the police arrived.' Bowles said his client has provided authorities with a full interview and continues to assist them. The statement did not address the lawsuit. 'We are asking for a full and complete investigation of all of the facts, including the live rounds themselves, how they ended up in the "dummies" box, and who put them in there,' the statement said. Gutierrez Reed said last week that she had inspected the gun Baldwin shot but doesn't know how a live bullet ended up inside. Santa Fe-area District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies said investigators have encountered no proof of sabotage. Her comments, first made on Good Morning America, were confirmed Wednesday by agency spokeswoman Sascha Guinn Anderson. Carmack-Altwies says that investigators know who loaded the gun, though it remains unclear how the deadly round of ammunition got on the movie set. The district attorney said she is concerned that there were so many levels of safety failures. Dordick said at the news conference that it was 'far-fetched' to suggest there was sabotage, but that Gutierrez Reed still had the same responsibility to know what was in the gun and who had handled it. Authorities have said that Halls, the assistant director, handed the weapon to Baldwin and announced 'cold gun,' indicating that the weapon was safe to use. Halls said last week that he hoped the tragedy prompted the film industry to 'reevaluate its values and practices' to ensure no one is harmed again, but did not provide details. Baldwin said on video on October 30 that the shooting was a 'one-in-a-trillion event' saying, 'We were a very, very well-oiled crew shooting a film together and then this horrible event happened.' The director Souza told detectives that Baldwin was rehearsing a scene in which he drew a revolver from his holster and pointed it toward the camera, which Hutchins and Souza were behind, according to court records in New Mexico. Souza said the scene did not call for the use of live rounds, and Gutierrez Reed said real ammo should never have been present, according to the court records. The Los Angeles lawsuit alleges that the scene did not call for Baldwin to fire the gun at all, only to point it. Hollywood professionals have been baffled by the circumstances of the movie-set shooting. It already has led to other production crews stepping up safety measures. The front page of the lawsuit filed on Mamie Mitchell's behalf by attorney Gloria Allred Surveillance footage captured the moment nine thieves smashed the glass display of a California jewelry store during a brazen robbery. Police say that at around 7:30 pm on Monday a group of nine people entered Iceberg Diamonds jewelry store in Sun Valley Mall and began smashing the glass display cases and stealing jewels. Security footage shows the large group, all dressed in head-to-toe black outfits and masks except for one robber in all white, simultaneously smashing the glass display repeatedly with hammers. Scroll Down For Video: Footage shows the group, all dressed in head-to-toe black outfits and masks except for one robber in all white, smashing the glass display with hammers Police said a group of nine people entered Iceberg Diamonds jewelry store in Sun Valley Mall and began smashing the glass display cases and stealing jewels Mall employee Edwin Garcia, who works at a Claire's store located directly across from Iceberg Diamonds says he witnessed the incident. 'A bunch of group of people came in maybe there was six or seven people with hammers and smashed the windows,' Garcia told ABC 7 News. Police say jewelry store employees attempted to intervene but they were 'kept back' by the hammer-wielding thieves who made out with all the jewelry before police arrived. Garcia said he witnessed an employee try to step in but then stop himself. The glass display, which was smashed repeatedly with hammers, is seen in the aftermath of the robbery Police are still searching for the thieves who robbed Iceberg Diamonds jewelry store (pictured) in Sun Valley Mall 'I think one of the workers tried to grab someone but I guess he chose not to because you never know what can happen,' he said. 'Then they just ran away super quick.' Customers inside the mall reported hearing gunshots but police say that it was actually the sound of the hammers breaking the glass and no shots were fired during the robbery. Garcia also thought he heard a gunshot during the chaos. 'At first I thought it was a gunshot, it was just the hammers,' he said. 'For me personally, I am staying out of it.' Police are still searching for the culprits. The incident comes amid a wave of thefts in the Bay Area. As of October 31 San Francisco police have received reports of 810 burglaries or attempted burglaries this year in the jurisdiction of the Mission District Police station, marking a 13 percent increase from the same time last year, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Jacob Blake, the black man whose shooting by Kenosha police last year set off the riots during which Kyle Rittenhouse fatally shot two men and wounded a third, is rehabilitating his injuries in Chicago. Blake, 30, is learning to walk again, according to his uncle, Justin Blake, who has been a vocal protester outside the courthouse in Kenosha where Rittenhouse is due to learn his fate. He has bad days, theres no doubt, but hes so grateful to be alive, Justin Blake, a 52-year-old Chicago resident, told The New York Times. Justin Blake said that his nephew has not been following the Rittenhouse trial, which went to the jury Tuesday. Instead, he has focused on his new T-shirt printing business. He needs to be focusing on himself, focusing on his children and his new normal, Justin Blake said of his nephew. A GoFundMe campaign started by Jacob Blakes mother, Julia Jackson, has raised more than $2.3million. Jacob Blake (seen above after he was hospitalized in Milwaukee) has been rehabbing the spinal cord injuries he suffered as a result of the shooting at the hands of Kenosha, Wisconsin police on August 23, 2020 Blake, 30, was paralyzed from the waist down as a result of the shooting in August of last year Blake's shooting sparked protests and widespread rioting in Kenosha. Two days after the shooting, Kyle Rittenhouse fatally shot two men and wounded a third. Jurors on Wednesday were deliberating Rittenhouse's fate as prosecutors charged him with murder The money is expected to go toward his medical care. It is not known which facility in Chicago is treating Jacob Blake. DailyMail.com has sought comment from the Blake family and his attorneys. Blake was shot after officers responded to a 'family trouble' around 5:15 p.m. August 23, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Blake had a warrant for his arrest at the time of his shooting, and was struck by seven bullets after turning toward a cop while holding a knife. The attorney for officer Rusten Sheskey, who shot Blake, has said Blake was holding a knife during the encounter and that the officer believed he was trying to kidnap the kids in the backseat of the SUV he was near when police saw him. Sheskey was placed on administrative leave but returned to work March 31; he was not charged, according to the Kenosha Police Department. In November 2020, Blake had pleaded guilty to two counts of disorderly conduct and domestic abuse from a previous incident, and was sentenced to two years' probation. As part of the deal, one count of criminal trespassing and one count of third-degree sexual assault and domestic abuse were dropped, according to NBC News. A probable cause statement from May 3, 2020, said a complainant met officers crying, in a nightgown saying Blake had woken her up demanding his things then grabbed her between her legs. She told police her car and debit card were missing after he left. The Rittenhouse shootings took place during riots on August 25, 2020 - two days after Jacob Blake was shot. Jurors in the Rittenhouse trial began the second day of deliberations on Wednesday. They were unable to reach a verdict Tuesday. About two hours into deliberations on the second day, jurors asked to view video presented at the trial and the judge said he would determine the procedures to allow that. Prosecutor Thomas Binger said they should be able to view any video they wanted as many times as they wanted, while defense attorney Mark Richards said he would object to the jury viewing video taken by a drone that prosecutors said showed Rittenhouse pointing his gun at protesters before the shootings. Rittenhouse, 18, faces life in prison if convicted on the most serious charge for using an AR-style semi-automatic rifle to kill two men - Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum - and wound a third - Gaige Grosskreutz. Blake says he was able to stand up in October of last year, saying his pain felt like his legs were sliding 'through a woodchipper' A GoFundMe campaign started by Jacob Blakes mother, Julia Jackson, has raised more than $2.3million The former police youth cadet is white, as were those he shot. Rittenhouse testified he acted in self-defense, while prosecutors argued he provoked the violence. The case has become a flashpoint in the U.S. debate over guns, racial-justice protests, vigilantism and law and order. His shooting touched off protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin in August, after a summer that saw nationwide protests over other officer-involved shootings of black people across the country Some of the protests became violent. Above, police stand near a building on fire in Kenosha Blake said of the unrest: 'I didn't agree with what they were doing, but I understood' In an interview with CNN this past August, Jacob Blake weighed in on the Rittenhouse case, saying that if he were black, he would have met the same fate as he did. Blake said Rittenhouse's race may have played a part in how differently he was treated by police. 'That was like a kick right in the you know what,' he said. 'I was angry, I was furious, and I felt like I had every right to be.' 'For the reasons they said they shot me, they had every reason to shoot him, but they didn't. Honestly if his skin color was different, and I'm not prejudiced or a racist, he probably would have been labeled a terrorist.' The jury in the Rittenhouse trial appeared to be overwhelmingly white. Prospective jurors were not asked to identify their race during the selection process, and the court did not provide a racial breakdown. As the jury deliberated, dozens of protesters - some for Rittenhouse, some against - stood outside the courthouse. Some talked quietly with those on the other side, while others shouted insults. Justin Blake, Jacob Blake's uncle, has been protesting outside the courthouse during the Rittenhouse trial. He is seen above outside the courthouse on Tuesday waving a Pan-African flag He has bad days, theres no doubt, but hes so grateful to be alive, Justin Blake (seen above in Kenosha on Tuesday) said At the time of the shooting, Jacob Blake had a warrant for his arrest for charges including sexual assault and domestic violence One woman could be heard repeatedly calling some Rittenhouse supporters 'white supremacists.' Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, who faced criticism over his response to the Kenosha protests in 2020, urged calm as the jury deliberated. He announced last week that 500 members of the National Guard would stand ready for duty in Kenosha if needed. 'Regardless of the outcome in this case, I urge peace in Kenosha and across our state,' Evers tweeted. He added: 'I ask all those who choose to assemble and exercise their First Amendment rights in every community to do so safely and peacefully.' Justin Blake reacted angrily to Evers decision to deploy the National Guard, calling the governor a coward and a racist. He said that Black Lives Matter protesters in Kenosha were positively focused.' The governor is a coward and a racist to send out National Guards,' Justin Blake told the New York Post. 'The only National Guard he's bringing out is for the people supporting Rittenhouse, while we'll be celebrating that somebody's going to jail, they'll be quite upset.' Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, killed two people during the unrest in Kenosha after Blake's death He also injured one other person. He faces two felony charges and is out on $2 million bail BLM protesters and counter-demonstrators supporting Rittenhouse have been arguing outside the courthouse in recent days. Rittenhouse supporters said Jacob Blake should not have resisted arrest on August 23 of last year. 'He shouldn't have resisted arrest. He should have stopped,' said one woman who was carrying a sign that read: 'BLM and Antifa are here 2 Intimidate.' 'Are you kidding me? His back is turned. He is no threat to the cops,' a BLM supporter responded. The large protests that some had anticipated did not materialize during the trial's testimony phase. On most days, only a few demonstrators gathered on the courthouse steps, and the high fence that protected the building during last years unrest is gone. During closing arguments Monday, prosecutor Thomas Binger said that Rittenhouse was a 'wannabe soldier' who set the deadly chain of events in motion by bringing a rifle to a protest and pointing it at protesters just before he was chased. But Rittenhouse lawyer Mark Richards countered that Rittenhouse was ambushed by a 'crazy person' Rosenbaum. Rittenhouse testified that Rosenbaum chased him down and made a grab for his rifle, causing him to fear the weapon was going to be used against him. His account of Rosenbaum's behavior was largely corroborated by video and some of the prosecution's own witnesses. As for Huber, he was gunned down after he was seen on video hitting Rittenhouse with a skateboard. And Grosskreutz admitted he had his own gun pointed at Rittenhouse when he was shot. In his instructions to the jury, Schroeder said that to accept Rittenhouse's claim of self-defense, the jurors must find that he believed there was an unlawful threat to him and that the amount of force he used was reasonable and necessary. All fifty Senate Republicans are launching a formal challenge to President Biden's vaccine requirement for private businesses, as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) order is being challenged in court. Indiana Sen. Mike Braun leads his 49 GOP colleagues in filing a resolution of disapproval against Biden's order that all companies with over 100 employees must require vaccines or weekly Covid-19 testing. The disapproval resolution is guaranteed a floor vote, which Braun says he will set for early December. The resolution is filibuster-proof, meaning it needs only pass by a simple majority. If one Democrat signs on, the resolution would then need to be approved by the House. Indiana Sen. Mike Braun leads his 49 GOP colleagues in filing a resolution of disapproval against Biden's order that all companies with over 100 employees must require vaccines or weekly Covid-19 testing Earlier this month a three-member panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans upheld a stay on the OSHA rule, ordering the Department of Labor to take no further steps to implement its mandate, which was meant to be implemented January 4, 2022. The rule is set to encompass 84 million workers, and employers could face fines of up to $136,532 for 'willful violations.' The resolution was referred to the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee before the full floor vote. While the resolution is unlikely to pass Congress where Democrats control both houses, it could serve as political fodder for Republicans seeking to unseat vulnerable Democrats in the midterm elections. All senators will have to go on record being in favor or against sweeping vaccine mandates coming down from the federal level. Vaccine mandates have been highly controversial throughout the US 'Republicans are united against President Bidens vaccine mandate for businesses, but this federal overreach is not a partisan issue, and the mass firings and worsening labor shortages that will result from this mandate are affecting Americans in all 50 states,' Braun said in a statement. 'I encourage Americans to make their voice heard to their representatives on this issue, and we welcome any Democratic member of the Senate to join us in overturning this unconstitutional mandate causing turmoil across the country.' 'Proud to stand up against President Biden's unconstitutional vaccine mandate on private businesses that will jeopardize the strength of our workforce and make hard-working Americans choose between putting food on the table and compromising their principles,' moderate Republican Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said of the resolution. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice (DOJ) promised to 'vigorously defend' Biden's vaccine mandate after it was held up by federal court. Circuit Court Judge Kurt Engelhardt wrote in the prevailing opinion that the mandate goes too far, and that he has 'grave' concerns about whether the edict is legal or constitutional. 'The mandate is staggeringly overbroad,' the opinion said. 'The mandate is a one-size-fits-all sledgehammer that makes hardly any attempt to account for differences in workplaces (and workers).' Biden administration officials are planning to request the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals to reimplement the mandate after it was temporarily halted by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. The Biden administration has argued the mandate is imperative for saving lives, at a time when over 1,000 deaths are still attributed to Covid-19 each day. At least 27 states have filed legal challenges in at least six federal appeals courts after OSHA released its rules on November 4. Four out of five Americans age 12 and up have had at least one Covid-19 shot. Of all ages, about 69% of Americans have had one jab and 59% are fully vaccinated. Nearly 31 million people have gotten their booster shot since August, when a third vaccine dose was recommended for those with compromised immune systems. Advertisement Two people were arrested on Wednesday evening as violent scuffles broke out outside the courtroom in Kenosha where the 12-person jury are deliberating the fate of Kyle Rittenhouse. Tensions rose when a 20-year-old man wearing a 'F**k Kyle' T-shirt, Bart Simpson backpack, and Chicago Bulls beanie was arrested after scuffling with prominent Rittenhouse supporter Emily Cahill. The two traded insults before the man threw a protest sign at Cahill. He and fellow anti-Rittenhouse protestors tried to wrestle the sign back and as he was being pulled off Cahill he sucker-punched one reporter in the jaw. Other protestors tried unsuccessfully to lead the man away and calm him down, but he then went on to strike several other people including a DailyMail.com photographer before being pinned to the ground and hauled away in a paddy wagon. He was heard calling for his mother as the vehicle pulled away. Justin Blake, uncle of Jacob Blake, marches with supporters, following the second day of jury deliberations in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial on Wednesday Supporters of the Jacob Blake family hold a moment of silence following the second day of jury deliberations in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, on Wednesday evening A community organizer talks with supporters of the Jacob Blake family, who gathered to eat together following the second day of jury deliberations in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial A 20-year-old man in a Chicago Bulls hat holds up a sign outside the courthouse, demanding Rittenhouse be convicted. The man later got into scuffles with Rittenhouse supporters and was arrested for disorderly conduct and battery Wearing a Bart Simpson backpack, a protester calling for Kyle Rittenhouse's conviction scuffles with an opponent on the steps of the courthouse on Wednesday A BLM supporter is seen scuffling with pro-Rittenhouse demonstrator Emily Cahill on Wednesday The man in the Bart Simpson backpack is pictured on Wednesday being arrested by Kenosha police following the scuffle Police arrested the man who hit the cameraman, as well as another woman. Both of them were taken to a nearby police van. The man, a 20-year-old, was arrested for battery, disorderly conduct, and resisting arrest, according to the Kenosha County Sheriff's Department. The 34-year-old woman was arrested for disorderly conduct. 'Yes I got a little hurt so I had to leave,' Cahill told Fox News. 'I'm going to try and be back tomorrow.' The flurry of violence as dark fell came after a calm day, which saw supporters of both sides had been sharing pizza as they awaited the verdict for the second day. Inside court, however, Wednesday saw high drama as Rittenhouse's defense team made a new request for a mistrial based on the controversial drone footage that they described as a 'linchpin' of the state's case against him. Addressing the court, defense attorney Corey Chirafisi said: 'We're talking about a potential life sentence here and it has to be addressed.' Chirafisi made his request for a mistrial without prejudice this time acknowledging that the state could and will retry the case. The jury has now asked to review the controversial footage, as well as the best views of all of the shootings, from six video clips, that they will be able to watch and re-watch as many times as they like. Justin Blake (center), whose nephew Jacob was shot by police on August 23, 2020 - sparking the Kenosha riots - is seen on Wednesday night leading a protest outside the courthouse The 20-year-old man with the Bart Simpson backpack is seen outside the Kenosha courthouse on Wednesday The 20-year-old can be seen grabbing at a pro-Rittenhouse demonstrator's sign He then grappled with a man wearing a black backpack, on the steps of the courthouse Emily Cahill, a Rittenhouse supporter, tries to keep a grip on her sign as the 20-year-old man attempts to wrestle it from her The young man continues tussling with Cahill, trying to get her sign Police are seen arresting the 20-year-old with the Bart Simpson backpack - he was arrested for battery and disorderly conduct Officers from Kenosha police form a barricade as the 20-year-old is handcuffed A man is pictured being pushed to the ground amid the chaos A second person is pictured being wrestled to the ground by Kenosha police A Kenosha officer tries to calm down an agitated woman outside the courthouse The second person is seen being detained by officers Speaking to the point that had dominated today's proceedings even before their request to re-watch the footage, Chirafisi said that it needed to be addressed and that they would have tried the case differently had they possessed evidence of the same quality as the state. According to Chirafisi there is no getting around the fact that the defense has been hamstrung because they did not have the highest quality version of one of the most significant videos played to the jury, while the state did. 'We would have done this case in a little bit different manner [had we had it].' He continued, 'We didn't have the quality of evidence that the state had until the case had been closed, the parties had rested, and we were going to closings. 'We've talked to Mr Rittenhouse and I'm going to be asking the court for a mistrial based upon if we're really trying to get to the heart of this, I've watched the video and I can tell you what I think, but it doesn't matter what I think because we can't put it to the jury anymore.' Kyle Rittenhouse's defense team made a new request for a mistrial Wednesday The jury in the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse asked if it must return to the courtroom to watch video footage or if they can do that in private. Judge Bruce Schroeder said Wednesday that he 'hasn't even had a chance to read the motion to dismiss' filed by the defense yesterday Standing to defend the state's position Assistant District Attorney James Kraus said that he thought they were 'putting too much emphasis on a technical glitch.' But he admitted, for the first time, that the video that had been sent to the defense was compressed. In a brief break it appeared that the state had realized that the video file had been compressed when Detective Martin Howard emailed it to Kraus - who then forwarded it to defense attorney, Natalie Wisco. Chirafisi said, 'If you're a prosecutor, your job is fairness and being a truth seeker. 'It's not debatable that it's not fair what happened. 'We can sit here all day and say it's been played, we didn't know there's another version. How is that reasonable?' Judge Schroeder decided to allow the jurors to view the footage but told the prosecution: 'I've persistently warned the state that there's a day of reckoning with respect to these things. I had my qualms. 'I forewarned you and you pressed with this I let it in. My view on it now is we might as well follow through with it and if they've got everything correct and it's reliable we're okay. 'But if it isn't it's going to be ugly.' The defense stated it has found evidence that the program used to enhance the footage is not for use in law enforcement, nor regarded as forensically reliable. Shortly after 3pm all parties returned to the court as they had come to an agreement over how the drone footage should be viewed over defense objections to it being viewed at all. The judge cleared the courtroom as jurors viewed it on the large monitors there rather than on a laptop in the jury room. A bailiff was positioned at the door. As he told everyone to get out, Judge Schroeder warned: 'If you leave anything electronic in here be sure to say goodbye because you will never see it again.' Rittenhouse, who was 17 at the time of the shootings, is charged with first-degree intentional homicide and other counts Lawyers for Rittenhouse filed their motion for mistrial with prejudice based on this and several other grounds. According to a motion filed yesterday by the defense, 'The problem is the prosecution gave the defense a compressed version of the video' Earlier on Wednesday the jury asked to see three separate videos, all of which relate to Rittenhouse's shooting of Gaige Grosskreutz. They asked for footage from Grosskreutz's own livestream that night as well as two other videos that capture his shooting. They have asked to view one presented by the defense's expert witness Dr. James Black - in both regular and slow motion and up until 10 seconds after Grosskreutz was shot. Grosskreutz admitted on the stand that he had been pointing his gun at Rittenhouse when the teen pulled the trigger on him a crucial point for the defense's claim of self-defense. Gaige Grosskreutz was shot by Kyle Rittenhouse on August 25, 2020 and his right bicep was almost entirely blown away. Grosskreutz, the state's star witness, took the stand last week Judge Bruce Schroeder felt compelled to again warn the state that their dependence on the controversial drone footage that the defense has accused them of withholding, is a 'high risk strategy' that could see their case collapse. He said the state's case could 'fall like a house of cards' if the footage proves to be forensically unsound. Schroeder had earlier admitted that he had not even had a chance to read the motion for a mistrial filed by the defense, which argued in part that the state failed to provide high-definition drone footage central to their case in a timely fashion. He returned to the court having done so. Turning to address the matter he asked Assistant District Attorney James Kraus to explain the state's position. As revealed by DailyMail.com, the defense stated in their motion that the prosecution provided them with a file that was 4MB in size while they possessed a file that was 11MB and provided that one to the state's crime lab for enhancement. Kraus insisted that he had emailed the same file and said that it must have been compressed by the Android phone to which it was sent or by the defense's email. It was a version that the defense robustly rejected. Defense attorney Natalie Wisco addressed the court for the first time in proceedings. She explained that she had never viewed the footage on her phone and that the file name and creation time of the footage supplied by the state on November 5 was different to that of the high-definition footage of which they only learned later. The difference was only exposed in court Friday, she explained, when the state did not have an exhibit ready for the judge to view and so she played the defense's version - which was markedly different in quality. 'This is your best picture?' asked the judge of the blurry image a request that prompted Kraus's admission that they had better. On Wednesday Wisco was blunt. 'There is no way that what ADA Kraus is saying is true because the file name [we received] should have been exactly the same as the one provided to the state crime lab,' she said. Kraus hit back, saying that 'as an officer of the court' he was 'insulted' at the allegation that he would lie. But in a startling move Judge Schroeder silenced him, saying: 'We are going to have to take testimony under oath. 'This is going to require expert testimony under oath as to what the facts are. 'I re-iterate my [earlier] comment that given the cloudy picture about this particular exhibit this is a high-risk strategy or the state. 'I was queasy about this from the beginning and I'm only queasier about it now.' Kraus suggested that the relevant exhibits could be downloaded onto a thumb drive and the courtroom turned into the jury room so that jurors could watch it under the supervision of court officers. He said that the court would have to be cleared and searched for any devices that might record deliberations. Rittenhouse fatally shot Joseph Rosenbaum (left), 36, with an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle after Rosenbaum chased Rittenhouse across a parking lot and threw a plastic bag at him shortly before midnight on August 25, 2020. Moments later, as Rittenhouse was running down a street, he shot and killed Anthony Huber (right), 26, a protester from Silver Lake, Wisconsin James Armstrong, a photographic expert in the Wisconsin State Crime Lab, testified about drone video during the trial last week Defense attorney Mark Richards said on Wednesday: 'I don't know what exhibits the jurors wish to see. 'We have a real problem with them seeing the drone footage. 'We have a motion pending based upon disclosure. If they want to see that, that's just tainting the jury further.' As revealed by DailyMail.com the state only provided a full-size file of the footage in question on Saturday November 13, two days ahead of closing. Richards' objection sparked the judge to respond to comments that he claimed he had seen in the media from experts expressing surprise that he had not ruled on the defense's motion for a mistrial. He said: 'I haven't even had a chance to read the motion to dismiss. I just got it yesterday and I really think that before reading I should let the state respond.' He said that motions should be 'taken under advisement' unless they were 'crystal clear.' Warming to his theme Judge Schroeder continued, 'It's a shame that irresponsible statements are being made. As long as I'm talking about it [let's talk about] the business of people not being identified as 'victims.' Judge Schroeder's ruling that the men shot by Rittenhouse could not be described as 'victims' caused a great deal of backlash for the judge. DailyMail.com revealed that there was a huge swell in the hate mail he has received as a result. On Wednesday he said: 'How would you like to be put on trial for a crime and the judge introduced the case to the jury by introducing you as the defendant and the person who's accusing you as the victim? 'Is it so difficult to use the term 'complaining witness'?' Prosecutors in the Kenosha shooter trial withheld evidence from the defense that was 'at the center of their case,' only sharing the high-definition drone video footage (pictured) on which they have hung their prosecution after the trial had concluded Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger played the enhanced drone footage to the jury during his closing statements and claimed that it showed Rittenhouse 'pointing his gun' at people an assertion that opened the door to the state claiming Rittenhouse provoked the violence of the night of August 25, 2020 The judge also addressed the criticism he had received over the unusual method with which the alternate jurors had been selecting Rittenhouse drew their numbers from a tumbler in court. Schroeder said he had come up with that method two decades ago when trying a murder case in Racine. 'There was a black defendant and 13 jurors - one of whom was black,' he said. 'The clerk drew the name out of the tumbler, and it was the only black [juror]. 'It was okay, but it was a bad optic I thought. I think people feel better when they have control.' Before returning to the matter in hand the judge went onto defend all five attorneys trying this case as 'very reputable and competent' and though he did not go into specifics he said it thought it 'shameful some of the things that are being done to these people.' He described some coverage as 'grossly irresponsible' and said: 'I'm going to think long and hard about live television of a trial again. 'When I see what's being done it's really quite frightening: frightening. That's the word for it.' Turning his focus back on the jurors' question, the judge ruled with the attorneys' agreement that they should return to the courtroom to watch any exhibits. As to how many times they are allowed to watch that video there was some discussion. Judge Schroeder felt that limiting the number of times the jurors can re-watch any footage or look at any still images was an 'insult' to their intelligence. Richards disagreed saying that watching or re-watching 'three or four times' was okay but that watching without limit could lead to an undue emphasis being placed on one piece of evidence. The judge allowed the jury to watch on Wednesday afternoon, but will make a final decision on how frequently they can re-watch it once the defense has had an opportunity to research legal precedents. Veteran broadcaster Andrew Neil said it was a 'huge mistake' for him to become the face of GB News, and branded the channel as a 'Ukip tribute band'. The former BBC presenter said the channel was still haunted by the 'shambles' of its launch and ran the risk of 'falling into irrelevance and obscurity'. Speaking at Freeview's Outside the Box event, he discussed his short time at the channel with interviewer and Sky News' Political Editor Beth Rigby. Referring to his brief stint with GB News, he said: 'The big mistake I made, and it was a huge mistake, and it did cause pain and aggravation, was that I put my name and face on the tin and yet quickly discovered that I really had no say in what was going into that tin.' Neil said he was in 'no rush' to return to television but that he did not want GB News to be 'the full stop in my broadcast career'. He said his two main issues with GB News were its production values and ideological stance, citing Nigel Farage being given a nightly show months after launch. Veteran broadcaster Andrew Neil said on Wednesday it was a 'huge mistake' for him to become the face of GB News, and branded the channel as a 'Ukip tribute band' 'My fundamental mistake was to get into bed with people who I thought shared my vision, but didn't actually,' he said. 'What made it very stressful and very difficult was that in the public domain, understandably and quite rightly, it was Andrew Neil's GB News, it was Andrew Neil's channel, that was the brand of it. 'And yet it was doing things ... that were not me.' 'It became apparent to me as the months of this year went on that a combination of the board and the founding members, that this was basically a Ukip tribute band, and that's what they really wanted.' Mr Neil added that GB News' disastrous launch in June 2021 would be remembered. '(The channel) has a danger, if it doesn't get on top of its production value and its ratings, it will just slide into irrelevance and obscurity,' he said. 'Most launches don't go very well, but there are some launches which go well enough to allow recovery. 'There are other launches that go so badly they haunt you for months and months afterwards. 'I think GB News is still haunted by the shambles of the launch, and that will take a long while to overcome. Pictured: Presenter Andrew Neil prepares to broadcast from a studio during the launch event for new TV channel GB News at The Point in Paddington, London in June 2021 Pictured: GB News presenters (left to right) Kirsty Gallacher, Andrew Doyle, Neil Oliver, Darren McCaffrey, Alex Phillips, Rebecca Hutson, Simon McCoy, Nana Akua, Liam Halligan, Gloria De Piero, Dan Wootton, Andrew Neil, Michelle Dewberry, Mercy Muroki, Tom Harwood, Colin Brazier, Inaya Folarin Iman, Alastair Stewart. GB News launches on Sunday evening with a special programme called Welcome To GB News on Sunday June 13, 2021 Speaking of experiencing technical problems while broadcasting for the channel he added: 'It's not just embarrassing, it's heart-stopping when you're ... about to go live and you're told in your ear every single link has gone down.' But Mr Neil admitted that even at such a late stage in his career with extensive experience in the industry it was still possible to make mistakes and learn from them. 'You think you know everything because you've done everything and you don't, and you can still make what was, on my part, probably the single biggest mistake of my career, to get into that position.' On returning to broadcast journalism, he said: 'I'm in no rush to come back to television at all. I'd like to do something on the TV front ... for one major reason, and it's entirely self-serving. 'I don't want GB news to be the full stop in my broadcasting career.' The presenter, who was also chairman at GB news, said he still believed that there was in Britain still a gap in the market for a 'centre right' news alternative, without the need to drift towards 'Fox News to the right'. Andrew Neil launched GB News in June with Neil saying it would not 'slavishly follow the existing news agenda' but quit with this fleeting Tweet in September However, he said that the BBC under Director-General Tim Davie was right to put impartiality at the heart of its news coverage. Asked whether he would return to the BBC having held discussions with Mr Davie, Neil said that while no roles are immediately available at the broadcaster, the door remains open. While he likely held political beliefs to the right of most BBC journalists, he said he would 'leave those at the studio door' and give politicians from all sides of the spectrum and 'equal opportunity thumping.' Neil also criticised 'mainstream' UK news channels for - in his eyes - failing to challenge stories that appeal to more 'liberal' sensibilities of journalists and editors. 'We're no longer journalists, we've become the PR department of Greenpeace,' Neil said, specifically of the coverage of COP26 summit in Glasgow in recent weeks. The Government was facing new fury today over PPE deals after claiming it had lost the official record of a phone call between a health minister, the former MP Owen Paterson and Randox, the company at the heart of his lobbying shame. MPs were told today that officials have been 'unable to locate a formal note' of what was said during a call involving Lord Bethell in April last year regarding equipment. Labour wants to force the Government to release minutes of meetings between ministers, officials and the diagnostics company amid concerns over how nearly 600 million of Covid testing contracts were awarded to the firm. Randox is the diagnostics company which employed Mr Paterson, the former Tory cabinet minister who resigned as MP for North Shropshire during the Westminster sleaze row, as a consultant. At Prime Minister's Questions, Boris Johnson said he was 'very happy to publish all the details of the Randox contracts, which have been investigated by the National Audit Office already'. Health minister Gillian Keegan later echoed the Government's desire to review the information it holds and publish what is deemed 'in scope' of Labour's request. But she prompted a furious reaction by disclosing the lack of a formal note related to the conference call on April 9 last year. Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner suggested the lack of minutes was in breach of the ministerial code. Randox is the diagnostics company which employed Mr Paterson (right) as a consultant. The former Tory cabinet minister who resigned as MP for North Shropshire during the Westminster sleaze row over his work MPs were told today that officials have been 'unable to locate a formal note' of what was said during a call involving Lord Bethell (pictured with Boris Johnson) in April last year regarding equipment. Speaking in the Commons, Liberal Democrat former minister Alistair Carmichael asked Ms Keegan to publish the minutes of the telephone conference call. Ms Keegan, in her reply, said: 'In terms of the minutes, I think we've said we will publish things here in the library.' She later said: 'We will review what information is held, that's in scope, and we will come back to Parliament and deposit them in the libraries of the House. We will commit to do that.' Pressed further by Labour MP Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) on the Randox meeting, Ms Keegan said: 'The meeting he refers to was a courtesy call from the minister to Randox to discuss RNA extraction kits. 'That was declared on the ministerial register of calls and meetings, and we have been unable to locate a formal note of that meeting, but all the other notes that are available with regard to this - and that meeting, by the way, was after any contracts were let with Randox.' Raising a point of order, Labour former minister Dame Angela Eagle said the minister had made 'astonishing' revelations to MPs about there being 'meetings with no minutes that are official, involve Government minister, and she is unable to locate a copy of what is clearly a meeting that happened'. Another Labour MP shouted: 'Staggering.' Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle said he hoped the ministerial officials would look into this, adding: 'I would expect that Government meetings that take place with people around would always be minuted. 'If not, I think it opens up another question and I don't want that question to be opened up - I'd sooner for it to be answered.' Opening the debate, Ms Rayner said: 'We already know that the former member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson) broke the rules on lobbying, we already know that Randox was awarded nearly 600 million of taxpayers' money without a tender. 'We already know that Randox were awarded a second 347 million contract, having failed to deliver on a previous 133 million contract, and we already know this decision was made after a conference call involving the then-member for North Shropshire and the health minister Lord Bethell. 'What we don't know is what happened in those meetings, who else was present, what was discussed and what was decided?' Health minister Gillian Keegan prompted a furious reaction by disclosing the lack of a formal note related to the conference call on April 9 last year Randox said it would 'co-operate fully' after Labour's motion attempting to force the Government to release minutes of meetings between ministers, officials and the firm was approved unopposed. A Randox spokesman said: 'Randox will be pleased to co-operate fully in laying before the House all the material required. 'Public disclosure will demonstrate the efficiency and value for money provided by Randox through contacts awarded in full compliance with Government regulations at a time of national crisis. 'Contrary to much of what has been written and broadcast, lobbying played no role in the awarding of these contracts. 'The company has 40 years' experience in testing and diagnostics. It is proud of its performance and delivery under the contracts awarded to it on merit by the Government. They resulted in the delivery of more than 21 million Covid tests, 15 million of them to the national testing programme from the start of the emergency in the spring of 2020. 'At this time, hindered by global shortages and less experience than Randox, other laboratories were simply not able to provide whole-system capabilities to deliver the tests which the World Health Organisation and the UK Government agreed were crucial to combating the pandemic.' The Biden administration is making billions of dollars available to drugmakers to scale up domestic production of COVID-19 vaccines in the hopes of building capacity to produce an additional 1 billion shots per year to share with the world. Money for the plan has been set aside from the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan that Congress passed in March. Under the new initiative, the Department of Health and Human Services' Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority is soliciting pharmaceutical companies that have demonstrated the ability to make the more-effective mRNA vaccines to bid for government investment in scaling up their manufacturing abilities. The Biden administration is making billions of dollars available to drugmakers to scale up domestic production of COVID-19 vaccines in the hopes of building capacity to produce an additional 1 billion shots per year to share globally President Joe Biden's (pictured) administration will make funds available to drugmakers who've showen they're able to produce mRNA vaccines using money from the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan that Congress passed in March Drugmakers Pfizer and Moderna produce the two U.S.-approved mRNA shots. The Biden administration believes the boosted capacity of COVID-19 shots will help ease a global shortage of doses, particularly in lower- and middle-income nations, stopping preventable death and limiting the development of potentially new, more dangerous variants of the virus. The initiative comes as the Biden White House has faced growing pressure at home and abroad over inequity in the global vaccine supply. And as the U.S. moves toward approving booster shots for all adults while vulnerable people in poorer nations wait for their first dose of protection. Currently, Americans over 65 are eligible for boosters - along with younger Americans who live and work in congregate settings or have certain medical conditions. There are no firm agreements yet with Moderna or Pfizer to take up the U.S. on the investment. But the Biden administration hopes that the enhanced manufacturing capacity, through support for the company's facilities, equipment, staff or training, will be available by mid-2022 to allow more COVID-19 doses to be shared overseas as well as to prepare for the next public health emergency. 'Investments being considered may involve costs associated with infrastructure (facilities/equipment), bolstering trained staff and long-term sustainment ('readiness) for COVID-19 vaccine, or variants of concern, and emerging infectious disease/pandemic response at no less than 100 million doses per month over and above current U.S.-based capacity,' the solicitation says. The New York Times first reported on the new initiative. Mexico President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is deploying the National Guard in an attempt to safeguard Cancun and other neighboring resort towns following a rise in violence linked to organized crime. Lopez Obrador announced the move during a press conference Wednesday almost two weeks after members of a street level drug dealing gang reportedly tied to the Sinaloa Cartel open fired and killed two members of a rival drug dealing ring that is also tied to the same criminal organization. 'This cannot be repeated,' the president said during a visit to Cancun. 'In a few more days, about 1,500 from the National Guard are to be mobilized to Quintana Roo.' Security lapses in the state of Quintana Roo made international headlines after 25-year-old Anjali Ryot, of San Jose, and 35-year-old Jennifer Henzold, of Germany, were caught in a gang crossfire and killed at the La Malquerida bar on October 19. Two German males, aged 26 and 25, and a 21-year-old woman from the Netherlands were also wounded in the shootout. Mexico President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced Wednesday that a National Guard battalion of 1,445 soldiers will be permanently deployed along the municipalities of Benito Juarez, Tulum and Solidaridad in the state of Quintana Roo to combat a rise in crime that has left a sense of insecurity at resorts frequented by at least 20 million international visitors Anjali Ryot, of San Jose, California, was one of two women killed at a bar in Tulum, Mexico, in an incident sparked by rival drug dealers. The 25-year-old, who was born in India, was visiting the Mexican tourist town for her birthday That was followed by an incident November 4 when panicked tourists were sent to hide in hotels after a gangland slaying on the beach near the $400-a-night Hyatt Ziva Riviera Cancun and adjacent Azul Beach Resort in Puerto Morelos, south of Cancun. At least 15 armed men were picked up by security cameras wandering near the hotel property around 2pm local time and were later shown by another surveillance camera tackling an alleged drug dealer to the sand before he was dragged away and shot dead. The gunmen reportedly killed a second drug pusher just steps away from the Hyatt Ziva Hotel, were he attempted to seek refuge. The attackers then fled on two speedboats via Petempich Bay. Authorities said a person suffered an injury in the attack. It's unknown if the victim was a guest or employee of the Hyatt Ziva. In June, a 30-year-old woman identified as Kanya, from Kentucky, was shot and wounded after assassins arrived on jet skis and launched an attack that killed two workers inside a gift shot. According to Mexico's Secretary General of National Public Security, the state of Quintana Roo reported 442 murders between January and September 2021 compared with 463 over the same period last year. However, the Caribbean coast municipalities of Benito Juarez - home to Cancun - Puerto Morelos, Solidaridad and Tulum, whose resorts attract about 20 million visitors a year, were the deadliest with 379 murders compared to 383 homicides last year. A tourist from Europe is tended to moments after gunmen opened fired on an alleged rival drug dealer and killed two female tourists on November 4 at a bar in Tulum A 30-year-old American woman, identified as Kanya, was wounded Friday at a beach in Cancun, Mexico, after two gunmen stepped off their jet skis and opened fire, killing two male workers outside a gift shop before escaping The new troops will be permanently based in the area beginning December 1, particularly in tourist zones, and will focus on intelligence work. 'This battalion will provide security to the entire tourist area, as the year progresses we will provide it with the tools to do its job, the equipment it requires to be able to attend this new mission,' Defense Secretary Luis Cresencio Sandoval said. Lopez Obrador created the National Guard in 2019 in a bid to overhaul the security forces which had battled criminal gangs for years. Violence linked to drug cartels is blamed for thousands of murders in Mexico every year. As of September, 21,495 people had died from gang-related violence this year, an average of almost 2,400 per month, according to the government. President Biden headed to Detroit on Wednesday for the next leg of his victory tour celebrating his new infrastructure package - with a visit to an auto plant run by General Motors, which paid $160,000 this year to a lobbyist whose brother is one of the president's closest advisers. Jeff Ricchetti, the brother of Counselor to the President Steve Ricchetti, reported being paid $160,000 by General Motors this year to lobby the White House and Congress. His lobbying disclosures indicate that the work included efforts on electric vehicle tax incentives. In Detroit, Biden will highlight investment in electric transportation with a visit to GM's 'factory zero' is its mission to repurpose itself as a builder of electric vehicles. The bipartisan bill includes $7.5 billion to build out a national electric vehicle charging network, which experts say will encourage more people to buy green cars and more manufacturers to build them. Biden is expected to test drive one of the first GMC Hummer EV pickups to come off the production line before they go on sale next year. It is his third visit to one of the big three automakers this year, following trips to see a Fiat-Chrysler plant in March and a Ford factory in May. President Joe Biden left the White House on Wednesday for Detroit, Michigan, where he will visit General Motor's first factory retooled to produce electric vehicles Steve Ricchetti (l) is a longtime Biden confidant and is currently counselor to the president. His role has attracted frequent accusations of a conflict of interest when his brother, Jeff (r), is a lobbyist who has seen business grow more than four-fold since Biden took office Biden is expected to test drive one of GM's new Hummer electric pickup trucks A senior administration official said there was no hint of family favoritism. 'Jeff had no role in this visit,' said the official. Even so Ricchetti's lobbying firm, which he set up with his brother, has enjoyed a bumper year since Biden took power. In the first half of 2021, Ricchetti Inc. took in $1.67 million in fees in the first half of the year, according to financial disclosures - a huge increase on the $370,000 it reported in the same period of 2020. In response to previous accusations of a possible conflict of interest, the White House said Steve Ricchetti recuses himself from issues raised by his brother or his firm. 'I do not lobby my brother, nor have I lobbied the White House this quarter,' Jeff Ricchetti told the Wall Street Journal earlier this year. But the link still raised concerns among ethics experts amid reports that Steve Ricchetti was involved in negotiations over the infrastructure bill. 'Steve Ricchetti ought to completely recuse himself from any part of the legislation that his brothers firm is lobbying on, and then have the White House not take calls from his brother,' Richard Painter, a former Democratic Senate candidate who was President George W. Bushs chief ethics lawyer, told the Free Beacon which first reported on the lobbying connections on Wednesday. His brother is a long time Biden confidant and one of the most powerful people in the White House. He worked as deputy chief of staff in Bill Clintons White House before opening Ricchetti Inc. with his brother. But he stepped aside when he went to work for then Vice President joe Biden in 2012. During the visit, Biden will deliver remarks on how the law 'builds electric vehicle charging stations across the country to make it easier to drive an electric vehicle, reduces emissions to fight the climate crisis, and creates good-paying, union jobs across the country,' the White House said in a statement. A broad transition to electric cars and trucks will help the United States meet Biden's pledge to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions 50% from 2005 levels by 2030. Democrats are working on a separate social spending and climate bill that contains up to $12,500 in tax credits for U.S.-made EVs, including a $4,500 credit for union-made vehicles. The bill is a key pillar of Biden's domestic agenda but has faced hurdles to passage from competing views between progressive and moderate lawmakers in his party. Channel 4 is set to look for a Scottish family to appear on Gogglebox after an SNP MP and viewers complained about the 'lack of representation' on the show. The pledge to fund a dedicated casting team to find a Scottish family before the end of the year was made after Scottish Tory leader, Douglas Ross, told bosses there had not been a Scottish family on the programme since 2016. Chairman of the Scottish Affairs Committee at Westminster, Pete Wishart MP, welcomed the decision, which followed his committee's evidence session on public broadcasting in Scotland with Channel 4. Channel 4 is set to look for a Scottish family to appear on Gogglebox (pictured) after an SNP MP and viewers complained about the 'lack of representation' on the show After almost a decade on screen, Gogglebox, which is currently on its 18th series, has only featured one Glasgow family, the Manuel's, who were living in Croydon at the time. Channel 4 chief executive Alex Mahon told the committee: 'We do get complaints about the lack of representation on Gogglebox which is one of our biggest shows.' She described this as being a 'continued pressure' and has since written to MPs to confirm that the broadcaster has agreed a separate budget for a dedicated casting team to find a suitable Scottish family to appear on the hit show. It is hoped that at least one Scottish family will be appearing on the programme, which has been honoured with BAFTAs and the National Television Awards, from the New Year. During the Scottish Affairs Committee session held on September 20, MPs explored a number of areas ranging from privatisation, Channel 4's presence in Scotland and the impact Covid-19 has had on its production companies. Chairman of the Scottish Affairs Committee at Westminster, Pete Wishart MP, (pictured) welcomed the decision Mr Wishart said: 'Channel 4 has impressive credentials for supporting independent producers and offering opportunities for young people wishing to explore the sector. 'We are bursting at the seams with talent in Scotland, and I am pleased to hear Channel 4's efforts to harness this potential. 'A theme which came up in our evidence session was the lack of a Scottish family on Gogglebox. 'It is clear some have approached the channel with similar concern, often offering themselves as an option. 'I am therefore pleased to see a dedicated team tasked with this and look forward to seeing the successful family on our screens in the new series.' In a letter to Mr Wishart, Ms Mahon said: 'Since I met with you we have agreed a separate budget with Studio Lambert for a dedicated casting team specifically tasked with finding a suitable Scottish family. 'The casting period is already underway and will run up to Christmas. 'The ambition is to identify at least one Scottish family who will become part of the Gogglebox cast for the next series which will air in the new year.' A lorry driver who killed a Canadian oil millionaire after causing a fatal crash on the M23 during the London to Brighton veteran car rally was using his mobile phone at the wheel. Michael Black, 52, ploughed into the back of a 110-year-old vintage car as it travelled at 21mph along the four-lane motorway after making a wrong turn on November 3, 2019. Ronald Carey, 80, suffered fatal injuries and was pronounced dead at the scene. His wife Billi, who was sat alongside him in the front passenger seat, also suffered life-threatening injuries in the crash. She was airlifted to hospital from the scene and survived the incident. Black, of Crawley, West Sussex, was convicted of causing death by careless driving at Guildford Crown Court on Wednesday. He was cleared of causing death by dangerous driving. The court heard that Mr and Mrs Carey had travelled from Canada to take part in the annual London to Brighton Veteran Car Run in their 1903 Knox Runabout 'Old Porcupine' car. Ron Carey, 80, had been at the wheel of a 1903 Knox Runabout 'Old Porcupine' vehicle with his wife Billi. This photograph is thought to have been taken hours before he died The London to Brighton Veteran Car Run route is pictured in green, while the route believed to have been taken by Mr Carey yesterday is seen in red The 60-mile run began in London's Hyde Park at dawn, with the route taking drivers down the A23 through Gatwick, Crawley and Burgess Hill before the first car arrived at Madeira Drive, Brighton, shortly after 10am. However, Mr Carey mistakenly took the slip road for the M23 rather than the designated A23 route. Black, driving a Scania tipper truck, meanwhile, had collected a load for the smart motorway works on the M23 and was on his way to dispose of it. His lorry struck the rear of the vintage car, causing both Mr and Mrs Carey to be thrown from the vehicle. Analysis of his phone showed a phone call was in progress when the crash took place. Scott Brady, prosecuting, told the court: 'They were in the third lane and ahead of Black. He was directly behind them in lane three. Shortly after 10am, Blacks Scania collided with the Knox. 'If Black had been keeping a good lookout this accident would not have occurred. He was not keeping a good lookout because, in his own words "I wasnt looking, I looked down and they were there". 'He said he wasnt keeping a good lookout because he was distracted by a phone call he was trying to make to a friend. He was certainly making a phone call at the time of the collision and he admitted as much, in a police interview. 'He said it was "ringing, ringing, ringing and it did not connect and I impacted with the vehicle".' The Careys on the Mall at the start of the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run in November 2019 The Canadian couple took the wrong lane and ended up on the M23 instead of the designated A23 route used for the rally Police at the scene following the crash at the junction of the A23 and the M23 in Surrey in 2019 Dashcam footage displayed to the jury showed the orange lorry smashing into the rear of the open-top Knox. Police Constable Joanna Robins told the court that the Knox was 'potentially in view for 14 seconds' before the collision took place. The jury was also played the harrowing 999 made by Black in the moments after the crash. It showed the lorry driver pacing back and forth between his vehicle and the mangled wreckage of the Knox as he made the call. As he watched the footage, Black closed his eyes and let out an audible sigh while he sat wearing a smart black suit, emblazoned with a poppy, in the dock. He sobbed uncontrollably as the verdicts were read out, while his wife was also in tears in the public gallery. Black will be sentenced on December 8. Mr Carey, who had made his fortune after founding oil supply company J&L Supply, had been a veteran car enthusiast since the 1980s and had contributed to museums and collections around the world, including his personal collection which was worth an estimated 3.8 million. Mr Carey, pictured with his wife Billi, was described as 'very well-respected and well-liked' A listing for Mr and Mrs Carey's vehicle on the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run website, which states it was registered in Arizona, has since been taken down Police officers are pictured at the scene in 2019 as well as a Highway Maintenance vehicle The couple had specially shipped the car to the UK to take part in the rally and the jury was shown a picture of the pair wrapped up in warm clothes just hours before the fatal crash. Mrs Carey listened to proceedings via video link from Arizona. Speaking after his conviction, Detective Constable Kelly Newton said: 'Black's defence was that he simply did not see the car in front of him until it was too late as a result of "looming" and the sun being a distraction. 'Today's verdict has reinforced that this isn't in fact accurate and he was distracted by the use of his mobile phone. 'I hope that the guilty verdict delivered today sends a clear message to other drivers, that losing concentration, even for a few seconds, can have devastating consequences.' A British Army soldier forbidden from drinking while on 'orderly duty' has been demoted after he started a drunken brawl following a pub row. Corporal Kirt Daykin, 38, rugby tackled a colleague to the ground before punching him in the head during a street fight outside a pub where he was based in Larkhill, near Salisbury, in July. The father-of-two was on 'orderly duty', where a soldier is forbidden from drinking so he can look after intoxicated colleagues and receive important messages, when the drunken incident took place. Bulford Military Court, in Wiltshire, heard Cpl Daykin was with the 47th Royal Artillery at Horne Barracks when he challenged Lance Bombardier Douglas Gough to a fight. Captain Rebecca Slee, prosecuting, said: 'Cpl Daykin reported for duty at 10am on the 9th [of July] and was to remain on duty until 6pm on the 11th. Corporal Kirt Daykin pictured outside Bulford Military Court in Wiltshire on Wednesday, where he pleaded guilty to single counts of battery, disorderly behaviour and contravening standing orders The court heard that Cpl Daykin rugby tackled a colleague to the ground before punching him in the head during a fight outside a pub near Salisbury 'During the evening of the 10th Cpl Daykin visited a pub called The Packhorse in Larkhill. 'Whilst Cpl Daykin was at the pub he consumed alcohol and became intoxicated, in contravention with the standing orders. Alcohol shouldnt be consumed at any time while on duty. 'On the way home from the pub there was an altercation between Cpl Daykin and LBdr Gough and Cpl Daykin rugby tackled him, brought him to the ground and punched him in the head.' The court heard the fight on the walk home came after a disagreement in the pub. Judge Advocate Jane England said: 'From what I understand Gough came out of the toilet, saw some play fighting and got the wrong impression. 'Cpl Daykin took exception to him intervening and breaking it up and thought Gough had hit him on the head. 'Ironically, one of his duties would have been to deal with those who returned to camp in a drunken state.' Tagbo Ilozue, defending, said in mitigation that, while Cpl Daykin had asked LBdr Gough to fight him, the latter had 'accepted willingly' and took off his hoodie as an invitation to brawl. Cpl Daykin was on 'orderly duty', where a soldier is forbidden from drinking so he can look after intoxicated colleagues and receive important messages, when the drunken incident took place Cpl Daykin was demoted to Lance Corporal and fined 800 following the hearing in Wiltshire He added that Cpl Daykin has struggled with alcohol dependency in the wake of death of both his father and grandfather in quick succession, which he found out about while on tour in Iraq. Mr Ilozue said this traumatic experience was followed by the breakdown of his marriage and his ex-wife taking his two young children, aged seven and 10, to Germany. Passing sentence, Judge Advocate England, said: 'Your general behaviour on the way home was unpleasant. 'You have had a difficult couple of years. You suffered two very sad bereavements, the breakdown of your marriage, the movement of your children abroad and you have not seen them. 'As a result, you used alcohol as a coping mechanism.' Cpl Daykin was demoted to Lance Corporal and fined 800 after pleading guilty to single counts of battery, disorderly behaviour and contravening standing orders. Donald Trump's former strategist Steve Bannon on Wednesday pleaded not guilty to criminal charges that he defied a subpoena issued by a congressional panel investigating the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Bannon, the first person to face charges in connection with the House probe, handed himself in to the FBI on Monday after last week being indicted on two counts of contempt of Congress. He claims communications with the former president are covered by 'executive privilege' and that the investigation is politically motivated. He was due to be arraigned in court on Thursday, but agreed to waive his right to a formal reading of the indictment, according to court documents filed on Wednesday. That means a scheduled virtual hearing would be little more than a check-in with the judge to discuss calendars. Bannon, who remains one of Trump's most visible and vocal propagandists, has used each twist of the case as fodder for his media machine. On Monday he and his supporters livestreamed the moment when he arrived to turn himself in to the FBI and a day later used their podcast to suggest they are victims of a witch hunt. Steve Bannon, former White House chief strategist under Trump, pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to two charges of contempt of Congress In a document submitted to U.S. District Court in Washington D.C., Bannon pleaded not guilty and waived his right to have the charges formally announced at a Thursday hearing 'This is going to be the misdemeanour from hell for Merrick Garland, Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden,' he told a throng of reporters as he left court after his first hearing. 'Joe Biden ordered Merrick Garland to prosecute me from the White House lawn when he got off Marine One, and we're going to go on the offence. 'We're tired of playing defense.' He arrived in court flanked by marshals and his supporters said he was handcuffed for part of the day's proceedings. He did not enter a plea during the 30-minute hearing on Monday before Washington D.C. Magistrate Judge Robin M. Meriweather. He was released without bail but is required to check in weekly with officials. He was also ordered to surrender his passport. On Tuesday Bannon was back on air and used his regular podcast to promise that he would fight the charges. 'They don't know how to handle when MAGA punches back and MAGA is punching back,' he told listeners to the War Room. Bannon and his supporters have used every step of the case as fodder for their media machine as they try to keep up pressure on the Biden administration 'Okay, we're not going to just sit here and take it any more ... the months and months and months and months and months of just the rhetoric and trying to weaponize the law and weaponize DOJ. 'We're not going to take it okay. We're going on offense.' Bannon was appointed White House chief strategist when Trump took power but was out later in the year after the two fell out. However, the two men remain in close touch. And House investigators want to know about their conversations ahead of the Jan. 6 rally and march on Congress that exploded into violence. He faces one contempt count for refusing to appear for a deposition before the House Select Committee and a second for refusing to produce documents. He faces up to one year in prison along with a fine of up to $100,000 if found guilty. New video footage shows the Liverpool suicide bomber on his journey to attack a woman's hospital in the city. CCTV images show Emad Al-Swealmeen inside the Delta taxi on his final journey to Liverpool Women's Hospital on Sunday before the 32-year-old blew himself up using a home-made IED. The driver, David Perry, leapt from the vehicle seconds after the blast before it was incinerated by flames. In the clip, the black Ford that Al-Swealmeen was inside was seen driving along the busy residential road of Lodge Lane - less than five minutes before his near-deadly attack. The taxi was captured by cameras at The Green Mountain Food Store, with its owner Naz Al-Asadi, 27, telling the Liverpool Echo that he was quizzed by officers who wanted to check his CCTV. 'The police came in around 12pm, they said to me can we check the CCTV?', Mr Al-Asadi said. 'I said yes, we should work together as this is something not good at all, this is very, very bad. They knew the time and they took a copy.' Police also visited other shops in the busy street, and staff and residents spoke of their dismay at hearing about the attack. It comes as counter-terror experts raided residential addresses linked with failed asylum seeker Al-Swealmeen and recovered 'several suspicious packages' which were examined by bomb squad officers. CCTV images show Emad Al-Swealmeen inside the Delta taxi (centre) on his final journey to Liverpool Women's Hospital on Sunday before the 32-year-old blew himself up using a home-made IED Counter terrorism police this morning announced they believed Al-Swealmeen had been planning the attack since April Police have also yet to find any evidence that failed asylum seeker and pizza chef Emad Al Swealmeen, 32, conspired with or was inspired by a terror group, suggesting he was a 'lone wolf' who became radicalised online during lockdown. Another business owner on Lodge Lane told the Liverpool Echo: 'I have no words to say about this guy who done it. 'We feel it paints a bad picture for us as Muslims, although he converted to Christianity. It is nothing to do with the Muslim people. 'I have heard about people that I know, women with the hijab, saying things to them about the situation.' It comes as police today called in the bomb squad and evacuated a pub as they searched an asylum hostel linked to the Poppy Day suicide bomber - as officers say he planned the attack for seven months. A Royal Logistics Corp bomb disposal vehicle was seen arriving in Sutcliffe Street, Liverpool along with a fire engine. Several 'suspicious packages' were recovered and examined by explosive ordnance experts and forensic officers. Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson of Counter Terrorism Police North West, said: 'Officers continue to search the Sutcliffe Street and Rutland Avenue addresses in relation to the CT incident on Sunday 14 November. 'This afternoon whilst searching a property on Sutcliffe Street several suspicious packages were found. 'Out of caution, these were examined by Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) officers prior to being recovered by forensics teams. 'An extension of the cordon to Boaler Street earlier today has now been retracted to cover only Sutcliffe Street. This decision forms part of our cautious and methodical approach to searching both addresses. 'The public may see EOD officers present tomorrow, if so, their presence will again be solely out of caution in case further items are found. 'Our main focus remains at the Rutland Avenue address.' Counter terrorism police this morning announced they believed Al-Swealmeen had been planning the attack since April, when he moved into an address on Rutland Avenue, near Sefton Park. So far detectives are not seeking anyone else in connection with the bombing, although they remain open-minded. Poppy Day suicide bomber planned attack for months after starting to buy ingredients for homemade device in April The suicide bomber who blew himself and a taxi up outside a Liverpool maternity hospital on Remembrance Sunday began building his killer device seven months ago, it was revealed today. Police have also yet to find any evidence that failed asylum seeker Emad Al Swealmeen, 32, conspired with or was inspired by a terror group, suggesting he was a 'lone wolf' who became radicalised online during lockdown. One theory is that the bomber was suffering a mental health crisis having been devastated at his continued failure to gain asylum here because the Home Office refused to believe he was Syrian. Today it emerged his next of kin have told police he was born in Iraq. In an update on the investigation Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing North West, said that the pizza chef who converted from Islam to Christianity began renting his flat in Rutland Avenue, Liverpool at around Easter. ACC Jackson said: 'A complex picture is emerging over the purchases of the component parts of the device, we know that Al Swealmeen rented the property from April this year and we believe relevant purchases have been made at least since that time'. He added: 'At this time we are not finding any link to others in the Merseyside area of concern but this remains a fast moving investigation and as more becomes known we cannot rule out action against others'. Advertisement Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing for the North West, said: 'The investigation into the terrorist incident at Liverpool Women's Hospital on Sunday 14 November continues. 'The taxi in which the device exploded has now been removed and today line searches by specialist officers will take place at the Hospital which could go into tomorrow. 'The post mortem on the deceased has taken place and the cause of death has been described as injuries sustained from the fire and explosion. 'A complex picture is emerging over the purchases of the component parts of the device, we know that Al Swealmeen rented the property from April this year and we believe relevant purchases have been made at least since that time. 'We have now traced a next of kin for Al Swealmeen who has informed us that he was born in Iraq. 'Our enquiries have found that Al Swealmeen has had episodes of mental illness, this will form part of the investigation and will take some time to fully understand.' Officers are yet to find any evidence that the failed asylum seeker conspired with or was inspired by a terror group, suggesting he was a 'lone wolf' who became radicalised online during lockdown. One theory is that the bomber was suffering a mental health crisis having been devastated at his continued failure to gain asylum here because the Home Office refused to believe he was Syrian. Today it emerged his next of kin have told police he was born in Iraq. In an update on the investigation Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing North West, said that the pizza chef who converted from Islam to Christianity began renting his flat in Rutland Avenue, Liverpool at around Easter. ACC Jackson said: 'A complex picture is emerging over the purchases of the component parts of the device, we know that Al Swealmeen rented the property from April this year and we believe relevant purchases have been made at least since that time'. He added: 'At this time we are not finding any link to others in the Merseyside area of concern but this remains a fast moving investigation and as more becomes known we cannot rule out action against others'. This is the moment the taxi carrying the suicide bomber exploded outside a Liverpool hospital in what police and MI5 are now probing as a Poppy Day terror attack. Experts fear he was copying an ISIS attack on a maternity hospital in Kabul His homemade bomb blew up as he approached the hospital. Experts have suggested it could have been a poorly made Mother of Satan device or even one put together with fireworks Aerial view of the aftermath of the explosion at the Liverpool Women's Hospital and the burnt out taxi Terrorist Al Swealmeen pictured on the right being converted to Christianity in Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral in 2017. Sources claim he may have found Jesus just to improve his immigration case These are the events that led to the explosion outside the Liverpool Women's Hospital and the arrests and raids that followed POPPY DAY HOSPITAL EXPLOSION: HOW EVENTS UNFOLDED ON REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY A picture shows the burnt out vehicle outside the Liverpool Women's Hospital on Sunday afternoon Sunday, November 14 10.57am: The taxi pulls up at the Liverpool Women's Hospital and explodes seconds later. 10.59am: The vehicle is fully engulfed just before the national silence for Remembrance Sunday. The passenger was killed and the driver was left with serious injuries. The latter is said to have spotted the explosives, 'jumped' from the car and locked the other man inside. At the time, a remembrance service involving scores of military personnel, veterans and civic dignitaries, was taking place at Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral less than a mile away. There are reports the taxi parked at the hospital because it could not get any closer to the Cathedral. 11.04am: Police and emergency services arrive at the scene, and it is initially thought the car might have caught alight because of a fuel leak. 1pm: Officers, who are believed to have spoken to hero taxi driver David Perry, announce the incident is being treated as an act of terrorism. 4.54pm: Police seal off Rutland Avenue (right). Around a mile from the blast. Locals said armed police ordered residents to leave and head to a nearby leisure centre, saying the area 'wasn't safe' and were 'pointing guns at a house'. Counter-terror negotiators were also called to the scene. 6.59pm: The men - aged 29, 26, and 21 - were detained in the Kensington area of the city and arrested under the Terrorism Act. Monday, November 15 3.30am: The operation at the Rutland Avenue address appears to wind down. 10am: Footage of the explosion emerges on CCTV from the scene. Midday: Police confirm it is being treated as a terror attack. And a man, 20, becomes the fourth suspect arrested 3pm: After raising the UK terror threat level to 'severe', speaking at a press conference at Downing Street, the Prime Minister said the blast was a 'stark reminder' to the public to remain vigilant, adding: 'What yesterday showed above all is that the British people will never be cowed by terrorism, we will never give in to those who seek to divide us with senseless acts of violence. 'And our freedoms and our way of life will always prevail.' 7pm: MailOnline names the suicide bomber as asylum seeker Enzo Almeni, 32, a Muslim who converted to Christianity four years ago. He changed his name from Emad Jamil Al Swealmeen. Tuesday November 16 7am: Four suspects who are said to have known Almeni a and were arrested in armed raids were released without charge Advertisement On Sunday, Almeni carried a homemade 'Mother of Satan' ball bearing bomb used by ISIS extremists to 'cause maximum carnage' at a maternity hospital and may have been driven to take revenge after his asylum bids kept being turned down, it was claimed today. A security source told The Sun: 'One of the issues being looked at is whether this unresolved grievance pushed him over the edge and prompted him to carry out the attack.' The UK's terror threat level was raised to 'severe' following an emergency COBRA meeting at Downing Street. Police and security services advised the Prime Minister that another attack on British soil is now 'highly likely'. Almeni's attack came exactly a month after Conservative MP Sir David Amess was fatally stabbed during a constituency surgery in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex. Alp Mehmet, the chairman of the Migration Watch think-tank questioned why Alemni had not been removed from Britain and said his case was 'seriously worrying'. He added that it points to the 'dysfunctional depths' which Britain's 'shattered asylum system has sunk'. The Church of England today denied there is any link between their vicars converting Muslim migrants and systemic abuse of the asylum system after it was revealed the Liverpool suicide bomber had found Jesus and then appealed his own case. Emad Al Swealmeen lost his first bid to stay in Britain in 2014, but appealed again in 2017 after he was confirmed at Liverpool Cathedral and his case was still outstanding when he blew himself up in a taxi on Sunday. Vicars have been accused of aiding asylum seekers to 'game' the immigration system by helping hundreds to convert from Islam and 'pray to stay' in the UK as it emerged people smugglers are using Instagram to urge migrants to follow Jesus to help them gain British citizenship. But in a statement the CofE said: 'We are not aware of any evidence to suggest a widespread correlation between conversion to Christianity, or any other faith, and abuse of the asylum system'. And in a barbed response to Home Office source claims that changing from Islam to Christianity is now 'standard practice' among asylum seekers 'to game the system', a spokesman said: 'It is not the role of clergy to establish the legitimacy of asylum claims and to assess security implications'. MPs are to demand a formal Parliamentary probe into whether fake Christian converts are duping the Church of England to avoid being deported back to strict Muslim countries they came from. If the inquiry goes ahead Priti Patel would likely be hauled in to give evidence after the Home Secretary said Al Swealmeen, who changed his name to Enzo Almeni shortly after finding Jesus, had exploited the UK's asylum 'merry-go-round'. Home Secretary Miss Patel declared last night: 'The case in Liverpool was a complete reflection of how dysfunctional, how broken, the system has been in the past, and why I want to bring changes forward. 'It's a complete merry-go-round and it's been exploited by a whole professional legal services industry which has based itself on rights of appeal, going to the courts day in day out on legal aid at the expense of the taxpayers.' Today it emerged that people traffickers have used social media sites such as Instagram to advertise crossings from France to the UK - and urge customers to consider conversion to Christianity to bolster their cases. Because the largest number of UK asylum seekers come from Muslim countries, they can also argue that their new faith would put their lives at risk if they returned to the home country. One such advert, in Arabic, has a picture of Jesus and says finding God will lead to more successful asylum claims 'in the shortest possible time with the lowest cost'. The Home Office has previously said converting to Christianity does not automatically result in a successful asylum claim. The Church of England has said baptism is 'open to all' and that it is up to the Government to vet asylum seekers, not them. The Liverpool hospital bomber spent seven months experimenting with different explosives while plotting his attack, it emerged last night. Emad Al Swealmeen, 32, started building a bomb factory at a rented bedsit as early as April, according to police. Traces detected at the property show he bought a range of chemicals capable of making more than one type of explosive, including one used by the 7/7 London bombers. Detectives are trying to untangle a complex picture of chemical purchases made both online and in shops. Armed police raided the bomb factory in the Sefton Park area of Liverpool shortly after Al Swealmeen accidentally blew himself up at Liverpool Womens Hospital on Remembrance Sunday. The next day, bomb disposal officers carried out a controlled explosion in the park, and Rutland Avenue, where the explosives factory was located, remains closed off. Yesterday afternoon officers also extended a cordon around Sutcliffe Street in Kensington, central Liverpool, where Al Swealmeen is thought to have lived. Emad Al Swealmeen, (pictured) 32, started building a bomb factory at a rented bedsit as early as April, according to police Detectives are trying to untangle a complex picture of chemical purchases made both online and in shops. Pictured: Forensic officers at work at Liverpool Women's Hospital Security sources said there was little to suggest the Christian convert (pictured, left)was ideologically motivated one theory is that he suffered a mental health crisis possibly triggered by his failure to win asylum Officers from the bomb squad were on the scene and a counter-terror police spokesman said several suspicious packages had been found. Residents were ordered to stay indoors and others forbidden from returning to their homes. They were instead directed to a nearby primary school for shelter. Forensic tests are still being carried out on the taxi which exploded with Al Swealmeen inside. It was confirmed last night that he died of injuries sustained in the blast and from the subsequent fire. A delivery driver yesterday told how he saw the bomb go off. I just heard this explosion this loud bang, recalled Liam Spencer, 21. At first I thought it could have been a car crash. Then I saw the car had exploded. I saw the driver who was in quite an awful state. 'I ran back to check and thats when I saw the man. He was on fire. Thats when I ran to go and get a fire extinguisher and security came out with one. Giving an update last night, Assistant Chief Constable Russ Jackson said Iraqi-born Al Swealmeen started buying chemicals in April, or even earlier. This is the moment the taxi carrying the suicide bomber exploded outside a Liverpool hospital in what police and MI5 are now probing as a Poppy Day terror attack Aerial view of the aftermath of the explosion at the Liverpool Women's Hospital and the burnt out taxi A complex picture is emerging over the purchases of the component parts of the device, Mr Jackson said. We know that Al Swealmeen rented the property from April this year and we believe relevant purchases have been made at least since that time. 'He also confirmed the bomber had suffered mental illness which will form part of the investigation. Security sources said there was little to suggest the Christian convert was ideologically motivated one theory is that he suffered a mental health crisis possibly triggered by his failure to win asylum. He had been sectioned in 2015 after being arrested for waving a large knife and threatening to kill himself by jumping off a bridge in Liverpool city centre. Al Swealmeen, who wanted to be a pizza chef, also spoke to church leaders about suffering from depression. A shopkeeper told the Mail he was obviously not right in the head and described how the motor racing fan, who adopted the name Enzo Almeni after the Ferrari legend, had threatened with a knife one of his staff staying at the same hostel. He seemed to have mental health issues for a number of years, the man added. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer predicted that the effects of climate change could be so 'horrible' that every year could top 'awful' 2020, when COVID-19 first ravaged the United States and the world. 'I tell my constituents, last year with COVID was awful, but in a few years, because of climate change, each year will be worse than COVID and each year will be worse than the next if we don't do anything about it,' the New York Democrat said at a press conference Wednesday on Capitol Hill, which was organized by the League of Conservation Voters and Climate Power. Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other top Congressional Democrats spoke at the event, as the party tries to pass the $1.75 trillion Build Back Better social spending bill, which includes a number of key climate change provisions. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer predicted that the effects of climate change could be so 'horrible' that every year could top 'awful' 2020, when COVID-19 first ravaged the United States and the world 'The effect of climate change is just going to be horrible,' Schumer said. 'But don't despair America, don't despair world - our "Build Back Better" [bill] tackles climate in a bold, ambitious way by making targeted investments in American industries, infrastructure, agriculture, to create millions of jobs with good wages, while restoring our manufacturing competitiveness,' the Democratic leader continued. Schumer said he hoped the bill would spur a 'green industrial revolution.' 'While lowering the cost of energy for everyday Americans,' he added. Schumer has said he wants to get Build Back Better passed by Christmas. Senate Democrats are using the process of reconciliation to pass the bill, so they can bypass Republican filibuster attempts. Sen. Ed Markey, who sponsored the 'Green New Deal' proposal in the Senate to compliment Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's action in the House, proclaimed at the press conference Wednesday: 'I am dreaming of a green Christmas.' He encouraged passage of Build Back Better, but also called on President Joe Biden to release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and ban oil exports to alleviate Americans' current pain at the gas pump. 'Right now oil companies are taking American consumers and shaking them upside down at gas pumps all across our country, while simultaneously sending a signal to the Republican Party to kill Build Back Better,' Markey said. Times Square sits empty on December 31, 2020, thanks to lockdowns due to COVID-19. Schumer predicted that every year could be worse than 2020 if nations don't take action on climate change The Massachusetts Democrat said fossil fuel companies wanted to 'kill a transition to all-electric vehicles, to plug-in hybrids, to battery storage technologies that will lead to inextricably, inevitably to the demise of those companies controlling the agenda of our nation.' 'If we're afraid of Russia's agenda right now, Saudi Arabia's control over our foreign policy in the Middle East, there's one sure and certain thing we can do and it's over the next month,' Markey argued. 'And that is to make sure that we have both of those countries and others like them on a pathway to bankruptcy - because the oil era will be over if we pass this bill,' he said. Pelosi argued that combatting climate change was a 'moral issue.' 'If you believe, as I do that this is God's creation and we have a moral obligation to be good stewards,' the devout Catholic speaker said. 'But even if you don't share that view, religiously, we all share it morally that we have a responsibility to future generations.' Amanda Knox has revealed she has sent messages to the family of former friend and roomate Meredith Kercher, who she was wrongly accused of murdering in Italy, saying she wants a relationship with them. Knox also said that she finds herself thinking 'oh my god, it could have been me' every year around the time of the anniversary of the 21-year-old's British student's death. But now, after having a daughter, she also says that she puts herself in Meredith's mother's shoes. On November 1 2007, Meredith an exchange student from the University of Leeds - was murdered in Perugia, Italy, where she was studying at the time. Knox and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were later jailed, before eventually being released from prison in 2011 following an appeal against their conviction. Knox had her conviction for the murder of her former roommate overturned by the Italian Supreme Court in 2015 after serving four years in jail. A local man, Rudy Guede, was convicted in a separate trial after his DNA was found on Kercher's body and in the room where she died. Amanda Knox (pictured speaking in 2019, file photo) has revealed she has sent messages to the family of former friend Meredith Kercher, who she was wrongly accused of murdering, saying she wants a relationship with them It's now over 14 years since 21-year-old student Meredith Kercher was raped and killed in a brutal attack in the apartment they shared in the Italian city of Perugia, on November 1, 2007 He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2008, but was released in December 2020 and will spend the rest of his sentence doing community work. Asked if she had spoken to Kercher's family yet, Amanda - now back in her native US - said: 'No, not yet. Not yet is my sort of position because like I know that it's a complicated situation. I know that at least in the past like it's unclear to me at this point how they feel about me. 'And I don't want to like force a relationship on them if it's traumatic for them. 'So I have sent messages to them through intermediaries telling them I want to have a relationship with you. I want to talk to you. And I'm waiting to see if that's something that they want too. 'I want the same thing that they want. I want to know the truth. I want to know what happened to Meredith. I want her to be recognised for who she was, and I want their suffering to be recognised for what it is. And I want them to get the closure that they deserve. I want that too. 'That's why I have really complicated feelings about her killer, Rudy Guede, because I've spent time in prison now too. Because he's out.' Guede was convicted in 2008 over Kercher's death but he was released from prison at the end of last year, and will serve the final years of his 16-year sentence doing community service. Amanda, who became known as 'Foxy Knoxy' in the press as the court case in Italy drew international attention, said: 'I know that he was a very young man when he made this colossal horrible decision to rape and murder Meredith. 'I don't know how he feels about that today. I would hope that he regrets that. He hasn't actually shown that he acknowledges what he did, and he hasn't like admitted to it and asked forgiveness, so it doesn't give me a super hopeful feeling that he truly feels rehabilitated even. 'Maybe he feels like a f***ing victim too because he was a young guy who was abandoned by his dad, brought like foster care in Italy (correct), didn't like have a great thing going for him and he sort of spiralled out of control going from burglary, to burglary, to burglary, until he majorly, majorly f***ed up. Knox then lamented the fact that her name became synonymous with Meredith's killing, and continues to be despite her being completely exonerated. Amanda Knox (pictured in an Italian court in 2009) and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were later jailed, before eventually being released from prison in 2011 following an appeal against their conviction. She was fully exonerated in 2015 Pictured: British student Meredith Kercher's family members, (from L-R) mother Arline, sister Stephanie and brother Lyle attend a news conference in Perugia on October 3, 2011 'His name is not the one that is affiliated with this horrible crime. Mine is. I wish that I could have a better word, but I think if I was going to be totally honest I'm angry, angry, and I'm still angry. That doesn't mean I can't have compassion for him but I am angry. 'I don't think that my name should ever have been associated with his actions, and the fact that no-one seems to really care about him, given that they were his actions, really bugs me out. 'And maybe my anger is a little bit sort of misdirected at him, because of all of the people not seeming to care that it was him.' Knox said she thinks about Meredith a lot around the anniversary of her murder. Asked on the Call her Daddy podcast on Wednesday if she thinks about Meredith, she said: 'It changes from the time of year. I think of her every time we come on to December 4, when I was first convicted. There are moments in the case that are very, very vivid to me. 'As much as my identity has been usurped by like this whole horrible tragedy, talk about her identity. She never got a chance to even fight back against a false narrative about her because she's gone. 'I'm especially thinking about that now that I've had a daughter because like on the anniversary of her death for the past many, many years, 14 years, I've always sort of put myself in her shoes, and thinking like 'oh my god, what must it have been like? What were her last moments ever as a person. Horrible, horrible moments. Thinking 'oh my god, it could have been me'. 'And this year I couldn't help but put myself in her mum's shoes, and thinking 'oh my god, if that happened to my baby'. What do you do? I can totally understand how her mum would have willingly taken her daughter's place if she could, but she couldn't.' In September, Knox had a baby girl Eureka Know Robinson with husband, Christopher Robinson, who she married in 2018. She said she considered not using the name Knox for Eureka, and had thought about changing her own in the past. A local man, Rudy Guede (pictured being escorted by police in Italy in 2007), was convicted in a separate trial after his DNA was found on Kercher's body and in the room where she died. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2008, but was released in December 2020 and will spend the rest of his sentence doing community work Asked if she'd thought about it, she said: 'I did. It's funny like it's the whole question of like do I embrace my identity or do I not embrace my identity. 'And I've always been a bit stubborn about this - where it's like there's nothing wrong with me. Like the world has sort of acted like there's something wrong with me, something wrong with my sexuality above all. And that's not my problem. 'Like I'm pushing back and I'm trying to say 'no, it's not my fault, there's nothing wrong with me', and therefore my daughter can embrace the fact that I am her mum even while I'm like trying to protect her from all these forces that are ultimately beyond my control.' Asked if she'd considered changing her own name ever, she said: 'No, in the same way that I never remotely considered taking a plea deal because I didn't f***ing do it, and so no.' Speaking earlier this month, Knox said she faces an 'ongoing struggle' to live with the public's 'made up version of herself. As details of the case built up, attention quickly turned to Knox in what has been described as an attempt to build a narrative of her being a 'sexually voracious femme fatale' and of she and her then-boyfriend as prime suspects. Media coverage dubbed the then 20-year-old US student as 'Foxy Knoxy', after a nickname she already had, and she was referred to at the time as a 'sex-mad American party girl' and an 'evil temptress'. Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour on November 4, Knox said the story that captured global attention 'became a morality tale about female sexuality.' 'Meredith was pitched as this virginous Madonna character and I was portrayed as this sexually obsessed lustful uninhibited whore,' she told radio host Emma Barnett on Tuesday. 'I think that there was an incredible violation of my privacy. But also a capitalisation upon my identity that often had nothing to do with me,' she told Barnett. 'People vehemently stood for one side or the other and were unable again there was the sense of confirmation bias you see what you want to see.' In September, Knox had a baby girl Eureka Know Robinson with husband, Christopher Robinson, who she married in 2018. Pictured: A pregnant Knox (file photo) Knox said she was speaking out about her ordeal after the release of Stillwater - a Hollywood movie based on a fictionalised version of the events surrounding the murder of Ms Kercher. When asked by Barnett what she would say to actor Matt Damon, the lead in the movie, Knox said: We should talk. We can have a conversation. Im not going to judge you. Lets recognise something real is happening here. Knox said the movie was, like the press, guilty of portraying her 'not really as a human being but as an idea of a person'. 'They (the press at the time of the case) were making Meredith into this perfectly invisible ideal victim to never name again,' Knox said. 'Its fascinating to me the number of times Foxy Knoxy was in the headline, but Meredith was not. 'Just the idea of a sexually deviant violent woman was enough to get people so riled up that they didnt care about the truth anymore. 'And that is an insane problem, and that is something that I dont think has really really been addressed. How justice was thwarted because of our obsession with female deviancy and female sexuality.' Speaking of how the case would have been viewed today - particularly after the MeToo movement, she said: 'It's interesting. I think that it would be I would hope that people would have been more sceptical about that portrayal of events today. Speaking BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour, Amanda Knox (pictured during the interview) said the media scrum following the conviction and later release made her lose control of her identity 'That said, I think that social media was already quite active at the time of my case and had a huge impact in how the case played out. 'And if anything it has become even more about tribalism, which is also a big problem where people vehemently stood for one side or the other and were unable again there was the sense of confirmation bias you see what you want to see.' 'So I very much felt like as I was coming into the world I was in conversation constantly with a made-up version of myself that was in people's minds before they ever encountered me as a real person. 'And that's an ongoing problem for me. 'It's an ongoing struggle for me that has it's not over.' Patrols by armed police will be increased and security plans for major events reviewed after the terror threat level was raised following the Liverpool attack. Assistant Commissioner Matt Jukes, the head of UK counter-terrorism policing, said the public will see an increased police presence in key locations and officers will boost their work online. Speaking in Leicester Square in London's West End on Wednesday, Mr Jukes said: 'All across the country you will have seen plans for major events reviewed, you will see an increased armed policing presence in some key locations. 'In places like London where we have dedicated counter-terror patrols they will be very focused. 'You will see some more visible policing, but of course also we will be very active in other places. Online, in our communities talking to people about their concerns.' The terror threat was raised from substantial to severe, meaning an attack is 'highly likely' rather than 'likely', after the blast outside Liverpool Women's Hospital on Remembrance Sunday. Patrols by armed police will be increased and security plans for major events reviewed after the terror threat level was raised following the Liverpool attack. Above: Armed officers outside Number 10 Downing Street in London on Tuesday Emad Al Swealmeen spent months planning his bomb attack, and had been buying components 'at least since April', investigators said. Mr Jukes said attacks that take months of planning provide opportunities for the public to spot suspicious behaviour. 'In this case it's too early to say what the behaviour was and how that might have been spotted by others, or indeed what others saw,' he said. 'But what we do know from other cases is that often attacks are planned over a series of months and there are opportunities for people to see changes in behaviour, to see unusual things happening. 'Unusual deliveries to an address or unusual purchases. Things which seem out of place. 'Without commenting on the individual case, there are so many opportunities for members of the public - neighbours, friends and family - to play their part in keeping our communities safe. The terror threat was raised from substantial to severe, meaning an attack is 'highly likely' rather than 'likely', after the blast outside Liverpool Women's Hospital on Remembrance Sunday 'There are signals in the way people bring together improvised explosives that are important for the public to recognise. Making strange purchases. 'If you're a retailer, for example, if someone's buying something that just doesn't feel right for them, then it's really important that you make that call to us on the anti-terrorist hotline.' The senior officer, who has worked in counter-terrorism for two decades, said that even with lone wolf terrorists there are still chances for someone to unmask them. 'The lone actor is still a real concern for us. 'The individual who spends time online. But the reality is they're never really completely alone - inspired by something they see online, instructed by something they've seen online, and also often in contact with friends and family. 'So it's so important that friends, family, neighbours spot the changes in behaviour. Very often when we look back on these events there may have been a signal that's been an opportunity.' He said police and the security services also need the help of the public, particularly parents, in spotting when someone has accessed terrorist or extremist material online. 'We're very concerned about the availability of information that's useful for terrorists online and that's why every year we're prosecuting people for sharing that information,' he said. 'We really do again need the help of the public who come across that. Sadly we need the help of parents as well. Emad Al Swealmeen spent months planning his bomb attack, and had been buying components 'at least since April', investigators said 'We know that many, many more young people are finding or coming across some of that information so it's an important conversation to have.' UK counter-terrorism police, who along with the security services are working on around 800 live investigations, want the public to remain vigilant about the risk of terrorism in crowded places in the run-up to Christmas. 'This is certainly a very concerning period that has led to the increase in the threat level. 'What we do know is that sometimes a terrorist attack in the UK or around the world can galvanise or encourage somebody else. 'Oftentimes we do see attacks coming together. That's the reason why the threat level has been increased. 'Clearly it's concerning but it's important for people not to feel powerless in the middle of that and to recognise we've all got incredible potential to make a contribution to make that call. 'If you feel something isn't right, make that call to the anti-terrorist hotline, go online to one of the reporting mechanisms, because we can all make a difference and defeat terrorism.' The Anti-Terrorist Hotline is on 0800 789 321. Donald Trump's White House trade advisor Peter Navarro attacked his old colleague Steve Mnuchin as the 'Neville Chamberlain' of the Trump administration in a Tuesday evening interview. Navarro appeared on Newsmax last night where he discussed US relations with China in front of a screen displaying a photo of Trump shaking hands with China Vice Premier Liu He and surrounded by his economic team. He accused Mnuchin of 'setting up' the meeting - which was barely over a week before the city of Wuhan was locked down over spiraling COVID-19 cases that hadn't yet impacted the globe. 'This is January 15, 2020,' the trade advisor said while gesturing to the photo. 'Now keep in mind that every one of these Chinese guys know that there's a Wuhan virus hot on the loose and they may infected,' Navarro wildly claimed. He commented on how close they were positioned to White House officials in the photo. 'This guy's the ambassador to China - he was known affectionately inside the White House as the guy who gave a panda bear to congressman that had a listening device on it,' Navarro continued. Meanwhile, tonight on Newsmax... Peter Navarro calls Steven Mnuchin the "Neville Chamberlain of our time" while going all Pepe Silvia over a Jan. 2020 meeting between Trump and Chinese officials. pic.twitter.com/OFwFeIeuaR Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) November 17, 2021 Navarro gave his interview in front of a blown-up photo of a January 15, 2020 White House meeting between US and Chinese officials He eventually arrived at Trump's Treasury Secretary. 'And of course Steve Mnuchin was the guy who set the whole thing up, he was the Neville Chamberlain of our time,' Navarro said. Chamberlain served as the United Kingdom's prime minister at the beginning of World War II and is widely known for his ill-conceived appeasement policy in dealing with Adolf Hitler. Navarro went on to criticize President Joe Biden for failing to hold China accountable and failing to hold up the 'skinny deal' Trump struck in 2020. Navarro compared Mnuchin to Neville Chamberlain, the UK prime minister at the start of World War II known for his disastrous appeasement policy when dealing with Nazi Germany 'Skinny deal is as dead as Biden's approval rating,' the former advisor quipped. That January, the US and China reached an interim trade deal to reduce tariff tensions. China agreed to buy massive amounts of US products. But the deal would up being a failure when Chinese imports fell far short of their expected target. It's not the first time Trump's trade advisor had harsh words for Mnuchin over China. In 2018 it was reported that Navarro 'cursed' at the former Treasury Secretary and 'fumed about being shut out of the talks' with the growing economic power. Earlier on Tuesday Navarro appeared in a separate segment on Newsmax - where he again compared government officials to the UK's infamous former leader. Speaking about Biden's summit with Chinese President Xi yesterday afternoon, Navarro commented that it was 'truly a Neville Chamberlain appeasement moment.' A married couple with eight children who moved to Atlanta to expand their businesses died in a murder-suicide weeks after the wife disclosed she was struggling to adjust to life in Georgia and asked for prayers. The couple was home alone shortly before 9 pm on November 6 when Keianna Burns, 44, fatally shot her 46-year-old husband, Ronnell Burns. She then shot herself. Hours earlier, Keianna Burns shared a video online that showed her dancing and singing with her young daughter, who police said was with a relative at the time of the incident. Weeks earlier, on October 30, she called on her friends to help her through a difficult time. Atlanta power couple Ronnell Burns, 46, and Keianna Burns, 44, died in a murder-suicide November 6, weeks after Keianna (right) told friends she was going through a difficult time and asked them to pray for her Im asking you one thing because I really need it right now I need prayer, I need prayer, I need strength, I need love,' she said in a Facebook live video. Pray for me. The family moved to Atlanta from St. Louis, Missouri, about six months before the tragedy to expand their Kritique Designs Beauty & Barber Salon and grow their Primerica Insurance clientele. Keianna Burns painted a rosy picture of her life on social media. Keinna painted a rosy picture of her life on social media, where she boasted about a new Maserati Levante, a gift from her husband The family moved to Atlanta from St. Louis, Missouri, about six months before the tragedy to expand their Kritique Designs Beauty & Barber Salon and grow their Primerica Insurance clientele. She boasted about a new Maserati Levante her husband gave her last year, and shared photos of her trunk stuffed with Louis Vuitton shopping bags. Despite keeping up appearances online, she confessed recently that she was having a hard time adjusting to the move. You have to be prepared for life changes, she said during her Facebook live video. Things in your life can change for the good or the bad overnight -literally. If you dont think youre a strong enough individual, some things may take you out. She told her followers that she needed their support as she worked through a difficult time. They help me through my gloomy days because yes, I do have them, she said. And if Im being perfectly honest, Im having one right now. Keianna Burns is pictured filming a Facebook live video weeks before her death News of the power couples death rippled throughout their vast network of friends and colleagues. To know this couple Keianna Burns and Ronnell Burns you had no choice but to love them, Rowena Terry posted on Facebook. They were selfless, loving, and caring. A lot of ppl say money makes you act different but not them. They are so down to earth. 'And very humble. They lit up any room they walked in. Motivational to others and only wanted to change the world. Police said there was no history of domestic violence at the familys Atlanta home. The couple shares biological children as well as some from previous relationships. The couple discussed divorcing earlier this year but decided to work it out, Ronnell Burns said He was previously married, and appeared on an episode of Divorce Court after breaking up with his first wife Ronnell Burns was previously married and appeared on an episode of Divorce Court with his first wife, who he accused of cheating on him. His ex accused him of ruining her credit history. Ronnell said in a video posted to YouTube that he and his current wife also had discussed divorcing. We decided we was going to get a divorce, that we didnt want to be with each other no more, he said. We were just done with each other. He said in the video, filmed earlier this year, that the couple decided to work it out. If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255. A far-right activist has been charged after allegedly encouraging protesters to bring guns to Melbourne's anti-lockdown rallies and execute Premier Daniel Andrews. Imre Pelyva allegedly used an encrypted messaging service to call on protesters to 'bring out rifles and shotguns' and shoot 'Mr Dan f**k in the head'. Counter-terrorism police charged Pelyva with incitement to manufacture explosives as authorities target neo-Nazi extremists infiltrating Victoria's anti-vaccine and pandemic law protest movements. Pelyva allegedly asked 'are we allowed to take firearms to the protest' and offered Mr Andrews' 'proper address' to other protesters, The Age reported. Imre Pelvya allegedly used an encrypted messaging service to call on protesters to 'bring out rifles and shotguns', and called for Premier Daniel Andrews to be shot in the head 'Someone needs to shoot Mr Dan f**k in the head with a .50 cal explosive tip!' he allegedly wrote in one encrypted app. 'Are we allowed to take firearms to the protest?' He allegedly also told other protesters how to make 'Molotov cocktails at home' and encouraged them to 'burn cop cars down and mash the heck out of them'. The Melbourne man has reportedly previously held a gun licence. Police have also hit Victorian neo-Nazi Kenneth Panten with racial vilification charges after he allegedly encouraged the state's residents to engage in violence. Panten allegedly encouraged attacks on mobile phone towers and power stations and shared instructions online about how to make an automatic rifle with a 3D printer. Victoria Police said it was investigating 'a number of recent incidents involving threats directed at members of parliament'. Pelyva also allegedly asked 'are we allowed to take firearms to the protest' and offered Mr Andrews' 'proper address' to other protesters The charges after the Victorian premier on Wednesday slammed the 'disgusting' protests outside Melbourne's Parliament House in recent days that saw people wheel in a wooden gallows and hang an effigy of the Labor leader. A video posted on social media shows the protesters gathered around a wooden gallows chanting 'Freedom', 'Traitor', 'Kill Dan Andrews' and 'Hang Dan Andrews' while attempting to place the head of an inflatable doll of the premier through the noose. Police have also hit Victorian neo-Nazi Kenneth Panten (pictured) with racial vilification charges 'I'll not be deterred from the work I'm doing to keep every family safe,' Mr Andrews said on Wednesday. 'I wouldn't want the the appalling, the disgusting and the potentially criminal behaviour of a small number of people to detract away from the amazing job that so many Victorians have done.' Debate on the Public Health and Wellbeing Amendment (Pandemic Management) Bill is set to resume on Thursday but a final vote may come as late as Friday, with MPs advised parliament could sit an extra day. The bill has become a lightning rod for anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination groups, with hundreds of protesters planning to camp out on the steps of parliament for the duration of the debate. One protester marched through Melbourne's CBD carrying nooses on Saturday - as a part of city-wide demonstrations that spanned several days 'It is so unfair for a small, ugly mob to be taking attention away from the more than 90 per cent of Victorians who have had a first dose and will soon have had a second dose,' Mr Andrews said. The premier's wife, Catherine Andrews, took to Twitter to thank those who sent messages of support following several days of ugly demonstrations in Melbourne. Mrs Andrews took the vile threats in her stride, offering a classy response to the horrifying ordeal. 'We have received so many beautiful messages today from all over. Thank you,' she said. Anti-vaccine protesters wheeled a wooden gallows to the steps of Melbourne's Parliament House on Monday night to hang an effigy of Dan Andrews during a wild rally Hundreds of angry Victorians turned-up to show their displeasure at the Andrews Government on Monday in Melbourne 'We are reminded that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness will not overcome it. As ever #IStandWithDan #GoHigh.' 'There are some people who are threatening me and my family. They are essentially attacking the safety of my family,' Mr Andrews said. 'I will not be deterred from the work I'm doing to keep every family safe. There are some out there making threats against me, Cath and the kids, but that's not my focus,' he said before referring to the 'small, ugly mob'. 'It is awful, but it does not speak to the conduct of the majority. On their behalf I am offended this ugly behaviour might be taking the focus away from how much we achieved.' The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) suspended implementation of its order requiring Covid-19 vaccines for private companies after a federal court blocked the measure. OSHA announced Wednesday that it was ceasing all enforcement of the measure of the emergency order, which ordered companies with 100 or more employees to require vaccines or weekly Covid-19 testing, or face a maximum of $136,532 in fines, $13,653 per violation. 'While OSHA remains confident in its authority to protect workers in emergencies, OSHA has suspended activities related to the implementation and enforcement of the ETS pending future developments in the litigation,' the OSHA website said. The rule is set to encompass 84 million workers, and employers could face fines for 'willful violations.' The announcement came after the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans upheld a stay on a ruling ordering OSHA to 'take no steps to implement or enforce' the emergency order 'until further court order.' The mandate was set to take effect Jan. 4, 2022. Biden ordered companies with 100 or more employees to require vaccines or weekly Covid-19 testing, or face a maximum of $136,532 in fines, $13,653 per violation Vaccine mandates have been highly controversial throughout the US Circuit Court Judge Kurt Engelhardt wrote in the prevailing opinion that the mandate goes too far, and that he has 'grave' concerns about whether the edict is legal or constitutional. 'The mandate is staggeringly overbroad,' the opinion said. 'The mandate is a one-size-fits-all sledgehammer that makes hardly any attempt to account for differences in workplaces (and workers).' Meanwhile, the Department of Justice (DOJ) promised to 'vigorously defend' Biden's vaccine mandate after it was held up by federal court. Biden administration officials are planning to request the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals to reimplement the mandate after it was temporarily halted by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. The Biden administration has argued the mandate is imperative for saving lives, at a time when over 1,000 deaths are still attributed to Covid-19 each day. At least 27 states have filed legal challenges in at least six federal appeals courts after OSHA released its rules on November 4. People cross Brooklyn Bridge as they take part in an anti-vaccine mandate protest in Manhattan, New York A man holds signs that read 'don't give-up on freedom' and 'I choose natural immunity' in Union Square at a 'Freedom Rally' against vaccine mandates Four out of five Americans age 12 and up have had at least one Covid-19 shot. Of all ages, about 69% of Americans have had one jab and 59% are fully vaccinated. Nearly 31 million people have gotten their booster shot since August, when a third vaccine dose was recommended for those with compromised immune systems. Hours earlier, all 50 Senate Republicans introduced a disapproval resolution against the mandate. Now, they say they'll continue to fight for OSHA to permanently give up on the rule. 'While I am pleased with the actions taken by the court and that OSHA has subsequently suspended President Bidens unconstitutional vaccine mandate for now, I will continue fighting to put a full stop to his efforts to fire Americans for choosing to not get the vaccine,' Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas said in a statement. While the GOP resolution is unlikely to pass Congress where Democrats control both houses, it could serve as political fodder for Republicans seeking to unseat vulnerable Democrats in the midterm elections. All senators will have to go on record being in favor or against sweeping vaccine mandates coming down from the federal level. The boss of debt-ridden Chinese property giant Evergrande has sold $1.1billion worth of assets including jets, art and Hong Kong flats under order from Beijing amid fears the firm's collapse could spark a global financial meltdown. Chinese authorities told the company's chairman Hui Ka Yan, 63, to use some of his personal wealth to help pay bondholders, two separate people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters last month. Evergrande is scrambling to meet its debt obligations, with Hui Ka Yan freeing up funds from luxury assets, according to state-owned China Business News on Tuesday, citing anonymous sources close to the matter. Evergrande's troubles in meeting bond repayments have rattled markets and left many of its investors, creditors and suppliers in financial chaos. Xu has been injecting funds into the company since the beginning of July. Chinese authorities told the chairman of Developer China Evergrande Group Hui Ka Yan (pictured in 2017, file photo), 63, to use some of his personal wealth to help pay bondholders It has been used to 'maintain the basic operations of his huge business empire,' the paper reported, such as paying staff salaries, interest payments and some bonds and cash that is owed to investors in Evergrande's wealth product. It has also gone towards finishing property projects in China. The outlet wrote: 'So far Xu Jiayin has been personally raising money to continue the life of Evergrande.' Guo Hui, whose cleaning business is owed more than 18 million yuan ($2.8 million) by Evergrande, had to sell his Porsche Cayenne and an apartment to raise cash and pay debts. 'He should be selling his things,' Guo told Reuters. 'He had no choice once the authorities made him.' Hui pledged one of his Hong Kong mansions of around 5,000 square feet in The Peak, Hong Kong's most prestigious residential enclave with sweeping views over the city's gleaming skyscrapers, for a loan from China Construction Bank in October, according to a filing with Hong Kong's Land Registry. The property is worth around HK$800 million ($103 million), an estate agent told Reuters and local media said it was pledged to raise about HK$300 million to repay an overdue Evergrande bond. The tycoon, ranked as Asia's wealthiest man in 2017, pledged two other luxury houses in the same development to Orix Asia Capital Ltd on Nov 8. for undisclosed amounts, according to the Land Registry. Local media outlet HK01 said on Tuesday the total amount raised was HK$821 million. One of the properties is worth HK$800 million, the estate agent said, while the other one is bigger and according to HK01 is worth HK$1 billion. Pictured: Villa del Mare, one of the homes owned by the chairman of Developer China Evergrande Group Hui Ka Yan, in Australia. He has been told to sell his assets to help pay for the debt obligations of the property giant Hui and Evergrande did not respond to requests for comment regarding the properties on The Peak. China's State Council Information Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Raised by his grandmother in a rural village, Hui founded Evergrande in 1996 in southern Guangzhou city, supplying low-priced homes and building a fortune. Xu (pictured) has been injecting funds into the company since the beginning of July He developed a passion for calligraphy, art and Koi carp - fish seen as a symbol of good luck and fortune for which he paid tens of millions of yuan, according to a source with direct knowledge of the matter. Under Hui's orders, Evergrande has been selling some art and calligraphy to raise fresh capital, said the source. The source declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the situation. Reuters could not immediately determine how much had been raised by selling the art pieces or what the money has been used for. Evergrande did not respond to a request for comment regarding the art sale. The source also said Evergrande sold two Gulfstream jets in recent weeks. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month Evergrande raised more than $50 million by selling two of its private jets to American aircraft investors. Hui also owns a 60-metre yacht called 'Event' estimated to be worth $60 million, as well as a private Airbus jet, according to Chinese media reports. Reuters could not independently verify the ownership of Hui's yacht and private jet. Hui and Evergrande did not respond to requests for comment regarding his aircraft, yacht and other assets. While Hui's net worth has plunged over the past few years from around $45 billion in 2017, he is still estimated to be worth $11.3 billion, according to the Hurun China Rich List 2021, released last month. But even as he moves to sell some of his personal assets, the proceeds raised pale in comparison to Evergrande's liabilities of more than $300 billion, equivalent roughly to the gross domestic product of South Africa. After Evergrande last week again averted a destabilising default with a last minute bond payment, its next deadline is December 28, with coupon payments totalling more than $255 million due. U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, who was appointed by Trump, says Democrats bid to get his tax returns is driven by politics A federal judge appeared to suggest asking for Donald Trump to turn over his tax returns to Congress is a partisan request claiming if the House flips red they could request Hunter Biden's financial disclosures. During a hearing on a long-running House Ways and Means Committee lawsuit, U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee, questioned the panel's pursuit of obtaining Trump's personal records. 'If Congress changes hands in a couple years here and a Republican chairman of the Ways and Means Committee asks for Hunter Biden's tax returns, are we just going to say, 'Oh, sure. You know, we've got to defer to Congress. They've said they're interested in legislating on presidential families, therefore we've got to turn them over'? Is that going to be the administration's position?' McFadden proposed on Tuesday to a Justice Department lawyer. Republicans have questioned Hunter Biden's financial information and business dealings over concerns there are conflicts of interest between his various positions when his father was vice president. Joe Biden's DOJ reversed its position this year to say that the committee does have the right to obtain the former president's tax returns. Under U.S. law, the IRS must provide these reports to the Ways and Means Committee when requested. Trump's lawyers, however, in August sought to block the Biden administration from complying with the committee's request. They argue there is no valid legislative purpose for the committee to obtain the tax returns, claiming they intend to use the documents as an attack on Trump. 'The requests are tailored to, and in practical operation will affect, only President Trump,' the filing reads. 'The requests single out President Trump because he is a Republican and a political opponent.' Trump's lawyers filed a suit in August seeking to block Biden's Justice Department from complying with the Ways and Means Committee's request to obtain the former president's tax returns It added: 'They were made to retaliate against President Trump because of his policy positions, his political beliefs, and his protected speech, including the positions he took during the 2016 and 2020 campaigns.' McFadden said he is also concerned about intentions based on comments made by Democrats who want to obtain Trump's tax filings, including the Ways and Means Committee Chairman Representative Richard Neal of Massachusetts. The comments, the judge says, suggest that 'there's something else going on' other than a legitimate legislative inquiry. The House panel maintains the tax returns are important because Trump's 'actions and statements raised unprecedented and serious concerns about his tax compliance and foreign entanglements and about the IRS's ability to enforce the tax laws against him while President.' 'Compared to past Presidents,' the committee's lawyers said in a court filing in October, 'Mr. Trump's returns appear to be inordinately large and complex, reflecting his sprawling domestic and international business activities, which raises the question of whether the IRS has the requisite resources and authority to examine such returns as effectively as needed for a President.' They added: 'And he repeatedly attacked the IRS and its audits of him both while a Presidential candidate and while President, which raised the important question of whether IRS employees are properly protected from a President's attempts to improperly influence its audits.' As Trump's lawyers try to block his returns from being handed over, the former president is also claiming executive privilege to stop the House panel probing the January 6 Capitol riot from obtaining internal records from the White House. A federal appeals court will hear oral arguments on November 30 for Trump's lawsuit seeking to block the committee from obtaining these documents. The darling stocks of the pandemic have crashed back to earth while travel and live event stocks soar, as life returns to something approaching normal. With vaccines widely available, shares of Peloton have plunged 65 percent this year, and Zoom is down 26 percent, while airlines, hotels and other sectors battered in the pandemic are thriving. 'The markets clearly sense the pandemic is over,' Ben Emons, managing director of global macro strategy for Medley Global Advisors, told the New York Times. 'We're in a full reopening, and we're moving toward a normalized situation.' The market's assessment comes despite that fact that daily COVID-19 cases and deaths have leveled off at a fairly high rate nationwide, and are sharply increasing in some states, such as Michigan and Minnesota. View of the crowd during the 2021 Global Citizen Live festival at the Great Lawn, Central Park on September 25. With reopening, travel and live events stocks are surging Likely, investors believe that there is little political will for further lockdowns, in particular given the availability of vaccines, and now booster shots, easing the concerns of those most fearful of the virus. Perhaps no stock was as emblematic of the pandemic as video-calling app Zoom, which overnight became the daily tool of office workers around the world as they worked from home. Shares of Zoom rose more than 730 percent during their peak last year, but have since plunged precipitously as workers trickled back into offices, and 'Zoom fatigue' became a byword for exhaustion with webcam meetings. Peloton, the maker of the high-priced connected exercise bike, also saw shares soar last year as gyms and exercise classes closed, sparking a fad for the company's products. Shares of Peloton rose as much as 440 percent last year, but so far in 2021 have plunged 65 percent, after the company this month slashed its annual revenue projection by as much as $1 billion. Peloton also was battered by a recall on its treadmills, after one child was killed and 29 were injured when they were pulled under the moving belt. After rising more than 400 percent during the height of the pandemic in 2020, Peloton's stock is now down more than 60 percent so far in 2021 A year-to-date view of Peloton stock shows how the share price has plunged But the company has also clearly suffered under reopening measures, and some analysts even called Peloton's share price plunge the official signal of the end of the pandemic. 'People are no longer trapped at home and competition is growing,' BMO Capital Markets analyst Simeon Siegel said earlier this month. Other pandemic plays include Clorox, which became a household staple at the height of the outbreak. Clorox shares are down 16 percent so far in 2021. Shares of Chegg, which provides widely used technology for remote schooling, are down more than 67 percent for the year. But some so-called 'stay at home' stocks are surviving reopening. Netflix shares remain up 33 percent so far this year, thanks to strong subscriber numbers and smash hits such as Squid Game. Amazon shares also remain up about 11 percent this year, as many consumers appear to be reluctant to give up shopping from home even as restrictions end. Planet Fitness has seen its shares soar 24 percent, and CEO Chris Rondeau has said that gym membership numbers had nearly returned to their pre-pandemic peaks A year-to-date view of Planet Fitness shares shows how the stock has soared Meanwhile, sectors that suffered under lockdown are now thriving for the most part. Planet Fitness, the popular gym chain, has seen its shares soar 24 percent, and CEO Chris Rondeau has said that gym membership numbers had nearly returned to their pre-pandemic peaks. 'Our height was 15.5 [million members]. We're 97 percent all the way recaptured back to where we were pre-Covid,' Rondeau told CNBC this month. Travel has also roared back into fashion. According to the TSA, airline traveler throughput was 130 percent higher over the past week than the same period last year, and only 15 percent lower than the pre-pandemic level in 2019. Expedia, the travel booking site, has seen its stock rise 34 percent this year. American Airlines is up 31 percent, Delta Air Lines rose 5 percent, and United Airlines gained 17 percent. Yerin Hong gets a hug from her boyfriend Soomin Kim after she arrived on a flight from Germany at the international terminal at O'Hare International Airport on November 8 According to the TSA, airline traveler throughput was 130 percent higher over the past week than the same period last year, and only 15 percent lower than the pre-pandemic level in 2019 Live events, which almost completely halted for a period last year, are also now all the rage. Shares of the concert and event ticketing company Live Nation are up 63 percent so far this year. Cruise lines also rebounded, with Royal Caribbean up 18 percent for the year. 'The stay-at-home stocks were the place to be because that was where the growth was,' Eric Mintz, portfolio manager at Eagle Asset Management, an investment firm in St. Petersburg, Florida, told the Times. 'When you've got this surge in reopenings, obviously you've got a number of companies doing very well, and industries,' he said. But Mitz warned that as the economy improves, growth-focused investors don't need to crowd into 'just a handful of stocks.' A Perth principal has threatened to shut down his entire school rather than get a Covid jab mandated for teaching staff by the Western Australian government. Principal Adam Zydek has sought legal advice on closing Divine Mercy College in Yangebup in the city's south, fearful staff members have claimed. During a staff meeting on Wednesday, Mr Zydek reportedly handed out anti-vaccination literature, blindsiding teachers who had expected a school announcement. 'Everyone was in tears,' the staff member told the West Australian. 'Staff walked out of the meeting.' Principal Adam Zydek (pictured) has threatened to shut down Divine Mercy College in Yangebup in south Perth because he does not wish to get vaccinated One staff member claimed the principal had previously vocalised his opposition to vaccines because he believed they posed a greater risk that Covid-19. They claimed the principal told teaching staff the technology used to develop vaccines had aborted baby foetuses. The staff member said he also claimed police would arrive at people's homes to forcibly administer the jab and put them in concentration camps. The McGowan government has mandated all teachers and school staff to get vaccinated against Covid-19 by the start of Term One next year. The first term of the school year begins on January 31. Nearly 400 students and 50 staff at the Catholic college will be forced to find education and employment elsewhere if Mr Zydek gets his way. Nearly 400 students and 50 staff at Divine Mercy College (pictured) will be forced to find education and employment elsewhere if Mr Zydek gets his way The principal - who has led the school since 1996 - has refused to comment on his personal views surrounding vaccines. He told the West Australian the school board was still considering its next move. ''We are still in the process of making a decision about how to approach the whole situation in the very best and proper manner, taking into account the best interests of staff and students,' he said. Education Minister Sue Ellery told the publication she was aware of the allegations and said she hoped they weren't true. Ms Ellery said if the claims were accurate it was 'terribly disappointing' that a principal would not put his trust in science. She said the education leader simply had to look at eastern states like NSW and Victoria to see evidence of how the virus can spread in schools as well as the efficacy of the vaccine to protect staff and students. In October, Mark McGowan announced Covid-19 vaccinations would be compulsory for three-quarters of the country's workforce, including teachers 'I have asked to be kept advised into investigations into the allegation,' she said. Independent Education Union WA branch secretary Rebecca Collopy said staff members had been ringing the union in tears. Ms Collopy said she had written to Mr Zydek to deliver a stark reminder he needed to comply with employment awards and consult with staff and their representatives. In October, Mark McGowan announced Covid-19 vaccinations would be compulsory for three-quarters of the country's workforce, including teachers. Employers who are caught using workers who have not been vaccinated will be fined $100,000, and employees risk $20,000 fines for flouting the order. An unlicensed beauty consultant from Texas has been charged with manslaughter, accused of injecting silicone into the butt of a female client, which prosecutors say resulted in her death more than three years ago. Lisa Fernandez, 47, was arrested Tuesday in connection with the April 2018 death of 38-year-old Marja McClendon. According to court documents, Fernandez was offering beauty injections without a license out of her home in Houston and obtained the silicone used in the procedures by illegal means. Prosecutors said McClendon had made two appointments with Fernandez to get butt injections, which caused her intense pain and breathing problems, KHOU11 reported. Lisa Fernandez, 47 (left), from Houston, has been charged with manslaughter for allegedly causing the April 2018 death of Marja McClendon, 38 (right) by giving her butt injections According to a witness account cited in the filings, the first round of injections on April 24, 2018, left McClendon feeling ill, but it did not achieve the aesthetic result she was looking for, so she returned for a second appointment after Fernandez refused to give her a refund. Prosecutors said McClendon was in so much pain during the second round of injections that Fernandez had to halt the procedure several times. When McClendon left Fernandez's home, she was coughing up blood and struggling to breathe. McClendon (left and right) had received two rounds of silicone injections, which left her coughing up blood and struggling for breath. She died from complications associated with a silicone pulmonary embolism A short time later, the 38-year-old woman was taken to an emergency room, but went home before she could be evaluated. McClendon was late readmitted to the hospital, where she died on April 30, 2018 as a result complications associated with a silicone pulmonary embolism. Her death was ruled a homicide. At the time of her arrest, Fernandez allegedly admitted to knowing that McClendon had been hospitalized, but she did not go with her to the emergency room to explain to the doctors how the injections were performed, and with what substance. Fernandez, who described herself as a beauty consultant, appeared in court on Wednesday and was ordered held on $40,000 bail Fernandez also allegedly admitted to the police that she was aware that if performed incorrectly, butt injections could result in serious harm, or even death, reported ABC13. Fernandez made her initial court appearance on Wednesday and had her bail set at $40,000. A judge barred Fernandez from performing any unlicensed medical or cosmetic procedures. Daniel Andrews enters Parliament on Thursday Daniel Andrews' controversial new law to give him sweeping powers to manage pandemics is under threat after a disgraced former Labor MP vowed to vote it down. Adem Somyurek has not been in Parliament since December 2020 but has returned at the 11th hour to thwart his old factional rival Mr Andrews. Mr Somyurek, who is an independent after leaving Labor when he was busted branch-stacking, said he will 'not support this bill in its current form'. 'I would encourage the government to go back to the drawing board and consult more broadly,' he wrote in an opinion piece for the Herald Sun. On Thursday morning the Government voted to delay the bill to avoid it being defeated. Premier Andrews said: 'We don't have the numbers in the upper house, we'll just do our normal thing which is to work with everybody and try and get an outcome that keeps us safe,' he told reporters. 'I don't know whether this matter will get resolved today, tonight or tomorrow - we'll have to wait and see.' Mr Somyurek said Victoria's parliamentary system is 'essentially an elective dictatorship' because Labor dominates the lower house and said the pandemic has shown that state governments have 'coercive powers'. He accused Labor MPs of being 'docile' and unwilling to challenge Premier Andrews, meaning 'it is difficult to protect the population from the tyranny of rule by decree'. The MP also said the laws may mean Victoria could be 'unjustly governed by a Coalition despot in the future'. The laws, which have passed Victoria's lower house and are being debated in the upper house this week, would give the premier the power to declare a pandemic for an unlimited period of time even if there are no cases of a virus. The move would let the health minister make 'any order' he deems reasonably necessary' which could include lockdowns, vaccine mandates, enforced mask-wearing and much more, with fines of up to $454,350 for rule-breakers. Adem Somyurek is seen outside his home in Melbourne after explosive allegations he stacked Labor branches with supporters for the gain of his political faction against Labor rules What happens to the bill now? A no vote by Mr Somyurek would result in a tie, meaning the bill would have to be reintroduced in parliament's lower house. Alternatively, the Government could delay the vote until the first week of December and change the bill to win over another crossbencher. If the bill does not pass by December 15, when the current state of emergency powers expire, the Government will not be able to enforce pandemic orders such as lockdowns and mask-wearing. Advertisement The Victorian government had been confident the bill would pass after delivering amendments to secure the support of left-wing upper house crossbenchers - the Greens' Samantha Ratnam, Reason Party MP Fiona Patten and Animal Justice Party MP Andy Meddick. But the return of Mr Somyurek - who quit the party before he was expelled for leading a widespread branch-stacking operation - opens the door for him to cast the deciding vote. Mr Somyurek has not been at parliament for almost a year and was suspended last month after he failed to provide proof of Covid-19 vaccination. But the clerk of the Legislative Council on Wednesday advised upper house MPs Mr Somyurek now 'complies with the order and is no longer suspended'. A no vote by Mr Somyurek would result in a tie, meaning the bill would have to be reintroduced in parliament's lower house. Alternatively, the Government could delay the vote until the first week of December and change the bill to win over another crossbencher. If the bill does not pass by December 15, when the current state of emergency powers expire, the Government will not be able to enforce pandemic orders such as lockdowns and mask-wearing. The bill has become a lightning rod for anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination groups, who have occupied the steps of state parliament this week. On Monday, they gathered around a wooden gallows on 'freedom', 'traitor', 'kill Dan Andrews' and 'hang Dan Andrews', as an inflatable doll depicting the premier was thrown onto the structure. On Wednesday night, Victoria Police confirmed the driver of the black Toyota Landcruiser which had been towing the gallows had been spoken to by officers. The man, a 48-year-old from Badger Creek, was issued a warning for traffic offences. Some protesters held three nooses, in possible reference to the three crossbench MPs who decide whether the bill passes Premier Dan Andrews was depicted as a rat in another placard held by protesters Last week Victoria's top barristers called for Mr Andrews to delay and wind back the proposed laws. Victorian Bar president Christopher Blanden QC previously called the proposed laws 'extreme' and said the Stasi, the secret police in communist East Germany from 1950 to 1990, would be happy with the powers. What are the main concerns with the Bill? No definition of a pandemic Broad powers to the Health Minister to make 'any order' Reasons for detaining someone not defined 'Breathtakingly broad' powers to public officials to enforce laws Allows orders such as lockdowns to apply to people based on political views or association Health advice does not have to be published until 14 days after decision Rules that breach human rights laws may not be invalidated and overturned Source: Victorian Bar Advertisement On Wednesday the Bar - made up of hundreds of top barristers - published a submission to the Department of Health which listed several problems with the laws and demanded changes. In its submission, the Bar said it wants a definition of a 'pandemic disease' to be spelled out and the health minister's power to be limited to specific actions. The lawyers want the minister to have to consider the 'harm and inconvenience' his orders may cause before he makes them. The Bar said the law gives 'breathtakingly broad' powers to public officials who would be able to 'take any action or give any direction' - except detain someone - to enforce pandemic orders and wants these powers to have a time limit. The laws would also allow the health minister to order someone be detained. The lawyers want the reasons for possible detention spelled out and an independent review process to oversee this. The Bar has also raised concerns the laws allow orders such as lockdowns to be applied to people based on attributes protected by the Equal Opportunity Act such as race, gender and political association. 'The Victorian Bar is particularly concerned about the inclusion of an express power to make pandemic orders that apply to a person by reference to their political belief, industrial activity or personal association with others,' the submissions said. 'The Victorian Bar recommends that the Bill be amended to exclude differentiation based on attributes that are of no obvious relevance to a person's health risk profile.' The lawyers said 'serious concerns' had been raised and want the Bill to be delayed. The new law will allow the health minister to make 'any order' he deems 'reasonably necessary' including lockdowns, vaccine mandates and enforced mask-wearing. Pictured: Melbourne in lockdown in October Huge fines and jail The new laws state a person can be fined up to $21,909 for breaching a pandemic order. This could include not wearing a mask, breaking a movement limit, attending an illegal protest or a gathering, refusing to get tested or failing to show ID. Businesses can be fined up to $109,044 for breaking rules which may include failing to make sure customers check-in or show proof of vaccine status. In addition, there is a new aggravated offence for breaches that 'cause a serious risk to the health of another individual'. These can be punished with a $90,870 fine and two years in jail. An example given in the bill is someone going to work when they are infectious and should be isolating. Businesses can also be guilty of an aggravated offence, with a maximum fine of $454,350 if, for example, they refuse to obey a lockdown and encourage customers to also flout the rules. What are the fines in Daniel Andrews' new law? $21,909: This fine is for breaching a pandemic order such as not wearing a mask, breaking a movement limit, attending an illegal protest or a gathering, refusing to get tested or failing to show ID. $90,870: This fine is for an aggravated offence for breaches that 'cause a serious risk to the health of another individual' such as going to work when infectious. $109,044: This fine is for businesses breaking rules which may include failing to make sure customers check-in or show proof of vaccine status. $454,350: This fine is for an 'aggravated' offence by a business such as encouraging customers to flout lockdown rules . Advertisement Power to the premier Under the new laws the premier would be able to declare a pandemic for three months an unlimited number of times. The current state of emergency laws require a parliamentary vote to extend them every 12 months - but the new laws have no time limit. The health minister will be able to sign off on public health orders instead of the Chief Health Officer, a role currently held by Brett Sutton. This gives the health minister the power to enforce lockdowns, shut down businesses, restrict movement, require masks, ban public gatherings, and enforce quarantine and isolation - powers currently held by the unelected CHO. These powers can be implemented regardless of the number of disease cases or severity. The bill will also extend the mandatory payment for hotel quarantine beyond 31 December. Vaccine mandates and lockdowns for anti-vaxxers The bill states that a pandemic order such as a lockdown or a vaccine mandate 'may apply to, differentiate between or vary in its application to persons or classes of person'. This allows the Government to select who it wants to apply the order to, including people who have been at a certain event, who live in a certain area or who have a certain type of job. The Government can discriminate based on 'presence in a pandemic management area; participation at an event; an activity they have undertaken; their characteristics, attributes or circumstances,' the bill says. It also allows the Government to lockdown unvaccinated people only. Under the new laws the premier would be able to shut down businesses, restrict movement and ban public gatherings even if there were no disease cases in Victoria. Pictured: A protester is arrested by police at a protest in St Kilda in October The bill says the Government can discriminate based on attributes defined in the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 which include race, religion, sexual orientation, marital status and political views. The group of lawyers against the bill warned a future health minister could target people based on their 'political beliefs or activities that involve questioning or opposing the government public health measures.' But Health Minister Martin Foley said those factors would not be taken into account. 'Any suggestion that those other considerations of the public health processes, that is just really mischief making. These are recommendations that come forward on clinical and epidemiological grounds. Not those kinds of characteristics,' he said. Professor Brett Sutton said attributes and characteristics could refer to 'intimate partners having the opportunity to see other individuals... people normally resident in regional Victoria... children under 16 years of age because they haven't had a vaccination opportunity... vaccinated or unvaccinated individuals in a vaccinated economy. 'You need the agility to spread to those characteristics and attributes that might exclude someone from a public health order and that might be directed at someone,' he said. Tiered fines system In a small win for disadvantaged people, the bill will allow disadvantaged people to apply for a 'concessional' fine. Greens leader Samantha Ratnam negotiated this in discussions with the Government. She said: 'I'm pleased that the Greens have been able to make sure these new laws have more transparency and are fairer for all Victorians, especially those facing disadvantage.' Barista Maelys is seen at work at Cafe Chez Mademoiselle in Prahran, Melbourne, in October Make health advice public The Victorian Government has faced constant criticism for not releasing the health advice that its lockdown decisions are based on. The bill will require the publication of the reasons for the Chief Health Officer recommending a pandemic order. It will also establish an Independent Pandemic Management Advisory Committee to scrutinise Government decisions and health advice. QR safeguards The new laws will ensure stronger safeguards to stop unlawful access to QR code check-in or contact tracing data, with a new offence in place. It means police can only get hold of the data if there is an 'imminent threat' to someone's life. Officers must acquire a Supreme Court order to access the data. This comes after it was revealed in June that police failed three times to get access to QR code data. Advertisement President Biden cruised around in an electric Hummer vehicle on Wednesday as he toured the General Motors 'Factory ZERO' electric vehicle assembly plant in Detroit, Michigan. The president, a car enthusiast, excitedly drove himself in the new vehicle, whipping around an empty parking lot in the factory. 'Anybody want to jump in the back? On the roof? This sucker's something else,' Biden said as he sat in the driver's seat after taking the vehicle for a spin. Unlike their gas-guzzling predecessors, these military-style pickup trucks operate on battery power. Biden visited a grand opening ceremony for 'Factory Zero' at the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Center, where a broad array of new electric trucks and vehicles will be built. GM boasts that the 9,000-lb vehicle can go from 0-60 miles per hour in three seconds and has a 350-kilowatt fast-charging capability which allows it to add 100 miles of range in just 10 minutes. However, the Edition One comes at a $112,595 cost. One GM staffer told the president the vehicle prototype was 'three times the weight of your Corvette and twice as fast.' Biden was in Motown celebrating his win on the $1.1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, which includes provisions for electric vehicles. The infrastructure bill allocates $7.5 billion to build electric vehicle charging stations. Most of those, however, will likely be 'Level 2' variety, which can give a vehicle 25 miles of battery capacity per hour. Biden was in Motown celebrating his win on the $1.1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, which includes provisions for electric vehicles The president, a car enthusiast, excitedly drove himself in the new vehicle, whipping around an empty parking lot in the factory. Biden sings praises of the vehicle after his test run General Motors this year paid $160,000 to a lobbyist whose brother is one of the president's closest advisers. Jeff Ricchetti, the brother of Counselor to the President Steve Ricchetti, reported being paid $160,000 by General Motors this year to lobby the White House and Congress. His lobbying disclosures indicate that the work included efforts on electric vehicle tax incentives. It is Biden's third visit to one of the big three automakers this year, following trips to see a Fiat-Chrysler plant in March and a Ford factory in May. Biden visited a grand opening ceremony for 'Factory Zero'.at the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Center, where a broad array of new electric trucks and vehicles will be built Steve Ricchetti (l) is a longtime Biden confidant and is currently counselor to the president. His role has attracted frequent accusations of a conflict of interest when his brother, Jeff (r), is a lobbyist who has seen business grow more than four-fold since Biden took office A senior administration official said there was no hint of family favoritism. 'Jeff had no role in this visit,' said the official. Even so Ricchetti's lobbying firm, which he set up with his brother, has enjoyed a bumper year since Biden took power. In the first half of 2021, Ricchetti Inc. took in $1.67 million in fees in the first half of the year, according to financial disclosures - a huge increase on the $370,000 it reported in the same period of 2020. In response to previous accusations of a possible conflict of interest, the White House said Steve Ricchetti recuses himself from issues raised by his brother or his firm. 'I do not lobby my brother, nor have I lobbied the White House this quarter,' Jeff Ricchetti told the Wall Street Journal earlier this year. But the link still raised concerns among ethics experts amid reports that Steve Ricchetti was involved in negotiations over the infrastructure bill. 'Steve Ricchetti ought to completely recuse himself from any part of the legislation that his brother's firm is lobbying on, and then have the White House not take calls from his brother,' Richard Painter, a former Democratic Senate candidate who was President George W. Bush's chief ethics lawyer, told the Free Beacon which first reported on the lobbying connections on Wednesday. His brother is a long time Biden confidant and one of the most powerful people in the White House. He worked as deputy chief of staff in Bill Clinton's White House before opening Ricchetti Inc. with his brother. But he stepped aside when he went to work for then Vice President joe Biden in 2012. During the visit, Biden will deliver remarks on how the law 'builds electric vehicle charging stations across the country to make it easier to drive an electric vehicle, reduces emissions to fight the climate crisis, and creates good-paying, union jobs across the country,' the White House said in a statement. A broad transition to electric cars and trucks will help the United States meet Biden's pledge to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions 50% from 2005 levels by 2030. Democrats are working on a separate social spending and climate bill that contains up to $12,500 in tax credits for U.S.-made EVs, including a $4,500 credit for union-made vehicles. The bill is a key pillar of Biden's domestic agenda but has faced hurdles to passage from competing views between progressive and moderate lawmakers in his party. Seven women who say they screamed at the operating table due to 'excruciating' pain because a nurse tampered with their pain medication sued Yale University on Wednesday, accusing it of failing to properly safeguard its supply of fentanyl. The women underwent painful and invasive procedures for in vitro fertilization and were supposed to receive the opioid at a Yale fertility clinic in Connecticut last year. They got saline instead, but their complaints were dismissed even as they 'screamed' during the surgeries and reported feeling 'torturous pain' afterward, according to a lawsuit filed in state court in Waterbury by the women and their spouses. The nurse responsible, Donna Monticone, was sentenced to just four weekends in prison in May, along with three months of home confinement and three years of supervised release. Prosecutors say 75 percent of the fentanyl given to patients during a five-month period was diluted with saline. Nurse Donna Monticone was sentenced to four weekends in prison in May after she tampered with the fentanyl supply at the clinic for her own use Prosecutors say that a DEA investigation found that 75 percent of the fentanyl given to patients at the clinic from June to October 2020 was adulterated by saline The seven women were having their eggs retrieved as part of the in vitro process at the Yale Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility clinic in Orange, Connecticut, above The affected women were all at patients at Yale's Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility clinic in Orange, Connecticut. Their names are Melissa Cowan, Alyssa Gargiulo, Brianne Mcloughlin, Leah Mirakhor, Dilay Nacar, Awo Osafo-Addo and Nicole Walsh. According to the lawsuit, they all underwent 'excruciating' oocyte retrievals, which require a surgeon to maneuver 'a thick needle through the vaginal wall, ovarian ligament, ovary, and ovarian follicle to aspirate mature eggs.' Oocyte retrieval is the second of five steps of in vitro fertilization, according to the Mayo Clinic. After the eggs are retrieved, they are fertilized outside of the body and inserted back inside the female patient. The entire procedure at Yale ranges from $15,000 to $30,000 and is not covered my most insurance plans, the lawsuit states. The lawsuit says staff was alerted to a problem in the supply of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid used as a painkiller, through 'patients intraoperative screams and postoperative reports of torturous pain.' 'It was more pain than I could ever imagine,' one woman told a local news station back in March. 'I remember screaming in the middle of the procedure from pain,' another patient said. They were allegedly told their pain was due to the lack of anesthesiologists on site on Saturdays and Sundays. The women argue that Yale 'never investigated these reports' and that their pain was minimized as 'normal.' They also say that, in early 2020, Yale sought to save money by 'bulk ordering' mass quantities of fentanyl for on-site storage after moving its fertility clinic to Orange, about seven miles from the Yale-New Haven hospital. The person in charge of the shipments was none other than the 'nurse who subsequently admitted to diverting fentanyl form the REI clinic,' the suit claims. The lawsuit accuses Yale officials of failing to follow mandated pharmacy protocols and allowing vials of fentanyl to be vulnerable to tampering. The suit also alleges Yale violated state and federal laws by keeping more than 175 vials of fentanyl in an unsupervised and unlocked area, and failed to implement safeguards including drug testing staff with access to opioids. 'Yale's failure to develop and implement safety measures mandated by state and federal law to secure drugs like fentanyl resulted in these patients being traumatized,' Joshua Koskoff, a lawyer for the women, said in a statement. 'What should have been a time of hope for these women and their families became one of unimaginable suffering.' The lawsuit accuses the clinic of using cost-cutting measures that left vials of fentanyl open to tampering A look inside of the clinic where fertility patients say Monticone diluted their fentanyl with saline solution, causing them to 'scream' during surgery Yale spokesperson Karen Peart Peart said university officials will not comment on the lawsuit. The lawsuit is seeking undisclosed damages. Nurse Monticone no longer works for the clinic and pled guilty to one count of tampering with a consumer product. She was sentenced to four weekends in jail and three months of home confinement in May instead of a recommended five year jail sentence. The New Haven Register reported that the judge weighed the testimony of people who experienced incredible pain because of Monticone's actions with the fact that she cooperated with the investigation. Monticone, 49, started using the drugs during a painful divorce and amidst a years-long custody battle for her children, the outlet reported, though the judge said the court was not able to determine the full scope of her familial problems. Attorney Josh Koskoff, who represents dozens of clients from the fertility center in the case, said that his clients were 'sensitive to the idea that this is a single mother,' according to CBS2s Tony Aiello. Monticone apologized to the affected patients during her sentencing hearing. The fact that Monticone had no prior criminal record played a part in her light sentencing, as well, the Register reports. Prosecutors say that an investigation by the Drug Enforcement Agency found that 75 percent of the fentanyl given to patients at the clinic from June to October 2020 was adulterated by saline. Wednesday's lawsuit includes civil allegations of medical assault and battery and medical malpractice. It says hundreds of patients potentially were unknowingly treated with saline instead of fentanyl at the clinic last year. Federal health officials are investigating an unusual flu outbreak on the campus of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, where 528 cases have been reported since October 6. University officials reported a sharp spike in cases over the past two weeks. During the week of November 8, there were 313 newly diagnosed cases. The previous week saw 198 cases. More than three out of four patients - 77 percent - have not been vaccinated against the A(H3N2) influenza virus, according to U-M officials. The large and sudden outbreak has prompted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to initiate an investigation. A team from the CDC will work in conjunction with the Washtenaw County Health Department, the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, and the university. CDC officials will be evaluating flu vaccine uptake and vaccine effectiveness and risk factors for spread through data analysis, questionnaires and sample collection of patients at the school, according to a statement from the university. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has launched an investigation into a flu outbreak on the campus of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor (above) 'Through prompt detection and collaboration with county and state health officials, as well as School of Public Health and Michigan Medicine researchers, we quickly identified these cases as influenza A(H3N2) virus infections,' said Lindsey Mortenson, UHS medical director and acting executive director. 'Partnering with the CDC will accelerate our understanding of how this flu season may unfold regionally and nationally in the setting of the COVID-19 pandemic.' The outbreak is concerning due to the timing - just a week before the Thanksgiving holiday, when students will travel to homes nationwide to spend the weekend with family. Health officials have repeated calls for students and faculty on the Ann Arbor campus to get vaccinated against influenza as soon as possible. According to the CDC, the flu vaccination reduces risk of contracting the illness by between 40 and 60 percent. The CDC says that the current flu vaccines work better against influenza B and influenza A(H1NI1) viruses compared to the A(H3N2) strands. Though flu vaccines are not considered foolproof, health officials still recommend getting the shot because of studies that show they help reduce the severity of illness and hospitalizations. The image above shows a colored transmission electron micrograph of H3N2 influenza virus particles 'While we often start to see some flu activity now, the size of this outbreak is unusual,' said Juan Luis Marquez, medical director at the Washtenaw County Health Department. 'Were grateful for the additional support of the CDC and our ongoing partnership with the university as we look more closely at the situation. 'This outbreak doesn't necessarily have an immediate impact on the broader local community, but it does raise concerns about what the flu season may bring. 'Most importantly, we strongly recommend anyone not yet vaccinated against seasonal flu to do so. 'And anyone at higher risk of severe flu complications should talk to their doctor about prescription antiviral medications at the first sign of flu symptoms.' Advertisement RAF F-35 Med crash was SEVENTH time 100m jets have malfunctioned in seven years June 23, 2014: A USAF F-35A had a catastrophic engine fire caused by a fractured rotor which saw it turn into a blaze as it took off in Florida. October 27, 2016: A US Marine Corp F-35B set alight mid-flight due to a fire in its weapons bay before the pilot landed safely in Beaufort, South Carolina. September 28, 2018: All operational F-35s were grounded while a probe was launched into why a fuel tube failed in flight after a horror crash at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort in South Carolina. April 9, 2019: Parts of the tail of a Japanese F-35 were found in the sea around 85 miles east of Misawa during a training mission. May 19. 2020: This F-35 crash on landing was caused by a tired, distracted pilot and unresponsive tail glitch. September 20, 2020: A F-35 stealth fighter jet fell out of the sky and exploded on the ground after hitting a KC-130J tanker in a mid-air collision near the Salton Sea in Imperial County, California. September 20, 2020: A F-35 stealth fighter jet fell out of the sky and exploded on the ground after hitting a KC-130J tanker in a mid-air collision near the Salton Sea in Imperial County, California Advertisement Royal Navy submarines are racing against the Russians to recover a crashed 100million jet with top secret technology from the bottom of the Mediterranean. An RAF pilot was forced to eject from his F-35B Lightning as it ditched into the sea soon after taking off on 'routine exercise' from the Navy's flagship aircraft carrier, HMS Queen Elizabeth. The aircraft was one of eight UK fast-jets onboard, along with 10 US aircraft. By plunging into international waters, the crash triggered a scramble to find the next-generation jet from the sea bed before it could be reached by Russia. It s thought to be the first time an F35-B has crashed in such an area. The technology aboard the US-designed aircraft, including top secret radar and sensors, is hugely sensitive as it allows the F-35 to fly 'unseen' in hostile territory at supersonic speeds. However, it is likely that China already knows all there is to know about the jet due to spying. The aircraft was located on Wednesday afternoon and the site on the sea bed will be manned by an Anglo-US dive security team until the jet is lifted to the surface. The operation, shrouded in secrecy, is understood to involve divers, miniature submarines and inflatable bags which may be used to lift the plane to the surface of the Mediterranean. As the UK's most advanced and expensive jet, the single-seater can land vertically and only needs a short runway to take off. It is the first one Britain has lost and the incident is the first mishap for the RAF's F-35B fleet and for the 3billion aircraft carrier which left the UK seven months ago. After he ejected, the pilot was reportedly left dangling from the edge of the HMS Queen Elizabeth because the lines of his parachute became caught on the edge of the flight deck. This week's crash raises fresh questions about the F-35B, of which Britain currently has 24. The UK is set to buy 138 of the fighter jets from US aviation giant Lockheed Martin for 9.1billion in the coming years, with 48 of those expected to be delivered by 2025. In June 2014 a USAF F-35A had a catastrophic engine fire caused by a fractured rotor which saw it turn into a blaze as it took off in Florida. Two years later a US Marine Corp F-35B set alight mid-flight due to a fire in its weapons bay. In 2018, a US F-35B pilot was forced to eject mid-air after the fighter jet crashed in South Carolina during a training exercise. And last year, an F-35B aircraft crashed near Naval Air Facility El Centro in California after crashing into a KC-130J, US officials told USNI News. An RAF pilot was forced to eject over the Mediterranean yesterday, sending his 100million stealth jet crashing into the sea Soon after taking off on 'routine exercise' from the Royal Navy's flagship HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier, the F-35B Lightning (file image) ditched into the sea and a rescue team was sent out to recover the pilot This map shows the approximate location of where the F-35B stealth jet crashed in the Mediterranean Sea on Wednesday Retired Rear Admiral Chris Parry said last night: 'Although an inquiry will establish the precise cause of the crash, it appears likely that the accident occurred because of engine malfunction. F-35 pilot 'was left dangling from flight deck after ejecting' The unnamed pilot who ejected from the stricken F-35 jet was then left dangling left from the HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier which he had taken off from. Rockets in his plane's seat blasted him more than 100feet upwards before his parachute opened. But a source told The Sun that when the pilot floated back down towards the warship, he 'came within inches' of hitting the flight deck. Instead, a cross-wind is said to have blown him sideways, where his parachute lines then became snagged on the edge of the 900feet long runway. The quick-thinking pilot was then left dangling from the edge of the warship, around 60feet above the water. He pulled an escape pin which released him from his harness and he then plunged into the water. 'He made the right decision,' a source said. 'We train for landing in water. The last thing you want is to get tangled in your parachute lines getting dragged along the edge of a 65,000 tonne warship.' A search and rescue helicopter was then used to pluck him out of the water. Advertisement 'Despite the F-35B's good safety record, it was inevitable that some of these high-performance aircraft, which operate in the distinctly demanding maritime environment, would have been lost at some stage.' The Ministry of Defence insisted last night 'no hostile action' was involved in the crash. Last night, the investigation was focusing on technical or human error. The pilot, who suffered minor injuries, is understood to have been rescued by helicopter. The pilot's family was informed of the crash before military chiefs released a statement yesterday afternoon about the incident. After he ejected, rockets in his plane's seat blasted him more than 100feet upwards before his parachute opened. But a source told The Sun that when the pilot floated back down towards the warship, he 'came within inches' of hitting the flight deck. Instead, a cross-wind is said to have blown him sideways, where his parachute lines then became snagged on the edge of the 900foot long runway. The quick-thinking pilot was then left dangling from the edge of the warship, around 60feet above the water. He pulled an escape pin which released him from his harness and he then plunged into the water. 'He made the right decision,' a source said. 'We train for landing in water. The last thing you want is to get tangled in your parachute lines getting dragged along the edge of a 65,000 tonne warship.' The US are understood to be helping with efforts to recover the plane. Whilst the UK has its own team capable of carrying out the operation, an American team and their machinery is currently nearer to where the accident occurred. According to navy sources mentioned in The Times, the operation is expected to involve deep water remote-controlled vehicles which will be used to find the F-35 and then attach huge inflatable bags to it so that it rises to the surface on its own. However, it will have a long way to travel because it is believed to be more than a mile beneath the surface of the Mediterranean. How mini underwater vehicles could be used to find F-35 before inflatable bags lift it to the surface The US are understood to be helping with efforts to recover the plane. Whilst the UK has its own team capable of carrying out the operation, an American team and their machinery is currently nearer to where the accident occurred. Inflatable lift bags are manufactured by US firm Subsalve According to navy sources mentioned in The Times, the operation is expected to involve deep water remote-controlled vehicles which will be used to find the F-35 and then attach huge inflatable bags to it so that it rises to the surface on its own. However, it will have a long way to travel because it is believed to be more than a mile beneath the surface of the Mediterranean. US-based firm Subsalve produces what it describes as 'underwater lift bags'. The firm, which has made bags for the US Navy, lists models on its website which can lift items weighing up to 48tonnes. The F-35 weighs up to 30tonnes when carrying weapons and its pilot Whilst the aircraft has not yet been found, the US Navy is using device called a TPL-25 towed pinger locator system to find the F-35's emergency relocation pinger. The TPL-25 system consists of a device which is towed behind a search vessel. It can detect a pinger at depths of up to 20,000feet (3.8miles). A Royal Navy source added to The Times that whilst the recovery is 'not rocket science', the problem is 'finding and getting' to the aircraft. The US Navy is also able to make use of winch system called a Flyaway Deep Ocean Salvage System (FADOSS). A page on the navy's website says the device provides 'reliable deep ocean lifting capacity of up to 60,000 pounds for the recovery of large, bulky, and heavy sunken objects such as aircraft or small vessels.' In March, the US Navy used the device to lift a Canadian helicopter from the sea. Advertisement US-based firm Subsalve produces what it describes as 'underwater lift bags'. The firm, which has made bags for the US Navy, lists models on its website which can lift items weighing up to 48tonnes. The F-35 weighs up to 30tonnes when carrying weapons and its pilot. Whilst the aircraft has not yet been found, the US Navy is using device called a TPL-25 towed pinger locator system to find the F-35's emergency relocation pinger. The TPL-25 system consists of a device which is towed behind a search vessel. It can detect a pinger at depths of up to 20,000feet (3.8miles). A Royal Navy source added to The Times that whilst the recovery is 'not rocket science', the problem is 'finding and getting' to the aircraft. The US Navy is also able to make use of winch system called a Flyaway Deep Ocean Salvage System (FADOSS). A page on the navy's website says the device provides 'reliable deep ocean lifting capacity of up to 60,000 pounds for the recovery of large, bulky, and heavy sunken objects such as aircraft or small vessels.' In March, the US Navy used the device to lift a Canadian helicopter from the sea. Having sailed to the Far East and attracted the attention of both Russia and China, the 3billion Queen Elizabeth was last known to have been in the eastern Mediterranean, after leaving Oman. The Prince of Wales is due to visit the carrier tomorrow as part of a royal tour to Egypt. The Lightning is described by the RAF as a fifth generation combat aircraft capable of conducting air-to-surface strikes and electronic warfare. The aircraft uses an array of sensors to operate undetected in enemy airspace. There were understood to be not only eight British F-35s aboard HMS Queen Elizabeth but also ten US aircraft. They have conducted some 2,000 take-offs and landings without incident. When not deployed on the carrier, the UK's F-35Bs are stationed at RAF Marham in Norfolk as part of 617 Squadron (the 'Dambusters'). In 2020, US military tests found 276 different faults in the jet's combat system. Last night the Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said: 'The F-35 ditched soon after take off. We are pleased the pilot is safe and back on board. Our operational and training flights continue.' The Ministry of Defence said: 'A British F-35 pilot from HMS Queen Elizabeth ejected during routine flying operations in the Mediterranean this morning. 'The pilot has been safely returned to the ship and an investigation has begun, so it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time. No other vessels or aircraft were involved.' A comprehensive military air investigation has been launched by the RAF and US experts. America enticed its Nato and other allies into sharing the cost of the aircraft by offering input into manufacture and 15 per cent of each one is comprised of parts from British companies while some of the jets will be made in Italy. But the planes have been plagued by a catalogue of problems which have sent costs soaring. By plunging into international waters, the crash triggered a scramble to recover the next-generation jet from the sea bed before it could be reached by foreign powers, particularly Russia. Above: File image of HMS Queen Elizabeth The F35s can hover as the come into land meaning the need a smaller flight deck. Pictured, an F-35B fighter jet prepares to land on the flight deck of HMS Queen Elizabeth in the Arabian Sea, off Mumbai's coast on October 21 History revisited: The 1966 Palomares B-52 bomber crash In 1966, a USAF B-52G bomber carrying four hydrogen bombs crashed into a KC-135 tanker during mid-air over the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Spain. Upon impact, the KC-135 was destroyed and all four crew members aboard were killed. The B-52G broke apart, and three of the seven crew died. Meanwhile, the four nuclear bombs fell 31,000 feet to the surface - three of which were found on land near the small fishing village of Palomares in Almeria. The non-nuclear explosives in two of the weapons blew up upon impact, resulting in the contamination of a 0.77-sq m area with radioactive plutonium. The fourth, which fell into the Mediterranean, was recovered intact after a two-month search. Advertisement There are fears about shortcomings in the technical systems underpinning the new generation of war planes will leave them unable to function properly. The true cost of the British planes delivered this year is estimated to be over 150million each to cover 'extras' such as software upgrades and spare parts. There are also concerns plane's software system is vulnerable to cyber-attack and cannot be tested independently by the UK. The weak broadband on the Royal Navy's principal aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth is also hampering the jet's abilities. Though the cost of the F-35 has been the focus of attention, there have also been embarrassing reports of operational shortcomings emerging from the United States. In a mock air battle in 2015, the cutting edge plane was defeated by an older generation F-16, a plane designed in the 1970s. In 2020 Pentagon tests found 276 different faults in jet's combat system. They included the 25mm cannon vibrating excessively and problems with the he aircraft's 'virtual reality' helmet. Overheating, premature wear of components in the vertical tails and vulnerability to fire were also found to be issues. The US Air Force temporarily grounded dozens its F-35 stealth fighters while it investigated an oxygen supply issue. The Marine Corps, who also operate the same F-35B model the UK has purchased, was forced to ground its planes after flaws were found in the computer system. Prince Andrews finances should be investigated by MPs and tax authorities after it emerged that he received a 1.5million off-shore payment from a banker friend, campaigners and experts have said. The Duke of York faced mounting scrutiny yesterday over whether he broke the Royal Familys conduct rules by accepting the money from Tory donor David Rowland. The Queens scandal-hit second son received the payment days before he paid off a loan from the financiers own Luxembourg bank. Buckingham Palace conduct rules state that royals should never accept gifts of money, or money equivalent, in connection with an official engagement or duty. They are also told to avoid gifts that would, or might appear to, place [them] under any obligation to the donor. Prince Andrew, pictured above with the Queen, is facing increasing scrutiny over accusations he accepted money from Tory donor David Rowland Former business partners Mr Rowland (left) and Prince Andrew (right) pictured together at Royal Ascot in 2006 Andrew, 61, has refused to say whether he paid back any of the money wired to him by a company registered in Guernsey in 2017. Former Lib Dem MP Norman Baker, an expert on royal finances, said he would be writing to the public accounts committee calling for an investigation into the dukes finances. He also called for HMRC to check if Andrew had paid tax on any income. Mr Baker said: The fact is the requirements on the royals are far less than people who are in elected office. A spokesman for Andrew said: In accounting terms it was all duly logged and taxes paid and everything went across the books in the proper way. Mr Rowland pictured outside the High Court in 2017. It is alleged he made a payment to Prince Andrew days before the Duke of York paid off a loan from the financiers bank Graham Smith, chief executive of campaign group Republic, said: When someone is paying a public figure large sums of money the question has to be: What do they want in return? There needs to be an urgent investigation into royal lobbying and cash for access, starting with Prince Andrew. Advertisement A rail investment package of 96billion is to be announced today to boost travel links across the North. Boris Johnson hailed it as the biggest transport investment programme in a century and said no town or city would be left behind. However only 40billion is new funding because the package includes most of the cost of HS2 from London to Crewe money already announced. It is also much less than would have been spent had the Government gone ahead with its original plans. Unveiling the plan today, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps is expected to confirm that the HS3 line linking Manchester and Leeds is being ditched. One of the two tunnelling machines at the south portal HS2 align compound in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, on November 3 And the eastern leg of HS2 linking Birmingham to Nottingham, Sheffield and Leeds will also be axed. Henri Murison of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership said: 'We won't be hoodwinked into believing we're getting 96billion for a transport revolution in the North. Phase 1 of HS2 accounts for half of that and only goes as far as Birmingham. In addition, half the HS2 budget on the eastern leg has disappeared altogether.' The revised plans will focus on upgrading existing lines to cut journey times in the North and Midlands, with some new track laid. Transport Secretary Grant Shapps is expected to confirm that the HS3 line linking Manchester and Leeds is being ditched The National Infrastructure Commission last year proposed scaling back HS2's eastern leg in favour of improving east-west links. A second report the Oakervee Review also raised questions about the best way to deliver improved rail connectivity. The Government last night insisted journey times would be 'the same, similar to or faster' than the original HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail plans. It said better east-west connections between major cities in the North and Midlands would also be achieved up to ten years sooner. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has hailed the 96billion package as the biggest transport investment programme in a century Mr Johnson said: 'If we are to see levelling up in action now, we must rapidly transform the services that matter to people most. 'That's why the integrated rail plan will be the biggest transport investment programme in a century, delivering meaningful transport connections for more passengers across the country, more quickly with both high-speed journeys and better local services, it will ensure no town or city is left behind.' Journey times between Manchester and Leeds could still be cut to about half an hour from 50 minutes. The original plans would have cut them to about 25 minutes. Ministers also say travel times from Birmingham to Nottingham will be cut from 72 minutes to 27, and Birmingham to Manchester from 90 to 40 minutes. But figures drawn up by the National Infrastructure Commission suggest much less capacity will be created. Space for up to around 21,000 extra commuters into Leeds will be created under the plans, compared with up to 42,000 originally. Bradford will see a similar drop in capacity Labour's transport spokesman Jim McMahon said: 'It's laughable that the Government expects people in the North to be grateful for some half-baked and repackaged plans, as they attempt to quietly back out of promises made on the vital major infrastructure projects those communities need so badly. 'Failure to deliver on HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail schemes ministers have committed to dozens of times is not only insulting, it is actively holding back investment and opportunity that could benefit millions.' Stanley Johnson could be fired from a prestigious role as an environmental ambassador over sexual assault allegations. The powerful Conservative Environment Network, of which he is international ambassador, said: The alleged behaviour is not acceptable. But as calls grew for an investigation, a supporter of the Prime Ministers charming father vowed it should not be a police matter if he was a little over-friendly, indeed handsy with women. Mr Johnson, 81, allegedly assaulted two women, the Conservative MP Caroline Nokes who said he had smacked her on the backside about as hard as he could and political journalist Ailbhe Rea who said he groped me. Stanley Johnson (left) with political journalist, Isabel Oakeshott (right) who tweeted: 'The charming Stanley Johnson can be a little over-friendly indeed handsy but I dont believe this is one for the police' Political journalist Ailbhe Rea (pictured) claimed Mr Johnson, 81, groped' her Yesterday in an excruciating exchange in the Commons, the Prime Minister found himself being grilled by MP Miss Nokes about government policy on sexual harassment. She did not mention her own claims against his father, but asked Boris Johnson if women would have more confidence if public sexual harassment was a specific crime, and if early intervention might stop those harassing women becoming sex offenders? Mr Johnson Snr ignored questions on the matter as he left his house in north west London yesterday. He had previously told Sky News: I have no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all but there you go. Labour has called for criminal authorities to investigate the claims, which emerged on Monday when Miss Nokes named Stanley Johnson during a panel discussion on Sky News among four female MPs about abuse of women. She said that during the Conservative Party conference in 2003, when she had been the Tories candidate for Romsey, Mr Johnson Snr had slapped her bottom and proclaimed: Oh, Romsey, youve got a lovely seat. After the allegation was broadcast, political journalist Miss Rea, who writes for the New Statesman magazine, tweeted: Stanley Johnson also groped me at a party at Conservative conference in 2019. Yesterday another political journalist, Isabel Oakeshott, tweeted a photo of herself with the PMs father but wrote: The charming Stanley Johnson can be a little over-friendly indeed handsy but I dont believe this is one for the police. Officers should focus their limited resources on investigating real crimes. She was deluged with replies from Twitter users accusing her of excusing sexual assault. One said: I dont think Handsy Stanley is the defence you think it is. Sky News political correspondent Kate McCann tweeted: You might be OK with someone being handsy but other women would find that uncomfortable... Your tweet suggests its their problem if theyre offended, not his for being over-friendly. Britain's Minister of State for Immigration Caroline Nokes (pictured) claimed Mr Johnson had smacked her on the backside about as hard as he could Lifelong conservationist Mr Johnson Snr was made international ambassador at the think-tank the Conservative Environment Network in February, but the organisation has now distanced itself from him, saying: We take all allegations of inappropriate behaviour very seriously. We have clear internal processes for managing allegations of this nature. The alleged behaviour is not acceptable to CEN. The chairman of CEN is Ben Goldsmith, a family friend of the Prime Ministers wife Carrie. Yesterday the PM was grilled about sexual harassment when he appeared before Parliaments liaison committee of senior MPs. They included Miss Nokes in her capacity as chairman of the women and equalities committee. Miss Nokes two days after accusing his father of smacking her bottom put it to the Prime Minister: Isnt it fair to say that if public sexual harassment was a specific crime, you might see women with more confidence to come forward? Mr Johnson replied: All women should have confidence to come forward and there are proper procedures for those claims and complaints to be investigated. The MP asked: Should we not intervene earlier, before those harassing women become sex offenders? The PM said: We need to prosecute people more effectively for things that are already criminal. Earlier Anne-Marie Trevelyan, the International Trade Secretary, said if Mr Johnson Snr had touched her inappropriately, Id have probably slapped him. She told Sky News: This is something women have, for far too long, had to tolerate the casual sexism, the wandering hand. When it came to carving artworks in ancient Egypt, apprentices did non-complex parts like limbs and torsos while master craftsmen tackled intricate bits like faces. This is the conclusion of an Egyptologist from the University of Warsaw who studied two 3,500-year-old reliefs in the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari, Thebes. Hatshepsut was a pharaoh of Egypt's Eighteenth Dynasty and the second historically confirmed female pharaoh who ruled from 14731458 BC. The 43-feet-long reliefs, mirrors of each other, line the temple's largest room (or the Chapel of Hatshepsut), showing a 100-strong procession taking gifts to the pharaoh. Moreover, they contain evidence for nearly every step in the relief production something typically not seen, as usually each subsequent stage covers up the last. Given this, archaeologists have previously relied on half-finished pieces each preserving snapshots of the art in progress to determine how reliefs were made. Analysis of the Hatshepsut reliefs, however, have revealed new insights into the production process such as how labour was divided up. It also overturned the notion that artists in ancient Egypt were not trained 'on the job' as some parts were clearly started by masters and finished by apprentices. When it came to carving artworks in ancient Egypt , apprentices did non-complex parts like limbs and torsos while master craftsmen tackled intricate bits like faces. Pictured: part of one of the mirrored reliefs on the north and south walls of the Chapel of Hatshepsut in Thebes This is the conclusion of an Egyptologist from the University of Warsaw who studied two 3,500-year-old reliefs in the Temple of Hatshepsut (pictured) at Deir el-Bahari, Thebes The 43-feet-long reliefs, mirrors of each other, line the temple's largest room (or the Chapel of Hatshepsut), showing a 100-strong procession taking gifts to the pharaoh Hatshepsut was a pharaoh of Egypt's Eighteenth Dynasty and the second historically confirmed female pharaoh who ruled from 14731458 BC Moreover, they contain evidence for nearly every step in the relief production something typically not seen, as usually each subsequent stage covers up the last. Pictured: two offering offering bearers, one carved by a master (right) and the other by an apprentice (left) HOW ANCIENT EGYPTIAN RELIEFS WERE SCULPTED Archaeologists have determined that ancient Egyptian reliefs were made in seven distinct stages. These were: Smoothing the wall and plastering of defects in the stone and joints between blocks Division of the surface into sections and application of a square grid The preliminary sketch is drawn in red paint, copied from a pre-prepared drawing Correction of the sketch by a master artist, who also added details in black paint Any text to accompany the images was inscribed With all the outlines done, the sculptors started their work, following the black lines The finished relief surface was whitewashed and coloured SOURCE: Antiquity Advertisement 'The chapels soft limestone is a very promising material for study, as it preserves traces of various carving activities, from preparing the wall surface to the master sculptors final touches,' said paper author Anastasiia Stupko-Lubczynska. To study the reliefs, Dr Stupko-Lubczynska and her team first rendered each relief surface at a 1:1 scale on plastic-film sheets that they attached directly to the walls. 'These were then scanned and processed as vector graphics,' she added. 'I couldnt stop thinking our documentation team was replicating the actions of those who created these images 3,500 years ago. 'Like us, ancient sculptors sat on scaffolding, chatting and working together.' The scans allowed the researchers to study the traces left in the stone by ancient chisels. In this way, Dr Stupko-Lubczynska explained, 'it was possible to "grasp" several intangible phenomena, which normally leave no evidence in the archaeological record.' This included the ability to distinguish which parts of the reliefs were made by apprentices or, at least, less-skilled artists and those which were fashioned by masters of their craft. Just like in the Renaissance workshops of 14th17th century Europe, it appears that less experienced artists would have worked on less complicated parts of large pieces of art while masters tackled complex details like faces, alongside correcting the mistakes of their inferiors. An exception seems to have come in the form of depicting wigs a time-consuming task on which masters and apprentices are thought to have worked together. This may have offered the more experienced artists an opportunity to pass on some of their skills. In one area, the team determined that a master would start each wigs, with an apprentice going on to try to finish them to the same standard. 'In one place, a master's workmanship is so remarkably detailed I feel it was done in front of the [apprentice] sculptor(s) learning from him and seems to say "Look at this! Who can beat me?",' said Dr Stupko-Lubczynska. 'It is generally believed that in ancient Egypt, artists were trained outside of ongoing architectural projects,' she continued. 'But my research in the Chapel of Hatshepsut proves that teaching also took place as reliefs were being executed "on the job training".' It seems like in ancient Egypt just like workplaces today not every trainee ends up working out, as the team found evidence of one wig that was only half-finished, suggesting that the apprentice sculptor didn't finish his part. To study the reliefs, Dr Stupko-Lubczynska (pictured) and her team first rendered each relief surface at a 1:1 scale on plastic-film sheets that they attached directly to the walls. 'These were then scanned and processed as vector graphics,' she explained 'The chapels soft limestone is a very promising material for study, as it preserves traces of various carving activities, from preparing the wall surface to the master sculptors final touches,' said paper author Anastasiia Stupko-Lubczynska, pictured here in the chapel The scans allowed the researchers to study the traces left in the stone by ancient chisels. In this way, Dr Stupko-Lubczynska explained, 'it was possible to "grasp" several intangible phenomena, which normally leave no evidence in the archaeological record.' Pictured: two offering bearers in the relief. Analysis has revealed that the faces were done by a master, while the wigs appear to have been done by an apprentice Just like in the Renaissance workshops of 14th17th century Europe, it appears that less experienced artists would have worked on less complicated parts of large pieces of art while masters tackled complex details like faces, alongside correcting the mistakes of their inferiors. Pictured: examples of where work had been corrected Just like in the Renaissance workshops of 14th17th century Europe, it appears that less experienced artists would have worked on less complicated parts of large pieces of art while masters tackled complex details like faces, alongside correcting the mistakes of their inferiors. An exception seems to have come in the form of depicting wigs a time-consuming task on which masters and apprentices are thought to have worked together. Pictured: wigs sculpted by different artists. C appears to have bene started by a master and completed by an apprentice, while j was never finished by the apprentice 'In one place, a master's workmanship is so remarkably detailed I feel it was done in front of the [apprentice] sculptor(s) learning from him,' said Dr Stupko-Lubczynska. She continued: 'It is generally believed that in ancient Egypt, artists were trained outside of ongoing architectural projects. But my research in the Chapel of Hatshepsut proves that teaching also took place as reliefs were being executed "on the job training" ' Pictured: some blocks attributed to the Chapel of Hatshepsut come from excavations, and were studied separately Dr Stupko-Lubczynska said that she had initially hoped that her analysis might be able to identify the hand of different individual artists. This, however, this was rendered impossible, as all the artists appear to have been trying to create a homogenous work in a shared, standardised style. Nevertheless, she noted, it was possible to tell that a different crew worked on each of the mirrored reliefs, thanks to the slight differences between them. On the south wall relief, for example, a jug is portrayed as a clay container on a rope whereas its north wall counterpart is made of metal, instead. The analysis also revealed parts where the artists were seemingly forced to deviate from standard practice. For example, some of the hieroglyphics near the wigs, for example, appear to have been added later in the process that they normally would. This, Dr Stupko-Lubczynska said, means that the sculptors must have began their work on the wigs before all the outlines of the inscriptions had been put down in paint perhaps because the scribes had no access to that part of the wall earlier. The full findings of the study were published in the journal Antiquity. Dr Stupko-Lubczynska and her team studied two 3,500-year-old reliefs in the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari, Thebes Archaeologists have determined that ancient Egyptian reliefs were made in seven distinct stages. After the wall was smoothed and any defects in the stone and joints between blocks were plastered over, the surface was divided into sections and a square grid was applied as depicted here (on the north wall relief and on a preparatory flake, bottom right) A bizarre new prototype device lets dogs call their owner by picking up and shaking a ball when they're home alone. Devised at the University of Glasgow, the device, called 'DogPhone', is a toy ball containing an accelerometer a device that detects motion of an object. When the accelerometer senses movement, it initiates a video call on a laptop, allowing dogs to see and interact with their owner while he or she is at work. Initially, dogs will be mystified by seeing and hearing their owner when they shake DogPhone, but they'll soon start to associate touching it with their owner appearing. Over time, they'll therefore learn to pick up and shake the ball when they're missing their owner and want to see them via the internet at least. While it's just a prototype for now, DogPhone could help address the issue of separation anxiety for pets who have grown used having people at home during the coronavirus pandemic. Scroll down for video DogPhone is a toy ball containing an accelerometer - a device that measures motion of an object. Dogs can learn to pick up and shake the device if they want to see and hear their owner on a computer screen, experts say HOW DOES DOGPHONE WORK? DogPhone is a soft ball containing an accelerometer - a device that detects motion of an object. When the dog touches DogPhone, the device initiates a video call on a laptop with the owner miles away. With DogPhone, the human owner can also use the system to call the dog. When they do so, DogPhone makes a ringing sound, to draw the dog's attention. But the pooch is 'free to answer or ignore the call', simply by ignoring the device. Advertisement DogPhone was created by Dr Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas at the University of Glasgow, along with colleagues from Aalto University in Finland. Dr Hirskyj-Douglas is a specialist in animal-computer interaction at the Universitys School of Computing Science, and owns a 10-year-old labrador, Zack, who helped with developing and testing the device. 'There are hundreds of internet-connected "smart toys" on the market that dog owners can buy for their pets, from fitness monitors to remotely-controlled treat dispensers,' she said. 'However, the vast majority of them are built with the needs of dog owners in mind, allowing them to observe or interact with their pets while away from home. 'Very few of them seem to consider what dogs themselves might want, or how technology might benefit them as living beings with thoughts and feelings of their own. 'What I wanted to do with DogPhone was find a way to turn Zack from a "usee" of technology, where he has no choice or control over how he interacts with devices, into a "user", where he could make active decisions about when, where, and how he placed a call.' With DogPhone, the human owner can also use the system to call the dog. When they do so, DogPhone makes a ringing sound, to draw the dog's attention. But the pooch is 'free to answer or ignore the call', simply by ignoring the device. Zack is pictured here at home holding DogPhone in his mouth, as seen from the live video stream To build DogPhone, Dr Hirskyj-Douglas first paid close attention to the kinds of objects that Zack likes to play with. After considering the possibility of a stick or a stuffed toy, she chose a soft ball. With the help of colleagues from Aalto University, Dr Hirskyj-Douglas built the internet-connected accelerometer to be concealed inside the ball. After several demonstrations of how the ball could be used to start a video call, Zack was given the ball to play with over 16 study days over the course of three months. In the first iteration of the experiment, lasting two days, Zack made 18 calls, half of which were accidental calls placed while he slept on the ball, suggesting the accelerometer system was too sensitive. During several of the calls where Zack was awake, he showed Dr Hirskyj-Douglas some toys that they often play with together and approached the screen, suggesting he wanted to interact with his owner. The second phase of the experiment, lasting seven days, resulted in only two calls, suggesting the accelerometer tuning had become not sensitive enough. DogPhone was created by Dr Ilyena Hirskyj-Douglas at the University of Glasgow, pictured here with Zack In the third phase, lasting another seven days, the accelerometer tuning was refined again to try to phase out accidental calls while allowing deliberate ones to be placed more easily. This time, Zack made 35 calls in total, averaging five in a day. While many of them seemed accidental, there was also more significant interactions between Zack and Dr Hirskyj-Douglas. She used her phone to show Zack her environment, including her office, a restaurant, an underground station, and a street busker. Zack again showed additional interest in these interactions, pricking up his ears and approaching the screen. 'Of course, we cant know for sure that Zack was aware of the causal link between picking up the ball and making a call, or even that some the interactions which seemed accidental were actually unintended on his part,' said Dr Hirskyj-Douglas. Screenshot of online interaction between Dr Hirskyj-Douglas and Zack. DogPhone could empower pandemic pups to stay in touch with their owners 'However, its clear that on some occasions he was definitely interested in what he was seeing, and that he displayed some of the same behaviours he shows when we are physically together. Over the course of the experiments, Dr Hirskyj-Douglas said she became 'unexpectedly anxious' when she placed a call to Zack and he wasnt in front of the camera or he didnt approach the screen. 'I hadn't considered that this might be a consequence of the two-way communication that DogPhone creates, and it's something to consider for the next iteration of the system,' she said. 'Whatever form that takes, we've taken another step towards developing some kind of "dog internet", which gives pets more autonomy and control over their interaction with technology.' Dr Hirskyj-Douglas is presenting a research paper on her work at the 2021 ACM Interactive Surfaces and Spaces Conference in odz, Poland, today. Grandmothers may be more emotionally connected to their grandchildren than to their own sons and daughters, a new study suggests. In experiments, US scientists scanned grandmothers' brains while they were viewing photos of their young grandchildren. When looking at the photos, brain regions associated with 'emotional empathy' tended to be activated in the grandmothers' brains, the researchers found. Emotional empathy is when we feel the same emotion as another person, such as distress in response to their pain. In contrast, when looking at photos of their sons and daughters, regions of the brain associated with cognitive empathy were activated. Cognitive empathy is when you can understand someone else's feelings, but it doesn't mean you're feeling the same thing. It's possible grannies are evolutionarily hardwired to experience the same emotions their grandkids are experiencing, as a tactic to help them through the early stages of life when they're young and vulnerable. Scientists have scanned grandmothers brains while theyre viewing photos of their young grandchildren - providing a snapshot of this inter-generational bond (stock image) EMOTIONAL VS. COGNITIVE EMPATHY When looking at the photos, brain regions associated with 'emotional empathy' were activated in the grandmothers' brains. Emotional empathy is feeling the same emotion as the other person, such as feeling distress in response to their pain. It involves sharing an emotional experience with someone, meaning you're able to feel what they're feeling. It differs to cognitive empathy - when you can understand someone else's feelings, but it doesn't mean you're feeling the same thing. Advertisement The new study, conducted by researchers at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, is the first to examine grandmaternal brain function. 'What really jumps out in the data is the activation in areas of the brain associated with emotional empathy,' said lead author James Rilling, professor of anthropology at Emory University. 'That suggests that grandmothers are geared toward feeling what their grandchildren are feeling when they interact with them. 'If their grandchild is smiling, they're feeling the child's joy. And if their grandchild is crying, they're feeling the child's pain and distress.' Humans are cooperative breeders, according to the researchers, meaning human mothers get help caring for their offspring, although the sources of that help can vary. 'We often assume that fathers are the most important caregivers next to mothers, but that's not always true,' Rilling said. 'In some cases, grandmothers are the primary helper.' In the 1960s, researchers came up with the 'grandmother hypothesis' to explain why grandmothers live decades after they've stopped being able to reproduce. Viewing grandchild pictures activated areas involved with emotional empathy (insula and secondary somatosensory cortex) and movement (motor cortex and supplementary motor area. Pictured are brain regions of interest (ROIs) used in this study THE GRANDMOTHER HYPOTHESIS The grandmother hypothesis, put forward by evolutionary biologist William Hamilton in a 1966 paper, has been applied to humans and other animals. Female chimps rarely live past childbearing years, usually into their 30s and sometimes their 40s. Human females often live decades past their child-bearing years - and that may have begun with our early Homo relatives 2 million years ago. The grandmother hypothesis says that before then, few females lived past their fertile years. But changing environments led to the use of food like buried tubers that weaned children couldn't dig themselves. So older females helped feed the kids, allowing their daughters to have the next baby sooner. By allowing their daughters to have more kids, grandmothers' longevity genes became increasingly common in the population and human lifespan increased. Evidence supporting this hypothesis includes a study of the traditional Hadza people of Tanzania, where foraging by grandmothers improves the nutritional status of their grandchildren. Another study of traditional communities showed that the presence of grandmothers decreases their daughters' interbirth intervals and increases the number of grandchildren. In more modern societies, evidence is accumulating that positively engaged grandmothers are associated with children having better outcomes on a range of measures, including academic, social, behaviour and physical health. A 2010 modelling study suggested the hypothesis isn't plausible, however. Advertisement Grandmothers being around to help care for their grandchildren helps increase chances of their grandchildren surviving, the hypothesis argues, which ensures preservation of their genes. To see how brain activity may be involved, the researchers scanned the brains of 50 grandmothers who were shown pictures of their grandchildren, all between three and 12 years old. Each grandmother lay in a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine, which measures brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow. As a control, they were also shown pictures of their own son or daughter (the child's parent), an unknown child and an unknown adult. Grannies also completed questionnaires about their experiences, providing details such as how much time they spend with grandchildren, activities they do together and how much affection they feel for them. The scans revealed that viewing grandchild pictures activated areas involved with emotional empathy (insula and secondary somatosensory cortex) and movement (motor cortex and supplementary motor area). However, when viewing images of their adult child, they showed stronger activation in an area of the brain associated with cognitive empathy (temporo-parietal junction and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex). The results indicate grandmothers may be trying to 'cognitively understand' what their adult child is thinking or feeling and why, but not as much from the emotional side. 'Young children have likely evolved traits to be able to manipulate not just the maternal brain, but the grand maternal brain,' Rilling said. 'An adult child doesn't have the same cute "factor", so they may not illicit the same emotional response.' Also, grandmothers who more strongly activated areas involved with cognitive empathy when viewing pictures of their grandchild reported in the questionnaire that they desired greater involvement in caring for the grandchild. Interestingly, compared with results from an earlier study of fathers viewing photos of their children, grandmothers more strongly activated regions involved with emotional empathy and motivation, on average, when viewing grandchildren photos. A grandmother carries her laughing granddaughter outside the tourist hotspot of Yangshou in southern China Pictured, a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) device, which measure brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow Future research could look at the neuroscience of grandfathers and how brain functions of grandparents differ across cultures. It's relatively rare for scientists to study the older human brain outside of the problems of dementia or other aging disorders. 'Here, we're highlighting the brain functions of grandmothers that may play an important role in our social lives and development,' said co-author Minwoo Lee. 'It's an important aspect of the human experience that has been largely left out of the field of neuroscience.' The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. The search for 'another Earth' has been a staple of science fiction for decades, and now a group of astronomers hope to discover one on our galactic doorstep. Alpha Centauri is a triple star system just over four light years from the Earth, split into a pair of sun-like stars known as AB, and a red dwarf called Proxima Centauri. So far planets have only been found orbiting Proxima Centauri, but experts from the University of Sydney and Breakthrough Initiatives believe they will find a world orbiting the larger binary pair using a new privately funded telescope. Known as the Toliman mission, it will launch in 2023 and scan Alpha Centauri AB for worlds in the habitable zone, where liquid water can flow on the surface. The team hope to be able to say whether there are habitable worlds orbiting either or both of the binary stars by the middle of this decade. Professor Peter Tuthill, project leader from the University of Sydney, told MailOnline there was a 30 per cent chance of finding at least one planet orbiting Alpha Centauri AB, but it is difficult to properly assess due to the fact it is a binary star system. A simulated view of what the TOLIMAN telescope could see of the Alpha Centauri binary through its diffractive pupil lens The closest star system to the Earth is the famous Alpha Centauri group. Located in the constellation of Centaurus (The Centaur), at a distance of 4.3 light-years, this system is made up of the binary formed by the stars Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, plus the faint red dwarf Alpha Centauri C, also known as Proxima Centauri ALPHA CENTAURI: OUR NEAREST CELESTIAL NEIGHBOUR Alpha Centauri is the closest star system to the Earth. It includes three stars, two that are Sun-like in a binary pairing, and a third smaller red dwarf star. The red dwarf, known as Proxima Centauri, is the closest star to the sun at 4.246 light years. The binary pair includes Rigil Kentaurus, or Centauri A, and Toliman, also known as Centauri B. Rigil Kentaurus has 1.1 times the mass and 1.519 times the luminosity of the Sun, while Toliman is smaller and cooler, at 0.907 times the Sun's mass and 0.445 times its luminosity. From the Earth they appear as a single larger star, called Alpha Centauri AB. With an apparent magnitude of 0.27, it is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Centaurus and the third-brightest in the night sky, outshone by Sirius and Canopus. They orbit around a common centre with a period of 79.91 years, however it is elliptical, ranging from the distance between Saturn and the sun to the distance between Pluto and the sun. Alpha Centauri C, or Proxima Centauri, is 0.21 light years from the binary pair. Proxima Centauri has two planets: Proxima b, an Earth-sized exoplanet in the habitable zone discovered in 2016; and Proxima c, a super-Earth about 1.5 AU from the red dwarf star. No planets have been confirmed around either Alpha Centauri A or B, but astronomers speculate there will be planets around one or both. Advertisement While the cost hasn't been revealed, it will in part be funded by a $788,000 (425,000) grant from the Australian government and includes work by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Saber Astronautics in Australia. It is expected to be a multimillion dollar project, but will cost less than $20m. TOLIMAN stands for Telescope for Orbit Locus Interferometric Monitoring of our Astronomical Neighbourhood, but is also the ancient Arabic name for the star. It is a new approach to exoplanet discovery, creating a telescope to focus on the nearest star systems, looking for potentially habitable worlds, instead of just any world. The telescope uses a diffractive pupil lense - a mirror that spreads starlight captured from nearby stars into a complex flower-like pattern. This pattern makes it easier to detect perturbances of star movements that are the tell-tale signs of orbiting planets. 'Our nearest stellar neighbours the Alpha Centauri and Proxima Centauri systems are turning out to be extraordinarily interesting,' said Dr Pete Worden, Executive Director of the Breakthrough Initiatives, which is funding the mission. 'The TOLIMAN mission will be a huge step towards finding out if planets capable of supporting life exist there.' Professor Tuthill said this will present a new window on the universe, including our nearest neighbour. 'Astronomers have access to amazing technologies that allow us to find thousands of planets circling stars across vast reaches of the galaxy,' he said. 'Yet we hardly know anything about our own celestial backyard. It is a modern problem to have; we are like net-savvy urbanites whose social media connections are global, but we don't know anyone living on our own block.' Having such a blind spot in our understanding of the local universe has 'important consequences' for astronomy, according to Prof Tuthill. 'These next-door planets are the ones where we have the best prospects for finding and analysing atmospheres, surface chemistry and possibly even the fingerprints of a biosphere the tentative signals of life,' he added. Telescope mirror engraving for TOLIMAN. Alpha Centauri is a triple star system just over four light years from the Earth, split into a pair of sun-like stars known as AB, and a red dwarf called Proxima Centauri The team believe that either or both of the two stars in Alpha Centauri AB may host temperate planets - those with flowing water that could host life. The third star, Proxima Centauri, is already believed to have one planet in a 'Goldilocks orbit', discovered in 2016. Breakthrough Initiatives, founded by Israeli science and technology investor and philanthropist Yuri Milner, which is supporting the mission, has a number of programs engaged in the hunt for alien life throughout the universe. Its Starshot mission hopes to one day send a fleet of tiny probes to Alpha Centauri, flying using lightsails - a mission that will take 20 years from launch, and four years to send any information back to the Earth. Proposed TOLIMAN mission telescope design. The team believe that either or both of the two stars in Alpha Centauri AB may host temperate planets - those with flowing water that could host life Our closest neighbours: Alpha and Proxima Centauri are just four light years away, here photographed in visible and x-ray spectra Scientists are developing a laser-powered SAIL that they claim could allow us to travel 24 TRILLION miles to our closest star system in 20 years It is our nearest star system and offers perhaps the best chance of finding alien life but reaching Alpha Centauri with current technology would take thousands of years. The good news is scientists may just have found a way to get there in the space of a human lifetime. It involves a laser-powered sail they claim could one day allow us to travel 24 trillion miles and reach our closest stellar neighbour within 20 years. The new type of spacecraft propulsion system has been designed by scientists from the Australian National University (ANU). The Breakthrough Starshot project calls for the design of an ultra-lightweight spacecraft, which acts as a light-sail, to travel with unprecedented speed to the triple star system 4.37 light-years away. While that is a large distance in terrestrial terms, it is three times closer than the next nearest Sun-like star. The concept would see probes launched into space by the laser propulsion system. Light to power the sail would come from the Earth's surface with millions of lasers joining forces to illuminate the sail and push it onto its interstellar journey. Advertisement Other projects, including TOLIMAN, have been designed to find planets and search for life in our stellar neighbourhood. Pete Klupar, Chief Engineer of Breakthrough Watch, said: 'These nearby planets are where humanity will take our first steps into interstellar space using high-speed, futuristic, robotic probes. 'If we consider the nearest few dozen stars, we expect a handful of rocky planets like Earth orbiting at the right distance for liquid surface water to be possible.' Saber Astronautics will provide spaceflight mission operations support, including satellite communications and command, space traffic management and a range of other flight services to download data from the satellite. Dr Jason Held, CEO of Saber Astronautics, said: 'TOLIMAN is a mission that Australia should be very proud of it is an exciting, bleeding-edge space telescope supplied by an exceptional international collaboration. It will be a joy to fly this bird.' Dr Eduardo Bendek, a member of the team from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said it is a huge technological challenge finding planets orbiting even the nearest and brightest stars in our galactic neighbourhood. 'Our TOLIMAN mission will launch a custom-designed space telescope that makes extremely fine measurements of the position of the star in the sky. If there is a planet orbiting the star, it will tug on the star betraying a tiny, but measurable, wobble.' Most of the thousands of known planets outside the solar system have been discovered using space telescopes such as NASA's Kepler and TESS missions. Finding exoplanets close to home will take more finely tuned instruments, which is where the TOLIMAN mission comes in. Mr Klupar said: 'The signal we are looking for requires a real leap in precision measurement.' Professor Tuthill added: 'Nobody is underestimating the challenge, but our innovative design incorporates new tricks. Our plan is for an agile, low-cost mission that delivers results by about the middle of the decade.' Pictured, a not-to-scale representation of how far away Proxima B is from Earth compared to Voyager 1, the farthest man-made object which was launched in 1977 He told MailOnline he has spent time looking at the odds of finding a planet, and it isn't a question with a single clear answer. 'There are a few unknowns that the present state of astronomy knowledge are not yet up to answering,' he explained. 'I think taking a moderately pessimistic case, then there is at least, say a 30% chance of at least 1 planet, and the more optimistic forecasts predict several planets. 'The problem here is the binary star,' Alpha Centauri AB, as 'nobody really knows what the implications of that are, so these numbers are under debate.' He said TOLIMAN hopes to be able to view any planet the mass of Earth or larger - if it is the size of Mars or smaller then it won't be visible, even if it exists. 'We are searching for Earth Analogs. Surely, eventually however, technology will catch up and we will exhaustively survey the Alpha Cen system.' The Leonids meteor shower will peak this evening with up to 15 shooting stars potentially visible each hour through to dawn tomorrow experts have said. The spectacle, which happens every November, occurs when small rocks burn up in Earth's atmosphere after breaking off from a comet called 55P/TempelTuttle. According to NASA, the Leonids are considered to be some of the fastest meteors known, travelling at speeds of 44 miles (71 kilometres) per second. The annual shower takes it name from the fact that their radiant the point in the sky from which they appear to originate lies within the constellation of Leo. Unfortunately for stargazers, conditions are expected to be fairly cloudy and changeable from today until Friday, the Met Office has predicted. The north is expected to experience spells of showers and bouts of wind, while the south of the UK will be largely dry, but with variable cloud that could spoil the view. The north and west of the UK will by cloudy with occasionally bouts of rain in the northwest, they forecast today however, clear spells are expected elsewhere. Scroll down for video The Leonids meteor shower will peak this evening with up to 15 shooting stars potentially visible each hour through to dawn on Thursday. Pictured: the Leonids in 1998 The annual shower takes it name from the fact that their radiant the point in the sky from which they appear to originate lies within the constellation of Leo ABOUT THE LEONIDS The Leonids are usually one of the more prolific annual meteor showers, with fast, bright meteors associated with Comet 55P/TempelTuttle. The radiant (the point where the meteors seem to stream from) is at the head or 'sickle' of the constellation Leo the Lion, hence the name. As the comet follows its path around the sun, it leaves a path of tiny debris. The cometary debris enters our planets atmosphere at speeds of up to 43 miles (70 km) per second, vaporising and causing streaks of light. Source: Royal Museums Greenwich Advertisement Weather permitting, the best possible views of this evening's peak will come in places with clear skies and far from sources of light pollution like big cities. There is no advantage to using binoculars or a telescope observers merely need to look up unaided and take in the widest possible view of the sky. According to the Met Office weather forecast, the north of the UK may see a mixture of cloud and rain and 'perhaps some clear spells'. 'The south will be drier but may also be fairly cloudy with some fog patches around,' Met Office senior meteorologist Greg Dewhurst told MailOnline last week. Meteors also known as 'shooting stars' are typically either bits of asteroids leftover from the formation of the solar system or, as in the case of the Leonids, material ejected from the disintegration of a comet as it passes near the Sun. Every year the Earth passes through these debris trails, resulting in material entering our atmosphere where they burn up, creating fiery and colourful streaks in the sky. 55P/TempelTuttle, the comet from which the Leonids originate, takes 33 years to complete one of its elongated orbits around the Sun. TIPS TO SEE A METEOR SHOWER Meteor showers are best seen with a good, clear view of the stars on a night with no clouds. Try to find somewhere with dark skies, an unobstructed horizon and very little light pollution Make sure there are no direct sources of light in your eyes, so that you can fully adapt to the local conditions and ensure that fainter meteors become visible. Theres no advantage to using binoculars or a telescope; just look up with your own eyes to take in the widest possible view of the sky. Source: Royal Observatory Greenwich Advertisement The nucleus of 55P/TempelTuttle is relatively small, measuring only about 2.2 miles (3.6 kilometres) across comparable in size to the island of Manhattan in New York. Its debris fragments burn up and vaporise before they hit the Earth's surface causing a streak of hot air which we see as a 'shooting star'. These beautiful streaks seen in the night sky can be caused by cosmic particles that are as small as a grain of sand. 'The Leonids meteor shower is named after the constellation of Leo the lion,' Royal Observatory Greenwich astronomer Anna Gammon-Ross told MailOnline. 'This is because, although meteors appear all over the sky, they all appear to emerge or radiate from a single point that lies within this constellation.' Stargazers who miss the shower's peak may still be able to catch the display in the following days albeit at a reduced rate of meteors each hour. Tonight, Ms Gammon-Ross explained, 'the radiant (the easiest region to see them) will be rising a little after 10pm here in the UK.' 'So the early hours of the morning will be the best time to look out for this shower, when Leo is nice and high in the sky.' According to NASA, the Leonids are some of the fastest meteors known, travelling at speeds of 44 miles (71 kilometres) per second. Pictured: the Leonids over New Mexico, 1998 Every 33 years, when 55P/TempelTuttle is closer to the Earth, stargazers can experience a Leonid 'storm' one that peaks with hundreds-to-thousands of meteors per hour, depending on location. 'Viewers in 1966 experienced a spectacular Leonid storm thousands of meteors per minute fell through Earth's atmosphere during a 15 minute period,' said NASA. 'There were so many meteors seen that they appeared to fall like rain. The last Leonid meteor storm took place in 2002.' The next such Leonid storm is due in 15 years time. After the Leonids, there will be another two meteor showers in 2021 the Geminids, which will peak December 1415, and the Ursids, which peak December 2122. A group of astronomers, including an amateur stargazer, have discovered a new galaxy in deep space. Astrophysicists at the University of Surrey, the Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia and amateur astronomer Giuseppe Donatiello, who heads the National Deep Sky Research Section of the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union, have spotted the galaxy Pisces VII/ Tri III. Further research is needed, but it's possible that Pisces VII/ Tri III is an isolated dwarf galaxy or a satellite of the Triangulum galaxy (M33), a spiral galaxy 2.73 million light-years from Earth. If it is indeed an isolated dwarf galaxy, it would be the faintest field galaxy ever spotted and if it's a satellite, it gives additional insight that the theory behind galaxy formation is accurate. A group of astronomers, including an amateur, have discovered a new galaxy, Galaxy Pisces VII/ Tri III Giuseppe Donatiello (pictured) found the galaxy by looking at public images to find new galaxies in the Andromeda system Donatiello said that he found the galaxy by looking at public images of the DESI Legacy Survey to find new galaxies in the Andromeda system when he stumbled upon Pisces VII/ Tri III. 'I found Pisces VII through the visual inspection in public images of the DESI Legacy Survey, precisely in order to identify new satellites in the Andromeda system, outside the areas already investigated in the past,' Donatiello said in a statement. 'I knew the likelihood of finding something new was real and I was right. A new galaxy has not been found in the Andromeda subgroup since 2013.' Donatiello said that he found the galaxy by looking at public images of the DESI Legacy Survey to find new galaxies in the Andromeda system when he stumbled upon Pisces VII/ Tri III The implications of it being a dwarf galaxy or satellite are fairly significant for astronomers. Emily Charles, a PhD student at the University of Surrey who worked on the project, said in a separate statement: 'Theoretical knowledge about galaxy formation means we'd expect to see many more little galaxies orbiting the Triangulum galaxy, M33. 'However, so far it only has one known satellite. If this newly identified galaxy does belong to M33, it might imply that there are many more that haven't been uncovered yet as they are too faint to show up in previous surveys of the system. 'M33 currently challenges astrophysicists' assumptions, but this new finding starts reassuring us that our theories are correct.' Galaxy Pisces VII/ Tri III could be an isolated dwarf galaxy or a satellite of the Triangulum galaxy (M33) The discovery was made using the Galileo National Telescope. After analyzing the data from the GNT, it was determined that the 'absolute magnitude and a first estimate of the distance, estimated at about 3.2 million light years,' according to the statement. If it is indeed estimated at around 3.2 million light-years, it is likely to be a satellite galaxy of M33, but if it's further away, that would likely make it a dwarf galaxy. Further research from more powerful telescopes are needed to more accurately identify its exact location in space Further research from more powerful telescopes are needed to more accurately identify its exact location in space. Noushin Karim, another PhD student at the University of Surrey who helped identify Pisces VII/ Tri III, said: 'Deep imaging from Hubble would allow us to reach fainter stars which act as more robust distance estimators, as they have a standard brightness. 'To confirm the new galaxy's movement, we need imaging from an 8m or 10m telescope, like Keck or Gemini.' The study was published last month in the scientific journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Astronomers continue to learn more about dwarf galaxies and their structure. In February, scientists confirmed that a halo of dark matter surrounding a dwarf galaxy 163,000 light-years from Earth is significantly larger than previously thought. Last month, researchers discovered that more than 1,600 fast radio bursts emanated from FRB 121102 over the span of 47 days in 2019, believed to come from a dwarf galaxy 3 billion light-years from Earth. Canon has launched a new camera that automatically takes photos in the home using facial recognition. The PowerShot PX, which is released in the UK and Europe today for 449.99 (500), is like having 'your own personal photographer', but scaled down into a five-inch-tall device. It automatically captures still imagery and video and can 'prioritise certain faces' such as for someone's birthday party. The camera can pan, tilt and zoom into a scene in the home, whether it's a 'spontaneous family dance-off' or friends around the dinner table. While Canon claims that the new camera is ideal for families, it has been widely criticised on social media, with one user branding it 'creepy', while one privacy expert has called it 'similar to CCTV'. Would you allow the PowerShot PX in your home? The device knows when to automatically capture still imagery and video The device automatically takes photos of you and your family, it also lets you capture shots by voice command whenever you want, by saying 'Hello Pixie, take a picture!' CANON POWERSHOT PX SPECS - Automatic capture of 11.7MP stills and 60p Full HD video - 19-57mm focal length range - Pan, tilt and zoom functionality - Facial recognition and tracking to keep subjects in frame - Voice command - Smartphone app for camera control and curation - USB-C recharging Advertisement The device has built-in Wi-Fi to connect to the home network, as well as Bluetooth, so users can view all photos and video on the app. Users can also use the app to turn their phone into a remote control for PowerShot PX, letting them 'compose the perfect shot' without having to get up and reposition it. 'With this clever camera, families can enjoy the moment and still capture it, without having to stay behind the lens,' Canon says. 'PowerShot PX uses auto-subject searching to keep loved ones in the frame and capture photos that otherwise might have been missed.' When on, 'intelligent face tracking' allows the camera to detect exactly when to take a photo automatically, without any manual or vocal command from the owner. One way it knows to take a shot is when it detects faces in close proximity to each other, all clustered together facing forward an indication to the technology that subjects are posing for a photo. Alternatively, users can capture shots by voice command by saying 'Hello Pixie, take a picture!', or take photos in a more traditional, manual way by controlling PowerShot PX via an accompanying app, available for both iOS or Android. Content is saved to an SD card inside PowerShot PX. Users can use the compatible smartphone app to take control over who the camera prioritises when capturing According to Canon, the camera is only active when it is switched on via the power button, but once users do so, it takes photos autonomously. To decide whether or not to take a photo or video, PowerShot PX uses an 'automatic shooting algorithm', which uses scene recognition technology that has been developed over several years, the company told MailOnline. Somewhat unsurprisingly, the device has received a wary reception from the public and privacy experts alike. One Twitter user, Canadian blogger @AaronWrotkowski, said: 'Canon made this so they could sell a murder mystery film about it "the last photos of the victim were taken by the Canon PowerShot PX".' Another Twitter user, @RegGBlinker, called it a 'horrible idea' and said 'we absolutely do not need to document my appearance in the lounge at all times of day and night forevermore'. Meanwhile, @happymxlocust said: 'It's an interesting idea though it would feel really creepy.' Dr Gareth Tyson, an internet data science expert at Queen Mary University of London, told MailOnline captured photos could potentially be accessed remotely by strangers. Users can 'look back on a digital scrapbook of candid moments' with PowerShot PXs accompanying app for iOS and Android The camera can pan, tilt and zoom into a scene in the home, whether it's a 'spontaneous family dance-off' or friends around the dinner table 'The camera is Wi-Fi enabled, which would allow owners to manage their photos from their smartphone,' Dr Tyson told MailOnline. 'This is handy, but it would leave the camera potentially open to attack where an adversary tries to access the photos remotely.' Javvad Malik, lead security awareness advocate at security awareness firm KnowBe4, said the device 'can be considered similar to CCTV'. 'The idea of being able to capture photos and videos without having to be behind a camera is an appealing idea. 'However, there are privacy implications with such a device which can automatically continually take pictures of people. 'From that perspective, while it's marketed as a personal camera, it can be considered similar to CCTV, and so the same principles can be applied. 'That is to inform people that pictures and video may be taken at any time, and that people can choose to opt out if desired.' The new device also lets users capture shots by voice command whenever they want, by saying 'Hello Pixie, take a picture - ideal for messy family moments PowerShot PX comes in two colours (black and white) and is compatible with smartphones with operating system iOS 8.4 or later, or Android 5.0 or later PowerShot PX is not an always-on camera it must be set up and switched on by the user before it can capture shots. Content is saved to an SD card inside the device, which connects to a smartphone via Bluetooth. 'The camera is not connected to the internet and user's data is not stored within the cloud,' a Canon spokesperson told MailOnline. 'Instead, all content is saved to a secure SD card inside the device.' PowerShot PX comes in two colours black and white and is compatible with smartphones with operating system iOS 8.4 or later, or Android 5.0 or later. NASA has updated a 3D real-time tool that lets you track Earth-observing satellites such as the recently launched Landsat 9, as well as the ISS and Aqua. Eyes on the Earth is created by the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, and shows Earth-observing satellites in real time, as well as the data they are collecting. It reveals everything from carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide levels in the atmosphere, through to current global sea levels and moisture in the soil. This information comes from a fleet of dozens of satellites, each specialising in different aspects of the Earth's climate and environment. 'Eyes on the Earth offers an engaging, interactive resource to learn more about environmental phenomena and their impacts,' NASA says. NASA has updated a 3D real-time tool that lets you track Earth-observing satellites such as the recently launched Landsat 9, as well as the ISS (visualisation pictured) and Aqua Eyes on the Earth is created by the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, and shows Earth-observing satellites in real time, as well as the data they are collecting, including the Landsat 9 (visualisation pictured) which takes images of Earth LANDSAT 9 Landsat 9 is the latest satellite in the Landsat mission, running for the past five decades. Landsat 9 will extend scientists ability to measure changes on the global land surface at a scale. This is 'where we can separate human and natural causes of change,' said USGS in a statement. 'Landsat 9 will thus contribute a critical component to the international strategy for monitoring the health and state of the Earth. 'Landsat users can now take advantage of more frequent observations (every 8 days using two satellites).' Advertisement NASA has more than two dozen missions studying Earth science, and each of these is represented on the real time virtual globe. One of the things it can be used for is to measure different greenhouse gasses, such as carbon dioxide, at any particular part of the globe. This is useful when looking to see if there are higher pollution concentrations than expected over a city. It could also be used to determine ocean surface levels at different locations, as well as how those levels have been changing over time. This information is useful for flood predictions. The newest version of Eyes on the Earth also provides snapshots of significant events in the natural world, according to the space agency Spinning the virtual globe, you can see details about the planet. This includes the maximum wind speeds of a tropical storm, the impacts of a northern California fire, and even see the scale of a phytoplankton bloom off of New Zealand and why it matters. The improvements also include upgrades for a more seamless user experience. 'With the latest advancements in technology, we are able to harness these innovations to combine larger amounts of data and imagery for users to visualise how our planet is constantly changing,' said Jon Nelson, from NASA JPL. There is also the ability to find out more about each of the individual satellites that are taking measurements - simply by clicking on the name. For example, clicking on the Aqua satellite will zoom in on its location and provide background information on its mission. It has been in orbit for nearly 20 years and is providing information on the Earth's water cycle by collecting information on ocean evaporation, atmospheric water vapour, clouds, precipitation, soil moisture and snow cover. NASA has more than two dozen missions studying Earth science, and each of these is represented on the real time virtual globe NASA and the USGS have released the first set of pictures from the Landsat 9 satellite since it launched in September. The city of Kathmandu, Nepal, seen at the bottom left of this Landsat 9 image, lies in a valley south of the Himalayan Mountains between Nepal and China. Glaciers, and the lakes formed by glacial meltwater, are visible in the top middle of this image The information is real time, including data from the Landsat 9 satellite, that launched into Earth orbit in September. When they launch, details of the NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) and SWOT (Surface Water and Ocean Topography) satellites will also appear. 'The graphics are as rich as the data, making for fascinating deep dives as you learn about the science, get to know the planet better, and learn about some of the many NASA missions that track the globe's health,' NASA says in a blog post. The two largest moons of Uranus, the seventh planet in our solar system, may be hiding buried oceans, a new study suggests. Uranus has 27 known moons, of which Titania and Oberon are the largest and second-largest, respectively. Both could support a subsurface ocean today if there was little heat loss through their outer ice shells, reveal researchers who ran computer simulations. This high-resolution colour composite of Titania was made from Voyager 2 images taken January 24, 1986, as the spacecraft neared its closest approach to Uranus WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT URANUS? Uranus was discovered by William Herschel in 1781 and is named after the Greek god of the sky Ouranos. It is 1.84 billion miles from the Sun and orbits every 84 years. It's biggest moons are Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon. It turns on its axis once every 17 hours and 14 minutes. It has the coldest temperatures of any planet in the solar system with a minimum temperature of -371F. It has a set of dark very thin coloured rings surrounding it. Advertisement 'Id bet they do have oceans,' study author Francis Nimmo at the University of California, Santa Cruz told New Scientist. 'It would not be at all surprising.' Uranus, known as the 'ice giant', is 31,000 miles (50,000 km) across and orbits 1.6 billion miles (2.6 billion km) from Earth. Its biggest moon, Titania, is about 980 miles (1,576 km) in diameter, while Oberon is around 946 miles (1,522km) in diameter. Both have surface temperatures averaging around -392F (-200C), but radioactive elements deep inside these moons may keep some of their interior water melted. Many of Uranus' smaller moons orbit closer to the planet than Titania and Oberon get most of their internal warmth from tidal heating the frictional heating of their core caused by the gravitational pull of the parent planet. However, tidal heating wouldnt be enough to melt the ice beneath the larger, more distant moons frozen surfaces, including Titania and Oberon, they say. However, Titania's and Oberon's sub-surface liquid oceans could be prevented from freezing by other factors. This Voyager 2 picture of Oberon is the best the spacecraft acquired of Uranus' second-largest moon One of these factors is how many pores the moons have and how big these pores are. A moon with a less porous surface would lose more heat into space than a more porous surface. Another factor is whether or not the liquid oceans contain ammonia, which would lower the liquid's melting temperature. Thirdly, clathrates cages of atoms with another atom trapped inside could limit the heat flux out of the ocean. On Pluto, clathrates at the base of the ice shell have been proposed to play an important role in preserving a subsurface ocean. According to the modelling results, if Titania had an ice shell porosity of more than 12 per cent or more than 10 per cent ammonia in its sea by weight, the moon could support an ocean more than 0.6 miles (1km) today. These estimations could be the same for its slightly smaller moon sibling, Oberon. View of Uranus captured by the Voyager 2 spacecraft in 1986. Uranus was shown to have a magnetic field that was misaligned with its rotational axis, unlike other planets that had been visited to that point The researchers have stressed the importance of designing future missions with the capability to detect an ocean at all five of Uranus' major moons Oberon, Titania, Umbriel, Ariel and Miranda. NASA is leading efforts to launch a space probe to Uranus and its planetary neighbour Neptune, as well as their surrounding natural satellites, in the 2030s. Little was known about the Uranus' moons until NASA's Voyager 2 space probe passed it during its flyby of Uranus in January 1986. Uranus was shown to have a magnetic field that was misaligned with its rotational axis, unlike other planets that had been visited up until then. More than two decades after it was first spotted, a brightly colored Peruvian songbird has finally gotten a proper name. Ornithologists from Louisiana State University first spotted what would be called the Inti Tanager in southeastern Peru's Manu National Park in October 2000. With its bright yellow feathers and distinctive black stripe, the bird's plumage was reminiscent of Uma Thurman's iconic track suit in Kill Bill: Volume One, and soon it earned the nickname the 'Kill Bill Tanager.' But it took more than a decade for researchers to find more specimens and start long the process of mapping the bird's family tree. Eventually they realized it wasn't just a whole new species, but a new genus, as well. Scroll down for video First spotted in 2000, the Inti Tanager earned the nickname 'the Kill Bill Tanager' because its distinctive yellow-and-black plumage is reminiscent of Uma Thurman's outfit in the 2003 movie Kill Bill Daniel Lane, an ornithologist at LSU's Museum of Natural Science, heard the little chirper's song while leading a birdwatching tour on Peru's Manu-Kosnipata Road, a popular birding location. He was quite familiar with the local avian inhabitants, so he assumed it was one of the more common birds in the area. However, when he and fellow ornithologist Gary Rosenberg saw it through a telescope, they realized it was something new: a canary-yellow songbird with a pink bill, a bushy crest and a distinctive black stripe on its head. 'My first wild impression was it looked like an Old World oriole, something like a Black-naped Oriole from Asia,' Lane told the Audubon Society. 'Since that was obviously impossible, my next thought was that it must be a tanager.' Ornithologist Daniel Lane's earliest sketch of an Inti Tanager, which migrates annual between Bolivia and Peru Unfortunately, after just a glimpse, the bird flew off out of sight. It wasn't until three years later, when Lane and Rosenberg were leading another birding tour in the region, that they saw the tanager again. Lane finally collected a specimen in 2004 but with just one bird, he couldn't determine its exact taxonomy. Finally in December 2011, Frank Rheindt, then a graduate researcher at Harvard University's Museum of Comparative Zoology, encountered a healthy breeding population in the foothills of Bolivia's remote Machariapo valley, some 200 miles away from where Lane had seen the tanager in Peru. Other ornithologists had actually visited the valley, located on the east side of the Andes, but always in the dry season, 'when the deciduous forest had shed its leaves and bird activity was low,' according to a statement from LSU. Rheindt was visiting during the rainy season, when the birds were easy to spot. A watercolor painting of a male (top) and female Inti Tanager. Inti means 'sun' in the Quechua language spoken by Incans 'That this unique, bright yellow bird could have gone unnoticed by ornithologists until recently attests to the remoteness of the areas where it lives and to the importance of continued biological surveys off-the-grid in South America,' the researchers wrote in a paper published in the journal Ornithology. Lane and a group of Bolivian ornithologists returned to the Bolivian site in 2019 to gather more genetic material and start mapping the tanager's family tree. Tanagers are among the largest families of birds, with more than 370 known species. They represent about 4 percent of all species of birds and more than 10 percent of avians in the Neotropical realm, which encompasses Central and South America. Nonetheless, Lane and Rosenberg's discovery, eventually labeled Heliothraupis oneilli, is notable: according to the release, fewer than 10 new genera of birds have been described since the 1960s. Female and male Inti Tanagers are similar, though females lack the telltale black stripe and their bills can be pink or bright orange. The bird's species name, oneilli, honors LSU ornithologist John O'Neill, a former director of birds at the museum who mentored both Lane and Rosenberg. Its genus, Heliothraupis, is derived from the Greek word helios, meaning 'sun,' and thraupis, meaning 'small bird' or 'finch.' And its common name, Inti Tanager, reflects this phrasing as well: Inti means 'sun,' in the Quechua language spoken by Incans. 'This species reminds me of the sun in multiple ways,' said Occidental College ornithologist Ryan Terrill, who co-authored the study. 'It often sings through the middle of the day, and so it is out in the sun,. It looks like a little sun, and it's in the open sunny habitat," Terill said. 'So I thought, some derivative of 'sun tanager' would be cool.' Researchers believe the Inti Tanager is migratory, but only within the tropicsa rarity among songbirds The team came up with the name 'sun tanager' while sitting around a campfire in Bolivia in 2012, Terill added. Since the Inti Tanager wasn't spotted during the dry season, the researchers believe it's migratory, but only within the tropicsa rarity among songbirds. They theorize it only breeds during the rainy season in Bolivia, from November to March. From June to November it heads west to 'winter' in the lower Andes in southeastern Peru, where Lane first spotted it. That would explain why its numbers were so much concentrated in Bolivia, according to Terrill, who estimated its non-breeding habitat in Peru could be ten times vaster. Joan Laporta has refused to rule out the prospect of Lionel Messi and Andres Iniesta following Xavi and Dani Alves back to Barcelona. As 38-year-old Brazilian right-back Alves was unveiled at the Nou Camp on Wednesday, having agreed to return on a short-term deal from January, Laporta continued the class reunion vibes. It came after he appointed former midfielder Xavi to succeed the sacked Ronald Koeman as manager earlier this month. Barcelona president Joan Laporta refused to rule out the prospect of club legends Lionel Messi (left) and Andres Iniesta (right) making a return to the Nou Camp It came after another club icon, Xavi Hernandez, was appointed as Barcelona manager Club icon Messi, 34, only left for Paris Saint-Germain last summer with Barcelona unable to afford a new contract for the Argentine. With Messi struggling with knee and hamstring injuries this season, he hasn't quite made the impression at PSG many expected. Former Barcelona midfielder Iniesta, now 37, has played for Japanese club Vissel Kobe since leaving Catalonia in 2018. He signed a two-year contract extension with the club back in May. But Barca president Laporta excited the club's fans by saying: 'I do not rule it out. 'It has happened with Dani, who has already said that age is just a number and has also made a significant financial effort to return. 'You are talking about two spectacular players, with Leo and Andres. Barcelona president Joan Laporta refused to rule out returns to the club for Messi and Iniesta 38-year-old Dani Alves was unveiled at the Nou Camp as he re-signed for the club this week 'I cannot predict the future, they are still playing. We will always keep them in mind, but at the moment they have current contracts with other clubs. 'You never know in life.' Alves, who will train with Barcelona but cannot play for the team until January, said it would be 'incredible' if Messi was to return from Paris. He said: 'What can I say? If you give me a couple of hours, I will look for him! 'He is the greatest player I have been able to see and have as a team-mate. Iniesta (left), Messi (centre) and Xavi (right) played in Pep Guardiola's great Barcelona team 'The great players are always missed when they leave. It would be incredible to be able to see him here again. Unfortunately, he is not here. 'I would encourage all former players to come back as there is nowhere to be found that is better than here.' He added: 'I'm very sorry for Messi and for Barca, but sometimes in life there are cycles that have to be closed. 'Messi will continue to be Messi and Barca will continue to be Barca, but a little less special.' Xavi takes charge of his first game as their manager against Espanyol this Saturday evening. Britons are being encouraged to embrace the 'daycation' to give hotels a boost this winter. The idea is to spend a day enjoying hotel rooms, spas and leisure facilities in your local area rather than staying overnight, to help hotels maximise revenues at the times when rooms typically sit empty. The campaign is being led by travel platform DayBreakHotels using the hashtag #StayForTheDay, and comes as the hospitality industry continues to find its feet in a post-lockdown world. Britons are being encouraged by DayBreakHotels to embrace the 'daycation' to give hotels a boost this winter. The platform's daycation listing includes the five-star LaLit London, pictured In March of this year, 55 per cent of hospitality businesses had temporarily paused trading, with one in five expressing 'low confidence' that their business would survive the next three months. From this low, hotels started to bounce back earlier this year. However, according to Deloitte, 90 per cent of hotel leaders in the UK believe performance will not return to pre-Covid levels until at least 2023. DayBreakHotels - a platform that enables customers to book rooms and facilities for day use at hundreds of hotels across the UK - believes the 'daycay' will help drive ongoing demand across the winter months. It adds that hotel rooms and meeting rooms can also be booked as plush remote offices, with over 150 hotels in DayBreakHotels' network offering users bespoke 'smart working' packages. Booking a room for the day can be up to 75 per cent cheaper than the cost of an overnight stay. The Mercure Sheffield Kenwood Hall Hotel & Spa, pictured, is available for a daycation via DayBreakHotels, which is using the #StayForTheDay hashtag to encourage Britons to embark upon 'daycays' DayBreakHotels said it 'brings up to 10,000 incremental revenue to its partner hotels each month through the sale of daytime access to rooms and services'. Using the DayBreakHotels app or website, customers can book rooms and other hotel perks - such as pool or spa access, restaurants or meeting rooms - for up to 75 per cent less than the usual nightly rate. DayBreakHotels said its bookings grew almost 130 per cent between June and September 2021, as more hotels started to reopen their doors. Hotels in the network include the five-star LaLit London near Tower Bridge, Pestana Chelsea Bridge in Battersea, Kenwood Hall Hotel & Spa in Sheffield and Mercure Holland House in Cardiff. The Capital Hotel next to Hyde Park is the most recent addition to the platform's UK offering. Pictured is the pool at the Mercure Sheffield Kenwood Hall Hotel & Spa. DayBreakHotels said it 'brings up to 10,000 incremental revenue to its partner hotels each month through the sale of daytime access to rooms and services' Simon Botto, founder and CEO of DayBreakHotels, said: 'It has been an unimaginably tough 20 months for the hotel trade. The sector is showing strong signs of recovery, but we're not completely out of the woods yet, especially seeing as many hotels are facing staff shortages on top of fewer bookings from international guests. 'We want to encourage people to "stay for the day" this winter to help them discover the lovely hotels on their doorstep whilst also supporting the industry. Booking a room for daytime use is a fun and affordable way of relaxing and enjoying a hotel's facilities for less, or it can provide a calm and luxurious space in which to work after a difficult few months. 'And it also extends a lifeline to a hotel industry keen for trade, helping hotels make money from rooms and services that would otherwise remain empty. 'We have over 600 hotels in our network up and down the UK, so there's something for everyone and lots of lovely places for couples, friends and families to hang out in. Whether you're after a daycation - using the room as a base whilst you enjoy the spa, gym, pool and room service - or whether you want to switch up your remote work routine and enjoy a change of scenery, your local hotels can put the facilities you need at your fingertips. After a difficult few months, your local hotels need you.' Daycations can also be booked through www.hotelsbyday.com, www.dayuse.co.uk and www.dayrooms.com. Home and Away has been the training ground for countless Aussie actors who have gone on to make it big in Hollywood. And actress Kirsty Marillier is hoping to follow in the footsteps of Chris Hemsworth, Isla Fisher and Melissa George, as she makes her big debut as the soap's new character Rose. 'It is really like that big break you crave and wish for as a student and young actor,' she told The Daily Telegraph. The big break! Actor Kirsty Marillier is hoping to follow in the footsteps of Chris Hemsworth, Isla Fisher and Melissa George, as she makes her big debut on Home and Away While she has only spent five weeks on the set of the show, Marillier is hoping that the big break is her ticket to Tinsel Town. 'Getting to shoot this amount of content, the amount Ive already done already, is an experience that will make me prepared for Hollywood, prepared for America, and just a really strong working actor, which is what Ive always wanted to be. 'I feel like I will grow so much being in Summer Bay,' she added. According to Kirsty's IMDB, she previously had a guest role on the series in 2018, but her new character will show up on screens early next year. Marillier has worked in the theatre sector in the past, with her most recent being the stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in Melbourne. Filming: Marillier is pictured on the set of Home and Away with co-stars Sam Frost Past work: Marillier has worked in the theatre sector in the past, with her most recent being the stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in Melbourne Of course, Home and Away has seen many before her go on to make it big in Hollywood. After leaving the soap, Chris went on to become a megastar thanks to his role as Thor in the Marvel superhero movies. Meanwhile, Tammin Sursok who played Dani Sutherland had a starring role in U.S. TV series Pretty Little Liars. Superstar: After leaving Home and Away, Chris Hemsworth went on to become a Hollywood superstar thanks to his role as Thor in the Marvel superhero movies Remember this? Chris pictured with his former Home and Away co-stars. Tammin Sursok (centre) and Bec Hewitt (front right) The late actor Heath Ledger also got his big break on the Channel Seven series. As did romantic-comedy favourite, Isla Fisher, who was best known as Shannon Reed from 1994-1997. Before them, was 1990s star Melissa George who played Angel Parrish. The hay days: The late Heath Ledger had a guest starring role as bad boy Scott Irwin on long-running soap in 1997. Pictured, Kate Ritchie and Heath Ledger Matthew Newton's marriage to his long-time girlfriend Catherine Schneiderman was finally confirmed this month during a speech at his late father Bert's funeral last week. And while Catherine - like her reclusive husband - has avoided the spotlight for many years, there is plenty of intrigue about the woman who stole Matthew's heart. The 28-year-old, who prefers to go by the name Cat, was born in America to parents Eric T. Schneiderman, a lawyer and politician, and Jennifer Cunningham, a political strategist. Who is Catherine Schneiderman? Meet the American politician's daughter, 28, who swept troubled Matt Newton, 44, off his feet - despite her father's strict stance against domestic violence. Catherine (right) and Matthew (left) are pictured in upstate New York on 15 November Her father is a member of the Democratic Party and served as the 65th Attorney General of New York from 2011 until his resignation in 2018. While little is known about Catherine's occupation, she graduated from Columbia University in the City of New York with a Master of Science. She started dating Matthew, now 44, in 2012 and the couple became engaged in October 2016. Confirmed: Matthew's marriage to his girlfriend Catherine (pictured) was finally confirmed this month during a speech at his late father Bert's funeral High-profile family: The 28-year-old, who prefers to go by the name Cat (left), was born in America to parents Eric T. Schneiderman (right), a former New York Attorney General, and Jennifer Cunningham, a political strategist. Catherine is pictured with her father Eric at a Democratic Party convention in 2014 Mother: Catherine (right) is pictured with her mother Jennifer Cunningham (left) at a Democratic Party convention in 2014. Jennifer and Catherine's father Eric are divorced Catherine's blossoming romance with Matthew quickly raised eyebrows due to her father's known stance against domestic violence. Eric Schneiderman passed a bill in 2010 to increase the punishment handed to those involved in such crimes. 'The time to criminalise this horrific form of abuse is now,' he said at the time. Catherine's (right) romance with Matthew quickly raised eyebrows, due to her father's known stance against domestic violence. Eric Schneiderman (left) passed a bill in 2010 to increase the punishment handed to those involved in such crimes. Catherine is pictured with Eric as he was being sworn in as the New York Attorney General in 2011 In the spotlight: Matthew is pictured at the Toronto International Film Festival in Canada in September 2017 Ex-file: Matthew was arrested in 2006 for allegedly physically assaulting ex-girlfriend Brooke Satchwell (left). He later pleaded guilty to 'common assault' in court. Pictured together in 2003 Former flame: In 2010, Matthew's then-girlfriend Rachael Taylor (left) filed a protective order against him, alleging physical, verbal and emotional abuse, and he entered Sydney's Northside West Clinic for treatment. Pictured together in 2009 'I am proud of the overwhelming bipartisan support for this legislation. It sends a strong message that we must do everything in our power to ensure that no one is immune from accountability for committing such a heinous crime.' In 2006, Matthew was convicted of assaulting his then-fiancee, actress Brooke Satchwell. In 2010, he announced his split from another fiancee, Transformers star Rachael Taylor, after two 'violent and unprovoked' attacks in Rome, which prompted her to take out an AVO against him. Aware: New Idea magazine previously reported Catherine (pictured) was aware of Matthew's past but 'sees him as a misunderstood genius' Off-beat chic: Catherine's Facebook profile contains several photos of the brunette showcasing her quirky fashion style Wedding bells: A family friend told New Idea in 2017 the couple had secretly married at the home of Catherine's mother in New York He was also arrested twice in Miami, Florida in 2012 - the first for trespassing and resisting officers, while a second incident saw him charged with battery and resisting arrest after he attacked a hotel receptionist. New Idea magazine previously reported Catherine was aware of Matthew's past but 'sees him as a misunderstood genius'. A family friend told the publication in 2017 the couple had secretly married at the home of Catherine's mother in New York. '[Matthew] rang his parents prior to the big day and invited them, but with Bert's health being a little strained in recent months they decided a long-haul flight to New York might not be a great idea,' the source said at the time. Partners: '[Matthew] rang his parents prior to the big day and invited them but with Bert's health being a little strained in recent months they decided a long-haul flight to New York might not be a great idea,' the source said at the time. Matthew's parents Patti and Bert are ictured at Woman's Day magazine's 60th anniversary party in Sydney in July 2008 'This is the best news ever for Bert and Patti... they're just so happy for Matthew.' The insider added: 'Matthew's battled a lot of demons over the years, but he finally feels like he's found his place in the world in New York with Cat.' Matthew is said to have completely given up on his home country and is happy living with Catherine in upstate New York. 'Because of his scandals over the years, he can't face coming home to Australia,' a source told Woman's Day magazine. 'Matthew lives a private, almost reclusive life with his partner Catherine in New York now, where he is rarely bothered. He has no desire to reawaken old demons by returning to Australia,' they added Neither Matthew nor Catherine were present at his TV icon father Bert's state Funeral on November 12. Content: Matthew is said to have completely given up on his home country and is happy living with Catherine in upstate New York Meanwhile, during Bert's memorial, the Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Werner Utri, referred to Catherine as Matthew's wife. 'Good morning and welcome to the state funeral of Mr Bert Newton... I'd like to begin by acknowledging a number of people with us today,' he said. 'First and foremost, Bert Newton's wife Patti, his daughter Lauren, his son-in-law Matt and grandchildren.' Fr Utri added: 'Unfortunately Bert's son Matthew and his wife Catherine were unable to join us as they are in New York.' It is not known whether the couple have any children. Paris Hilton teased views from her honeymoon on Tuesday, just a day after word new husband Carter Reum is father to a nine-year-old lovechild. The socialite, 40, first shared a snap from the plane before posting video from the deck of a yacht about 11 hours later. Appearing to be above the drama, she celebrated her trip by adding a GIF that said 'Honeymoon goals.' Getaway or get away? Paris Hilton teased views from her honeymoon on Tuesday, just a day after word new husband Carter Reum is father to a nine-year-old lovechild. They're pictured at wedding last Thursday above Later on Paris posted a clip of jet-skiers zooming past and waving. Then there was a beautiful video of sharks and sting rays coming up to the boat's edge. Paris and Carter celebrated their nuptials last Thursday, following the wedding with a carnival night and a second reception on Saturday. Days after, word Reum shares a lovechild with reality star Laure Bellizzi emerged via Page Six. Bellizzi - a Chicago native who now lives in California with the child - also briefly dated actor Mel Gibson. Hilton and Reum tied the knot at a lavish ceremony in Bel Air on Friday. In 2011, when Bellizzi was pregnant, it was reported that the baby was Mel Gibson's love child, though he vehemently denied the claims. DailyMail.com has reached out to Hilton and Reum's reps who have so far been unavailable for comment. Keeping positive: Appearing to be above the drama, she added a GIF that said 'Honeymoon goals' on top of shots from a yacht Travelogue: The socialite, 40, first shared a snap from the plane before posting video from the deck of a yacht about 11 hours later Sea life: Then there was a beautiful video of sharks and sting rays coming up to the boat's edge High seas: Later on Paris posted a clip of jet-skiers zooming past and waving Bellizzi also refuted the rumors to TMZ in November 2011, saying: 'Mel Gibson is not the father of my child.' As it turns out, she was carrying Reum's child. It is the first time that any significant details from Reum's relationship history has been revealed, after he and wife Hilton have shared their romance openly in her new reality show Paris In Love. A source claimed to the outlet that Carter has 'only seen [his daughter] once since she was born 9 years ago.' In response, a spokesperson for Reum said: 'The people who this story matters to have known about it for 10 years. Carter supports this child. While he does not have a traditional father-daughter relationship with her, he has provided for her since she was born, and will continue to do so.' Romance overshadowed? Just days after their fairy tale nuptials came news Reum was father to a nine-year-old with reality TV persona Laura Bellizi Pictured: Bellizi is seen above pregnant in 2011, and at the time it was speculated she was carrying Mel Gibson's baby - both ended up denying the rumors Bellizi has kept a low profile since hitting the headlines with Gibson in 2011. She appeared on the VH1 reality show Secrets of Aspen during its one season run in 2010 but has not appeared on TV since. A source close to the situation added to the outlet that her daughter had been 'triggered' by seeing Reum's lavish wedding to Hilton, and felt 'left out' of her father's life. The source said: 'Also, she saw the articles of Paris and Carter talking about starting a family. She felt tremendous rejection and felt left out. She wants to have a relationship with him.' Reum is worth an estimated $40million, after co-founding investment company M13 with his brother Courtney Reum. Meanwhile, Reum's wife Hilton is worth an estimated $300million. Reality star: Laura Bellizzi pictured in April 2010 The source continued that Reum's daughter wants to 'know her daddy.' 'She just wants to really complete the missing pieces of her puzzle,' the source divulged. 'She's at that age where self-identity is so important, and children want to know who they are and where they come from. It's important for him to help her with that.' 'It's not about [Reum] or the mother. It's about making the child whole. She is absolutely an amazing little girl. She has so much love to give. And she wants to give it to him, his family and whoever he chooses to love.' A second source told the outlet: 'She is of an age now where she is cognizant and wants her paternal family to hear her and know her. He may not claim or love her, but she claims and loves him and his family.' PICTURED: Paris Hilton stuns in Oscar de la Renta wedding gown as she marries Carter Reum at her grandfather's Bel-Air estate... and declares 'my forever starts today' Hilton has made no secret of her plan to start a family with Reum of their own, now they are married. In January this year, she revealed she is undergoing IVF with Reum to ensure she can have a 'boy and girl twin', after dating him for a year. The socialite told The Trend Reporter with Mara podcast on Tuesday that best friend Kim Kardashian had introduced her to the idea. Paris said: '[Kim was the one] who told me about that. I didn't even know anything about it. I'm happy that she told me that advice and introduced me to her doctor. 'We have been doing IVF, so I can pick twins if I like.' Married At First Sight bride Joanne Todd recently returned to work as a barber after she was sacked from a salon for refusing to get the Covid-19 vaccine. And on Tuesday, fellow MAFS star Patrick Dwyer shared a video to Instagram of himself getting his hair cut by Jo before they filmed a hilarious reel together. The video begins with the mother of two, 40, telling Patrick, 28, she hopes he likes his haircut while he sits in a salon chair, before he mistakenly replies: 'Yeah, you too!' No vaccine, no problem! MAFS groom Patrick Dwyer shared a video to Instagram of himself getting his hair cut by co-star Joanne Todd, who recently lost her job for refusing the Covid jab 'Me too?' she replies with a confused look on her face, before they swap positions. Patrick is then shown standing over Jo holding a pair of scissors and a spray bottle. 'First day on the job,' he captioned the next clip, in which Jo is seen looking rather impressed with her new hair makeover. Confusion: The video begins with the mother of two, 40, telling Patrick, 28, she hopes he likes his haircut while he sits in a salon chair, before he mistakenly replies: 'Yeah, you too!' First day on the job: Patrick is then shown standing over Jo holding scissors and a spray bottle The next scene shows the personal trainer telling Jo to 'enjoy her workout' before she mistakenly replies 'you too'. The MAFS stars are then seen working up a sweat as they pretend to exercise. The post comes just weeks after Jo announced she had returned to work as a barber after she lost her previous job for refusing to get the Covid-19 vaccine. Not again! The next scene shows the personal trainer telling Jo to 'enjoy her workout' before she mistakenly replies 'you too' Jo said she was thrilled to be back doing what she loves, but did not reveal whether she had been vaccinated or not. 'I'm very lucky to get to work next to one of my closest friends every day. It makes my job even more enjoyable, also having such a great boss,' she said. She had announced in September she was no longer working at her usual barbershop in Karingal after being told to get the jab or quit. Back at work: The post comes just weeks after Jo announced she had returned to work as a barber after she lost her previous job for refusing to get the Covid-19 vaccine New job: Jo said she was thrilled to be back doing what she loves, but did not reveal whether she had been vaccinated or not Jo insists she isn't an anti-vaxxer, despite losing her job for refusing to get the jab. In an interview with Yahoo! Lifestyle, she maintained she was not against getting the vaccine, but wanted to 'wait a little longer'. She added that people who choose not to get vaccinated are being treated 'unfairly'. Support: 'I'm very lucky to get to work next to one of my closest friends every day. It makes my job even more enjoyable, also having such a great boss,' she said. Pictured with a co-worker 'I want people to know that I am not anti-vax at all. I do think it should be a choice,' she explained. 'I also think it's unfair how the unvaccinated are being treated for their own rights to not choose to get the vaccine. 'I just believe that everyone should have a choice with their own bodies and not come with rules.' Speaking out: Jo had announced in September she was no longer working at her usual barbershop in Karingal after being told to get the jab or quit Jo said she'll happily 'cut the unvaccinated and the vaccinated' and 'won't discriminate'. 'I'm not saying I'll never get a vaccine. I am just choosing to wait a little longer,' she added. Jo was relentlessly mocked on social media after revealing she lost her job for refusing the Covid-19 vaccine. Creating controversy: She was relentlessly mocked on social media after revealing she lost her job for refusing the Covid-19 vaccine While there was the usual chorus of 'good for you' and 'stand up for your rights' from anti-vaxxers, other Aussies said they had 'no sympathy' for the MAFS star. She was labelled foolish for choosing to walk away from her job of 12 years because of her stubbornness, with some fans saying they were unfollowing her on Instagram. The coronavirus vaccine is a safe and vital measure being taken to protect the community from the spread of the virus. The vaccine makes you significantly less likely to become seriously ill with Covid, and also reduces the likelihood of transmission. Jesinta Franklin has lashed out at people who say tasks such as 'taking a shower' and 'cleaning the house without kids around' is a 'break' for mothers. The model 30, who shares daughter Tullulah, one, and son Rocky, eight months, with her husband Lance 'Buddy' Franklin, reshared a post by lifestyle brand Mother.ly on Wednesday which made a series of statements about stay-at-home mothers. The quote read: 'Cleaning your house without kids is not a break. Showering is not a break. Grocery shopping alone is not a break. Hitting back: Model and footy WAG Jesinta Franklin has lashed out at people who say tasks such as 'taking a shower' and 'cleaning the house without kids around' is a 'break' for mothers. Pictured with her daughter Tullulah 'It's chores and basic hygiene, but mothers are supposed to be grateful to do these things that literally everyone else does. And at some point, we just break.' The caption for the post on Mother.ly's page read: 'Errands and showers are NOT self-care for moms. Thinking they are is what's burning moms out.' Jesinta gave the quote her seal of approval by sharing it on her own Stories with her 376,000 followers. Shared: Jesinta, who shares daughter Tullulah, one, and son Rocky, eight months, with her husband Lance 'Buddy' Franklin, reshared a post by lifestyle brand Mother.ly on Wednesday which made a series of statements about stay-at-home mothers Jesinta is a highly successful model and brand ambassador. While it's clear she absolutely loves motherhood, Jesinta recently said that some days are more difficult than others. Last December, she confessed she 'misses her old life' sometimes during a candid interview on the Fisher Price Beyond Play podcast. 'It's okay to say you sometimes don't enjoy it or you don't enjoy the newborn phase or, "today, you know what, I just hated being a mum. I miss my old life and I think about it all the time,"' she said. 'Saying those things should be normal and the more we talk about it, we'll actually see less cases of postnatal [depression]. I think we'll see anxiety reduce in women.' Opening up: Last December, Jesinta confessed she 'misses her old life' sometimes during a candid interview on the Fisher Price Beyond Play podcast Exhausted: In May this year, she spoke about the difficulties of having two children under two - especially when her AFL star husband is away In May this year, she spoke about the difficulties of having two children under two - especially when her AFL-star husband is away. 'When your newborn sleeps but your toddler is up all night. It's so much fun when daddy is interstate!' she joked on Instagram alongside a picture of herself cradling her little girl. She later revealed the secret trick she used to finally get her little one to drift off: playing songs by The Wiggles. 'Praise be The Wiggles!' she later wrote, alongside a video of herself lying on the floor with her head in her hands, clearly distressed at how little sleep she was getting 'Praise be The Wiggles!' she wrote, alongside a video of herself lying with her head in her hands, clearly distressed at how little sleep she was getting. 'Look at those bags, that's real life for you! Just breaking up your feed of Instagram's usual perfect pictures of motherhood. With everyone in matching, clean outfits running through fields of daisies!' Jesinta and Buddy married in the Blue Mountains in November 2016. The Sydney Swans star had proposed in December 2014 after 14 months of dating. He has become known for his idiosyncratic dress sense. And Jared Leto showed it off when he emerged in New York City this Tuesday ahead of the release of his latest film House Of Gucci. The 49-year-old Oscar winner warded off the autumnal chill in a faux tiger fur coat, which he had thrown over a peekaboo top. Idiosyncratic dress sense: Jared Leto showed it off when he emerged in New York City this week ahead of the release of his latest film House Of Gucci Accessorizing with a sleek pair of black shades, he emphasized his slender legs with a pair of matching fitted trousers. The Dallas Buyers Club actor wore his luxurious long brown hair down and rounded off his ensemble with a pair of black leather shoes. Years ago a picture of him in fur circulated online and he assured his fans on Twitter that 'of course its FAKE FUR. I would never wear REAL fur. Ever. Not my thing.' As Tuesday wore on he was spotted at the star-studded New York premiere of House Of Gucci wearing a gold suit made of either velvet or velour. Off he goes: The 49-year-old Oscar winner warded off the autumnal chill in a faux tiger fur coat, which he had thrown over a peekaboo top Legging it: Accessorizing with a sleek pair of black shades, he emphasized his slender legs with a pair of matching fitted trousers Once again he draped himself in a faux fur coat - this time a long cream number that in combination with the rest of his outfit brought back memories of the 1970s. House Of Gucci centers on Patrizia Reggiani, who married Maurizio Gucci in the 1970s - and had him killed by a hit man in the 1995 a decade after their divorce. Ridley Scott directed the film, which will see Adam Driver portraying Maurizio opposite Lady Gaga as his scenery-chewing wife. Swanking about: As Tuesday wore on he was spotted at the star-studded New York premiere of House Of Gucci wearing a gold suit made of either velvet or velour They are heading up a star-studded cast with other members of the Gucci family played by Jared, Salma Hayek, Jeremy Irons and Al Pacino. Jared had to have prosthetics applied to play Maurizio's cousin Paolo Gucci and recently told Screen Rant about the experience of wearing the look in public. 'I actually did every day, but you just reminded me, I haven't talked about this yet. But I actually did the hair and makeup at my apartment in Rome,' he shared. Retro chic: Once again he draped himself in a faux fur coat - this time a long cream number that in combination with the rest of his outfit brought back memories of the 1970s 'And when I was shooting in Milan, we did it at the hotel. So we would go from the hotel or the apartment down to the street and off to work. And yeah, it was great.' He explained: 'It certainly helped to catapult me to a brand new place and I fell in love with the character. This is a guy who's larger than life. He's a dreamer. The physicality, the sense of humor. It was just a dream come true for me.' Earlier this year Patrizia complained to the Italian wire service ANSA: 'I am rather annoyed at the fact that Lady Gaga is playing me in the new Ridley Scott film without having had the consideration and sensibility to come and meet me.' Starring Lady Gaga: House Of Gucci centers on Patrizia Reggiani, who married Maurizio Gucci in the 1970s - and had him killed by a hit man in the 1995 a decade after their divorce She insisted: 'It is not an economic question. I won't get a cent from the film. It is a question of good sense and respect.' Gaga explained her decision in a new interview, telling British Vogue: 'You know, I only felt that I could truly do this story justice if I approached it with the eye of a curious woman who was interested in possessing a journalistic spirit so that I could read between the lines of what was happening in the films scenes.' The Italian American celeb added: 'Meaning that nobody was going to tell me who Patrizia Gucci was. Not even Patrizia Gucci.' She has walked countless high fashion runways. Yet Gigi Hadid leant her talents to the high street on Tuesday, as she posed for a new H&M promotional video in a range of stylish looks from the brand. The supermodel, 26, showcased her sizzling figure in a series of chic ensembles, including a pink sequin slip dress with a daring slit up the leg. Glam mama! Gigi Hadid leant her talents to the high street on Tuesday, as she posed for a new H&M promotional video in a range of stylish looks from the brand Gigi tried on the backless gown while posing up a storm in the clip. The mother of one's hair blew with the wind as she approached the camera, looking as edgy as ever with a deep slick of red lipstick on her pout. The ad begins with Gigi admiring her reflection in the mirror whilst clad in a cropped vest and matching trousers before draping a matching blazer over her shoulders. Rocking some thick yet stylish fringe, Gigi smoldered with lipstick coating her pout and a smoky swipe of eye shadow bringing out her blue-green eyes. Wow: Gigi tried on the backless gown while posing up a storm in the clip Work it: The supermodel, 26, showcased her sizzling figure in a series of chic ensembles, including a pink sequin slip dress with a daring slit up the leg She then tries on a neon green polka dot dress which cinched into her envy-inducing waist. The star looked ready to rock the runway with her hair slicked back into a clean updo and a dramatic swipe of winged eyeliner applied beside her lids. She posed artfully for the camera with the dramatic bright frock while playing with her braided ponytail. '#ad New new by @hm x @ibkamara ! Congratulations ! # Wish it was this easy to try on lewwkkssss... Launching globally on 12/9 and in the US and CA on 12/16 #HM #HMxME,' Gigi captioned the post. The post comes amid a turbulent time for the Hadid family. Hello gorgeous: Gigi worked her magic in the ad Strike a pose:The ad begins with Gigi admiring her reflection in the mirror whilst clad in a cropped vest and matching trousers before draping a matching blazer over her shoulders She bangs! Hadid rocked some thick and stylish fringe Getting glammed up! The model touched up her makeup and tried on a chunky silver choker Zayn pleaded no contest to four harassment charges against him in October and was sentenced to 360 days probation, an anger management course and told he must have no contact with Yolanda or a security guard who witnessed the fight. He denied the claims made against him which include him pushing the reality star into a dresser and calling her a 's**t.' The incident happened after a fight at the home in Pennsylvania he shares with Gigi Hadid and their daughter Khai. Gigi was modelling in Paris and Yolanda let herself into the couple's home, seemingly without Malik's consent A fight ensued, in which he allegedly called her a 'f****** Dutch s**t' and said: 'Stay the f*** away from my daughter' He is then said to have phoned Gigi in Paris and berated her down the phone, screaming: 'Strap on some f*****g balls.' A security guard witnessed the event and he yelled at him: 'Get the f*** out of my f***ing house copper,' Zayn posted a statement on social media at the time that confirmed there was an incident, that he pleaded no contest (although it was unclear at the time that he'd been criminally charged) and that he was trying to protect his daughter. Outfit change! She then tries on a neon green polka dot dress which cinched into her envy-inducing waist Spot on! The star looked ready to rock the runway with her hair slicked back into a clean updo and a dramatic swipe of winged eyeliner applied beside her lids. Model behavior: She posed artfully for the camera with the dramatic bright frock while playing with her braided ponytail He denied striking Yolanda, as had been reported by TMZ, citing an unnamed source. He said: 'As you all know I am a private person and I very much want to create a safe and private space for my daughter to grow up in. 'A place where private family matters aren't thrown on the world stage for all to poke and pick apart. 'In an effort to protect that space for her, I agreed to not contest claims arising from an argument I had with a family member of my partner's who entered our home while my partner was away several weeks ago.' Rocky road: The post comes amid a turbulent time for the Hadid family Gigi and Zayn have now split - it's unclear if that was before the September 29 incident or as a result of it. 'This was and still should be a private matter but it seems for now there is a divisiveness and despite my efforts to restore us to a peaceful family environment that will allow for me to co-parent my daughter in a manner in which she deserves, this has been 'leaked' to the press. 'I am hopeful though for healing for all involved with the harsh words shared and more importantly I remain vigilant to protect Khai and give her the privacy she deserves.' The tension between Zayn and Yolanda allegedly began when he suspected her of leaking news of Gigi's pregnancy to the media, according to an unnamed source cited by The Sun. MailOnline have contacted representatives for Zayn, Yolanda and Gigi for further comment. Rebel Wilson has been announced as the new face of Tourism Fiji. As international borders open to Aussies from December 1, the actress has landed a seven-figure deal in a bid to encourage travel to the tropical destination. Her partnership is believed to be similar to Chris Hemsworth's 2016 deal with Tourism Australia which saw him pocket $1.25million over a two-year period. Bula spirit: Rebel Wilson has been announced as the new face of Tourism Fiji . As international borders open to Aussies from December 1, the actress has landed a seven-figure deal in a bid to encourage travel to the tropical destination 'The campaign is called "Open for Happiness", and reflects exactly what Fiji does like nowhere else in the world - welcome our guests with a genuine warmth and Bula spirit that will leave you in love with Fiji and its people,' Brent Hill, the CEO of Tourism Fiji, said in a statement. 'We look forward to shortly sharing the full campaign of what Rebel got up to in her time here in Fiji!' Rebel recently jetted to Fiji to kickstart her commercial partnership. On Monday, she injected some red-carpet glamour into the tropical paradise as she posed on a boat in a stunning evening gown. New gig: Her partnership is believed to be similar to Chris Hemsworth's 2016 deal with Tourism Australia which saw him pocket $1.25million over a two-year period On location: Rebel recently jetted to Fiji to kickstart her commercial partnership 'Shipwrecked glam': On Monday, she injected some red-carpet glamour into the tropical paradise as she posed on a boat in a stunning evening gown Describing her look as 'shipwrecked glam', Rebel posed up a storm in the floor-length dress which emphasised her incredible 35kg (77lbs) weight loss. The gown cinched in at her waist, and melted down her svelte frame like butter. The dress was cut up at the sleeves as though she'd been on a long voyage, but she still managed to ooze sophistication as she posed on the rickety wooden vessel. Rebel opted for a sun-kissed base of makeup, peach lipstick and long lashes, and wore her hair in tousled beach waves. 'Thanks to my talented team who turned on the shipwrecked-glam look all week in Fiji. Were all Cali Dreamers!' she wrote. Beauty: Hours later, Rebel slipped her figure into a cleavage-baring sequinned dress as she spoke about her time in Fiji Grateful: 'I just wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone in Fiji, Tourism Fiji, the Fiji government, Fiji Airways - everything has just been so amazing,' she said Hours later, Rebel slipped her figure into a cleavage-baring sequinned dress as she spoke about her time in Fiji. 'I just wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone in Fiji, Tourism Fiji, the Fiji government, Fiji Airways - everything has just been so amazing,' she said. 'It's been such an amazing trip, and I'm so proud to be doing these commercials for Fiji and promoting your beautiful country.' Fitness journey: The Jojo Rabbit star recently lost an incredible 35kg (77lb) after embarking on her 'year of health' in 2020 The Jojo Rabbit star recently lost an incredible 35kg (77lbs) after embarking on her 'year of health' in 2020. She told Today Health last Saturday she'd developed a newfound love of walking. 'I feel like sometimes people think you need to work your body really hard to get results, and yeah, if you were training to be the next Thor or something you would be doing hardcore things, but as a regular person, walking is just so healthy for you,' she said. Rebel said she loves to 'put in a podcast or listen to music' during her walks, and praised the physical activity for being 'so easy to do anywhere in the world'. Self-care: Rebel also emphasised the importance of self-care, and said she indulges in regular massages and facials in addition to eating well and exercising 'I can just go out and do it. It's become my favourite form of exercise right now,' she added. Rebel also emphasised the importance of self-care, and said she indulges in regular massages and facials in addition to eating well and exercising. She said she also aims for eight hours of sleep a night, and uses the idea of starting a family as motivation to stay healthy. 'I think what the pandemic taught us all is that health is so important. Your health is your world,' she said. 'It doesn't matter how much money you've got, if you've got terrible health, you can't enjoy anything and if you're healthy, you can live life to the full W Magazine is reportedly scrambling to pull their next issue featuring Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott on the cover after the Astroworld Festival tragedy. Editors are said to be desperately attempting to recall the magazine 'before it hits store shelves,' a source told Page Six this week. 'W editors have cleared any planned coverage of Travis and Kylie from their website, but the magazine was already printed, and now they are trying to stop the delivery trucks,' an insider told the outlet. Panic mode: W Magazine is reportedly scrambling to pull their next issue with Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott on the cover after the Astroworld Festival tragedy; pictured in 2019 Additionally, they explained: 'In the light of what happened at Astroworld, the interview and cover lines seem inappropriate, to say the least.' DailyMail.com has yet to hear back from W Magazine for a request for comment. On Monday, Nike announced they would postpone their sneaker release with Scott after a nine-year-old boy became the latest fatality in a deadly crowd surge during his performance in Houston. Stressful: Editors are said to be desperately attempting to recall the magazine 'before it hits store shelves,' a source told Page Six this week The child was reportedly a big fan of the rapper music, and was sitting on his father's shoulders when the countdown to Scott's performance had began. The pair stayed near the back of the crowd because his father, Treston Blount, thought it would be calmer, he previously told ABC 13. But as soon as Scott took the stage, Treston said, people started pushing. He lost consciousness and Ezra fell to the ground, and was soon trampled on by eager concert-goers. W editors have cleared any planned coverage of Travis and Kylie from their website, but the magazine was already printed, and now they are trying to stop the delivery trucks,' an insider told the outlet; seen in June When Treston regained consciousness, he said, he could not find Ezra anywhere, and rushed to the on-site medic tents and several hospitals. Eventually, he said, he filed a police report, and received a message from an officer with a picture of his boy. When he got to the hospital, he discovered his son incurred severe damage to his brain, kidney, and liver after being 'kicked, stepped on, and trampled, and nearly crushed to death,' according to a lawsuit his family has filed against Scott and the events organizer, Live Nation. The Blount family is seeking at least $1 million in damages. In a statement, the family's lawyer, Ben Crump, said that he was 'committed to seeking answers and justice' on behalf of the family. 'The Blount family tonight is grieving the incomprehensible loss of their precious young son,' Crump said. 'This should not have been the outcome of taking their son to a concert, what should have been a joyful celebration. Ezra's death is absolutely heartbreaking.' With Ezra's death, the death toll stemming from the crowd surge rose to 10 people. Ten dead: On Monday, Nike announced they would postpone their sneaker release with Scott after a nine-year-old boy became the latest fatality in a deadly crowd surge during his performance in Houston; pictured during 2021 Astroworld Festival at NRG Park The dead ranged from 9 to 27 years old. Hundreds more were injured. City officials are investigating what caused the pandemonium at the sold-out event attended by about 50,000 fans. On Wednesday, Houston's police chief blamed Scott for not pulling the plug on the deadly Astroworld concert as new footage showed cops casually filming the Travis Scott show nearly 30 minutes after a mass casualty event was declared. Houston Police Chief Troy Finner refused to provide a timeline for the police response after a sizable group pushed toward the stage at NRG Park. When asked about the timing of the police response after it became apparent things had become dangerous, Finner said the police department was still in the early stages of its investigation and that he was 'not gonna discuss timelines.' Tragic: The dead ranged from 9 to 27 years old. Hundreds more were injured Many unknowns: When asked about how the concert came to an end, and why Scott was able to complete his set, the chief said investigators are still looking into the specifics during a press conference on Wednesday Video and photos obtained by TMZ shows members of the Houston Police Department calmly walking around and even pulling out their cellphones to record Scott's performance after the Fire Chief declared a 'mass casualty event' at 9:38 pm. A set of photos with the time stamps 9:57 pm shows police officers recording the rappers performance, 19 minutes after the chief's declaration, TMZ reported. TMZ also obtained video of officers casually strolling past the stage shot at 10:02 pm, 25 minutes after the mass casualty declaration. When asked about how the concert came to an end, and why Scott was able to complete his set, the chief said investigators are still looking into the specifics during a press conference Wednesday. Chaos: Around 2pm hundreds of fans stormed the festival's VIP entrance. About seven hours later the surge in front of the main stage killed nine people, but the two events appear to be unrelated 'I don't know, and that's part of the investigation,' he told reporters, adding 'We've been looking and the timelines have moved and that's why we shouldn't jump ahead of things, lets just wait. that's part of the investigation.' Finner, who said he did not have a close relationship with Scott and had only met him twice, said whether or not the show went on was not up to the police department. 'Authorities ability to end the show - we don't hold the plug, okay? But it's always in a plan, there's always discussion of how that would happen and we had those discussions with the promoters,' Finner said. 'The ultimate authority to end the show is with production and the entertainer,' he added. Married At First Sight's Jessika Power is giving away $5000 of her own money to families in need this Christmas. The 30-year-old reality star will hand out $1,000 to five families in the coming weeks. Jessika, who tearfully recalled her own childhood struggles and estrangement from her mother on Big Brother VIP, said she wanted to spread some cheer to those in need. Married At First Sight star Jessika Power is giving away $5000 of her own money to families in need this Christmas 'You know what. I never had a big Christmas. It wasn't until I was away from my mother that I had the big Christmas lunch,' Jess said. 'This year, I will choose five families from Australia from my own money. To have an amazing Christmas for you and your family to have. ' Jessika said the money would be used for presents and food on the table. 'This is my time to give back. I will give five families at the start of December to just feel happy as opposed to stressed or embarrassed,' she added. 'You know what. I never had a big Christmas. It wasn't until I was away from my mother that I had the big Christmas lunch' : Jessika, who tearfully recalled her own childhood struggles and estrangement from her mother on Big Brother VIP, said she wanted to spread some cheer to those in need Giving: 'This is my time to give back. I will give five families at the start of December to just feel happy as opposed to stressed or embarrassed,' she said 'I just want to do my little bit. I'm going to stick to my own backyard and bring some Christmas cheer to anyone that I can.' During an episode of Big Brother VIP this month, Jess broke down when she spoke about her own struggles growing up with a drug addict mother, Melinda Mackenzie. 'This photo is very hard to talk about and I knew I would cry the second I got up here, I'm sorry,' she told her housemates. Moved: On an episode of Big Brother VIP this month, Jess (pictured) broke down as she recalled her troubled childhood Her voice breaking, Jessica went on: 'This is my mother years before her addiction. This photo hurts me because it shows my mother in such a beautiful light and what we lost through addiction.' 'I knew I would struggle with this, sorry,' said Jess, who had to pause as the tears became overwhelming. Composing herself, the reality star added: 'This is me and my brother and my mum, and this is when my mum was so good... we would always go camping, just all the fun things. Emotional: During an episode of Big Brother VIP this month, Jess broke down when she spoke about her own struggles growing up with a drug addict mother, Melinda Mackenzie 'And I think it was about eight years later, when we really lost her to addiction. She's come good in [recent] years and stuff but it's so hard to see what addiction does do to people'. Jessika said that the experience 'made her a better person' and more empathetic to the struggles of others, even when they are unkind to her. 'It's shaped me because I had to grow up a lot faster than other kids. I had to be a mum and look after a mum,' she said. 'This photo is very hard to talk about and I knew I would cry the second I got up here, I'm sorry,' she told her housemates The TV star added that she has plenty of family support despite not being close to her mother. 'Since 2000 my mother and I haven't had a connection. But I have an amazing family. My mother is one of eight [children] so I have all my uncles and my aunties and my nan, I have everybody that I need,' she said. Jessica recently told The Daily Telegraph that she 'saw a lot of things that a child should never see'. Difficult: 'I think it was about eight years later, when we really lost her to addiction. She's come good in [recent] years, but its so hard to see what addiction does do to people,' she said 'It was really rough growing up... I was in situations a child should never be put in,' she told the paper. 'I saw my mother being abused by the various men that came and went. There were times where there were dirty needles left around the house. I stayed down a year because my mum never really got me to school.' Jessika said that while she does not think her mother is a 'bad person' the pair no longer talk. The reality star was raised by her aunt, and in 2018 lashed out at her mum when she spoke to Woman's Day. In her interview with the magazine, Melinda said she felt ashamed watching her daughter cheat on 'husband' Mick Gould on season six of MAFS. They are one of the most controversial couples to ever appear on Married At First Sight. And on Wednesday, Bryce Ruthven and Melissa Rawson revealed in an Instagram Q&A that only one expert from the hit reality TV series had congratulated them on the birth of their sons, Tate and Levi, after they welcomed their babies last month. The Q&A, which was featured on Bryce's account, saw one follower ask the couple, both 32, whether any of the experts - John Aiken, Mel Schilling and Alessandra Rampolla - had sent their well-wishes. Shock: Bryce Ruthven and Melissa Rawson have revealed that only one of the Married At First Sight experts congratulated them on the birth of their twin boys 'When the news was made public... no they didn't, which we thought they may have even through social media,' said Bryce. However, the radio personality did reveal that one eventually contacted the pair. 'Recently though, one of them reached out to me via Instagram and asked to give me a call and we had a good chat,' Bryce continued. 'When the news was made public...they didn't': Bryce and Melissa revealed the surprising news in a recent Instagram Q&A after a follower asked which experts had sent their well-wishes 'That expert congratulated us on the engagement, had a bit of a chat about the show and wanted to check in on how @lissrawson was after giving birth 10 weeks early, which was nice of them.' One fan also asked which former stars from the show had sent their well-wishes. Bryce answered with a list of the TV grooms and brides in the next post, which included Jason Engler, Belinda Vickers, Cameron Dunne, Booka Nile, Jake Edwards and James Susler. Well wishes: One follower asked which former stars from the show had sent their well-wishes. Bryce answered with a list of the TV grooms and brides in the next post, which included Belinda Vickers, Cameron Dunne, Booka Nile, Jake Edwards and James Susler Bryce and Melissa appeared on the 2020 season of Married at First Sight. The couple copped plenty of backlash from the public during their time on the show after viewers complained to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). Some viewers said their relationship was 'toxic', that Melissa was 'subjected to gaslighting', and accused Channel Nine of a 'failure of duty of care' towards her. But last month, an investigation found the network did not breach the Commercial Television Code of Practice. In the clear: The couple copped plenty of backlash from the Australian public after viewers complained to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) Despite the backlash, Rawson and Ruthven have remained together since the series went off air. They welcomed twins Levi and Tate, who are currently in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), after they were born 10 weeks premature on October 16. The couple announced their baby news back in July, and also revealed they are engaged to be married. Salma Hayek looked like the ultimate bombshell on Tuesday evening as she attended the star-studded House of Gucci premiere in New York City. The 55-year-old Academy Award-winner modeled a striking blue velvet color-block Gucci gown with a cutout across the chest to showcase her ample bust. The neck and wrists of the dress were decked out in in large rhinestones that glistened in the light as she struck poses for shutterbugs on the red carpet. Bombshell: Salma Hayek looked like the ultimate bombshell on Tuesday evening as she attended the star-studded House of Gucci premiere in New York City The skirt of her dress was made of a black, silky fabric and featured a dramatic slit up one leg. Hayek added height to her 5foot2inch frame with a pair of black platform heels. As for accessories, the Frida star rocked a dainty pair of diamond studs as not to clash with her bedazzled dress. She wore her brunette hair down and neatly tucked behind her ears. Oh my! Salma made no secret of her eye-popping assets in the sizzling gown Ahem! She was showing off her best assets in the sizzling gown She wore blue velvet: The 55-year-old Academy Award-winner modeled a striking blue velvet color-block gown with a cutout across the chest to showcase her ample bust Dazzling: The neck and wrists were decked out in in large rhinestones that glistened in the light as she struck poses for shutterbugs on the red carpet The Eternals actress highlighted her pout with ruby red lipstick while giving herself a sultry gaze with a soft array of brown eyeshadows. Salma carried her essentials in a classy black clutch with gold hardware. Before hitting the red carpet, she took to Instagram to share a trio of glamour shouts, as well as to shoutout her stylist Annabelle Harron for her show-stopping ensemble. 'Start spreading the news! In New York for the [House Of Gucci] premiere,' captioned Salma. A vision: Her look was perfectly paired with elegant accessories Understated: As for accessories, the Frida star rocked a dainty pair of diamond studs as not to clash with her bedazzled dress Drama: The skirt of her dress was made of a black, silky fabric and featured a dramatic slit up one leg A vision: She looked sensational in the flesh-flashing dress Social butterfly: Before hitting the red carpet, she took to Instagram to share a trio of glamour shouts, as well as to shoutout her stylist Annabelle Harron for her show-stopping ensemble Hayek portrays clairvoyant Giuseppina 'Pina' Auriemma - who was sentenced to 25 years in prison for allegedly organizing the murder of Maurizio Gucci for a fee - in the forthcoming Ridley Scott-helmed film. The cold-blooded murder of the fashion scion in 1995 shocked the world especially when his glamorous ex-wife Patrizia was found guilty of plotting it. As the film documents, Patrizia had married into the Gucci empire but is dropped from the iconic fashion family when Maurizio left her from a younger woman. During the murder trial, which transfixed Italy, Reggiani arrived each day wearing head-to-toe Gucci clothes and accessories. Cheeky! She paired the look with staggering Mary Jane shoes House Of Gucci: Hayek portrays clairvoyant Giuseppina 'Pina' Auriemma - who was sentenced to 25 years in prison for allegedly organizing the murder of Maurizio Gucci for a fee - in the forthcoming Ridley Scott-helmed film House Of Gucci: The cold-blooded murder of the fashion scion in 1995 shocked the world especially when his glamorous ex-wife Patrizia was found guilty of plotting it The court heard how she had ordered the murder of her husband after he offered her $650,000 in a divorce settlement. Lady Gaga will play Patrizia, while Marriage Story's Adam Driver will step into the late Maurizio Gucci's shoes. House of Gucci also stars the likes of Al Pacino, Jared Leto, and fashion designer/auteur Tom Ford. The film hits theaters on November 24. In 2022 the Jonas Brothers - along with parents Kevin Jonas, Sr., mom Denise, and youngest brother Frankie - are expanding their family business with a second opening of their restaurant Nellie's Southern Kitchen. The eatery will be taken to Las Vegas next year, replicating the flagship establishment in Belmont, North Carolina. It was inspired by their late paternal great-grandmother, Grandma Nellie. Entrepreneurs: The Jonas Brothers, along with their parents and youngest brother Frankie, are expanding their family business with a second opening of their restaurant Nellie's Southern Kitchen The announcement was made via the Nellie's Southern Kitchen Instagram account on Monday. A post was shared with the brand's 26,000 followers that read: 'We are extremely excited to announce that Nellies Southern Kitchen will make its Las Vegas debut at MGM Grand in early 2022!! Head over to the link in our bio to read more about the new location.' Then a second post was uploaded in the form of a Reels video. Soundtracked to the band's 2019 hit song Sucker, the content showed clips of the Vegas strip, signature dishes, and behind-the-scenes food prep. 'Tag who youre bringing to NSK Las Vegas!! #jonasbrothers #lasvegas #mgmgrand #nelliessouthernkitchen,' said the caption. The restaurant will be located at The District at MGM Grand. Family biz: The eatery will be taken to Las Vegas next year, replicating the flagship establishment in Belmont, North Carolina News! The announcement was made via the Nellie's Southern Kitchen Instagram account on Monday In a statement Kevin Sr. said, 'To open a restaurant in the heart of the iconic Vegas strip is thrilling, and I know my grandma Nellie would be truly amazed seeing her name in lights.' The patriarch added, 'Our family loves Las Vegas. We have spent significant time in the city and are proud to invite everyone to pull up a seat and enjoy our family's hospitality and treasured family recipes.' The original restaurant opened its doors in 2016. Mom-of-four Mrs. Jonas remarked, 'One of our greatest joys in life is sharing a meal with those we love. There is always room for guests in our home and around our table. Grandma Nellie was the perfect example of showing this kind of comfort to people!' Yum! A second post was uploaded in the form of a Reels video. Soundtracked to the band's 2019 hit song Sucker, the content showed clips of the Vegas strip, signature dishes, and behind-the-scenes food prep Nick, Joe, and Kevin Jonas are the subjects of a Netflix special called Roasted, hosted by Kenan Thompson. It's arriving on the streaming giant November 23. In a recent clip shared to the musicians' Instagram account, Pete Davidson poked fun at the brothers and bandmates. 'I listen to the Jonas Brothers every time I'm in a supermarket,' he joked, which got Kevin to throw his head back with laughter. The show will feature a bevy of special guests, including John Legend, who will be performing a song on piano for the brothers, as well as comedian Gabriel Iglesias, One Direction member Niall Horan, Lilly Singh, and Jack Whitehall. Christine McGuinness has revealed her father is a heroin addict who would inject himself in front of her when she was a teenager. The model, 33, has previously kept her father Johnny's battle with drugs out of the public eye but writes about his struggles in her book Christine McGuinness: A Beautiful Nightmare. Johnny's troubles started when she was young, with the model writing that her mother Joanne left him when Christine crawled across one of his used needles when she was a one-year-old baby. In an extract seen by The Sun, the media personality told how her dad is one of the longest living heroin addicts in the UK and said he has never met her children. Heartbreaking: Christine McGuinness has revealed her father is a heroin addict who would inject himself in front of her when she was a teenager She wrote: 'I saw my dad inject heroin. As a teenager, I struggled with his addiction. I blamed myself. When I became a mum, I kept thinking about how he chose drugs over his own kids. 'But as I've gotten older, I've realised it wasn't as simple a choice for him. Addiction is an illness.' Joanne moved away from Blackpool to Merseyside with Christine and sister Billie-Jo, and despite Johnny's addiction, Christine said she had a good relationship with her father and loves him dearly. Family: Christine told how her dad is one of the longest living heroin addicts in the UK and said he has never met her children However, the star admitted he has never met her husband Paddy or their children Penelope, Leo, both eight, and Felicity, five, as she doesn't feel comfortable with the thought of them being introduced to an addict. Christine did offer her father the chance to meet Paddy when she asked him to walk her down the aisle at their wedding in 2011. He said yes but then backed out on the day as she was getting into her bridal gown and said he couldn't make it, so Christine walked down the aisle by herself. Christine said her grandparents have tried to help him and put him into rehab but she doesn't think there's any turning back at this point. Partner: Christine did offer her father the chance to meet Paddy when she asked him to walk her down the aisle at their wedding in 2011 but he backed out (pictured in October 2021) The star also revealed doctors previously thought they'd have to amputate his leg due to the damage done by using dirty needles over the years. She has also been contacted by hospitals on several occasions to warn her that Johnny may die. Although Christine said she still loves her father, she doesn't think she will ever be able to respect him. His absence during important moments in her life made Christine even closer with her mother Joanne. She wrote: 'My mum longed for that relationship to work. It broke her heart. I'm so grateful she did leave him and that she got [us] away.' While Christine has a fractured relationship with her father, she has remained close to her mother. Last year, Joanne was diagnosed with breast cancer, but this summer, Christine assured fans her mother is 'doing incredibly well' having completed her breast cancer treatment. Taking to Instagram and posting a snap of her cuddling her beloved parent, she penned the following note for her followers: 'Ma. Always remember you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, smarter than you think and loved more than you know. 'So many of you ask about my mum, she is doing amazingly well, Im so proud of her. Chemotherapy and radiotherapy is all done now its time for her to enjoy life!' FRANK is a support service that offers information about drugs, plus advice for people who use drugs. Call the FRANK helpline on 0300 123 66 00. Animation fans will be able to own a piece of history with items from the estate of iconic voice artist Mel Blanc going up for auction next month. Personal items such as his own studio microphone, several signed items and much more will be up for bidding as an exclusive presentation as part of Julien's Auctions Icons & Idols: Hollywood Classics and Legends, taking place December 3 at Julien's Auctions in Beverly Hills and online. Other items as part of the collection range from a folder full of Jewish and Yiddish jokes he wrote and registered with the Writers Guild of America West (expected to fetch $300-$500) to his own personal microphone he recorded voices such as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and The Flintstones with ($4,000-$6,000). Auction: Animation fans will be able to own a piece of history with items from the estate of iconic voice artist Mel Blanc going up for auction next month Jokes: Other items as part of the collection range from a folder full of Jewish and Yiddish jokes he wrote and registered with the Writers Guild of America West (expected to fetch $300-$500) to his own personal microphone he recorded voices such as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and The Flintstones with ($4,000-$6,000) The most expensive item, according to estimated value, is an 18K Yellow Gold ID Bracelet with a box clasp closure. The bracelet features his name in cursive on the front and 'Pacific Palisades, Cal' and presumably his phone number, 213 454-6575, on the back. The item weights 114.9 grams and comes with the 1983 The Franklin Mint Almanac,' showing Blanc on the cover wearing the bracelet, with the lot expected to fetch between $5,000 and $7,000. Bracelet: The most expensive item, according to estimated value, is an 18K Yellow Gold ID Bracelet with a box clasp closure Number: The bracelet features his name in cursive on the front and 'Pacific Palisades, Cal' and presumably his phone number, 213 454-6575, on the back Almanac: The item weights 114.9 grams and comes with the 1983 The Franklin Mint Almanac,' showing Blanc on the cover wearing the bracelet, with the lot expected to fetch between $5,000 and $7,000 The studio-used microphone is a late 1950s Sony C-37A, 'free-standing tube condenser microphone' that he used for 'decades' because of its high quality. The mic stand is heavily rusted with the microphone itself labeled 'Mike 2,' and the microphone itself is not in working condition. The microphone also comes with a black-and-white photo of Blanc using the mic with his friend Vincent Prince, with the lot expected to fetch between $4,000 and $6,000. Decades: The studio-used microphone is a late 1950s Sony C-37A, 'free-standing tube condenser microphone' that he used for 'decades' because of its high quality Not working: The mic stand is heavily rusted with the microphone itself labeled 'Mike 2,' and the microphone itself is not in working condition Also included in the collection is a signed animation cel from 1958 featuring five of Blanc's famous characters, Porky Pig, Tweety Bird, Bugs Bunny, Sylvester the Cat, and Daffy Duck. The cel is inscribed in black fountain pen ink on the background page, which reads, 'For Pat/ with love from/ 'Uncle' Mel Blanc/ 4/8/58.' The lot is expected to fetch between $800 and $1,200 at auction. Cel: Also included in the collection is a signed animation cel from 1958 featuring five of Blanc's famous characters, Porky Pig, Tweety Bird, Bugs Bunny, Sylvester the Cat, and Daffy Duck A collection of Blanc's paperwork for Hanna-Barbera Productions is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000. Among the items is a 1962 contract for voicing Barney Rubble and Dino in The Flintstones and a 1964 letter to Blanc from William Hanna with a print of Fred and Barney. Also up for sale is Blanc's signed 1942 Warner Bros. employee ID card, which was on display at the Warner Bros. lot for many years, and is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000 at auction. Paperwork: A collection of Blanc's paperwork for Hanna-Barbera Productions is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000 Contract: Among the items is a 1962 contract for voicing Barney Rubble and Dino in The Flintstones and a 1964 letter to Blanc from William Hanna with a print of Fred and Barney Auction: Also up for sale is Blanc's signed 1942 Warner Bros. employee ID card, which was on display at the Warner Bros. lot for many years, and is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000 at auction Also up for bidding are items from his 1988 autobiography That's Not All Folks! including photocopied pages of the final draft. Also included is, 'a bound "uncorrected page proof" of the book; the final printed book with Blanc's black felt-tip ink signature on the title page; Blanc's name tag when he plugged his book at the 1988 American Booksellers Association in New York City' The lot also includes, 'a foamcore poster of the book's cover; and a cardboard poster of the book's cover with added text reading "Thsufferin'/ Thsuccotash," with the lot expected to go for $1,000 to $2,000. Book: Also up for bidding are items from his 1988 autobiography That's Not All Folks! including photocopied pages of the final draft Included: Also included is, 'a bound "uncorrected page proof" of the book; the final printed book with Blanc's black felt-tip ink signature on the title page; Blanc's name tag when he plugged his book at the 1988 American Booksellers Association in New York City' Poster: The lot also includes, 'a foamcore poster of the book's cover; and a cardboard poster of the book's cover with added text reading "Thsufferin'/ Thsuccotash," with the lot expected to go for $1,000 to $2,000 Also expected to sell between the $1,000 and $2,000 range is the voice legend's 14K gold pocket watch, gifted from his wife. The front has, 'floral and bird engravings accented with seven round diamonds totaling approximately 0.08 ct., and two small rubies totaling approximately 0.03 ct.' The lid features a white dial with Arabic chapters, subsidiary dial, and scrolled gold hands, against a star and floral motif background.' Watch: Also expected to sell between the $1,000 and $2,000 range is the voice legend's 14K gold pocket watch Watch: The lid features a white dial with Arabic chapters, subsidiary dial, and scrolled gold hands, against a star and floral motif background. Another lot features a group of 1950s and 1960s vintage desktop items that Blanc personally owned, including a Zenith transistor radio. Other items include, 'a small roulette wheel standee with a sticker on its base reading "MBA" (for Mel Blanc Associates), a sterling silver cigarette box, a ballpoint pen reading in part "Mel Blanc.' There is also, 'a vermeil key adorned with a St. Genesius medallion (patron saint of actors, clowns, comedians, and musicians), and a small blue jewelry box,' with the lot expected to fetch $300-$500. Radio: Another lot features a group of 1950s and 1960s vintage desktop items that Blanc personally owned, including a Zenith transistor radio A large collection of approximately 300 pages of handwritten notes will fetch between $1,000 and $2,000. 'Ranging in date from the 1960s to the 1980s, Blanc writes bits of dialogue for cartoon characters, jokes, gags, story ideas, statistics, addresses, trivia, lists, raunchy thoughts, and the like -- an amazing look into the brain of this genius!' according to the description. Also up for auction is an original caricature of Blanc by artist Basil Wolverton, which is rather brittle but still expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000. Collection: A large collection of approximately 300 pages of handwritten notes will fetch between $1,000 and $2,000 Caricature: Also up for auction is an original caricature of Blanc by artist Basil Wolverton, which is rather brittle but still expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,00 A collection of Blanc's ledgers and other eras that span from the 1950s to the 1970s is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000. Another piece of artwork is, 'a large colored felt-tip ink on paper drawing depicting Mel Blanc surrounded by the dozens of cartoon characters he voiced over the decades with the title "That's Not All Folks!" by Paul Madden in 1988." The artwork is, inscribed "To: Mel Blanc/ On the occasion of his 80th Birthday,' and is expected to sell for between $500 and $800. Ledgers: A collection of Blanc's ledgers and other eras that span from the 1950s to the 1970s is expected to fetch between $1,000 and $2,000 Art: Another piece of artwork is, 'a large colored felt-tip ink on paper drawing depicting Mel Blanc surrounded by the dozens of cartoon characters he voiced over the decades with the title "That's Not All Folks!" by Paul Madden in 1988 Birthday: The artwork is, inscribed "To: Mel Blanc/ On the occasion of his 80th Birthday,' and is expected to sell for between $500 and $800 Another more expensive item is a 14K gold money clip that Blanc received from Jack Benny, which is said to sell between $2,000 and $3,000. Another gold item up for sale is Blanc's personalized 14K yellow gold Dunhill cigarette lighter with his name engraved, said to sell for between $1,000 and $2,000. An animation cel from The Flintstones, featuring the character he voiced, Barney Rubble, is expected to fetch $300 to $500. Lighter: Another gold item up for sale is Blanc's personalized 14K yellow gold Dunhill cigarette lighter with his name engraved, said to sell for between $1,000 and $2,000. Animation: An animation cel from The Flintstones, featuring the character he voiced, Barney Rubble, is expected to fetch $300 to $500 A collection of jokes entitled 'Jooish,' featuring, 'dozens of mimeographed pages of gags, stories, and jokes about being Jewish,' is said to sell for $300 to $500. The voice artist's 1972 California driver's licence, featuring his Pacific Palisades address, will fetch $400 to $600. His custom bomber jacket featuring Bugs Bunny's catch phrase, 'What's up Doc?' is likely to go for between $600 and $800. Jokes: A collection of jokes entitled 'Jooish,' featuring, 'dozens of mimeographed pages of gags, stories, and jokes about being Jewish,' is said to sell for $300 to $500. License: The voice artist's 1972 California driver's licence, featuring his Pacific Palisades address, will fetch $400 to $600 Bomber: His custom bomber jacket featuring Bugs Bunny's catch phrase, 'What's up Doc?' is likely to go for between $600 and $800 A set of two original print black and white photographs of Mel Blanc in 1961 dressed up as the most famous cartoon character he voiced, Bugs Bunny, will fetch $100 and $200. Other items include a 1970 contract for a Jack Benny special ($400-$600), a signed color photograph with Blanc and President Ronald Reagan ($400-$600) and custom Cartier eyeglasses ($500-$700). The auction will take place December 3. Set: A set of two original print black and white photographs of Mel Blanc in 1961 dressed up as the most famous cartoon character he voiced, Bugs Bunny, will fetch $100 and $200. Contract: Other items include a 1970 contract for a Jack Benny special ($400-$600) Photo: a signed color photograph with Blanc and President Ronald Reagan ($400-$600) Custom: custom Cartier eyeglasses ($500-$700) Academy: A group of nine membership cards from the AMPAS ranging in date from 1955 to 1981, all noting that Mel Blanc was a "Member in Good Standing." Blanc signed five either in blue ballpoint ink or black felt-tip ink on the lower margins ($1,000-$2,000) SAG: A group of 22 Screen Actors Guild cards spanning 40 years, from 1947 to 1987, with five signed in either blue or black ballpoint ink "Mel J. Blanc" ($1,000-$2,000) Australian actress Melissa George is a bona fide glamazon. But the 45-year-old debuted an entirely new look on Wednesday while on set of her TV series The Mosquito Coast. She appeared to be completely bald while having a wig fitted. Before and after: Melissa George showcased a new 'bald' look as she returned to work on The Mosquito Coast on Wednesday Her locks were secured under a wig cap as a hair and makeup team worked behind her. 'Wig fitting,' Melissa captioned the photo. Melissa will reprise her role as Margot Fox on The Mosquito Coast. Her character is the wife of protagonist Allie Fox, played by Justin Theroux. The Apple Original series follows an idealistic inventor who, disgusted with the corruption of the industrial world, uproots his family to Latin America. Star: Melissa will reprise her role as Margot Fox on The Mosquito Coast. Her character is the wife of Allie Fox, played by Justin Theroux The U.S. government then attempts to catch Allie, leaving him and his family on a dangerous quest to outrun the feds in Mexico. The role comes after Melissa revealed the devastating financial consequences of her acrimonious divorce from French businessman Jean David Blanc. The actress ended her five-year marriage to Jean David, 53, in September 2016, and has since been embroiled in a bitter dispute over the custody of their sons. 'I was left with nothing': Melissa revealed in June she was broke and unemployed after her bitter divorce and custody battle with ex-husband Jean David Blanc, 53. Pictured in 2013 Speaking to Stellar magazine in June, the star claimed she was left penniless after her marriage ended, forcing to sell her prized collection of jewels and clothing. 'I was left with nothing [after the separation and court battles]... So I said, "Okay, what do you have? I've got beautiful jewellery and designer clothes. And I just sold absolutely everything,"' the former Home and Away star said. 'I wouldn't take work because I didn't want to leave my babies. I mean, once you've lost it all, you really know what you need. Trust me,' the mother of two added. 'I just sold absolutely everything': Speaking to Stellar magazine in June, Melissa said she was forced to sell her prized collection of jewels and clothing to make ends meet Melissa confirmed she had no plans to move back to Australia, due to her ongoing custody dispute with Jean David. Melissa and Jean David met in 2011 at a BAFTA Awards after-party and began a relationship the following year. In early 2017, the pair were convicted of assaulting each other following an alleged domestic dispute in 2016. Her boys: Melissa has been embroiled in a bitter dispute over the custody of the sons she shares with Jean David, Raphael, six, and Solal, four (pictured) Jean David later said in a statement at the time: 'Regarding the supposed violence against Melissa George, I strongly contest it and have thus filed an appeal against the judgment, which is not final.' Melissa starred as Angel Parrish on Home and Away from 1993 to 1996, and made her Hollywood debut in 1998 film Dark City. She also featured in 2001's Mulholland Drive and 2005's Derailed. Machine Gun Kelly stepped out in Los Angeles on Tuesday afternoon. The 31-year-old rapper made a quick pitstop at an Erewhon Market, where he picked up a juice drink and a carton of water. The outing comes just days after he and Megan Fox returned from a romantic getaway to Greece, during which they were seen making their way around various locations. On his own: Machine Gun Kelly was seen picking up lunch at an Erewhon Market in Los Angeles on Tuesday afternoon Kelly donned a slim-fitting blue polo short featuring a white circular pattern throughout it. The hitmaker, born Colson Baker, also rocked a wide-legged pair of black-and-white pants and a dual-tone set of boots. The performer accessorized with numerous articles of jewelry and wore a stylish set of wide-framed sunglasses for the length of his outing. He also kept a set of wired earbuds with him as he enjoyed a bit of time to himself. Fashionable: Kelly donned a slim-fitting blue polo short that featured numerous circles across its construction during his outing Kelly and Fox were first spotted in Greece earlier this month, and they were spotted enjoying the Mediterranean climate as they stepped out together on numerous occasions. They were also seen making the most of each other's company while spending time at various restaurants and places of interest. The happy couple initially met while working on Randall Emmett's directorial debut, Midnight in the Switchgrass. Before she became involved with the rapper, the Transformers actress was married to Brian Austin Green, with whom she tied the knot in 2010. Vacation: Kelly and Fox were first spotted in Greece earlier this month, and they were spotted enjoying the Mediterranean climate as they stepped out together on numerous occasions; they are seen at the 2021 MTV Video Music Awards The couple welcomed three sons named Noah Shannon, Bodhi Ransom and Journey River over the length of their marriage. The two separated several times over the course of their relationship, and their divorce was made official last month. Kelly previously fathered a daughter named Casie with his former girlfriend, Emma Cannon. The hitmaker was also linked to model Sommer Ray and media personality Amber Rose, although he split from both. Collaborators: The happy couple initially met while working on Randall Emmett's directorial debut, Midnight in the Switchgrass; they are seen at the 2021 iHeartRadio Music Awards Fox and the rapper kept their relationship private at first, although the actress notably starred in the music video for his 2020 track Bloody Valentine. The two appeared to confirm their relationship last June when they were spotted sharing a kiss in public. The actress recently spoke about how she and Kelly share similar senses of dress during an interview with the New York Post, where she discussed how they had coordinated colors and themes at several red carpet events. Keeping it secret: Fox and the rapper kept their relationship private at first, although the actress notably starred in the music video for his 2020 track Bloody Valentine; they are seen in May 'We were just wanting to go together, kind ofthen people decided we were matching. It wasn't necessarily a planned thingThat's just how it flowed,' she said. Fox pointed out that she and her boyfriend were happy to dress in similar styles, as she would have liked to do so during her younger years. 'I haven't seen two grown adult people match their outfits this way. Maybe it's like something you think about [in] high school or middle school even,' she said. She added: 'There's a fun element that maybe people have been missing...we're not too serious.' Kanye West and Drake put their differences aside on Tuesday when Kanye posted a friendly photo of the two together to his Instagram account. Kanye, 44, and Drake, 35, were seen standing next to each other and looking relaxed while accompanied by the music executive James Prince outside of Drake's Toronto mansion on Monday. The apparent reconciliation came just over a week after the Jesus Walks rapper shared rare praise for the Canadian actor-turned-musician during his Drink Champs interview, even as he blasted him over threatening lyrics. Reunited and it feels so good! Kanye West revealed Tuesday that he and Drake had put aside their feud. He posted a photo of the rappers posing together outside of what appeared to be Drake's Toronto mansion on Monday; pictured with James Prince (L) Kanye and Drake were seen standing next to each other on stone steps leading up to a stone building's front entrance. The Donda rapper was dressed casually in a black hoodie with matching jeans and tall black rain boots, and he sported a badge on a lanyard around his neck. Drake had his hands in the pockets of his plaid jacket and wore dark jeans with white trainers, while Prince cocked a finger gun at the camera. Kanye, who has changed his legal name to Ye, cleared up any confusion about the meeting by simply captioning the photo with an emoji of a dove holding an olive branch in its beak. Making amends: Kanye cleared up any confusion about the meeting by simply captioning the photo with an emoji of a dove holding an olive branch in its beak Having a blast: Drake revealed that the former collaborators were spending time together in his hometown of Toronto in a subsequent video on his own Instagram account Drake revealed that the former collaborators were spending time together in his hometown of Toronto in a subsequent post to his own Instagram account. The newly reunited friends mugged for the camera and were bathed in purple light. Drake waved at the camera as Kanye began to bizarrely let out a buzzing, whining sound. Another video featured controversial comedian Dave Chappelle as he warmed up a crowd inside Drake's Toronto mansion. 'You have to admit to yourself, this s*** is impressive. I cannot believe I'm in a n***a's house,' he said, before praising Drake for how far he had come in the world. Letting loose: Drake waved at the camera as Kanye began to bizarrely let out a buzzing, whining sound 'N***a's ran from slavery to this place,' he said of the Canadian city. 'But tonight, we feel free.' Kanye also shared more of Chappelle's toast to the two rappers in his Instagram Stories. 'Make some noise for Kanye and Drake,' he said to cheers from the audience. 'And make some noise for our reconciliation,' he continued, adding, 'We got work to do.' Drake captioned his post, 'You have reached your destination,' and he tagged the photos to make clear that they were in Toronto. Star power: Another video featured controversial comedian Dave Chappelle as he warmed up a crowd inside Drake's Toronto mansion Still work to do: 'Make some noise for Kanye and Drake,' he said to cheers from the audience. 'And make some noise for our reconciliation,' he continued, adding, 'We got work to do' In Prince's post with the same photo Kanye originally shared, he suggested the once-estranged rappers might join each other on stage soon. 'What a beautiful night I had last night in Canada. Lets make history December 9 Free Larry Hoover Concert,' he wrote. Last week, Kanye invited Drake to perform at the benefit concert in an Instagram video featuring Prince. The Monster rapper has been advocating for the release of Hoover, a former gang leader who was convicted of murder in the 1970s and is currently serving a life sentence, and he previously made his case on a track on his recent Donda album. Open invitation: Last week, Kanye invited Drake to perform at the benefit concert in an Instagram video featuring James Prince Earlier this month, Kanye both continued his feud with Drake and suggested there was a possibility of a reconciliation during his appearance on Drink Champs. The pair have been in a war of words since 2009, when Kanye critiqued one of Drake's lyrics on the Young Money song Every Girl. In response, days later Drake said in an interview, 'Before I met him, I had the utmost respect for Kanye West. Id even go as far as to say hes the most influential person as far as a musician that Id ever had in my life.' Since then, the two have continued to exchange barbs via their music and interviews. Early on in his chat, Kanye shared some rare praise for the hitmaker, calling him a very important artist who added something to the algorithm.' He added: 'The style of rap that he was doing was more sophisticated than the style of rap that I grew up on,' noting that Drake's song had 'good melodies' and 'good music.' But after he was asked if he could 'smoke' Drake in a Verzuz battle, Kanye replied, 'Yeah, absolutely.' He went on: 'It already happened. He played one of my leaked songs and it was better than every other song this year,' he said of a track that featured Outkast's Andre 3000. Going strong: Earlier this month, Kanye both continued his feud with Drake and suggested there was a possibility of a reconciliation during his appearance on Drink Champs Kanye also denied leaking Drake's address. In August, he estranged husband of Kim Kardashian shared, then deleted, a map detailing the purported location of Drake's Toronto home, which appeared to be in response to Drake's jab at him on a collaboration with Trippie Redd, in which he referred to Kanye as 'burned out.' Explaining his post, Kanye said: 'No, he advertised it when he was building the house. Everyone knows it. It's like a place in Canada you go by. It's like a monument. 'You can find it. That's how I was able to find it. It's Googleable. It's on Google Maps.' He also complained that those close to him worried he was having an 'episode' whenever he referenced his feuds in his music. Mixed bag: He praised Drake's 'sophisticated' version of rap, even as he accused Drake of threatening him in his lyrics and wondered whether he had had an affair with Kim Kardashian; seen with Kenny Burns in 2015 He defended his reactions after believing that Drake threatened him on a track. 'A man threatening my life on a song and they wonder why you end up in the hospital,' he said, adding that Drake was 'driving me crazy' with his jabs in songs. He claimed that Drake said to him, 'I never f***ed Kim.' 'But you acted like you did,' Kanye continued. 'You've got bars, it's like, "Hidden Hills, give your wife the chills."' He said it was disrespectful and said he asked Drake if he ever 'DMed' Kim. Getting personal: Kanye and Drake's feud hit its nadir in 2018, when Kanye produced Pusha T's diss track The Story Of Adidon, in which Pusha revealed that Drake had a child with former adult actress Sophie Brussaux; Drake seen in 2019 in LA Although Kanye and Drake have had minor clashes throughout the years, their relationship took a significant blow after Kanye produced Pusha T's album Daytona in 2018. Pusha went after Drake with his song Infrared, which accused the Certified Love Boy rapper of using a ghostwriter. He followed it up with The Story Of Adidon, in which Pusha revealed to the world that Drake had fathered a child with former adult actress Sophie Brussaux. Kanye reportedly knew of Drake's child, so the former Degrassi star reportedly became convinced that he had shared the information with Pusha T, though Kanye has since denied revealing that Drake had a son. In a 2019 interview with Rap Radar, Drake claimed he had 'no desire to mend anything with' Kanye or Pusha, though he seems to have changed his tune with the Runaway rapper. Their feud continued until just months ago, as some fans speculated that one of the reasons Kanye repeatedly pushed back the release date of Donda was to steal some of Drake's thunder with the release of his album Certified Lover Boy. But fans may soon have a chance to hear the rap titans working together again if they're able to bury their feud for good. Chris Evans on Tuesday took to Instagram with a selfie alongside his Boxer mix rescue dog Dodger. The 40-year-old actor, sporting a beard and a white T-shirt, captioned the shot 'Twins?' The Captain America star, who has more than 13.3 million followers, garnered more than 2.7 million likes on the post. The latest: Chris Evans, 40, on Tuesday took to Instagram with a selfie alongside his Boxer mix rescue dog Dodger The Boston native has owned the canine for four-and-a-half years, as he adopted the dog amid production on his movie Gifted in April of 2017. Speaking to People that month, the A-list actor explained the circumstances unto which he came upon adopting Dodger. 'One of the last scenes we were filming was in a pound, a kennel,' Evans told the outlet. 'I foolishly walked in and I thought, "Are these actor dogs or are these real up for adoption dogs?" And sure enough they were, so I was walking up and down the aisles and saw this one dude and he didn't belong there.' The Knives Out star continued: 'I snagged him and he's such a good dog. They aged him at about one, he acts like a puppy, he's got the energy of a puppy, he's just such a sweetheart, he's such a good boy. He loves dogs, he loves kids, he's full of love.' Evans said that his time with the dog proved to be 'exhausting,' as 'playing with him is exercise' and 'hes up for anything.' The Boston native has owned the canine for four-and-a-half years, as he adopted the dog amid production on his movie Gifted in April of 2017. He was snapped in 2019 in San Francisco The actor relaxed with his pet earlier this month in a post on the social media site Evans said earlier this year that Dodger was a driving force behind his decision to join Instagram in May of 2020. He shared this pic of the dog last year The actor explained his love of dogs, calling them 'such great animals' and describing himself as 'a dog lunatic. 'I really cant say enough about dogs,' he said. 'He sleeps on my pillow, you wake up face-to-face.' Evans said that he 'keep a very clean dog' as he bathes Dodger 'twice a week.' He added, 'We get dirty! We run around, hes in the mud a lot, so yeah, I think its nice having a fresh clean dog.' Evans said on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon earlier this year that Dodger was a driving force behind his decision to join Instagram in May of 2020. 'I had too many good pictures of my dog,' he said. 'I was like, they're being wasted in my phone. I need to put these somewhere.' Nine presenter Charlotte Goodlet and her former AFL star husband Kieran Jack have celebrated their three-year wedding anniversary. The glamorous couple announced the milestone on Tuesday, each sharing their own heartfelt tribute on Instagram. Charlotte shared a photo of the twosome posing arm-in-arm in front of the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge, adding the caption: 'Three years married to you [Kieran]. 'Here's to many more': Nine presenter Charlotte Goodlet (right) and her AFL star husband Kieren Jack (left) celebrated their three-year wedding anniversary on Tuesday. Charlotte marked the occasion by sharing this photo of the couple posing in front of Sydney's Opera House and Harbour Bridge 'Here's to many more,' she wrote, adding a love-heart emoji. Meanwhile, former Sydney Swans player Kieran uploaded a photo of the couple posing behind protective face masks, while adding a tongue-in-cheek caption. '[Charlotte] hinks this is random. I think its cool. Marriage is about compromise. Happy 3 years,' he joked. 'Happy three years:' Former Sydney Swans player Kieran uploaded a photo of the couple posing behind protective face masks, while adding a tongue-in-cheek caption Big day: Kieren and Charlotte married in November 2018 at the picturesque Allview Escape in the New South Wales' Blue Mountains, having become engaged in October 2016 Charlotte and Kieran wed during a lavish Blue Mountains ceremony in November 2018. The pair exchanged vows at the picturesque Allview Escape in the New South Wales' Blue Mountains, having become engaged in October 2016. Unfortunately, Kieren's parents Garry and Donna Jack did not attend the nuptials. Feud: The athlete's parents, who have been estranged from the couple since 2016, nonetheless wished 'them both well' in a statement to the Daily Telegraph The athlete's parents, who have been estranged from the couple since 2016, nonetheless wished 'them both well' in a statement to the Daily Telegraph. 'It is unfortunate and disappointing that we were not in attendance of our son's wedding, but sadly none of the family made the invite list. Nonetheless, we wish them both well,' Kieren's parents Garry and Donna Jack told the paper. Garry, an NRL Balmain Tigers legend, and wife Donna, have been estranged from son Jack and his now-wife Charlotte, since 2016. Happier times: Kieren and his family made headlines after his mother Donna took to Twitter claiming she was banned from attending his milestone 200th AFL game in July 2016 Kieren and his family made headlines after his mother Donna took to Twitter claiming she was banned from attending his milestone 200th AFL game in July 2016. 'So sad ... you 200 AFL & you don't want us there, your parents. No appreciation for all the yrs helping you get there,' Donna wrote in a post that was later deleted. Reports also indicated that Jack's family disapproved of Charlotte. Julie Goodwin famously won reality TV cooking series MasterChef in 2009. And now 51-year old is set to return to screens in a different kind of show that will see her living below the poverty line. In the SBS documentary Could You Survive on the Breadline? Julie will join two other prominent Australians on a journey to see what it's like to live with financial disadvantage. A different kind of journey: MasterChef's Julie Goodwin (pictured) has revealed her 'profound' experience with poverty and scraping by in the new SBS documentary, Could You Survive on the Breadline? 'It was a pretty profound experience actually,' she told Yahoo Lifestyle. 'I sort of had preconceived ideas of what it might be like to live in emergency accommodation and I guess I had an idea of some of the stories I might hear, but I was really unprepared for what it was actually like.' Julie - along with NSW Greens MP Jenny Leong and journalist Caleb Bond - will meet, stay with and learn from a variety of Aussies living in poverty in the three-part series. Doing it tough: Julie - along with NSW Greens MP Jenny Leong and journalist Caleb Bond - will meet, stay with and learn from a variety of Aussies living in poverty in the three-part series At one point in the series, the MasterChef winner accompanied a woman living with her husband on food stamps. The famous cook had a pre-conceived idea of what poverty might be like as she had already grown up in a world where her family struggled to make ends meet. 'I experienced it firsthand, not in the same way as some of the people that I met, but certainly living paycheck to paycheck,' she said. Family past: 'I experienced it firsthand, not in the same way as some of the people that I met, but certainly living paycheck to paycheck,' she said Julie adds that she wasn't 'born with a silver spoon' and didn't come to the documentary with an 'ignorant point of view'. However, she also admits she still had 'much to learn' after her unique experience. Could You Survive on the Breadline? premieres Wednesday November 17 at 8.30pm on SBS and SBS On Demand Emma Watson set her time-turner back on Tuesday as she took a journey through the past with her costars from the Harry Potter film series. The 31-year-old actress posted a behind-the-scenes photo to Instagram that was taken with her costars Danielle Radcliffe, 32, and Rupert Grint, 33, from what appeared one of the early films in the series. The Little Women actress looked back on the films, which she called her 'home' and 'family' as she celebrated the 20th anniversary of Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone after the three leads were reported to be participating in an upcoming reunion special on HBO Max. Old friends: Emma Watson, 31, shared a cute throwback from one of the early Harry Potter films with her costars (LR) Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint on Tuesday, after a 20th anniversary reunion was announced Emma was pictured smiling in her photo while wearing a blue and violet crushed velvet shirt and standing next to her costars. Daniel skipped Harry's iconic glasses and and Rupert's casual sweatshirt was a far cry from the robes their characters wore throughout the films. In her lengthy caption, Emma wrote 'lucky' she was to have been involved with the series and how 'proud' she was of all her collaborators. 'Harry Potter was my home, my family, my world and Hermione (still is) my favorite fictional character of all time,' she wrote. 'I think a journalist once said it was irritating how many times during an interview I mentioned how lucky I was and started counting BUT I DAMN WELL KNEW!!! And still know.' She added that she was inspired by what her collaborators and costars had gone on to do since their Harry Potter days. Massive cast and crew: In her lengthy caption, Emma wrote 'lucky' she was to have been involved with the series and how 'proud' she was of all her collaborators, who were pictured in a second snap Proud: 'I am proud not just of what we as group contributed as actors to the franchise but also as the children that became young adults that walked that path,' she said; seen October 17 in London 'I am proud not just of what we as group contributed as actors to the franchise but also as the children that became young adults that walked that path,' she said. 'I look at my fellow cast members now and I am just so proud of who everyone has become as people. I am proud we were kind to each other that we supported one another and that we held up something meaningful. 'Thank you to the fans that have continued to show their support well after the last chapter closed,' Emma continued. The magic of the world wouldnt exist without you. Thank you for fighting to make it such an inclusive and loving place.' The Bling Ring star added a special shoutout for the 'crew who made these films all the time.' 'Thank you for all of your hard work too I know your contributions sometimes get overlooked.' The actress concluded her post by encouraging her 61.5 million followers to tune in to her upcoming reunion special. 'Happy 20th Anniversary Potterheads! We hope you enjoy the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts which will stream New Years day, Jan. 1 on HBO Max. Lots to look forward to,' she wrote. Back at it: 'Happy 20th Anniversary Potterheads! We hope you enjoy the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts which will stream New Years day, Jan. 1 on HBO Max. Lots to look forward to,' she wrote; still from Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix Emma also shared a second photo snapped during the production of a later film in the series showing most of the cast and crew outside the Hogwarts school. Earlier on Tuesday, it was announced that she would be joining Daniel and Rupert for the reunion special on HBO Max. The trio will also be joined by Chris Columbus, who directed the series' first two films, Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone and Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets. The reunion will likely mark the first time Emma, Daniel and Rupert have made a joint public appearance since the release of their film Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2 in July of 2011. The first Harry Potter film premiered 20 years ago on November 16, 2001, nearly a decade before the final film was released. According to HBO Max, which has all the Harry Potter films available to stream, the reunion will 'tell an enchanting making-of story through all-new, in-depth interviews and cast conversations.' Decades on: Casey Patterson, whose production company is producing the special gushed over the cast as she said: 'Theres magic in the air here with this incredible cast, as they all return home to the original sets of Hogwarts, where they began 20 years ago' The principal cast members will be joined by a bevy of talent, including Helena Bonham Carter, Ralph Fiennes, Tom Felton, Gary Oldman, Imelda Staunton, Bonnie Wright, Jason Isaacs, and many others. Casey Patterson, whose production company is producing the special gushed over the cast as she said: 'Theres magic in the air here with this incredible cast, as they all return home to the original sets of Hogwarts, where they began 20 years ago. 'The excitement is palpable as they prepare to take their fans on a very special and personal journey, through the making of these incredible films.' Of the upcoming special, President of Warner Bros. Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics Tom Ascheim said in the statement: 'It has been an incredible journey since the debut of the Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone film, and witnessing how it has evolved into this remarkable interconnected universe has been magical to say the least. 'This retrospective is a tribute to everyone whose lives were touched by this cultural phenomenon from the talented cast and crew who poured their heart and soul into this extraordinary film franchise to the passionate fans who continue to keep the Wizarding World spirit alive 20 years later.' Together again: Emma, Daniel and Rupert will be joined by much of the cast and director Chris Columbus. It's the first time the three actors have made a public appearance since 2011; seen in 2011 Flying high: There will be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren The special will later air on channels TBS and Cartoon Network in spring 2022 before the theatrical release of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. There will also be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren. The Harry Potter films amount to one of the top selling franchises of all-time, with the eight films having grossed $7.7 billion, while the first film has grossed over $1 billion alone over its lifetime. In May of this year, Emma shut down rumors that she had retired after she hadn't starred in any projects since 2019's acclaimed film Little Women. But last month, she suggested on Instagram that she had taken up behind-the-camera hobbies during her time in lockdown. 'Getting behind the camera and learning how it works is about the most empowering thing Ive learned in lockdown,' she captioned photos of herself with a camera. 'As a young woman, I always thought the most glamorous and exciting thing would be to be someones muse; and of course as women we are inspiring... but wow its something else to be able to tell your own story and other people's.' Christie Brinkley channeled her iconic role as Roxie Hart at the 25th anniversary of the Broadway musical Chicago at the Ambassador Theatre in Manhattan on Tuesday. The Michigan-born, Malibu-raised stunner easily defied her 67 years while wearing a bell-sleeved LBD with thigh-high kinky boots selected by stylist Jamie Frankel. Hairstylist Mitch Barry coiffed Christie's signature fringed blonde locks and make-up artist Sandy Linter brought out her natural beauty for the festivities. Triple threat: Eighties supermodel Christie Brinkley channeled her former character Roxie Hart at the 25th anniversary of the Broadway musical Chicago at the Ambassador Theatre in Manhattan on Tuesday 'Happy 25 years, Chicago! You don't look a day over 24,' Brinkley (born Hudson) exclaimed on the red carpet. It's been a decade since the Hamptons native was first cast as the aspiring vaudevillian and murderess at the same exact theater, and she 'absolutely loved every second of it.' 'I did my first run on Broadway and that was for four months,' Christie said in her Westlake Malibu Lifestyle cover story this month. 'After New York, they asked me to do London and I headlined the national tour. Right before Covid hit, I was able to go back and do it again. We played Las Vegas and returned to Broadway again.' Wow! The actress took on the role of the murderous vixen in the iconic musical in both the Broadway and West End shows in 2011 (pictured) Sexy after 60! The Michigan-born, Malibu-raised stunner easily defied her 67 years while wearing a bell-sleeved LBD with thigh-high kinky boots selected by stylist Jamie Frankel Evergreen: Hairstylist Mitch Barry coiffed Christie's signature fringed blonde locks and make-up artist Sandy Linter brought out her natural beauty for the festivities Brinkley (born Hudson) exclaimed on the red carpet: 'Happy 25 years, Chicago! You don't look a day over 24' Brinkley - who relies on cosmetic dermatologist Dr. Simon Ourian - was relieved she didn't let fear stop her from saying yes to 'this dream come true.' 'Believe me there were little voices trying to tell me I couldn't do it... to stay safe and take the easy path,' the Bellissima Prosecco owner reflected in a March 22 post. 'But thank goodness I didn't listen. Now I have stories to tell and cherished memories to last a lifetime! Oh and don't let age stop you either! You've got this!' 'I absolutely loved every second of it!' It's been a decade since the Hamptons native was first cast as the aspiring vaudevillian and murderess at the same exact theater Christie said in her Westlake Malibu Lifestyle cover story this month: 'I did my first run on Broadway and that was for four months. After New York, they asked me to do London and I headlined the national tour. Right before Covid hit, I was able to go back and do it again. We played Las Vegas and returned to Broadway again' 'Don't let age stop you': Brinkley - who relies on cosmetic dermatologist Dr. Simon Ourian - was relieved she didn't let fear stop her from saying yes to 'this dream come true' (pictured in 2019) Christie is looking forward to celebrating Thanksgiving with her three children from three different husbands - daughter Sailor, 23; daughter Alexa, 35; and son Jack, 23. 'Thanksgiving is very special. I decorate the table the day before and I cook a big meal for the whole family,' Brinkley told the mag. 'I love it when everybody is in the kitchen together. I make sure they stay there by serving caviar, smoked salmon, and lots of my family's favorite delicacies on an enticing platter.' Sailor Lee is from the SBLA Beauty brand ambassador's fourth marriage to architect Peter Cook, which ended in 2008 after 12 years. 'I love it when everybody is in the kitchen together!' The Bellissima Prosecco owner is looking forward to celebrating Thanksgiving with her three children from three different husbands - daughter Sailor, 23; daughter Alexa, 35; and son Jack, 23 (pictured July 3) Jack Paris is from Christie's third marriage to ex-husband real estate developer Richard Taubman, which ended in 1995 after less than a year. Alexa Ray is from Brinkley's nine-year marriage to five-time Grammy winner Billy Joel, which ended in 1994. The 25th anniversary ceremony reunited original castmembers - Bebe Neuwirth, James Naughton, and Joel Grey - from the 1996 Broadway revival, which was staged at the Richard Rodgers Theatre. Back onstage together! The 25th anniversary ceremony reunited original castmembers - (from L-R) Bebe Neuwirth, James Naughton, and Joel Grey - from the 1996 Broadway revival, which was staged at the Richard Rodgers Theatre Showtime! The 62-year-old actress won a Tony Award for her performance as Velma Kelly in Chicago and she wore a black silk top with velvet pants and motorcycle boots for the event 'Our original Mr. Cellophane!' The 89-year-old father of Jennifer Grey looked dapper in a black suit with a polka dot pocket square and sneakers Iconic: Joel portrayed Amos Hart in Chicago, but he won the Tony and Oscar for his performance onstage and on film as the Master of Ceremonies in Cabaret The 62-year-old actress won a Tony Award for her performance as Velma Kelly in Chicago and she wore a black silk top with velvet pants and motorcycle boots for the event. The 89-year-old father of Jennifer Grey looked dapper in a black suit with a polka dot pocket square and sneakers. Joel portrayed Amos Hart in Chicago, but he won the Tony and Oscar for his performance onstage and on film as the Master of Ceremonies in Cabaret. Who knew they were friends? Also celebrating all things Chicago were Girls5eva actor Andrew Rannells (L) and The Masked Singer panelist Nicole Scherzinger (R) PDA: The Grammy winner (L) and the Grammy nominee (R) - both 43 - affectionately embraced each other as Nicole puckered up her red pout for the photographers 'Hacha whoopie jazz!' Also excited to be there on Tuesday was Rupaul's Drag Race #12 alum Brita Filter, who gushed about sitting third row during the show Also celebrating all things Chicago were Girls5eva actor Andrew Rannells and The Masked Singer panelist Nicole Scherzinger. The Grammy winner and the Grammy nominee - both 43 - affectionately embraced each other as Nicole puckered up her red pout for the photographers. Also excited to be there on Tuesday was Rupaul's Drag Race #12 alum Brita Filter, who gushed about sitting third row during the show. Tom Holland made a surprise appearance at the Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer launch event in Los Angeles on Tuesday. The 25-year-old actor, who has been portraying the web slinging hero since 2016, could hardly contain his joy as he addressed a crowd of diehard Spider-Man fans. Holland looked sharp in a stylish brown and red plaid blazer and matching trousers. Surprise! Tom Holland made a surprise appearance at the Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer launch event in Los Angeles on Tuesday Layered under his jacket was a cream toned shirt with a large stripe across the front and along with collar. Tom had his brunette hair gelled in place and rocked a pair of brown spectacles. The English star was joined onstage by moderator Coy Jandreau, who picked on lucky fans to ask Tom a question about the forthcoming film. Fans have long wondered if Tobey Maguire and/or Andrew Garfield would have cameos in Spider-Man: No Way Home, which Holland refused to confirm or deny, according to Variety. Fanfare: The 25-year-old actor, who has been portraying the web slinging hero since 2016, could hardly contain his joy as he addressed a crowd of diehard Spider-Man fans Lookin' good! Holland looked sharp in a stylish brown and red plaid blazer and matching trousers He did, however, say that shooting the film was a 'true moment in cinematic history.' 'We were there on the day making it happen, and it was crazy and I would love to tell you,' Holland gushed, which sparked chatter among eager audience members. Though he is proud of the ambitiousness of the film, Tom admitted that he wasn't completely convinced Marvel could make it happen when it was first pitched to him. 'I was like, "That's never going to work. There's no way you're going to be able to get that done." And they did,' he recalled. Ready to talk: The English star was joined onstage by moderator Coy Jandreau, who picked on lucky fans to ask Tom a question about the forthcoming film Hush hush: Fans have long wondered if Tobey Maguire and/or Andrew Garfield would have cameos in Spider-Man: No Way Home, which Holland refused to confirm or deny, according to Variety Bold: Holland said shooting the film was a 'true moment in cinematic history' Keeping mostly mum on the film's plot, Holland did reveal during the Q&A thata '35-beat' fight scene between Spider-Man and one of the villains proved to be the hardest to shoot. 'You're going to see a style of fighting in this film that you've never seen in a Spider-Man movie before. They designed these fights to shock you guys, to really put you on your back foot.' Tom assumed the role of Spider-Man in 2016 following Andrew Garfield's two film stint as the superhero. Before Garfield, Tobey Maguire famously played the role. Difficult shoot: Keeping mostly mum on the film's plot, Holland did reveal during the Q&A thata '35-beat' fight scene between Spider-Man and one of the villains proved to be the hardest to shoot Skeptical: Though he is proud of the ambitiousness of the film, Tom admitted that he wasn't completely convinced Marvel could make it happen when it was first pitched to him Taking it all in: Tom seen watching the trailer with fans Holland would appear on screen for the first time as Spider-Man in Marvel's Captain America: Civil War. In 2017, Tom's very first Spider-Man centered film, titled Spider Man: Homecoming, premiered in theaters. The second feature, titled Spider-Man: Far from Home, premiered in 2019. Spider-Man: No Way Home is slated for a December 17 release. James Kennedy said he didn't want his fiance Raquel Leviss to get another nose job on Tuesday night's episode of Vanderpump Rules on Bravo. ' I don't want a fiancee with a botched nose,' James told Lala Kent at her house. ' 'There I f***ing said it. I'm not a f***ing a**hole these are the facts.' James, 29, went over to Lala's house to meet her newborn daughter Ocean and brought a small bunny and pair of tiny Uggs as presents. Lala asked him about what she missed at Charli Burnett's culinary party. James told her that Raquel was really wasted and fell asleep on the floor but she looked like a sleeping beauty. Being honset: James Kennedy said he didn't want his fiance Raquel Leviss to get another nose job on Tuesday night's episode of Vanderpump Rules on Bravo Lala asked him if it affected him because he didn't drink. James admitted that playing drinking games sober was really annoying. He said he ended up calling Raquel dumb and telling her that he didn't want her to get nose surgery again. James said in a confessional of the first night he met Raquel in 2016 that he didn't want to take her home because he knew how deep she was because or how kind she was. He said he did it because she looked like a six foot supermodel. Lala told him that James was wrong to weigh in on Raquel's decision. Lala said it was her face and that she needed to feel beautiful. New look: Raquel wanted to fix her nose after it got tweaked when James went in for a hard kiss 'I got this face without doing a single thing,' said James. 'Not all of us are that blessed,' said Lala. Across town Tom Schwarz, 38, and Tom Sandoval, 38, went over to Lisa Vanderpump's house to get her advice on their new bar. They told her that they hadn't been able to sell their business partner Greg on their business plan for their new bar and wanted to run it by her. Natural look: 'I got this face without doing a single thing,' said James to Lala Kent They read her their mission statement for their idea for their new bar Schwartz & Sandy and that it was going to be 'a funkadelic dive lounge where you check your worries at the door.' Sandoval did most of the talking about elaborate design ideas. Lisa, 61, said they needed to streamline their presentation. Ariana Madix, 36, went to Scheana Shay house to visit. Scheana's boyfriend Brock Davies, 30, was at the sewing machine making outfits for his new daughter Summer out of old clothes. Bar advice: Across town Tom Schwarz, 38, and Tom Sandoval, 38, went over to Lisa Vanderpump's house to get her advice on their new bar Dive lounge: They read her their mission statement for their idea for their new bar Schwartz & Sandy and that it was going to be 'a funkadelic dive lounge where you check your worries at the door' Scheana, 36, asked Ariana if she was considering surrogates for her frozen eggs. She suggested that they could both get surrogates at the same time. Ariana said she wasn't signing on to the baby boom just yet. Katie Maloney-Schwartz, 34, then texted them both and invited them both to a femme fatale cocktail party. James met his fiance Raquel, 26, at Stretch lab to discuss what happened at the party. She told him that she was upset by his comment about her nose job. 'I'm the one who is going to have to look at your face,' said James. 'I'm the one waking up next to you. ' Nose talk: 'I'm the one who is going to have to look at your face,' said James. 'I'm the one waking up next to you' James said in a confessional that he had seen these Beverly Hills moms that have gone overboard with plastic surgery. He said he didn't want his wife to look like that. James asked her what if he went and botched his nose and he said that she would end up leaving him eventually. 'Is that what you would do with me?' Raquel asked. Good question: 'Is that what you would do with me?' Raquel asked James said no but that he wouldn't be okay with it. He asked her to stop messing around with that. She told him that it was her body and that his number one job as a finance was to support her. He apologized and admitted that he shouldn't have said anything. Across town, Schwartz brought Katie to see their new bar. Sandoval was there to meet up with their investor Greg. Sandoval was not happy that Katie was there. Sandoval started to show Greg his design plan and what he had ordered for the bar. When he told him that he ordered lights that were $1,700 each, Greg was not happy. 'Are you serious,' said Greg. 'It's a waste of money.' Sandoval and Schwartz then shared with Greg their mission statement but he called it a 'word salad.' Katie stepped in and tried to offer suggestions and Greg liked her ideas. He told them that Katie was going to work with them on their mission statement. Great ideas: Katie stepped in and tried to offer suggestions and Greg liked her ideas 'I told you I was useful,' said Katie. Greg told him she could switch places with one of them. Sandoval did not look happy. Later the group gathered at Ariana and Sandoval's house for the Femme Fatale cocktail party. They danced and drank. Lala went over and grabbed Scheana and said she wanted to talk to her. Scheana said she thought they had moved on from any past issues but then she Lala became a 'mean girl f***ing b****.' Not happy: Sandoval was not happy that Schwartz's wife Katie had such a good meeting 'Very nice,' said Lala. She told Scheana that she had known her for a long time and had brought really shocking dudes around. She said she was only concerned for Scheana and her baby. Scheana said she needed to know from her that genuinely cared and that it was not an act. They agreed to move past it and hugged. Lala then went to talk to Brock but he didn't feel like she was giving a genuine apology. He said he didn't want to be involved with someone 'popping off.' He said she was condescending to people. She said she was like fine wine and then Brock told her that he was drinking scotch. The next day at Lisa Vanderpump's house Villa Rosa, Schwarz showed up looking for a serving platter tower. He told her that he had a weird few days. He said he was putting his work in front of his family. He told her his loan was still pending. He said that he was stressed that each day he was accruing more debt. British restaurateur: Lisa later dealt with a stressed out Schwartz Brock did a Barre class with Charlie and Scheana. He told Charlie about how Lala and Scheana made up. Brock said he didn't react well, but thought he needed to apologize to Lala for his reaction. At night everyone went to hang out together at the Belmont. Charlie told the women that they all had wikifeet profiles where their feet were rated. She suggested they sell foot pics to raise money for Raquel's nose. Brock decided to mend fences with Lala and apologized to her. The two hugged. She told him 'onward and upwards.' Brock said even invited her to his birthday party. Exercise session: Brock did a Barre class with Charlie and Scheana Sandoval interjected himself in their discussion and told Lala that all the confrontations were caused by her picking fights. Lala said 'are we really back on the hamster wheel.' Sandoval told her that he wanted her to stop picking fights with everyone. 'I want you to grow,' he said. 'She is the one lighting the fuse of this bomb and then playing the victim,' Sandoval said in a confessional. 'It's just getting really f***ing old.' Vanderpump Rules will return next Tuesday on Bravo. She's long been known as one of Hollywood's most glamorous stars. And Joan Collins once again cut a very stylish figure as she stepped out for dinner at their go-to restaurant, Craig's in West Hollywood alongside husband Percy Gibson, 56, on Tuesday. The actress, 88, wowed in a red and black floral dress which she teamed with an edgy black leather jacket. Fabulous: Joan Collins once again cut a very stylish figure as she stepped out for dinner at Craig's restaurant in West Hollywood alongside husband Percy Gibson, 56, on Tuesday The Dynasty star's chic dress featured a split at the front, which further showed off the knee-high suede boots she donned beneath. Joan carried her essentials for the night in a small black clutch bag, and rounded off her fabulous loom with Van Cleef jewellery and a sweep of bold red lipstick. Meanwhile, Percy dressed up for the occasion in a black suit paired with a crisp white shirt. The couple appeared in great spirits as they flashed broad smiles while leaving the celebrity hotspot. Looking good: The actress, 88, wowed in a red and black floral dress which she teamed with an edgy black leather jacket The actress married producer, Percy almost two decades ago in 2002 but Joan has recently credited the coronavirus lockdown for bringing them closer than ever. The couple, who have a 31-year age gap, spend most of their time in St. Tropez, but also split their time between Los Angeles and England. Elsewhere, during an appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show last month, Dame Joan branded William Shatner 'a fool' while criticising his trip to space. Actor William, 90, made history in October when he became the oldest man to meet space after rocketing up into the atmosphere in one of Amazon mogul Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin vessels. Stepping out in style: The Dynasty star's chic dress featured a split at the front, which further showed off the knee-high suede boots she donned beneath Dame Joan was seemingly unamused by William's mission as she told Jonathan: 'Let's take care of this planet first before we start going off.' The performer, who appeared on alongside Succession star Brian Cox, 75, comedian Rob Beckett, 35, and television presenter Alex Scott, 37, added: 'Who wants to do that? No, absolutely not! Did you see Bill Shatner? He was in the air and they were turning him upside down.' Echoing Dame Joan's sentiment, Brian said after being asked whether he would venture into space: 'No, absolutely not. I think it's ridiculous.' The actor continued: 'I remember watching [Sir Richard] Branson and [Jeff] Bezos going up for their 11 minutes or whatever No, we do not need more spaceships, we've got enough c**p flying around up there, we do not need any more.' Alice Evans has claimed that her estranged husband Ioan Gruffudd's girlfriend Bianca Wallace 'ruined her life' in another scathing post. Hitting back at trolls claiming they're defending the actress, the star took to Instagram to share a playful snap, along with a caption claiming Bianca was 'a b***h who manifested Ioan away from their daughters.' Ioan recently went public with his new girlfriend Bianca, after Alice claimed the pair had been embroiled in a three-year affair - which has been denied by a friend of the couple. Raging: Alice Evans has claimed that her estranged husband Ioan Gruffudd's girlfriend Bianca Wallace 'ruined her life' in another scathing post Posting a selfie of her filtered complexion, Alice furiously branded Bianca the 'stealer of her husband,' before claiming she 'made her child cry.' The actress furiously hit back at trolls who attempted to defend Bianca's behaviour, claiming she 'manifested' Ioan against their two daughters. Her caption read: 'Hey Bianca Mae Wallace, stealer of my husband, ruined of the life I'd worked so hard to achieve and also person who makes my kid cry -aperson I will never forget ever. 'Anyway somebody alerted me tonight that whenever I posted a relatively cute pic of myself on ivstagram, within about 19 minutes emergered a sock account pretending to be on ''Bianca's side.'' Furious: Hitting back at trolls claiming they're defending the actress, the star claimed Bianca was 'a b***h manifested Ioan away from their daughters New love: Ioan recently went public with his new girlfriend Bianca, after Alice claiming the pair had been embroiled in a three-year affair - which has been denied by a friend of the couple 'Although how one could be on the side side if a total b***h who manifested a father away from two lyrics girls who ducking ADORED him then I do not know, except to say that this person is completely devoid of human empathy. 'Good luck, Ioan. And oh, let's see what this pic brings out. I was tempted to out a picture of Bianca next to one of mine ( after all the 'youre 50! Give up! You're so fat!). 'But I didn't. Because that's not my way. How do you like THIS one, BB?' Grateful: Earlier that evening, Alice had taken to social media to thank her followers for their support Open: She penned a caption praising her 'angel' followers for 'giving her strength' in the wake of her split from Ioan Earlier that evening, Alice had taken to social media to thank her followers for their support, writing: 'Night folks. Another tough day. But slowly getting there. 'You are my Angels. Thank you for giving me the strength to do what I am doing.. which gets me through! Love you all.' Since publicly sharing that she and Ioan had split in January, Alice has shared many blistering tweets taking aim at his new girlfriend Bianca. Fury: Earlier this month Alice branded estranged husband Ioan's new girlfriend Bianca a 'creepy mistress' in a blistering series of tweets Sharing a snap of Bianca posted on September 12, Alice wrote: 'How to be a good Mistress, Part One: 1) Don't send out silly face-tuned Instagrams like this when you're semi-naked and horse-teethed telling people 'I'm just going to miss the dog' BULL. S**T. You're going to sleep with my husband. Another fan highlighted Ioan and Bianca's relationship confirmation on Instagram, writing: 'All they had to do was not post a photo bragging about it. So simple. Common effing sense.' Alice responded: 'It's the fatal flaw. It shows that she just couldn't wait. (patience is the only real virtue my husband had and he has it in spades) But By God she must be good. To convince him to post a life-wrecking simple post like that. Just for her.' Alice also reposted a now-deleted tweet which showed Bianca had liked a family photo of Ioan and Alice with their children back in 2019. New romance: Evans, 53, confirmed her separation from the Welsh star, 48, in a series of furious tweets posted on Twitter in January, and last month Ioan confirmed his new romance with Bianca, 29 (pictured) She wrote: 'Creepy. Bianca Wallace spent many months liking pics of our little family before stepping in and seducing the father.' On Monday, Alice spoke of her heartbreak at the end of her 20 year relationship with Ioan, writing: 'The only question remaining in my mind is 'why?' Why spend 2, maybe 3 years pretending? 'Was there not a moment where you felt it was on you to take a stance and stick to it? Were you together when we went to Moscow? (PLEASE SAY NO 'What about our trip to France? (oh god).' 'The trouble is; if you trust somebody THAT much (When everyone else has passed or lives far away) If that person convinces you, by their every day behavior, by the ticket, the notes of his love, the grandiose exclamations of love that you WILL be together for eternity - If that Post: Sharing a snap of Bianca posted on September 12, Alice wrote: 'How to be a good Mistress, Part One' Oh no: Alice also reposted a now-deleted tweet which showed Bianca had liked a family photo of Ioan and Alice with their children back in 2019 'Can't sleep. I used to think I would die for him. What was wrong with me? I just had total confidence that in this world, He was the one person I could absolutely count on My rock. My honey. My best friend.' MailOnline has contacted representatives for Ioan Gruffudd and Bianca Wallace for comment. This comes after Alice said she considered harming herself after husband Ioan abruptly ended their 14-year marriage, and admits she has a 'very long and messy divorce' ahead of her. The actress is now adjusting to life without Gruffudd after he publicly confirmed a new relationship with co-star Bianca Wallace on Instagram, a move she described as 'every woman's nightmare.' On her side: One fan commented on Ioan's decision to publicly announce his new romance Heartbreak: Alice called Ioan her 'rock, honey and best friend' in a tweet onMonday Questions: Alice has claimed that Ioan and Alice had a three year affair Thinly veiled dig: Alice changed her Twitter bio in the wake of her latest string of tweets Appearing remotely on Thursday's edition of Lorraine, Evans admitted she feared the worst when he returned to the family home in Los Angeles after filming his new show Harrow in Australia. She said: 'He came back, hugged the kids, he very dryly gave me a kiss on the cheek and that was when I knew something was wrong. 'We'd been together 20 years. I was one of those very complacent - what's the Bridget Jones phrase? Smug married. And I think these are things like, just with other things, one can go through like loss of a parent or infertility, you don't know what it's like until it happens to you. 'I thought it was never going to happen to me. He told me within the first few days - I just don't love you anymore. 'And look, I'm not questioning his right to feel that - I'm not bashing him - but it was so out of the blue and then for about four months we just continued here and he just kept saying, 'I'm sorry, I don't feel the same way for you anymore. I might leave, I might not leave.' Family: The former couple share two daughters - Ella, 12 and Elsie, eight Devastated: This comes after Alice said she considered harming herself after husband Ioan abruptly ended their 14-year marriage, and admits she has a 'very long and messy divorce' ahead of her She added: 'And I eventually got to the point where I'd been on my own for the whole pandemic with my two kids. I've looked after them for ten years when he's mostly filmed for those ten years, outside of Los Angeles. So I was here and he was here but he wouldn't talk to me, wouldn't look at me, and went to sleep in the spare room. 'Eventually, I thought I might do myself harm. 'I spoke to my friends and they kept saying, 'This is not like him, this just doesn't sound right'. I think I bored [them] and my friends just didn't know what to say to me, and at one point I just thought, 'I am going to lose my mind'. 'And I just tweeted, 'He's leaving us' And then all hell broke loose' Emotional: Evans broke down as she shared her mental anguish during a remote appearance on Thursday's edition of Lorraine Evans has divided followers since going public with the split, but she insists she has no regrets in her willingness to share personal details regarding the nature of her relationship with Gruffudd, including their sex life, as she comes to terms with the collapse of their marriage. She said: 'His reaction wasn't good. Initially, I think no one had ever really done this before and I would say the reaction was about 50:50. 'You know, there were a lot of people who were angry with me and almost didn't believe me, which is kind of weird when you think about it because it's a pretty strange thing to make up if I'm suddenly going to be 20 years with someone and then make up some idea that he's left me, he's leaving us, when he hadn't. 'A lot of people were shocked and there was so much talk of a dignified silence. And I'm going to do this [makes quotation marks with her fingers], because I don't know how you can describe a dignified silence when I'm talking about my entire life falling to pieces around me.' She added: 'I think people use that phrase a lot but as time went on, because I did stop tweeting - because I was told legally not to - and then I went back to it. 'It's sort of, kind of a messy story, but I think as people understood what had happened, I would say support is now about 80 or 90 [per cent] in favour of me. Not in favour of me against him, but in favour of me speaking out and understanding why I'm doing it.' Happier times: Evans and Gruffudd embrace on their wedding day in Mexico on September 14 2007 Opening up: Evans admitted she feared the worst when he returned to the family home in Los Angeles after filming his new show Harrow in Australia Gruffudd announced his new relationship with Wallace in October, and Evans says she has had no contact from her estranged husband since then. She said: 'He'll only talk to me through lawyers. If he's talking to the children on face time, he'll move away and call the lawyers. I don't know why.' She is also adamant that her husband's relationship with Wallace, his Harrow co-star, began long before the very public collapse of their marriage. Moving on: Gruffudd announced his new relationship with Bianca in October, and Evans says she has had no contact from her estranged husband since then New romance: Wallace, pictured here in an undated Instagram post, worked with Gruffudd on location in Australia Starring role: Gruffudd in a still from Harrow. Evans claims it was during a break from the show that he ended their marriage 'It's very bizarre because as a lot of people know, he insisted, I think I'm OK to say this, he insisted until two weeks ago that there was nobody else,' she added. 'My phone pinged and said he has unblocked you on Instagram. I thought maybe he wants to talk. It was announced by him and his mistress that they were a couple on Instagram two weeks ago. I looked at the picture and it said something like finally someone who can make me happy. 'People from his set in Australia were saying so glad you guys are finally out and you're happy. I was slayed. This is my husband. 'I think I was owed more than an Instagram after 20 years of marriage and two children. I feel like a bit of an idiot as well. I'm pretty sure this has been going on for quite a while. It's not somebody he's just met now.' Horrified: 'People from his set in Australia were saying so glad you guys are finally out and you're happy. I was slayed. This is my husband,' said Evans Speaking out: Alice has been vocal about the divorce on social media and hit back at those criticising her for speaking out so publicly about the split Evans currently remains at the family home in Los Angeles with their two daughters, Ella, 12, and Elsie, eight, but admits she might be forced to move as a consequence of her ongoing divorce from their father. She said: 'I don't know because we have a very messy and long divorce ahead of us. Divorce lawyers in America are terrifying people. 'I don't know if I'm going to be able to stay here in the house. Initially o teas going to be an amicable divorce but it's gotten quite nasty now and I don't know why.' Thanking Lorraine for allowing her the opportunity to talk about the split, she said: '[It's been] very tough, but I just wanted to say thank you for having me on and letting me speak a little bit about what's being going on which is pretty much every woman's nightmare.' Proud mother: Evans currently remains at the family home in Los Angeles with their two daughters, Ella, 12, and Elsie, eight, but admits she might be forced to move as a consequence of her ongoing divorce Evans previously claimed she was was 'heartbroken' and felt 'dead' after Ioan went Instagram official with Bianca, prompting her to accuse him of having a three-year romance. Last month a friend and co-worker of Ioan denied his estranged wife's claims that he had a three-year affair with his now-girlfriend Bianca. In a series of tweets, wardrobe assistant Amy Douglas, who worked with Ioan and Bianca on the Australian series Harrow, accused Alice, 50, herself of being 'abusive,' and insisted they didn't begin speaking until filming for series three began in 2020. Amy, who said Ioan and Bianca gave her permission to speak out, defended her pals after Alice accused her estranged husband of cheating on her for three years with the Australian actress, who is 21 years her junior, telling fans she was 'lost, sad and confused.' In her first tweet, Amy responded to a fans' claim that Ioan and Bianca's romance began while they were filming Harrow, clarifying that the actress was simply an extra and the pair didn't begin speaking until season three, which was recorded in 2020. She wrote: '[Bianca was] an extra and didn't have contact with him in season two, I know because I was there as crew. Season three yes, but they only started talking towards the end.' She added: 'I am also her friend and I KNOW they didn't, as I said they didn't even speak to each other until the end of season three. Don't buy into the lies you are being fed.' All over: Gruffudd filed for divorce in March, citing irreconcilable differences as the reason behind their split Amy continued: 'Being her friend I KNOW it didn't happen. I know her as a person and her principals. You do not. So don't believe everything you're fed by manipulating people who try to make themselves the victim and ruin other people's reputations.' The fashion designer then claimed that Alice threatened to divorce Ioan during the final week of filming for Harrow in 2020, and said she was aware how 'upset' he became. Responding to another user she said: 'Your point? I saw what Alice was doing to Ioan in the last week of filming, threatening a divorce if he didn't go home. I saw how upset he was on set. And Bianca was barely even on set for season three. I know, you do not. 'She is not a home-wrecker! Who do you actually personally know here in this situation. Obviously no one. And I'm very perceptive, it didn't show on set, he is a very professional person. I saw how upset he was on the phone being abused by her.' Bombshell: Bianca grew up in Queensland before moving to Brisbane to pursue an acting career Amy added that both Ioan and Bianca had given their permission for her to speak out, and clarified that their early relationship on the Harrow set was strictly professional. Gruffudd filed for divorce in March, citing irreconcilable differences as the reason behind their split. The document, which was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on March 1, revealed the former couple separated on New Year's Day - a month before they went public with their relationship status. At the time, they had shared a joint statement that read: 'As you can imagine, this is an incredibly difficult time for our family and we remain committed to our children. Thank you for respecting our privacy.' It was also reported the divorce papers state the exes are in a 'collaborative process and intend to resolve all issues including spousal support by written agreement'. Family: The family are pictured in happier times Evans, meanwhile, had addressed the pair's split in a shock statement shared to Twitter in January in which she claimed Gruffudd had 'mentally tortured' her. The mother-of-two also accused her estranged husband of 'winding the s**t up me' as she posted a vitriolic video about their 'collaborative divorce' talks. Evans and Gruffudd met on the set of 102 Dalmatians in 2000, when Alice was in a relationship with Pablo Picasso's grandson Olivier. The former couple became engaged six years later after she gave him an ultimatum about their relationship, and they tied the knot in an intimate ceremony in Mexico in September 2007. Gruffudd hasn't publicly addressed the couple's divorce. Daniel Radcliffe has hailed the Harry Potter franchise for being 'fantastic' when people are hungover. The 32-year-old actor, who was partial to the butterscotch, sugar and water concoction Butterbeer in the fantasy films, praised the series' ability to transport people to a 'place of warmth and comfort.' Speaking to a BBC documentary marking 20 years since the debut film, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, the lead star said: 'The time in most people's lives when they discovered it meant that it has an incredibly important place in a lot people's childhoods, and they still feel very protective over it. Cure: Daniel Radcliffe has hailed the Harry Potter franchise for being 'fantastic' when people are hungover (pictured in 2020) 'One of my favourite fates that we could never have ever imagined for the Harry Potter films, but that I have been told by several friends, is that they are fantastic when people are hungover and feeling really c****y about themselves. 'They will just watch back-to-back a few movies and it takes them to a place of warmth and comfort. 'That is so lovely to me. That is the real-world effect that a film can have on someone's life. I think that is great.' Star: The 32-year-old actor praised the series' ability to transport people to a 'place of warmth and comfort' (pictured above in Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, 2004) Daniel also credited the series' world-famous author J.K. Rowling, 56, branding her 'immensely intelligent.' He said: 'It would be very difficult for anything to happen in the Harry Potter world without her involvement really, and it feel like the same world. She cares about the people she writes and the people she writes for. 'And it is lovely that she has chosen to expand the world in so many different ways because there is such a hunger for that. 'She is an immensely intelligent, funny, kind human being and I think that obviously comes across in her writing.' Talent: Daniel also credited the series' world-famous author J.K. Rowling (pictured, 2019) branding her 'immensely intelligent' On Tuesday, Emma Watson set her time-turner back as she took a journey through the past with with her co-stars from the Harry Potter film series. The 31-year-old actress posted a behind-the-scenes photo to Instagram that was taken with Daniel, as well as Rupert Grint, 33, from what appeared one of the early films in the series. The Little Women actress looked back on the films, which she called her 'home' and 'family' as she celebrated the 20th anniversary of Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone after the three leads were reported to be participating in an upcoming reunion special on HBO Max. Old friends: On Tuesday, Emma Watson set her time-turner back as she took a journey through the past with with her co-stars from the Harry Potter film series (Rupert Grint pictured R) Emma was pictured smiling in her photo while wearing a blue and violet crushed velvet shirt and standing next to her costars. Daniel skipped Harry's iconic glasses and and Rupert's casual sweatshirt was a far cry from the robes their characters wore throughout the films. In her lengthy caption, Emma wrote 'lucky' she was to have been involved with the series and how 'proud' she was of all her collaborators. 'Harry Potter was my home, my family, my world and Hermione (still is) my favorite fictional character of all time,' she wrote. 'I think a journalist once said it was irritating how many times during an interview I mentioned how lucky I was and started counting BUT I DAMN WELL KNEW!!! And still know.' She added that she was inspired by what her collaborators and costars had gone on to do since their Harry Potter days. Massive cast and crew: In her lengthy caption, Emma wrote 'lucky' she was to have been involved with the series and how 'proud' she was of all her collaborators, who were pictured in a second snap Proud: 'I am proud not just of what we as group contributed as actors to the franchise but also as the children that became young adults that walked that path,' she said; seen October 17 in London 'I am proud not just of what we as group contributed as actors to the franchise but also as the children that became young adults that walked that path,' she said. 'I look at my fellow cast members now and I am just so proud of who everyone has become as people. I am proud we were kind to each other that we supported one another and that we held up something meaningful. 'Thank you to the fans that have continued to show their support well after the last chapter closed,' Emma continued. The magic of the world wouldn't exist without you. Thank you for fighting to make it such an inclusive and loving place.' The Bling Ring star added a special shoutout for the 'crew who made these films all the time.' 'Thank you for all of your hard work too I know your contributions sometimes get overlooked.' The actress concluded her post by encouraging her 61.5 million followers to tune in to her upcoming reunion special. 'Happy 20th Anniversary Potterheads! We hope you enjoy the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts which will stream New Year's day, Jan. 1 on HBO Max. Lots to look forward to,' she wrote. Back at it: 'Happy 20th Anniversary Potterheads! We hope you enjoy the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts which will stream New Year's day, Jan. 1 on HBO Max. Lots to look forward to,' she wrote; still from Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix Emma also shared a second photo snapped during the production of a later film in the series showing most of the cast and crew outside the Hogwarts school. Earlier on Tuesday, it was announced that she would be joining Daniel and Rupert for the reunion special on HBO Max. The trio will also be joined by Chris Columbus, who directed the series' first two films, Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone and Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets. The reunion will likely mark the first time Emma, Daniel and Rupert have made a joint public appearance since the release of their film Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2 in July of 2011. The first Harry Potter film premiered 20 years ago on November 16, 2001, nearly a decade before the final film was released. According to HBO Max, which has all the Harry Potter films available to stream, the reunion will 'tell an enchanting making-of story through all-new, in-depth interviews and cast conversations.' Decades on: Casey Patterson, whose production company is producing the special gushed over the cast as she said: 'There's magic in the air here with this incredible cast, as they all return home to the original sets of Hogwarts, where they began 20 years ago' The principal cast members will be joined by a bevy of talent, including Helena Bonham Carter, Ralph Fiennes, Tom Felton, Gary Oldman, Imelda Staunton, Bonnie Wright, Jason Isaacs, and many others. Casey Patterson, whose production company is producing the special gushed over the cast as she said: 'There's magic in the air here with this incredible cast, as they all return home to the original sets of Hogwarts, where they began 20 years ago. 'The excitement is palpable as they prepare to take their fans on a very special and personal journey, through the making of these incredible films.' Of the upcoming special, President of Warner Bros. Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics Tom Ascheim said in the statement: 'It has been an incredible journey since the debut of the 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' film, and witnessing how it has evolved into this remarkable interconnected universe has been magical to say the least. 'This retrospective is a tribute to everyone whose lives were touched by this cultural phenomenon from the talented cast and crew who poured their heart and soul into this extraordinary film franchise to the passionate fans who continue to keep the Wizarding World spirit alive 20 years later.' Together again: Emma, Daniel and Rupert will be joined by much of the cast and director Chris Columbus. It's the first time the three actors have made a public appearance since 2011; seen in 2011 Flying high: There will be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren The special will later air on channels TBS and Cartoon Network in spring 2022 before the theatrical release of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. There will also be a first look of the special during the premiere of quiz competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses which airs Sunday, November 28 on TBS and Cartoon Network and is hosted by Helen Mirren. The Harry Potter films amount to one of the top selling franchises of all-time, with the eight films having grossed $7.7 billion, while the first film has grossed over $1 billion alone over its lifetime. In May of this year, Emma shut down rumors that she had retired after she hadn't starred in any projects since 2019's acclaimed film Little Women. But last month, she suggested on Instagram that she had taken up behind-the-camera hobbies during her time in lockdown. 'Getting behind the camera and learning how it works is about the most empowering thing I've learned in lockdown,' she captioned photos of herself with a camera. 'As a young woman, I always thought the most glamorous and exciting thing would be to be someone's 'muse'; and of course as women we are inspiring... but wow it's something else to be able to tell your own story and other people's.' Tiger King 2 debuted on Netflix on Wednesday - with the hotly anticipated sequel chronicling Joe Exotic's fight for freedom after being convicted in the murder-for-hire plot of rival Carole Baskin. 2020 Netflix smash hit Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness, told the story of zoo owner Joe as he spiralled out of control amid a cast of eccentric characters in the true murder-for-hire story from the underworld of big cat breeding. In 2019, Joe, 58, was convicted on 17 federal charges of animal abuse and two counts of attempted murder for hire in his plot to kill nemesis and Big Cat Rescue owner, Carole Baskin, 60 - and sentenced to 22 years in prison. The explosive five-part second season sees the former G.W. Zoo owner fighting for release via a presidential pardon and would-be hitman Allen Glover claiming that his target was not in-fact Carole, but Joe himself. Return: Tiger King 2 debuted on Netflix on Wednesday - with the hotly anticipated sequel chronicling Joe Exotic's fight for freedom after being convicted in the murder-for-hire plot of rival Carole Baskin Co-director Rebecca Chaiklin, who returns alongside Eric Goode for the new series, even voices her belief that there has 'potentially been a miscarriage of justice' in Joe's murder-for-hire conviction. The series also explores the much-debated fate of Big Cat Rescue owner Carole's previous husband Don Lewis, who mysteriously vanished without a trace in 1997 and was declared dead in 2002 - with claims arising he could still be alive in Costa Rica. In Tiger King, Carole was blamed for Don's disappearance and accused of 'feeding him to the tigers' by her rival Joe -claims she has fiercely denied. Arch nemesis: In 2019, Joe, 58, was convicted on 17 federal charges of animal abuse and two counts of attempted murder for hire in his plot to kill nemesis and Big Cat Rescue owner, Carole Baskin, 60- and sentenced to 22 years in prison Without a trace: The series also explores the much-debated fate of Big Cat Rescue owner Carole's previous husband Don Lewis, who mysteriously vanished without a trace in 1997 and was declared dead in 2002 Joe was sent to prison after paying hitman Allen Glover 2,000 to decapitate Carole - but Glover double crossed him and went to the police. Now, Glover says the plot was to decapitate Joe using barbed wire, admitting 'I was going to kill Joe' - and that he was working with Joe's rival and the man who bought G.W. Zoo, Jeff Lowe. Joe said: 'They were going to kill me because Jeff was on my life insurance. They actually even set a trap to decapitate me. 'They strung a piece of barbed wire across from tree to tree. They were hoping I'd be riding a four-wheeler fast enough that I'd hit that wire.' Glover reveals the plot in a sworn affidavit on camera, saying: 'We came up with a plan to decapitate Joe's head to kill him to clear him away from the property so Jeff could take it over, animals and everything. This don't make me look good at all.' Netflix hit: 2020 Netflix smash hit Tiger King: Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness, told the story of zoo owner Joe as he spiralled out of control amid a cast of eccentric character There he is: Joe was sent to prison after paying hitman Allen Glover 2,000 to decapitate Carole - but Glover double crossed him and went to the police Tiger King 2 also claims that Glover and Lowe were co-conspirators in getting Exotic convicted on the murder-for-hire plot. The documentary states that Jeff declined to comment on the allegations. Lowe took over the park after Exotic was sent to prison, but it closed permanently to the public last August after its federal animal exhibition license was suspended. Baskin then won control of the zoo in 2020 when a judge ruled she would be allowed to take over the property. This summer she sold it. Joe said: 'Everybody from the zoo is out there making money from Joe Exotic. 'I'm paying the price for every one of them people. Catfight: Now, Glover says the plot was to decapitate Joe using barbed wire, admitting 'I was going to kill Joe' - and that he was working with Joe's rival and the man who bought G.W. Zoo, Jeff Lowe' (pictured) 'I'm done with it. I will die making sure they end up in prison.' Co-director Rebecca said: 'I'm not sure that Joe's case was investigated properly. I believe there has potentially been a miscarriage of justice on the murder-for-hire charges. 'So that is something I have been keen on exploring.' Former zoo employee Ashley Webster also claims: 'On my very first day, Jeff said something about killing Carole Baskin, about how she needs to die. 'Jeff Lowe was very much behind Carole Baskin's murder plot as Joe was.' Ashley also claims Exotic promised to pay her a couple of grand to travel to Florida and kill Carole, adding I didnt really know Joe and I was so uncomfortable.' Exotic denies the claim, saying: I dont even remember talking to Ashley Webster. She was there for such a short time and she came to be a playmate for Jeff and (his wife) Lauren. Ashley alleges she left a voicemail for Carole warning her of the plot - and said three days later the FBI visited her at her home. She said: They were very aware that Jeff Lowe was conspiring to kill Carole Baskin, because I told them that.' Elsewhere in Tiger King 2, Baskin's former husband Don Lewis' attorney Joseph Fritz reveals a detective called into confirm Don was living in Costa Rica. He said: 'When we were talking about Don, the detective got mad at me and slipped up and told me there were federal reports of him alive and well in Costa Rica that he had to overcome. Rey Rodriguez, Dons associate added: He talked about moving to Costa Rica and starting over afresh. Don told me he was there to get away from Carole and so he put investments into my name. Closed: Lowe took over the park after Exotic was sent to prison, but it closed permanently to the public last August after its federal animal exhibition license was suspended Further claims include that Lewis would often be seen in Costa Rica with young women, with Rey saying: 'Dons favourite woman was Corina. I believe she was about 15. I told Don, be careful what youre doing. These little girls have family, people will find out. Lewis was also said to be linked with a gang who could forge passports, with fresh allegations that he changed his identity in the wake of his disappearance. There are also claims that Lewis was close with a gang who forged passports, with some believing that he has changed his identity. Baskin is currently suing Netflix and a production company. She wants to prevent the use of interviews and footage involving her in the upcoming sequel. Cool cats and kittens: Baskin is currently suing Netflix and a production company. She wants to prevent the use of interviews and footage involving her in the upcoming sequel Netflix counters that Carole and her husband agreed in writing that the material could be used in the future. The streaming service added that she is trying to block the company's First Amendment right to free speech. The lawsuit, pending in Tampa federal court, is the latest twist in the saga involving Baskin and Exotic - real name Joseph Maldonado-Passage. The first series was immensely popular. It aired in March 2020 just as coronavirus pandemic restrictions forced people to stay home. It drew some 64million household viewers in its first month and was nominated for six prime-time Emmy awards, according to the company. Much of the series has focused on a dispute between Baskin and Maldonado-Passage over treatment of tigers, lions and other big cats at an Oklahoma zoo he formerly operated. In her lawsuit, Baskin contends that Royal Goode Productions Inc., which produced Tiger King for Netflix, led her and husband Howard Baskin to believe their footage would only be used in a single documentary. Jailed: Exotic said his conviction was a 'conspiracy' and an 'obstruction of justice' - as he continues to push for a presidential pardon, this time from Joe Biden Baskin also objects to her portrayal in the first series, especially the insinuation she had something to do with the mysterious 1997 disappearance of her previous husband, Don Lewis, who was declared dead in 2002 but whose remains have never been found. 'The Baskins believed that any sequel, though odious, would not include any of their footage,' the lawsuit says. 'Tiger King I was particularly harsh and unfair in its depictions of the Baskins and Big Cat Rescue.' Baskin declined further comment earlier this month on the lawsuit but did speak to The Associated Press recently about at upcoming Discovery+ two-part series called 'Carole Baskins Cage Fight,' intended to call attention to the problem of zoos that allow tiger petting and private ownership of the animals. Baskin has crusaded for better treatment of big cats. 'We have never, ever had anybody mislead us and be so dishonest with us as the producers were of Tiger King,' Baskin told AP. 'And so they were just a fluke. I mean, that was not like it was our first experience and we were never going to do it again. It was like, OK, well, that was horrible, but thats just them. Thats not the industry.' Swirling rumours: Elsewhere in Tiger King 2, Baskin's former husband Don Lewis' attorney Joseph Fritz reveals a detective called into confirm Don was living in Costa Rica (Don and Carole pictured) Netflix, however, says the Baskins explicitly agreed in written releases that all their interviews and footage shot at their Tampa cat refuge could be used in future projects. Aside from that, Netlix's lawyers say tampering with the sequel amounts to unconstitutional prior restraint of the right to free speech and that the Baskins can only sue for damages after it airs. 'Defendants did not need to obtain a release from plaintiffs to use the footage in Tiger King 2 or its promotion trailers,' Netflix attorney Rachel Fugate said in court documents. The Baskins 'have no claim at all, much less one that can evade defendants' First Amendment protections.' Netflix also notes in its filing that Baskin has used the popularity of 'Tiger King' for her own publicity purposes, even appearing on ABC's 'Dancing With The Stars' and essentially becoming a 'pop culture phenomenon' because of the program, the company attorneys said. A Tampa federal judge overseeing the lawsuit had not yet issued a ruling as of earlier this month. As for Maldonado-Passage, an appeals court recently ruled that his 22-year prison sentence on the Baskin murder-for-hire plot should be reduced. He is being held at a federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas. Maldonado-Passage also announced earlier this year that he has an aggressive form of prostate cancer and, in a Twitter post, asked people to pray for him. Exotic said his conviction was a 'conspiracy' and an 'obstruction of justice' - as he continues to push for a presidential pardon, this time from Joe Biden. The Tiger King 2 synopsis reads: 'With Joe Exotic behind bars and Carole Baskin closing in on ownership of his disreputable zoo, the Emmy-nominated saga continues its twisted course with Tiger King 2,' it says. 'Newfound revelations emerge on the motivations, backstories, and secrets of America's most notorious big cat owners,' it was noted. 'Old enemies and frenemies, including Jeff Lowe, Tim Stark, Allen Glover, and James Garretson return for another season of murder, mayhem, and madness.' The synopsis ended with: 'Thought you knew the whole story? Just you wait.' Tiger King is available to stream on Netflix now. It might be mid-November and just weeks away from Christmas. But, Jenna Coleman, 35, nailed autumnal chic in a floral midi skirt and burnt orange coat as she stepped out to grab takeout coffee in London, on Tuesday. The Doctor Who star looked effortlessly stylish in her pretty purple skirt, which she toughened up with a black pair of chunky biker boots. Gorgeous: Jenna Coleman, 35, nailed autumnal chic in a floral midi skirt and burnt orange coat as she stepped out to grab takeout coffee in London, on Tuesday Ensuring she kept warm as temperatures in the capital continued to plummet, Jenna wore thick black leggings beneath her ensemble. She wrapped up with a high-necked black jumper and layered over the top with her sumptuous longline coat boasting frill edging. Adding an extra twist, Jenna carried her belongings in a dogtooth print crossbody bag and shielded her eyes with vintage shades. Stylish: The Doctor Who star looked effortlessly stylish in her pretty purple skirt, which she toughened up with a black pair of chunky biker boots Jenna recently arrived back in England after visiting Paris for Fashion Week at the start of October. She jetted to a number of different countries over the summer after relaxing at a wellness retreat in Spain. In August it was revealed that Jenna would be joining the cast of new series The Sandman. She will play Johanna Constantine, the great-great-great grandmother of comic book character John Constantine, who was played by Keanu Reeves in 2005 film Constantine. Divine: She wrapped up with a high-necked black jumper and layered over the top with her sumptuous longline coat boasting frill edging In a blog post on Netflix's website, show creator Neil Gaiman explained why he chose Jenna, writing: 'I created her (Johanna) to fill the role that John Constantine does in the past. 'When we broke down the first season, given that we knew that we would be encountering Johanna in the past, we wondered what would happen if we met a version of her in the present as well. 'We tried it and the script was sparkier, feistier, and in some ways even more fun. 'So having written her, we just had to cast her. Jenna Coleman gave us the Johanna of our dreams - tough, brilliant, tricky, haunted and probably doomed.' Ridley Scott cut a dapper figure as he stepped out with his glamorous wife Giannina Facio for the premiere of his new movie House Of Gucci on Tuesday night. The 83-year-old actor hit the red carpet in style in a sharp black suit and baby blue shirt at the premiere, held at Jazz in New York City's Lincoln Center. Giannina, 66, showcased her toned legs as she wowed in a sequined black minidress, matching stilettos and elegant aqua gloves for the special night. Happy: Ridley Scott cut a dapper figure in a black suit as he attended the premiere of his new film House Of Gucci with his glamorous wife Giannina Facio in New York on Tuesday night Ridley accessorised his clean cut suit with a purple spotted pocket square and completed the ensemble with a pair of classic loafers. Meanwhile, Giannina looked gorgeous in her glittering cocktail dress, which she styled with a pair of simple heels and the blue satin gloves. The Costa Rican actress finished off her look with a pair of elaborate tassel earrings and swept her tresses up into a relaxed pony tail with her longer layers framing her face. Giannina looked flawless in a full face of glamorous makeup as she posed next to the film's director - who she married in 2015. Stunning: Giannina put on a leggy display as she wowed in a sequined black minidress, matching stilettos and elegant aqua gloves Ridley's forthcoming House of Gucci film follows the organised murder of Maurizio Gucci, which saw Giuseppina 'Pina' Auriemma [Salma Hayek] jailed for 25 years. The cold-blooded murder of the fashion scion in 1995 shocked the world especially when his glamorous ex-wife Patrizia Reggiani was found guilty of plotting it. As the film documents, Patrizia had married into the Gucci empire but is dropped from the iconic fashion family when Maurizio left her from a younger woman. During the murder trial, which transfixed Italy, Reggiani arrived each day wearing head-to-toe Gucci clothes and accessories. Group hug: The couple cosied up to Al Pacino and Lady Gaga,who wowed in a busty sheer gown, on the carpet The court heard how she had ordered the murder of her husband after he offered her $650,000 in a divorce settlement. Lady Gaga will play Patrizia, while Marriage Story's Adam Driver will step into the late Maurizio Gucci's shoes. House of Gucci also stars the likes of Al Pacino, Jared Leto, and fashion designer/auteur Tom Ford and will hit theaters on November 24. All together: Pacino, Gaga, Ridley, Giannina,and Jeremy Irons got together for a group photo Gaga has spoken at length about her transformation into Patrizia and using the accent for an entire nine months to remain in character. She previously said: 'I started in the voice six months before we started shooting and I stayed in it for the whole of filming, which I am sure was super annoying for Adam [Driver] For me I thought it was harder to go in and out, so I stayed in character'. The star then told British Vogue: 'I lived as her [Reggiani] for a year and a half. And I spoke with an accent for nine months of that. I never broke. I stayed with her.' Gaga then revealed she dyed her hair off-screen to stay in character: 'It was nearly impossible for me to speak in the accent as a blonde. I instantly had to dye my hair.' Rawson Marshall Thurber's Red Notice has secured Netflix's biggest opening weekend in the streaming service's history. The action comedy film, starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds, began streaming last Friday and has amassed an astonishing 148.7million hours of watching since its release. The leading stars celebrated the achievement of biggest opening day over the weekend and with Netflix's fresh metrics, it appears the film's success is only going to rocket. Success: Red Notice has secured Netflix's biggest opening weekend ever - with new metrics showing 148.7million hours have been watched since its release (from R-L Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds) The Rock, 49, stars as FBI agent John Hartley, who unwillingly joins forces with renowned art thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) in a bad to catch an even more notorious criminal (Gal Gadot). As well as directing the feature, Rawson - renowned for his work on Skyscraper and We're The Millers - was the master behind the script. The trio of leading stars have been taking to Twitter to mark the momentous milestones the film is reaching. Leading stars: The Rock, 49, stars as FBI agent John Hartley, who unwillingly joins forces with renowned art thief Nolan Booth (Ryan Reynolds) in a bad to catch an even more notorious criminal (Gal Gadot) Israeli actress Gal penned: 'Amazing news - RED NOTICE is officially the biggest opening weekend in @netflix history and the #1 movie in the world! 'Thank u to all of you who watched it, liked it, shared it, I'm so grateful to see all of your wonderful responses from around the world #RedNotice.' Dwayne paid tribute to production company Seven Bucks. Stats: The leading stars celebrated the achievement of biggest opening day over the weekend and with Netflix's fresh metrics, it appears the film's success is only going to rocket 'A proud Seven Bucks achievement. THANK YOU to our global audience. Much more work to be done. Back to work we go Heavy check mark #audiencefirst @DanyGarciaCo @SevenBucksProd,' he gushed. 45-year-old Ryan jokingly alluded to Taylor Swift's second re-recorded album, Red (Taylor's Version), which was released the same day as his latest venture. 'WOW #RedNotice is @Netflix biggest ever opening day for a film. Congrats to this whole team! Cant wait for Red Notice (Taylors Version),' he wrote. History making: The trio of leading stars have been taking to Twitter to mark the momentous milestones the film is reaching Placing second on Netflix's top ten films of the week was romantic comedy Love Hard, starring Vampire Diaries' Nina Dobrev. The Christmas movie centres on Nina's character Natalie, who flies 3000 miles to surprise someone she's met on a dating site, only to find out she has been catfished. Catfishing is defined as 'a deceptive activity where a person creates a fictional persona or fake identity on a social networking service.' Also starring in the feel-good film includes Jimmy O. Yang, Darren Barnet and Matty Finochio. Runner-up: Placing second on Netflix's top ten films of the week was romantic comedy Love Hard, starring Vampire Diaries' Nina Dobrev (pictured) On Monday, Ryan got back into his Red Notice con-man character as he attempted to sell an Egyptian Egg from the Netflix film in a hilarious skit. The actor appeared on the US version of The Antiques Roadshow in a spoof scene posted to his Instagram account to sell the fictional golden Cleopatra egg - captioned: 'The #RedNotice scene I wish I'd shot.' Host Lark E. Mason asked Ryan to tell him about the artifact, with Ryan responding: 'Yes. It's an egg.' Fun: On Monday, Ryan got back into his Red Notice con-man character as he attempted to sell an Egyptian Egg from the Netflix film in a hilarious skit Lark then asks: 'And what's its family history?' with Ryan retorting: 'Well, no. This is not a family heirloom. 'My family disowned me years ago. They don't like me. But this is more of an heirloom that my good friend at the museum lent me.' The star then humorously remarks that that his friend is unaware that he has the egg. Lark gives Ryan a run-down of the egg's history, recounting how it was one of three commissioned by Cleopatra, with two held in public collections and one vanishing during the Second World War. He says: 'German soldiers had taken it to a secure hideaway. And there it remained up until recently. A unimpressed Ryan interrupts and asks how much the egg is worth - with Lark confirming the item is worth more than $100m. Bryce Ruthven revealed he and fiancee Melissa Rawson no longer speak to former best friends Johnny Balbuziente and Kerry Knight after an epic falling out. In a candid Q&A with fans on Instagram Stories on Wednesday, Bryce, 32, said he was no longer in touch with his former Married At First Sight co-stars. 'They've completely wiped us (and Jason [Engler]) for whatever reason,' Bryce began in a scathing post. No love lost: Bryce Ruthven (left) revealed he and fiancee Melissa Rawson (right) no longer speak to former best friends Johnny Balbuziente and Kerry Knight after an epic falling out 'We've heard "our friendship is not good for their image" and that "we're competition for public attention" as the only remaining couples from MAFS, which we have zero interest in and just want to focus on our little family.' In addition to getting engaged after the show ended, Bryce and Melissa, 32, welcomed twin sons Tate and Levi last month. 'We're just disappointed that we're poor judges of character in that friendship. Some are a genuine couple and our friends and some are all for the positive public image and limelight... Will leave it at that,' he continued. Former friends: In a candid Q&A with fans on Instagram Stories on Wednesday, Bryce, 32, said he was no longer in touch with his former Married At First Sight co-stars. Pictured, Johnny Balbuziente and Kerry Knight 'They've completely wiped us (and Jason [Engler, second left]) for whatever reason,' Bryce began in a scathing post Another fan asked Bryce if he's 'still best mates with Jason and Johnny', and he used it as another opportunity to hit out at his former friend. 'Jason - absolutely, one of the best blokes I've ever met. Very loyal and still a close friend of Melissa and I,' he began. 'Johnny - nope, fake and more concerned about a public nice guy image. Also threw Jason under the bus with a particular homophobic video that he, his TV partner and friend were also involved in.' 'Johnny - nope, fake and more concerned about a public nice guy image,' Bryce responded when asked if he's still friends with Johnny 'Jason - absolutely, one of the best blokes I've ever met. Very loyal and still a close friend of Melissa and I,' he began A video emerged on Instagram back in April showing Jason, 36, using homophobic language while talking about bisexual MAFS groom Liam Cooper. Meanwhile Johnny, 31, and Liam's MAFS 'wife' Georgia Fairweather were also present, with the video taken during a raucous night out shortly after filming had wrapped. Added Bryce: 'We prefer to be friends with honest people that take accountability for when they were in the wrong, not leave it up to one person to wear all the blame.' 'We've heard "our friendship is not good for their image" and that "we're competition for public attention" as the only remaining couples from MAFS, which we have zero interest in and just want to focus on our little family,' Bryce said Daily Mail Australia has reached out to representatives for Bryce, Johnny and Kerry for comment. Bryce encouraged his Instagram followers to send in their questions, telling them 'nothing is off limits'. He also listed the MAFS co-stars who had reached out to congratulate himself and Melissa on the birth of their twins, with both Johnny and Kerry, 31, noticeably absent. Giovanni Pernice sent Strictly Come Dancing fans into a frenzy on Tuesday night when he seemingly dropped the F-bomb live on It Takes Two without the programme's host Rylan Clark-Neal noticing. The professional dancer, 31, appeared on the show alongside his partner Rose Ayling-Ellis, 27, to talk about their stunning Couple's Choice performance, when he snuck in the expletive. The pair played a fun game to see how well they knew each other and, after scoring full marks, were then told they couldn't take home the trophy - prompting Giovanni to say: 'f**k that'. 'F**k that'Giovanni Pernice sent Strictly Come Dancing fans into a frenzy on Tuesday night when he seemingly dropped the F-bomb live on It Takes Two Rylan didn't acknowledge the outburst but instead continued to celebrate how well the couple had done as Rose looked on in disappointment at the lack of prize. Viewers quickly took to Twitter to express their confusion at what they thought they heard Giovanni say on the 6.30pm family show. One fan wrote: 'I am LOVING that @pernicegiovann1 just dropped the F Bomb with @Rylan and no one noticed!! What a Don! Gio and Rose rock! #Strictly #ITT.' Another questioned: 'Did Giovanni just say f**k sake? #ItTakesTwo #Strictly,' while another added: 'Did Gio just say f**k that on TV at 6:40pm? #Strictly #ittakestwo".' Competitive: The pair played a fun game to see how well they knew each other and were then told they couldn't take home the trophy - prompting Giovanni to say: 'f**k that' Not bothered: The pro dancer managed to get away with it without the show's host Rylan Clark-Neal noticing Woo! The pair had scored full marks on a quiz about how well they knew each other but were dissapointed when they couldn't take a trophy home The professional dancer is yet to clarify exactly what he said. Giovanni and Rose's appearance on It Takes Two comes after they incorporated a breathtaking 'silent moment' during their routine on Saturday. The EastEnders star and the Italian dancer performed a Couple's Choice to Symphony by Clean Bandit featuring Zara Larsson, a stunning segment of which wasn't performed to any music. Couple: Aljaz Skorjanec and Janette Manrara departed It Takes Two filming with balloons as they celebrated her birthday on Tuesday Partners: John Whaite (left) cut a casual figure in a black top and blue jeans as he left alongside partner Johannes Radebe (right) Competitors: Nancy Xu opted for a laid back look as she left filming with Rhys Stephenson Celebrations: Aljaz gave a thumbs up as he and wife Janette left filming Outfit: Nancy wrapped up in a black coat with dark blue jeans Filming: Letting her locks fall loose down her shoulders, she also sported a face mask Smart: Ranj Singh looked dapper in a navy waistcoat and trousers with a black floral print An emotional Anton Du Beke, 55, branded the moment 'the greatest thing he's ever seen on the show.' Head judge Shirley Ballas, 61, stood up to praise the moving routine and told the pair: 'This is a number that will be etched in my heart for a long, long time.' Motsi Mabuse, 40, showed her gratitude to Rose for implementing the thought-provoking element to the dance on behalf of the deaf community. 'Did Gio just say f**k that: Viewers quickly took to Twitter to express their confusion at what they thought they heard Giovanni say on the 6.30pm family show Moving: Giovanni and Rose's appearance on It Takes Two comes after they incorporated a breathtaking 'silent moment' during their routine on Saturday 'Thank you. This was such a beautiful moment to include us in your world,' she said. They received an almost-perfect score of 39, leaving the couple on a sentimental cloud nine. 'The positivity that she gives me in a single day is out of this world,' Giovanni said, before Rose chimed in to add: 'Thank you to Strictly for giving me the opportunity to tell my story.' Their friendship is one full of banter, with the two often ribbing each other during their appearances on Britain's Got Talent. And David Walliams has revealed that Simon Cowell snubbed his 50th birthday party earlier this year and didn't even send a card, with the comedian suggesting the music mogul purposefully treats him 'cruelly'. During an appearance on Wednesday's Lorraine alongside his Border Terrier Ernie, David, 50, also explained how Elton John kindly offered to perform at the bash, branding him a 'lovely man'. Oh dear! David Walliams has revealed that Simon Cowell snubbed his 50th birthday party earlier this year and didn't even send a card In August, David hosted a spectacular star-studded party with a plethora of showbiz stars in attendance including Elizabeth Hurley, Amanda Holden, Laura Whitmore, Ant and Dec, Ayda Field and Gary Barlow. But once face notably missing was Simon, 61, who failed to make an appearance at the bash held at posh Mayfair venue Claridge's. Speaking of the no-show, David explained: 'He didn't come to my birthday. He didn't send me a card or anything.' Treat them mean: The comedian suggested that the music mogul purposefully treats him 'cruelly' as he knows he will 'love' him more However, highlighting the light-hearted friendship he has with the X Factor boss, David suggested that Simon is intentionally 'cruel' to him as he knows he will 'love' him more. He quipped: 'He likes to keep me hanging, he knows I love him more when he treats me cruelly.' Meanwhile, the children's author detailed the touching gesture made my Elton John, 74. Nice gesture: During an appearance on Wednesday's Lorraine, David, 50, also explained how Elton John kindly offered to perform at the bash, branding him a 'lovely man' Pals really: Speaking of the no-show, David explained: 'He didn't come to my birthday. He didn't send me a card or anything. He likes to keep me hanging' Chit chat: David opened up to Lorraine Kelly about his 50th birthday party during his interview He told Lorraine about Elton performing: 'He offered. He just said is anyone performing at your birthday? And I said "No" and he said "Well I'll do it. I'll do three songs" 'He did Your Song and dedicated it to my mum and put in her name in it - Kathleen. 'I didn't tell anyone he was going to perform. It was amazing. It was a total surprise. He's a very lovely man.' Meanwhile, as David called him out for the birthday snub, Simon gushed he's 'closer than ever' to his girlfriend Lauren Silverman as he offered a rare insight into their eight-year relationship. Entertainer: He told Lorraine about Elton performing: 'He offered. He just said is anyone performing at your birthday? And I said "No" and he said "Well I'll do it. I'll do three songs" The music mogul said that his romance with Lauren is 'still alive' having realised they still 'enjoy each other's company' after months of being holed up together during the Covid lockdown. Simon, who shares son Eric, seven, with Lauren, also confirmed that despite its axe earlier this year, he is hoping The X Factor will return in the near future. Speaking to OK! after hosting his annual Together For Short Lives charity ball, Simon gushed that his romance with Lauren was still going strong, after their cosy appearance on the red carpet. Asked whether their relationship was still alive, he said: 'I guess so! Covid-19 was the real test. Like everyone, we were in lockdown for a long time and that's when you realise whether or not you actually enjoy each other's company or not. 'And we really really did. So to answer your question... yes, the romance is still alive. We're closer than ever.' She has mighty big shoes to fill as she is portraying one of the most legendary actresses of all-time in Lucille Ball. And Nicole Kidman at least has the look perfectly right. The 54-year-old American-born Australian actress looked the spitting image of the iconic I Love Lucy star as she was featured in one of the character posters for Being The Ricardos released by Amazon Studios on Thursday. Incredible: Nicole Kidman (left) looked the spitting image of the iconic Lucille Ball (right) as she was featured in one of the character posters for Being The Ricardos released by Amazon Studios on Thursday Nicole had the perfect signature red hair with old Hollywood curls as she contrasted her porcelain skin with a swipe of bright ruby red lipstick. She was not the only one featured in the newly-released images as seven of her castmates also had their own posters including Javier Bardem, Tony Hale, Alia Shawkat, Jake Lacy, J.K. Simmons, Clark Gregg, and Nina Arianda. Bardem stars as Desi Arnaz who was both Lucille's husband on legendary 1950s-era sitcom I Love Lucy and in real life. In the details: The 54-year-old actress had the perfect signature red hair with old Hollywood curls as she contrasted her porcelain skin with a swipe of bright ruby red lipstick Big shoes to fill: Javier Bardem stars as Desi Arnaz who was both Lucille's husband on legendary 1950s-era sitcom I Love Lucy and in real life The film follows Lucy and Desi as they face a crisis that could end their careers and another that could end their marriage. Bardem, 52, channels the Cuban-American actor perfectly as he looks off into the distance while holding onto his signature basket-weave fedora. Hale, 51, donned thick framed plastic eyeglasses while holding onto a leather notebook as he portrays Jessurun James 'Jess' Oppenheimer who was the head writer of I Love Lucy. Man with the plan: Tony Hale, 51, donned thick framed plastic eyeglasses while holding onto a leather notebook as he portrays Jessurun James 'Jess' Oppenheimer who was the head writer of I Love Lucy Stunning: Alia Shawkat, 32, also posed with a notebook along with a swipe of bright red lipstick as she portrayed writer on the sitcom Madelyn Pugh Oh so now you're fine with someone being a writer? Jake Lacy, 36, pensively put a pencil under his bottom lip as he looked off into the distance as he portrayed Bob Carroll Jr. who wrote on the show alongside Pugh and Oppenheimer His Arrested Development co-star Shawkat, 32, also posed with a notebook along with a swipe of bright red lipstick as she portrayed writer on the sitcom Madelyn Pugh. Lacy, 36, pensively put a pencil under his bottom lip as he looked off into the distance as he portrayed Bob Carroll Jr. who wrote on the show alongside Pugh and Oppenheimer. Simmons, 66, gripped onto a brown fedora as he portrayed actor William Frawley who famously played landlord Fred Mertz. Landlord: J.K. Simmons, 66, gripped onto a brown fedora as he portrayed actor William Frawley who famously played landlord Fred Mertz Mysterious: Clark Gregg, 59, donned glasses and a grey bowtie while looking off to the side as he stars as Howard Wenke Sidekick: Nina Arianda, 37, also donned the fashions of the era including curly hair, ruby red lipstick, and large plastic spherical earrings as she portrayed Vivian Vance who famously starred as Fred's wife and Lucy's sidekick Ethel Mertz on I Love Lucy Gregg, 59, donned glasses and a grey bowtie while looking off to the side as he stars as Howard Wenke. And finally Arianda, 37, also donned the fashions of the era including curly hair, ruby red lipstick, and large plastic spherical earrings as she portrayed Vivian Vance who famously starred as Fred's wife and Lucy's sidekick Ethel Mertz on I Love Lucy. The release of the eight character posters comes at a good time as Being The Ricardos has received rave reviews after its first screening for critics on Saturday night. Kidman was in attendance for the screening and panel discussion on Sunday night along with the film's writer and director Aaron Sorkin and her co-star Bardem. At the screening, the Oscar-winning actress revealed she had 'massive trepidation' about playing the comedy legend. Hit: Kidman was in attendance for the screening and panel discussion on Sunday night along with the film's writer and director Aaron Sorkin and her co-star Bardem (Nicole pictured at the Deadline Contenders event on Sunday) However, critics who viewed the movie appeared to be extremely impressed with Kidman's performance, which is already generating Oscar buzz. New York Times reporter Kyle Buchanan tweeted, 'Lucy, you've got some campaigning to do: BEING THE RICARDOS played well in its first screening, suggesting a solid awards contender. 'I bought Nicole more as offscreen, dramatic Lucy than as a sitcom dynamo, but the audience still ate her and Javier Bardem up.' First look: The 56-year-old actress, who stars as Lucille Ball, was in attendance for the screening and panel discussion along with the film's writer and director Aaron Sorkin and her co-star Javier Bardem, who portrays Desi Arnaz Turner Classic Movies host Dave Karger wrote, 'Last night's first big screening of #BeingTheRicardos definitely silenced the skeptics. 'A 5th Oscar nomination for Nicole Kidman seems especially likely. So cool to chat with her and the fantastic Javier Bardem (also a strong contender) in front of the very impressed audience.' Collider's Perri Nemiroff revealed that she had an emotional reaction to the film. Nervous: At the screening, the Oscar-winning actress revealed she had 'massive trepidation' about playing the comedy legend Blown away: However, critics who viewed the movie appeared to be extremely impressed with Kidman's performance, which is already generating Oscar buzz '#BeingTheRicardos just left me in a puddle of tears,' she tweeted. 'What a beautiful and deeply moving behind the scenes look at the pressures and complexities involved in making that show - highs, lows and everything in between. Nicole Kidman is INCREDIBLE.' Nemiroff went on the say, 'Alia Shawkat, JK Simmons and Nina Arianda are especially impressive scene stealers. Might even be a little overwhelmed by the range of emotions I just cycled through. FAR exceeded my expectations.' In his review of the movie, Variety film critic Clayton Davis heaped praise on the performances as well as Sorkin's writing and directing. High praise: New York Times reporter Kyle Buchanan said that the audience ate Kidman and Bardem up Silencing the skeptics: TCM host Dave Karger said that a 5th Oscar nomination for Kidman seemed likely Emotional: Collider's Perri Nemiroff revealed that she had an emotional reaction to the film Wowed: Nemiroff added that the film 'FAR exceeded my expectations 'Under Sorkin's direction, 'Being the Ricardos' presents plenty of chuckles and sympathy for our favorite redhead in history,' Davis wrote. 'Kidman embodies the essence of Ball, especially in her mannerisms during the rehearsals and filming of episodes. She very well may break your heart, demanding the viewer's sympathy and a best actress nomination may seem almost certainly in the cards for her.' At the screening, Kidman confessed that she was extremely nervous about playing the I Love Lucy star in the new biopic and credited the support of Sorkin for helping her take on the part. Star power: At the Deadline Contenders event, Kidman was joined by the film's writer and director Aaron Sorkin (far left) and her co-stars (L-R) Javier Bardem, Nina Arianda and J.K. Simmons Nicole recalled: 'I had massive trepidation about a month prior, and Aaron had to get on the phone and send me emails saying, 'You've got this.' 'It was frightening but incredibly exciting.' The new Amazon Studios movie centers on a single production week of the 1950s sitcom I Love Lucy and focuses on the relationship between Lucille and her co-star Desi who played Lucy and Ricky Ricardo in the comedy respectively - and Nicole revealed that the project helped her get to know 'the woman behind the lipstick'. 'I had massive trepidation about a month prior, and Aaron had to get on the phone and send me emails saying, 'You've got this,'' she said about taking on the role, as reported by Variety In reel life: The film depicts the often complicated relationship between real-life Hollywood power couple Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz as they filmed their hit 1950's sitcom, I Love Lucy Taking on an icon: Sitting onstage at the panel event, Nicole spoke about her role as Lucille Ball in the upcoming biopic The Bombshell actress explained: 'I fell in love with her as I was reading the script. I realized what she was doing (was) trailblazing for women.' Javier also revealed that he knew little about his character despite the popularity of I Love Lucy in the actor's native Spain. The 52-year-old star shared: 'I was obsessed with him and his skills as a comedian, as a person, as a producer and a musician at that time while being a foreigner in this country.' Sorkin recreated an iconic I Love Lucy moment in the film with Ball stomping on grapes during a winemaking scene and Nicole was determined to perform it to perfection. She said: 'It was my obsession to get it absolutely accurate. It was his obsession to have this human being portrayed what's behind the creation of Lucy Ricardo and who is the woman behind this character?' It's set to premiere in cinemas next month, before streaming on Amazon Prime from December 21. Paris Hilton has been wed to Carter Reum for less than one week, but the entrepreneur is already looking into the future with her new husband. On Wednesday the 40-year-old blonde beauty told People that they are very much looking forward to having children. 'I can't wait to grow our family,' the Paris In Love star shared. 'I feel like Carter and I are puzzle pieces getting connected.' She also said that she thinks he will be the 'best dad.' This comes just after PageSix claimed he has a 'secret daughter,' aged nine. Let's do it: Paris Hilton has been wed to Carter Reum for less than one week, but the entrepreneur is already looking into the future with her new husband I want kids! On Wednesday the blonde beauty told People that they are very much looking forward to having children; seen with the flower girls at her wedding The DJ and perfume mogul also said she is happy to be with someone who loves her and not the fame that is a big part of her life. 'I never thought I'd meet a man like him, who loves me for Paris and not Paris Hilton. He's going to be the best husband and the best dad,' she added. In January this year, she revealed she is undergoing IVF with Reum to ensure she can have a 'boy and girl twin', after dating him for a year. The socialite told The Trend Reporter with Mara podcast that best friend Kim Kardashian had introduced her to the idea. Paris said: '[Kim was the one] who told me about that. I didn't even know anything about it. I'm happy that she told me that advice and introduced me to her doctor. We have been doing IVF, so I can pick twins if I like.' Also in her People interview, the star said she has been on Cloud Nine since she said I do at their grandfather's estate in Bel-Air with pals Kim Kardashian and Nicole Richie looking on. 'This is the most magical feeling in the world,' said The Simple Life vet. She wants to be Mama Paris Reum: 'I can't wait to grow our family,' the Paris In Love star shared. 'I feel like Carter and I are puzzle pieces getting connected.' She also said that she thinks he will be the 'best dad' New look at the wedding: On Wednesday Paris shared this image from her photo booth Bling it on baby: She shared a look at her wedding diamonds. 'I never thought I'd meet a man like him, who loves me for Paris and not Paris Hilton. He's going to be the best husband,' she added 'Knowing that I officially get to spend the rest of my life with the love of my life is a dream come true.' Carter also spoke to the publication. 'Paris is the love of my life. That is one thing I know without a doubt,' he shared. Hilton also said the wedding at her grandfather Barron's estate was 'meaningful' because 'the home holds so much significance.' She dreamed of saying I do there to her Romeo. Sissy already has two kids: Paris' sister Nicky has two kids: Lily-Grace and Teddy Te cake that is fit for a queen: The billionaire had a six tier wedding cake with a crown on top and a Cinderella carriage on the front. There was also the CP - Carter Paris - logo 'I always imagined having my fairy tale wedding there since I was a little girl. There are so many memories at the estate that I hold dearly, so to be able to celebrate my love story there was amazing,' said the model. Sister Kathy was at the wedding as was her RHOBH star mom Kathy. Pals included Kim, Nicole and Emma Roberts, Ashley Benson, Paula Abdul. 'We wanted to make sure that no matter what, we were able to celebrate with our friends and family,' said Hilton. Moon time: Their honeymoon has been in a tropical paradise. She has already shared images taken from a yacht adding 'honeymoon goals.' The destination is eight hours away from Los Angeles, she shared. 'We are going to take as much time as possible for ourselves,' she said 'The people around us are the most important and we cherish the bonds we have with them.' Their honeymoon has been in a tropical paradise. She has already shared images taken from a yacht adding 'honeymoon goals.' The destination is eight hours away from Los Angeles, she shared. 'We are going to take as much time as possible for ourselves,' she said. 'We're going to travel as much and enjoy our time.' Meanwhile, this week it was claimed Reum has a secret nine-year-old child from a previous relationship who he has allegedly seen 'only once.' Millionaire entrepreneur Reum, 40, fathered a child with reality star Laura Bellizzi, known for appearing on the short-lived VH-1 show Secrets of Aspen, PageSix reported Monday. Revealed: Reum has 9-year-old child with reality star Laura Bellizzi who briefly dated Mel Gibson Bellizii - a Chicago native who now lives in California with the child - also briefly dated actor Mel Gibson. In 2011, when Bellizzi was pregnant, it was reported that the baby was Mel Gibson's love child, though he vehemently denied the claims. DailyMail.com has reached out to Hilton and Reum's reps who have so far been unavailable for comment. A spokesperson for Reum said this week: 'The people who this story matters to have known about it for 10 years. Carter supports this child. While he does not have a traditional father-daughter relationship with her, he has provided for her since she was born, and will continue to do so.' Bellizzi also refuted the rumors to TMZ in November 2011, saying: 'Mel Gibson is not the father of my child.' As it turns out, she was carrying Reum's child. It is the first time that any significant details from Reum's relationship history has been revealed, after he and wife Hilton have shared their romance openly in her new reality show Paris In Love. A source claimed to the outlet that Carter has 'only seen [his daughter] once since she was born 9 years ago.' Pictured: Laura Bellizi is seen above pregnant in 2011, and at the time it was speculated she was carrying Mel Gibson's baby - both ended up denying the rumors Bellizi has kept a low profile since hitting the headlines with Gibson in 2011. The reality show, VH-1's Secrets of Aspen, that she appeared on in 2010, only ran for one season and she has not appeared on any other shows since. A source close to the situation added to the outlet that her daughter had been 'triggered' by seeing Reum's lavish wedding to Hilton, and felt 'left out' of her father's life. The source said: 'Also, she saw the articles of Paris and Carter talking about starting a family. She felt tremendous rejection and felt left out. She wants to have a relationship with him.' Reum is worth an estimated $40million, after co-founding investment company M13 with his brother Courtney Reum. Meanwhile, Reum's wife Hilton is worth an estimated $300million. The source continued that Reum's daughter wants to 'know her daddy.' 'She just wants to really complete the missing pieces of her puzzle,' the source divulged. 'She's at that age where self-identity is so important, and children want to know who they are and where they come from. It's important for him to help her with that.' 'It's not about [Reum] or the mother. It's about making the child whole. She is absolutely an amazing little girl. She has so much love to give. And she wants to give it to him, his family and whoever he chooses to love.' A second source told the outlet: 'She is of an age now where she is cognizant and wants her paternal family to hear her and know her. He may not claim or love her, but she claims and loves him and his family.' Tamar Braxton revealed her Calabasas home was broken into on Tuesday evening by someone she knows in a lengthy post shared to Instagram. The 44-year-old television host detailed the shocking series of events at 2:30 a.m. on Wednesday where a 'broken, bum a** man (one that I know) broke into my home and stole my safe only.' Braxton was reportedly not at the residence at the time of the burglary, but concluded her social share with prayers for the thief instead of payback. Tough: Tamar Braxton revealed her Calabasas home was broken into on Tuesday evening by someone she knows in a lengthy post shared to Instagram Tamar wrote that the culprit picked up a safe from her home and 'not a Birkin, not a computer, not one of Logan's game systems, but he only went through my drawers, broke mirrors turned my bed upside down and took my safe.' She noted that she's 'not angry' about the stolen goods. 'You did not break me. You did not violate me. What your broken broke a** don't realize that God gave me that home and EVERY single thing in it during a pandemic, & also during the time when I was all of those things. 'God personally put the pieces of my life back together again. So pumpkin, you did not steal from me. Those things you took, he will give back to me a million times fold!!! Braxton added: 'You took from God!!! I know that is not a payback you are not prepared for.. but get ready. This time you really did it!! I'm not sure you realize that I am truly a kings kid and I'm VERY special to him.' Sweet dreams: Tamar wrote that the culprit picked up a safe from her home and 'not a Birkin, not a computer, not one of Logan's game systems, but he only went through my drawers, broke mirrors turned my bed upside down and took my safe' In one final twist, she wrote: 'So I'm sure this one he's going to take very personally. and Father, have your way - Amen.' Tamar exuded strength during a difficult time nearly one year after admitting she attempted to take her own life in the summer of 2020. She confessed to Taraji P. Henson on her Facebook Watch show that she felt her eight-year-old son Logan 'deserved better.' Former Empire star, 50, asked if she 'thought [Logan] would be better without' her, prompting a tearful Tamar to respond: 'I thought in that moment.' Son: The Grammy nominee admitted that she felt she was 'embarrassing' her son Logan after appearing on her reality show, Braxton Family Values (pictured) Fighting back the flow of tears, Tamar who shares her son with ex-husband Vincent Herbert, 47 added: 'Because I knew thats not what my whole life really was. 'Thats not who I was. I didnt want him to be embarrassed in front of his friends. Here is this loudmouth ghetto mama.' Tamar was rushed to a hospital in July 2020 after she was found unresponsive at the Ritz-Carlton Residences at LA Live in Los Angeles, after attempting to take her own life. She discussed her mental health battle on the The Tamron Hall Show and said she was at her 'lowest point' during her suicide attempt. Struggle: She previously said she had contemplated suicide long before her attempt this year, but her sisters have admitted they had no idea what Tamar was going through (seen in 2019) When asked if she 'took pills' during her suicide attempt, she responded: 'It's so hard to say, Tamron, because I feel like there's a responsibility for - you know, I call them family, my fans who watch.' The singer and TV personality continued: 'I don't want to give any examples. But what I will say is, that was my lowest point of life.' Tamron also asked if Tamar tried to take her own life before her July attempt, to which she said: 'I'm just going to be a hundred percent. There has been a time where I wanted to.' He is known for his incredibly buff body. So Jason Momoa was naturally keen to flaunt his best assets as he hit the town at the Nomad Hotel after last week's House Of Gucci premiere in London. The actor, 42, who is currently in the UK to shoot the Aquaman sequel, was seen dancing to the tunes of DJ Amazonica during which he tore off his shirt to rock out to the tunes of AC/DC's 1980 hit Back In Black. Woah! Jason Momoa was naturally keen to flaunt his best assets as he hit the town at the Nomad Hotel after last week's House Of Gucci premiere in London Jason was dressed to impress in a suit earlier in the evening however things seemed to get raucous when he departed with his shoes hanging off. Within the event, he was seen at the very front of the dancefloor rocking out while Amazonica hit the booth below a neon sign. The neon sign bore a quote from the movie - the words: 'The father, son, House of Gucci', in the words of Lady Gaga's character Patrizia Reggiani. Jason was not holding back with his moves as he threw himself around the floor in wild fashion with his shirt off and his buff body on full display. Rock on! The actor, 42, who is currently in the UK to shoot the Aquaman sequel, was seen dancing to the tunes of DJ Amazonica during which he tore off his shirt to rock out to the tunes of AC/DC's 1980 hit Back In Black Hunky! He was making the most of his buff body Nice! Within the event, he was seen at the very front of the dancefloor rocking out while Amazonica hit the booth below a neon sign Amazonica, who is a regular guest DJ at Cannes, the BAFTAs, the OSCARs, and the Golden Globes, was the head DJ at the after-party, following her recent stints at the James Bond and Last Night In Soho premiere after-parties. Jason looks to have made a full recovery since his recent bout of coronavirus. Last month, insiders revealed to The Sun on Wednesday that he was isolating after testing positive while filming the Aquaman sequel in the UK, with movie bosses hoping to stop any further outbreaks on set. Peace out: The neon sign bore a quote from the movie - the words: 'The father, son, House of Gucci', in the words of Lady Gaga's character Patrizia Reggiani Wild thing! Jason is pictured leaving the event in wild style last week Lairy: Jason was acting excessively lairy as he left the House Of Gucci after-party Rock on: Amazonica, who is a regular guest DJ at Cannes, the BAFTAs, the OSCARs, and the Golden Globes, was the head DJ at the after-party (pictured at the event) 'Jason is fine luckily and is now isolating after getting a positive test. But it's a real headache for the film's bosses, who are now worrying about having to delay their tight filming schedule,' they claimed. The source went on to say that they're 'hoping this is a one-off and that they can work around Jason and continue filming on the production'. It's also been claimed that everyone on set is getting tested for Covid-19 regularly. She's known for her fashion forward outfits. And Chloe Sims didn't disappoint with her latest ensemble, as she took to Instagram on Wednesday to show off her green leather power suit, just days after it was revealed she had declared her love for her ex Pete Wicks. The TOWIE star, 40, ensured that her ample assets were on display in a brown crop top underneath the suit jacket, which gave a glimpse at her toned abs. Stunning: Chloe Sims didn't disappoint with her latest ensemble, as she took to Instagram on Wednesday to show off her green leather power suit In the string of shots she posed with her hand on her hip, staring sultrily down the camera lens. The blonde beauty accessorised with a mini brown leather bag and coordinating bright green high heels with straps that snaked around her ankles. Chloe wore her golden locks pulled back from her face in a low ponytail, and finished her look off with a full face of glam makeup. Captioning the stunning pics, she wrote: 'Feelin festive. Todays little filming look for TOWIE Christmas.' Stylish: The TOWIE star, 40, ensured that her ample assets were on display in a brown crop top underneath the suit jacket, which gave a glimpse at her toned midriff Captioning the stunning pics, she wrote: 'Feelin festive. Todays little filming look for TOWIE Christmas' The post comes after her on-off flame Pete Wicks had her name tattooed on his hand. Pete, 33, will unveil the inking to his former lover in an episode of TOWIE after telling her she is 'irreplaceable' in his life. His romantic tribute comes months after fans were left aghast when the duo revealed they had been sleeping together in a two-year entanglement, despite vehement insistence that they were 'just friends'. Gorgeous: Chloe wore her golden locks pulled back from her face in a low ponytail, and finished her look off with a full face of glam makeup In a clip obtained by The Sun, the inked-up hunk said: 'I didn't really know what get to you for your birthday either... 'You are irreplaceable to me, so I might have got like a tattoo on my hand', before revealing the ink to the stunned star. Clearly touched by the gesture, Chloe said: 'How have I not noticed that? Oh my god! That is so nice!' while covering her face in shock. His love: The post comes after her on-off flame Pete Wicks had her name tattooed on his hand after telling her she is 'irreplaceable' in his life Pete then incredibly declared his love for the mother-of-one, saying: 'The point of that is, you do mean everything to me and for anyone else who feels like I don't or for anyone you feel like I've not justified this to, I do love you to bits.' Chloe then burst into tears clearly overwhelmed by his words and declared: 'I do love you to bits, you know that - I would be lost without you'. In September, the pair sparked reconciliation rumours when they departed the National Television Awards together in London. However in an interview with The Sun following the red carpet event, Pete revealed they are just 'friends': 'Things are all good. We have known each other so long and we have been through so much so it is nice that we are back to having fun'. Reflecting on their split, he said: 'What happened was in the past. We are both over the situation. The foundation of me and Chloe is that we were such good friends.' In an episode of TOWIE that aired in May, Chloe and Pete become embroiled in a heated argument as they addressed the end of their two-year relationship. Chloe declared Pete made her feel 'like s**t' as she exposed him for playing down the intensity of their former romance. Chrissy Teigen is being slammed as out-of-touch for throwing a Squid Game-inspired party for her VIP friends last week. At the cookbook author's soiree guest dressed up like the characters and played high-stakes children's games, like in the dystopian series from South Korea, where indebted players take on a life-or-death competition for cash. The internet was quick to call out Chrissy, 35, for her 'tone-deaf' celebration, pointing out the irony of the ultra-wealthy masquerading as the poor, desperate characters from the show. 'I'm sorry rich people are literally so tone deaf,' one critic tweeted. 'Squid Game was literally about people whose lives were so awful because of being poor that theyd rather play a game of literal life or death to escape going back to poverty and chrissy teigen is really reenacting it in her mansion.' Think it through: Chrissy Teigen is being slammed as out-of-touch for throwing a Squid Game-inspired party for her VIP friends last week 'Tone deaf': The internet was quick to call out Chrissy, 35, for her 'tone-deaf' celebration, pointing out the irony of the ultra-wealthy masquerading as the poor, desperate characters from the show Another Twitter user said: 'Taking personal offense at the complete lack of self awareness Chrissy Teigen must have in order to throw a Squid Game-themed party where she watches her rich friends "fight to the death." The commentary just writes itself...' Guests included Modern Family's Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Pretty Little Liars' Shay Mitchell, according to People. Servers were costumed as the show's anonymous henchmen and the party was decorated with a huge piggy bank full of cash hovering above, just like in the show. Social media from the event revealed that the guests had been competing for a trip to Napa and dinner at the Michelin-starred French Laundry restaurant. One person added: 'Usually Im a fan of Chrissy Teigen but theres something super f**ked up and weird about spending the weekend cosplaying Squid Game with your incredibly rich friends.' Opinions: There were plenty of people talking about the party There: Guests included Modern Family's Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Pretty Little Liars' Shay Mitchell Another remarked: 'Yknow what, Im tired of being self aware and trying to live a judgment free life. 'I wish to be as ignorant as Chrissy Teigen hosting a Squid Game party with her rich LA friends.' Someone else reminded the internet of Kylie Jenner's poorly thought out Handmaid's Tale fete from 2019, asking: 'Who do you think missed the point more: Kylie Jenner and her Handmaid's Tale party or Chrissy Teigen with her Squid Game party?' 'The simply unmatched irony of john legend and chrissy teigen hosting a squid game party for all their rich celeb friends,' another posted along with gleeful photos of the soiree. Chrissy didn't appear to recognize any irony, gushing about her party online Saturday. Up for debate: Someone else reminded the internet of Kylie Jenner's poorly thought out Handmaid's Tale fete from 2019, asking: 'Who do you think missed the point more: Kylie Jenner and her Handmaid's Tale party or Chrissy Teigen with her Squid Game party?' The help: All of the event's servers were costumed as the anonymous orange jumpsuit-wearing henchmen Taking to Instagram to share a look at the festivities, she wrote: 'Where do I even begin!! 'What an absolutely epic night. my dream came true of watching my friends fight to the death! dunk tank, musical chairs, hide and seek followed by a very riveting final game of pin the tail on the donkey.' Chrissy and John did not dress as the desperate characters, but instead played the murderous Robot Girl from episode one and a wealthy benefactor enjoying the battle royale in the later episodes. Teigen recently began her first media tour of the year to promote her latest cookbook, Cravings: All Together, a stark contrast for the usually public-facing persona who took some time to reflect on the past these last few months. Eager: The party was decorated with a huge piggy bank full of cash hovering above, just like in the show Grand prize: Social media revealed that the guests had been competing for a trip to Napa and dinner at the Michelin-starred French Laundry restaurant Teigen has been the target of backlash since her abusive tweets originally made in 2011 resurfaced online, including one that urged a then 16-year-old Courtney Stodden to kill themselves. Stodden recently claimed that Teigen has yet to personally apologize for her actions, but Chrissy told TMZ in September that she 'reached out to' Stodden via text. During the same interview, Chrissy was asked about Addison Rae's backlash for introducing herself to Donald Trump at a UFC fight, which she replied: 'I have decided I'm not getting involved in anyone's s**t ever again.' Chrissy attempted to right a few of her wrongs with an apology shared to Medium in June which was her first time speaking out since taking a social media hiatus after a host of bullying allegations came to light. 'Hi all. It has been a VERY humbling few weeks,' she wrote. 'I know Ive been quiet, and lord knows you dont want to hear about me, but I want you to know Ive been sitting in a hole of deserved global punishment, the ultimate "sit here and think about what youve done." She added: 'Not a day, not a single moment has passed where I havent felt the crushing weight of regret for the things Ive said in the past.' Longtime General Hospital castmember Bergen Williams has died at age 62 after battling a rare health condition in which copper accumulates in the organs. The talented actress - full name Laura Lynn 'Bergen' Williams - had an inherited condition called Wilson's Disease which causes copper to accumulate in vital organs including the brain. It could be treated if diagnosed early enough but can cause liver failure, kidney problems, and even death. Tragic: Longtime General Hospital castmember Bergen Williams has died at age 62 after battling a rare health condition in which copper accumulates in the organs Signature role: She (seen in March 2010) starred as Big Alice Gunderson on General Hospital from 2001 to 2014 On Tuesday, someone claiming to be her sister announced on Twitter that she had succumbed to the illness on July 20 but the family chose to keep it private until this month. The post read: 'Bergen Williams succumbed to the ravages of Wilsons Disease surrounded by loving family. 'Bergen was a writer, inventor and actress who played Big Alice on the TV soap "General Hospital."' 'Rest in power': On Tuesday, someone claiming to be her sister announced on Twitter that she had succumbed to the illness on July 20 but the family chose to keep it private until this month She had quite the run on the longest-running soap opera in production as she starred as Big Alice Gunderson on the ABC daytime program from July 2001 to December 2014. Williams was featured in a total of 155 episodes over her run on the series. On the show, Williams portrayed a live-in housekeeper who works for the Quartermaine family at their mansion. Quite the gig: She (seen second from left in July 2007) had quite the run on the longest-running soap opera in production as she starred as Big Alice Gunderson on the ABC daytime program from July 2001 to December 2014 Staple: On the show, Williams (seen center) portrayed a live-in housekeeper who works for the Quartermaine family at their mansion What is Wilson's Disease? Wilson's disease is a rare inherited disorder that causes copper to accumulate in your liver, brain and other vital organs. Most people with Wilson's disease are diagnosed between the ages of 5 and 35, but it can affect younger and older people, as well. Copper plays a key role in the development of healthy nerves, bones, collagen and the skin pigment melanin. Normally, copper is absorbed from your food, and excess is excreted through a substance produced in your liver (bile). But in people with Wilson's disease, copper isn't eliminated properly and instead accumulates, possibly to a life-threatening level. When diagnosed early, Wilson's disease is treatable, and many people with the disorder live normal lives. Source: Mayo Clinic Advertisement The family has been a staple of the soap since their introduction in the 1970s. General Hospital - which is still currently in production - premiered in 1963 and is not only the longest-running American soap opera but is also the longest-running Hollywood-produced serial in production. Williams had a long acting career which spanned two-and-a-half decades from 1990 to 2015. She had roles in other series including Nip/Tuck, 7th Heaven, V.I.P., NYPD Blue, Sons Of Tucson, Happy Endings, Babylon 5, Scrubs, and Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman. Williams also had roles on the big screen including Clifford, Lord Of Illusions, Killer Pad, and Without Charlie. They paved the way for a future of Bravo-lebrities. Vicki Gunvalson looked completely in her element as she whooped it up with Tamra Judge on a girls' night out at Craig's in Los Angeles on Tuesday evening. The 59-year-old former Real Housewives of Orange County matriarch caught up with Patti Stanger and ex Vanderpump Rules star Jax Taylor outside the trendy eatery on Melrose Avenue. Dos amigas: Vicki Gunvalson looked completely in her element as she whooped it up with Tamra Judge on a girls' night out at Craig's in Los Angeles on Tuesday Vicki rocked a short and sweet yellow dress with a black chain print that featured billowing sleeves and a plunging neckline. The newly-single CEO of Coto Insurance showed off her toned and tanned legs, and added inches to her statuesque frame with a pair of black leather boots to match her purse. Gunvalson, who has two children and three grandchildren with another on the way, swiped on a vibrant shade of red lipstick and let her platinum blonde hair rest across her shoulders. She confirmed her split from fiance Steve Lodge in September and weeks later revealed that the retired homicide detective allegedly cheated on her. Bravo friends: The 59-year-old former Real Housewives of Orange County matriarch caught up with Patti Stanger and ex Vanderpump Rules star Jax Taylor outside the trendy eatery on Melrose Avenue Girls just want to have fun: Vicki rocked a short and sweet yellow dress with a black chain print that featured billowing sleeves and a plunging neckline 'He used me, he lied to me, he's been dating a 36 year old and is not what he portrays himself to be,' she wrote online when a fan questioned what really went wrong. 'No Christian man would do what he's done.' Lodge, 63, was a gubernatorial hopeful who ran against Gavin Newsom in the California recall election, and though she had publicly supported him Vicki has now accused him of using her platform to gain supporters. Providing more details about his affair Vicki wrote: 'While I was out of town working on a biz trip he took her to my condo in Mexico! He's been flaunting around my town in OC making out in public places it's disgusting.' Tamara looked equally as stunning wearing a pair of black leather leggings with a black long-sleeved blouse. Judge, 54, who stepped away from the show after season 14, added a bold pop of color with metallic platform heels and wore her golden blonde hair in loose curls. Patti, who served as The Millionaire Matchmaker for years before ending its run on Bravo in 2020, rocked a chocolate brown silk dress with leopard print boots. Real OG of the OC: The newly-single CEO of Coto Insurance showed off her toned and tanned legs, and added inches to her statuesque frame with a pair of black leather boots to match her gorgeous purse Bold and beautiful: Tamara looked equally as stunning wearing a pair of black leather leggings with a black long-sleeved blouse Classic: Patti, who served as The Millionaire Matchmaker for years before ending its run on Bravo in 2020, rocked a chocolate brown silk dress with leopard print boots Jax who's real name is Jason Michael Cauchi sported his favorite plaid shirt and dark jeans combo with a pair of Nike's. He announced he was leaving VPR last year with wife Brittany Cartwright in matching posts highlighting a few of their favorite moments from the show which detailed many of their highs and lows throughout their relationship. During an Instagram live in October, the former self-proclaimed 'No. 1 guy of the group' appeared to be waiting to resume his role on the show amid the COVID-19 pandemic when he answered: 'Vanderpump Rules is supposed to go back to filming. In fact, we are supposed to go back to filming this month. I think that's the last I heard.' While Brittany and Jax released his-and-hers statements about leaving the popular Bravo program in December, Variety reported they were fired following the fall out from racial accusations waged by Jax's former love interest, Faith Stowers, against co-stars Stassi Schroeder and Kristen Doute, who were also fired from the show. Josh Hutcherson was spotted using crutches to help him hobble along a beach in Tulum, Mexico earlier this month. The 29-year-old performer did not let an injury on his left leg, which was set in a cast, stop him from enjoying the tropical weather during his coastal getaway. The Hunger Games franchise star has not made any comments regarding his health as of yet, and the source of his injury has not been made known to the public. Extra support: Josh Hutcherson was spotted using crutches to help him stroll along a beach in Tulum, Mexico earlier this month Hutcherson kept it casual during his walk, as he sported a slightly loose-fitting tie-dye t-shirt and a pair of black shorts. The performer has previously suffered several leg injuries, and he was recently seen making his way around Hollywood with the assistance of a knee walker. The Zathura: A Space Adventure actor also had his leg in a cast and used the same walker after suffering an injury in 2019. He also had to keep one of his legs in a brace after hurting himself while lifting weights in 2017. Dressed down: Hutcherson kept it casual during his walk, as he sported a slightly loose-fitting tie-dye t-shirt and a pair of black shorts Not the first time: The performer has previously suffered several leg injuries, and he was recently seen making his way around Hollywood with the assistance of a knee walker Hutcherson is also currently prepping for the release of the upcoming drama feature Across the River and Into the Trees. The Paula Ortiz-directed project is notably based on Ernest Hemingway's 1950 novel of the same name. The film is centered on an aging Army colonel who takes a trip to Italy and attempts to come to terms with his impending death. Development on the forthcoming movie initially began in 2016 when it was announced that Martin Campbell would serve as its director. Staying busy: Hutcherson is also currently prepping for the release of the upcoming drama feature Across the River and Into the Trees Numerous performers, such as Pierce Brosnan and Isabella Rossellini, were also attached to the project at the time. However, Campbell departed the project in 2020, when it was announced that Ortiz would take the director's chair. Many of the roles were recast following the shakeup, and Liev Schreiber was added as the picture's star. Hutcherson's casting in the project was previously announced by Variety in November of last year. Signing on: Hutcherson's casting in the project was previously announced by Variety in November of last year; he is seen in January 2019 Physical production initially began last October, with Venice serving as one of the primary filming locations. It was later reported that work on the project had completed shooting this past March. Across the River and Into the Trees currently does not have a set release date. Meadow Walker celebrated her first ever Vogue cover on Wednesday. The model daughter of Paul Walker, 23, looked simply stunning while gracing the Korean issue of the fashion bible in a gauzy off-white gown which made her look like a Grecian goddess. Gushing about her accomplishment on Instagram, the beautiful brunette wrote: 'MY FIRST VOGUE COVER!! @voguekorea Thank you so much to the amazing team <3 A dream come true.' Cover girl: Meadow Walker wowed while sharing her very first Vogue cover online Wednesday Later on the star was seen out with her dog and new husband Louis Thornton-Allan in the SoHo neighborhood of New York. She was dressed down in cargo pants and a black hoodie. Meadow certainly has a lot to celebrate lately. Last week she marked two-years since privately having a tumor removed, sharing a photo from before her procedure. Pinch me! Gushing about her accomplishment on Instagram, the beautiful brunette wrote: 'MY FIRST VOGUE COVER!! @voguekorea Thank you so much to the amazing team <3 A dream come true' Healthy: Last week she marked two-years since privately having a tumor removed, sharing a photo from before her procedure She gave a thumbs up while her hair was tucked under a surgical bonnet, and captioned the shot saying: '2 years ago today. Ive come a very long way. 'Bye bye tumor. Blessed & grateful.' Before her health milestone Meadow hit a personal high, tying the knot with actor Louis Thorton Allan in the Dominican Republic in October. Walker announced her marriage just three months after their engagement. Puppy love: Later on the star was seen out with her dog and new husband Louis Thornton-Allan in the SoHo neighborhood of New York Fur baby: The smiled and doted on their doggy during the outing Casual: She was dressed down in cargo pants and a black hoodie Louis is studying acting at the prestigious Stella Adler school in New York City and recently starred in a music video for Blu DeTiger's song Vintage. Meadow, who was 15 at the time of her father's tragic car crash on November 30, 2013, has established a nonprofit in her father's memory called The Paul Walker Foundation, which is aimed at marine science. She was walked down the aisle by her godfather, Vin. Hitched! The model tied the knot with actor Louis Thorton Allan in the Dominican Republic in October Family first: The model was walked down the aisle by her godfather Vin, and announced the big news by posting video of the nuptials to her Instagram account In June, the franchise's Vin opened up to Extra about being Meadow's godfather and admitted that he feels 'very protective' of the young model. 'She's the first person on Father's Day to wish me Happy Father's Day,' he told the outlet. The actor continued: 'To see her with my children is one of the most beautiful things. 'There are moments when I see her playing with [his daughter] Pauline and it hits me so deep cause I can only imagine what my brother sees when he sees that.' She has broadened her horizons from modeling to acting. And now Cindy Crawford's daughter Kaia Gerber is taking on a role that has been played by top talents over the decades. The 20-year-old model will be playing Daisy Buchanan in a table read of The Great Gatsby for amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, Variety reports. New venture: Kaia Gerber will be playing Daisy Buchanan in a table read of The Great Gatsby for amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, Variety reports In a new trailer for the table read, which is being put on by Acting For A Cause, Kaia can be seen decked out in full 1920s flapper gear. Daisy is the leading lady in the Jazz Age fable, attempting to juggle her affair with Gatsby alongside her marriage to the wealthy Tom Buchanan. The trailer shows Kaia acting as if she is near tears while reading the scene where Daisy is confronted by both of the men in her life. 'Oh, you want too much!' says Kaia emotionally, flapping one hand: 'I love you now, isnt that enough? I cant help whats past. I did love him once but I love you too.' Looking fab: Bringing her modeling skills to bear on the project, she posed up a storm in her flapper gear for a string of publicity stills There they are: Kaia is pictured at the table read desk next to Nat Wolff, who will be seen playing the title role of Jay Gatsby Swanking about: Her jewelry included earrings by Samer Halimeh, bracelets by Effy Jewelry and Graziela Gems and rings by Leo Mathid and Kallati Moment of levity: Kaia was able to enjoy laugh during the table read while sitting beside Jake Picking who is playing her character's husband Tom Buchanan Nat Wolff can be seen on one side of her playing Jay Gatsby while Jake Picking is seated on the other playing Tom Buchanan. Near the end of the novel the narrator Nick Carraway remarks: 'They were careless people, Tom and Daisy they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together and let other people clean up the mess they had made.' Directed by Brando Crawford, Kaia is joined in the cast by such names as Kahyun Kim and Booksmart actor Mason Gooding. Josephine Langford, who has acted in the After films, will be featuring in the cast as Daisy's pal Jordan who strikes up a romance with Gatsby's pal Nick. Torn: The trailer shows Kaia acting as if she is near tears while reading the scene where Daisy is confronted by both of the men in her life 'I did love him once but I love you too': 'Oh, you want too much!' says Kaia emotionally, flapping one hand: 'I love you now, isnt that enough? I cant help whats past' Stylist Jared Eng has dressed the cast in Dolce And Gabbana to evoke the period feeling of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel, which was published in 1925. Dolce And Gabbana, the top sponsor of the table read, has also agreed to match each donation up to $15,000 to amfAR. 'Having the opportunity to play Daisy was such an honor. The Great Gatsby has always been one of my favorite books, and I always felt there were so many layers to Daisy in particular,' Kaia told Variety this week. What a lineup: Directed by Brando Crawford (second from right), Kaia is joined in the cast by such names as Kahyun Kim (right) and Mason Gooding (third from right) Cast list: Josephine Langford, who has acted in the After films, will be featuring in the cast as Daisy's pal Jordan who strikes up a romance with Gatsby's pal Nick Sweet: 'Being able to do this alongside incredible actors and for an important cause made the experience so much more meaningful to me,' said Kaia 'I loved exploring those layers on a deeper level. Being able to do this alongside incredible actors and for an important cause made the experience so much more meaningful to me,' added the showbiz legacy. Bringing her modeling skills to bear on the project, she posed up a storm in her flapper gear for a string of publicity stills. Her jewelry included earrings by Samer Halimeh, bracelets by Effy Jewelry and Graziela Gems and rings by Leo Mathid and Kallati. Incidentally: Dolce And Gabbana, the top sponsor of the table read, has also agreed to match each donation up to $15,000 to amfAR Fan: 'The Great Gatsby has always been one of my favorite books, and I always felt there were so many layers to Daisy in particular,' Kaia told Variety Predecessors: Nat's role has previously been occupied by such Hollywood heartthrobs as Robert Redford and Leonardo DiCaprio In a striking period touch Kaia's outfit included an elaborate white feathered headpiece designed by Rinaldy Yunardi. Daisy has been played in previous film adaptations of The Great Gatsby by such names as Betty Field, Mia Farrow and Carey Mulligan. Stage adaptations include plays by Owen Davis and Simon Levy, as well as an opera that has seen Daisy sung by famous sopranos Dawn Upshaw and Maria Bengtsson. Character: Daisy is the leading lady in the Jazz Age fable, attempting to juggle her affair with Gatsby alongside her marriage to the wealthy Tom Buchanan Many wondered if she was the 'actress' mentioned in Taylor Swift's newly-released extended version of All Too Well. But Jennifer Aniston didn't seem bothered by the speculation from Swifties on her latest outing. The 52-year-old actress looked fresh-faced while out and about in West Hollywood on Monday. Simply stunning: Jennifer Aniston looked fresh-faced while out and about in West Hollywood on Monday Jennifer looked absolutely radiant as she kept her look simple with a body clinging black turtleneck sweater and relaxed fit light blue jeans. She teamed the top and bottom combination with a pair of black suede heels. Jennifer did add a bit of luxury extravagance to her look as she lugged along a black leather Gucci Diana tote bag featuring iconic bamboo handles. Wow factor: The 52-year-old actress looked absolutely radiant Casual cool: She kept her look simple with a body clinging black turtleneck sweater and relaxed fit light blue jeans Pretty: The A-list actress showcased her radiant face with minimal make-up as her highlighted blonde locks were worn down in a middle part In the details: She teamed the top and bottom combination with a pair of black suede heels Good spirits: She looked relaxed as the wind blew around her hair The A-list actress showcased her radiant face with minimal make-up as her highlighted blonde locks were worn down in a middle part. She added a bit of specs appeal with a pair of black plastic rimmed eyeglasses. Jennifer had her hands full as she not only held on to her designer bag but also a forest green teddy coat and bottle of Fiji water. This comes after rampant speculation who the 'actress' was in Taylor Swift's latest song as some named Aniston as a possibility. Rocking it: Jennifer did add a bit of luxury extravagance to her look as she lugged along a black leather Gucci Diana tote bag featuring iconic bamboo handles Stunning: She added a bit of specs appeal with a pair of black plastic rimmed eyeglasses Juggling act: Jennifer had her hands full as she not only held on to her designer bag but also a forest green teddy coat Keeping safe: She was joined by a security detail Moving on: She also gripped onto a Fiji water bottle and her cell phone Making moves: No doubt she had a busy day ahead of her Sturdy: She gripped onto the handrail while making her way down the stairs All eyes on her: No doubt fans were excited to see the Friends star The pop star, 31, remembers her heartbreak in the 10-minute track - which has long been believed to be about actor Jake Gyllenhaal - singing: 'Now I'm weeping in a party bathroom / Some actress asking me what happened / You, that's what happened.' As Swifties believed the Friends star was the actress in question, Aniston's close friend Jennifer Meyer took to Instagram to debunk that theory. 'NOT TRUE PEOPLE!!! YOU HAAVE THE WRONG ACTRESS' the A-list jeweler commented under an E! News post about Taylor's track. Fan originally pegged Aniston as the gal in question based on a 2011 New York Daily News article, with the headline: 'Jennifer Aniston gives Taylor Swift love advice: 'Hang in there, everything will be okay.' Try again: Taylor Swift fans might be disappointed to learn Aniston is not the mystery actress mentioned in the new, extended version of All Too Well Other fans wondered if Anne Hathaway, who starred with Jake in 2010s Love & Other Drugs, was the mystery thespian. During a recently resurfaced Glamour UK interview from 2015, the Princess Diaries star said: 'She just seems to be following her heart. 'I met her I hope its OK to say this when she and Jake were together. She was 20 at the time and we hung out one night. I was like, "You are a magnificent creature."' 'She was on fire and Ive watched her become this force of nature,' Anne added. Romance: The pop star, 31, remembers her heartbreak in the reimagined track, which has long been believed to be about actor Jake Gyllenhaal, singing: 'Now I'm weeping in a party bathroom / Some actress asking me what happened / You, that's what happened.' They're seen together in November 2010 Sorry folks: While Swifties initially believed Jennifer Aniston was the actress in question, Aniston's close friend Jennifer Meyer took to Instagram to debunk that theory Although fans have long speculated that All Too Well was written about Jake, he and Taylor had a surprisingly short-lived romance. The two only dated from October through December of 2010, and the People's Choice Awards occurred on January 5 of 2011. Although Taylor has never confirmed that the song is about the Donnie Darko star, she delved into her tortured mental state when she wrote it during a Tonight Show appearance last Thursday. 'I showed up for rehearsals and I just was really upset, and sad, and everybody could tell, it was really, like, not fun to be around me that day,' Taylor explained to host Jimmy Fallon. 'So I started playing guitar and just kind of playing the same four chords over and over again. Source: Fan originally pegged Aniston as the gal in question based on a 2011 New York Daily News article, with the headline: 'Jennifer Aniston gives Taylor Swift love advice: 'Hang in there, everything will be okay' Could be Anne: Other fans wondered if Anne Hathaway, who starred with Jake in 2010s Love & Other Drugs, was the mystery thespian. She's seen in 2019 above 'And I just started, kind of, the band sort of joined in, and I started ad-libbing what I was going through, and what I was feeling, and it went on, and the song kept building and building and building in intensity, and the song just went on for about, you know, 10 to 15 minutes of us doing this,' she said. The longer version includes lines suggesting that the couple split due to their age difference. 'You said if we had been closer in age maybe it would have been fine / And that made me want to die,' she sings. Rehearsals for her tour began in early 2011, and the song was released in its shortened version in 2012 on the original version of Red, which would fit the timeline if it was written about the actor. Taylor told Fallon that she was most excited for her fans to hear the longer version out of all the material on Red (Taylor's Version), which she signaled by making her directorial debut with a short film to accompany the song which she stars in with Sadie Sink, 19, and Dylan O'Brien, 30. She's the Hollywood star who has embraced a more low-key and laidback life in Perth, Australia. And on Monday, American actress Kate Walsh proved she's just like the rest of us as she was spotted cleaning up after her dog at a local park in her new hometown. The 54-year-old Grey's Anatomy star appeared in high spirits as she went for a walk in the park with her pup, saying she's 'happy' to be back in Perth. Just like the rest of us! On Monday, American actress Kate Walsh proved she's just like the rest of us as she was spotted cleaning up after her dog at a local park in her new hometown of Perth, Australia Kate dressed casually for the outing, showing off her trim pins in a pair of shorts and wearing a black jacket. She finished her look with a trucker cap and a pair of black sandals and dark sunglasses. Kate told photographers she's 'happy to be in Perth again and will be start rehearsal for her project at the state theatre soon'. Low-key: Kate dressed casually, showing off her trim pins in a pair of shorts and wearing a black jacket. Kate first relocated to Western Australia in March last year, right at the start of the Covid pandemic, and quickly fell in love with Perth. She previously told The Daily Telegraph she enjoyed living in the city so much she didn't want to return to New York City, even when she was able to. 'I didn't really want to go back to New York in the middle of a pandemic when it was pretty gnarly to say the least," she said. New hometown: Kate first relocated to Western Australia in March last year, right at the start of the Covid pandemic, and quickly fell in love with Perth 'I couldn't go home initially, and now that I can, I don't really fancy going back. When I have my own mother saying don't come home, my 86-year-old mum we are in a very challenging time!' Kate jetted off to Paris in June, presumably to shoot the Netflix show Emily in Paris. She returned to Australia once production wrapped. Advertisement She may be an attention magnet, but Bella Thorne shunned the spotlight as she celebrated her mother Tamara Thorne's wedding to her longtime partner Ross in Mexico. The actress, 24, was spotted preparing for her mother's special day at their suite in Puerto Vallarta on Tuesday. Bella dropped jaws twice that day - first in a skimpy black bikini which put her fabulous body on display, followed by a plunging black bridesmaid dress. Wedding bells! Bella Thorne served as a bridesmaid at her mother Tamara Thorne's wedding to Ross in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico on Tuesday Cheeky! Thorne put her backside on display in a thong bikini as she held hands with her fiance Benjamin Mascolo The Disney star looked stunning in a plunging black number which fit her like a glove. Bella looked breathtaking with her scarlet tresses styled into loose waves with a chic side part. The superstar, who is engaged to boyfriend Benjamin Mascolo, carried an ornate bouquet as she posed up a storm with her fellow bridesmaids. In addition to striking poses in their gowns, the ladies were seen taking the requisite pre-wedding photographs in their white robes. Taking the plunge: Thorne appeared to be smoking something in her plunging black bridesmaid dress Bikini babe! The actress was first spotted kicking back in a skimpy swimsuit Strike a pose! Bella posed up a storm with her fellow bridesmaids Bella's fiance Benjamin was also spotted hanging out with the rest of the party. The hunk, who performs as a solo artist under the name B3N, put his many tattoos and toned body on display as he hung out with the swimsuit-clad gang shirtless. At one point, he was seen tenderly holding hands with his bikini-clad other half. After some fun in the sun, it was time Tamara and Ross to officially become man and wife. Hubba hubba! Bella's fiance Benjamin put his toned and tattooed body on display It takes two! It won't be much longer until it's Bella's turn to walk down the aisle Making memories: Mascolo appeared to be taking photos of his stunning fiance Before and after! Thorne got her hair and makeup done in a white robe before changing into the glamorous gown All eyes were on Bella's mother Tamara once she emerged from the suite in her beautiful white wedding gown. Tamara turned every head wearing a plunging gown with sweeping train and veil cascading over her loose waves. The bride was later seen exchanging vows with her husband beneath an arch decorated with a flowing white sheet and hanging florals. The couple gazed tenderly at one another as they said 'I do' just feet away from the sand. Strike a pose! The ladies took the requisite pre-wedding photos in their robes All glammed up! The bridesmaids were looking and feeling their best in their ultra-stylish looks Picture perfect: Photographers captured the pre-wedding fun Flower power! Thorne and a fellow bridesmaid posed about with their elegant bouquets Bella watched on from the sidelines with the rest of the bridesmaids, standing behind the others with her exquisite bouquet in hand. It won't be much longer until it's Bella's turn to walk down the aisle. The musical couple were first linked in April of 2019 and in March of this year they announced their engagement. In September, Mascolo opened up about his plans for their wedding, telling ET that they think the nuptials could take place next summer. Here comes the bride! Tamara made her grand entrance in a stunning white wedding dress with plunging neckline Model behavior! The bridesmaids were having a blast posing it up for the camera I do! Tamara and Ross exchanged vows beneath an arch decorated with florals and a sweeping white sheet 'It's going to be, we think that'd be next year, next summer. We hope between June, July, August. The truth is, we have so much work, we want to find the time to enjoy the wedding. We don't want to rush it,' he said. 'We don't want it to be between jobs and projects because it's such an important moment of our life because it has to be the best days of our life. And it's already stressful to organize a big wedding like we want to do, so that's already enough on our plate,' he said. Benjamin also said they planned on doing two weddings - one in the U.S. and another in Italy. Soulmates: The couple gazed at one another as they solidified their union before loved ones Touching: Thorne watched on intently as her mother became a Mrs. The site of their Italian wedding would likely be Lake Como, where the couple went in the early days of their relationship. 'We're already working on it, because big weddings take a lot of time to organize. What we can say, is that we want to do two. We want to do one in the U.S., in Los Angeles, and one in Italy. And it's most probably going to be Lake Como because we love Lake Como,' he explained. 'Ben took me there when we first started dating and I said, "You know, if we ever get married, we'll get married here,"' Bella said. Stepping up: Bella was seen at the altar with the bride and groom Love story: Meanwhile, Bella and Benjamin were first linked in April of 2019 and in March of this year they announced their engagement. Phoebe Burgess has revealed she was 'f**king furious' after learning her ex-husband Sam had traces of cocaine in his system while on his way to pick up their children Poppy, four, and Billy, two, earlier this year. The retired NRL star, 32, avoided a conviction after pleading guilty to three charges in May following a February 22 police traffic stop where he tested positive for the drug. Phoebe, 32, discussed the incident for the first time on Thursday, telling the No Filter podcast it 'broke a lot of trust in someone who is the father of my children'. Angry: Phoebe Burgess has revealed she was 'f**king furious' after learning her ex-husband Sam had traces of cocaine in his system while on his way to pick up their two children Poppy, four, and Billy, two, earlier this year. The former couple are pictured here in happier times 'That's the first time I have ever been f**king furious,' she told host Mia Freedman. 'I was really angry. This was something I had absolutely no ability to control...' 'I was furious. I was furious at the people around him. I didn't understand how someone could get into that position. 'The first thing I said is, "Who the f**k is looking after him? What is going on?"' Freedman, surprised by her revelation, responded: 'Just listen to what you just said: who is looking after this grown man.' Court matter: The retired NRL star, 32, avoided a conviction after pleading guilty to three charges in May following a February 22 police traffic stop where he tested positive for cocaine. Pictured outside Moss Vale Local Court on May 4 The mother of two calmly responded: 'It takes a lot of work to break things that tie you to someone or something. 'There were a lot of turning points, and that was another turning point that for me broke a lot of trust and a lot of faith in someone who is the father of my children. 'It broke a lot inside of me. And the biggest thing I think that I've spoken about, is mutual respect and having trust. 'That goes beyond marriage when you share children.' In February, Burgess was pulled over at Braemar while on his way to collect daughter Poppy and son Billy from Bowral, about 8km away, and failed a roadside drug test. Incident: Sam had been on his way to collect four-year-old daughter Poppy and two-year-old son Billy from Bowral when police stopped his BMW X5 on the Hume Highway at Braemar A preliminary test detected signs of cocaine in his saliva and Burgess was taken to Southern Highlands police station where a secondary oral fluid test was undertaken. That test returned positive to cocaine. The retired South Sydney Rabbitohs player was also charged with driving an unregistered BMW X5 without a valid NSW drivers licence. Sam avoided a conviction in May; however, he was was ordered to pay $1,162 in fines, was placed on a good behaviour bond for nine months and was asked to complete a traffic offenders program. Magistrate Mark Douglass said at Moss Vale Local Court that Burgess had shown remorse, contrition and insight into his behaviour. Reality TV appearance: Sam had confessed to several indiscretions during his grilling on SAS Australia this year, including that he'd slept with a woman from Melbourne in 2017 behind Phoebe's back Magistrate Douglass also noted Burgess had undergone a 'very arduous and rigorous' four-week residential rehabilitation program after his offending. That program did relate specifically to drugs. Burgess had confessed to several indiscretions during his grilling on reality show SAS Australia this year, including that he'd slept with a woman from Melbourne in 2017 behind Phoebe's back. 'I embarrassed my wife. I'd had an affair with a girl, a woman in Melbourne. That's true,' he said. 'I turned to drinking, taking drugs - I thought I could manage that. Then got pulled [up on a] DUI with drugs in my system, which was all over the press again, which stopped me seeing my kids again. I just checked myself into rehab.' The Burgesses were married for four years before splitting for good in 2019. Aussie model Gabrielle Epstein has gained a massive following on Instagram thanks to her racy bikini snaps. And the 27-year-old showcased one of her most risque looks to date on Thursday as she posed up a storm in a tiny white G-string bikini. The OnlyFans star displayed a serious amount of underboob in her flesh-flashing two-piece as she went for a bike ride. Her wildest look yet! Aussie Playboy model Gabrielle Epstein, 27, showed off some serious underboob in a white G-string bikini while going for a bike ride on Thursday The pictures appear to have been taken in Mexico, where U.S.-based Gabby has been on vacation recently. She left little to the imagination in her bikini, which featured an inverted-style halterneck top with ties that wrapped around the waist. Her bottoms were high-waisted with a G-string design. If you've got it! Gabrielle's bikini featured an inverted-style halterneck top with ties that wrapped around the waist, and the bottoms were high-waisted with a G-string design 'Biking in Neena Swim,' Gabby captioned the photos. It comes after Gabrielle fired back at critics who claimed her social media posts were too explicit. Speaking to Maxim, she called out the 'toxic double standard' between how men and women are treated differently on Instagram. Having her say: It comes after Gabrielle fired back at critics who claimed her social media posts were too explicit. Speaking to Maxim, she called out the 'toxic double standard' between how men and women are treated differently on Instagram 'There are plenty of photos of men without their shirts on showing their nipples but the fact that mine can be covered and a photo still gets removed creates a very toxic double standard,' she said. 'We are all human, we are all born with bodies and we should not be taught to be ashamed of how they look in a natural state.' She said she'd turned to OnlyFans to get around Instagram's censorship. 'I also feel like I can be more of myself on OnlyFans,' she said. 'To me showing my body isn't about me being objectified, it's about me feeling confident, powerful and beautiful in my own skin.' She recently found love with boyfriend Aaron Rizzatti following her split from farmer Matt Trewin in August. And Farmer Wants A Wife star Tara Hurl showed off her best assets on Tuesday as she posed for a stunning bikini photo shoot. The 25-year-old donned an itsy-bitsy blue two-piece in a gallery of Instagram snaps. Bikini babe: Farmer Wants A Wife star Tara Hurl showed off her best assets on Tuesday as she posed for a stunning bikini photo shoot at Sorrento Back Beach in the Mornington Peninsula 'From where Id rather be,' she captioned the photos, which were taken at Sorrento Back Beach in the Mornington Peninsula. Back in August, Tara debuted her relationship with new beau Aaron. She shared a series of loved-up photos to Instagram of the pair, just a day after confirming her split with on-screen lover Matt. Cheeky view! 'From where Id rather be,' she captioned the photos Romance: Back in August, Tara debuted her relationship with new beau Aaron Rizzatti She captioned the post: 'The world works in mysterious ways. We came in to each other's lives when the timing wasn't right and then found each other again right at the perfect moment. 'The last seven months with you have been an absolute dream and I'm forever grateful for all your love and the immense amount of maturity and understanding you've shown me, especially in the past month. 'You always dream of meeting someone who you just click with, who you can be your complete self around and finding comfort in knowing they wouldn't change a single thing about you.' New love: She shared a series of loved-up photos to Instagram of the pair, just a day after confirming her split with on-screen lover Matt Tara said the pair had been on an 'emotional rollercoaster' over the past few months but 'we are already strong enough to get through even the toughest days'. She continued: 'From having to relive me "dating" someone on national television, watching me go through every emotion under the sun and still being there with a smile on your face, having to hide our relationship, to looking after me in hospital after I almost broke my back and then taking me surfing four days later, having you being relocated numerous times for work, and me following close behind.' Tara also thanked Aaron, his friends and family for welcoming her 'wholeheartedly into their lives and being accepting and understanding'. Down-low: She thanked Aaron, his friends and family for being so understanding and agreeing to keep quiet about their relationship while Farmer Wants A Wife aired on TV Tara and Matt confirmed they were no longer together during the FWAW reunion. The much-awaited finale saw a mammoth 1.37 million viewers tune in across Australia to see which of the five farmers ultimately found love. Seven enjoyed a 28 per cent rise year-on-year in viewership for the night, and was crowned the number one commercial free-to-air network. Jeremy Renner brushed off abuse accusations made by his ex-wife Sonni Pacheco in a new interview in which he explained why he doesn't engage in a public back-and-forth on the issue. The Academy Award-nominated actor, 50, was asked about the claims in a chat with Mens Health published Wednesday, and said he doesn't 'respond publicly or privately to nonsense,' as a response 'only empowers it.' The Modesto, California native added, 'If you respond to it, you give it gas. I dont fuel s*** fires. I just dont do it. I refuse to.' The latest: Jeremy Renner, 50, brushed off abuse accusations made by his ex-wife Sonni Pacheco in a new interview in which he explained why he doesn't engage in a public back-and-forth on the issue. He was snapped last month in London The Avengers actor and Pacheco, 30, wed in 2014 and split later that year, with their divorce finalized the following year. The former partners are parents to daughter, Ava, eight, and Pacheco has leveled a number of claims at the Hawkeye actor amid their custody battle. Pacheco in 2019 said in court docs filed in Los Angeles that Renner had threatened he would fatally shoot her and himself, TMZ reported. She claimed that the actor had been verbally abusive to her and had issues with drug abuse, which Renner denied. A rep for the Mayor of Kingstown actor told US Weekly in October of 2019, 'The well-being of his daughter Ava has always been and continues to be the primary focus for Jeremy. This is a matter for the court to decide. Details: The Avengers actor and Pacheco, 30, wed in 2014 and split later that year, with their divorce finalized the following year. She was snapped in 2016 in LA The Modesto, California native said of the claims, 'If you respond to it, you give it gas. I dont fuel s*** fires. I just dont do it. I refuse to' 'Its important to note the dramatizations made in Sonnis declaration are a one-sided account made with a specific goal in mind.' The couple's public clash made headlines last year at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, when Renner submit court docs in an effort to have his child support payments lowered, citing a lack of work as the studios had shut down at the time. She subsequently told Page Six in a statement, 'It is very disheartening that in a time of global crisis there is yet another attempt to reduce funds I rely on to provide for our child.' In May of 2020, Renner submit court docs claiming that Pacheco had taken funds in excess of $50,000 from their daughter's trust fund over a two-year period, and had 'used those funds for her own personal benefit ... to pay property taxes, attorneys fees, and other expenses completely unrelated to the minor,' US Weekly reported. Pacheco told the outlet in response that she was 'sick of being continually bullied, having my name slandered, and the truth muted' in the ongoing conflict. She added, 'Anyone who is a parent knows that the most important thing in the world is their childs health and safety. Over the years, its hard to fathom what Ive seen and what people have told me theyve seen in regards to Jeremys disturbing actions while our child is in his care.' Drinking coffee or tea may be linked with a lower risk of stroke and dementia, new research suggests. The study also indicates drinking coffee may be associated with a lower risk of post-stroke dementia. Researchers studied 365,682 participants from the UK Biobank study, who were recruited between 2006 and 2010 and followed them until 2020. At the start, participants self-reported how much coffee and tea they drank. Over the study period, 5,079 participants developed dementia and 10,053 experienced at least one stroke. Drinking coffee or tea may be linked with a lower risk of stroke and dementia, new research suggests (file photo) Researchers found that people who drank two to three cups of coffee, or three to five cups of tea per day, or a combination of four to six cups of coffee and tea had the lowest incidence of stroke or dementia. While those who drank two to three cups of coffee and two to three cups of tea daily had a 32 per cent lower risk of stroke. According to the study they also had a 28 per cent lower risk of dementia compared with those who did not drink tea or coffee. The research, by Yuan Zhang and colleagues from Tianjin Medical University, China, further suggests that intake of coffee alone or in combination with tea is associated with lower risk of post-stroke dementia. However, the scientists highlight that the UK Biobank reflects a relatively healthy sample relative to the general population which could restrict the ability to generalise these associations. Additionally, relatively few people developed dementia or stroke which can make it difficult to extrapolate rates accurately to larger populations. The study also indicates drinking coffee may be associated with a lower risk of post-stroke dementia (file photo) Finally, while it is possible that coffee and tea consumption might be protective against stroke, dementia and post-stroke dementia, researchers say causality cannot be concluded from the associations. Writing in the Plos Medicine journal, the authors said: 'Our findings suggested that moderate consumption of coffee and tea separately or in combination were associated with lower risk of stroke and dementia.' Dr Rosa Sancho, head of research at Alzheimer's Research UK, said: 'Participants only reported tea and coffee consumption at the beginning of the study, and there is no data on long-term habits, so it's not clear how relevant the findings are to long-term brain health. 'While previous studies have looked at associations between tea and coffee consumption and better brain health, there has been inconsistency in findings. 'Future research with participants of a range of ages and ethnicities will be needed to fully understand what types of dementia and stroke are associated with tea and coffee drinking. 'Participants in this study reported themselves to be mainly White British (96 per cent), therefore we cannot infer an association that is relevant to everyone in the UK.' New Delhi: New Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett is set to visit India next year and both countries are working on the tentative dates, the country's envoy told ANI. "We are working on it (Israel PM's visit to India). We don't have a date yet but hopefully, it's not at the beginning of the year. Maybe, in the middle of the (next) year," said $25 million of adjusted working capital. OIL AND GAS TERMS The Company uses the following frequently recurring oil and gas industry terms in the MD&A: Liquids bbls Barrels Bbl/d Barrels per day NGLs Natural gas liquids (includes condensate, pentane, butane, propane, and ethane) Condensate Pentane and heavier hydrocarbons Natural Gas Mcf Thousands of cubic feet Mcf/d Thousands of cubic feet per day MMbtu Million of British thermal units MMbtu/d Million of British thermal units per day Oil Equivalent Boe Barrels of oil equivalent Boe/d Barrels of oil equivalent per day Disclosure provided herein in respect of a boe may be misleading, particularly if used in isolation. A boe conversion rate of six thousand cubic feet of natural gas to one barrel of oil equivalent has been used for the calculation of boe amounts in the MD&A. This boe conversion rate is based on an energy equivalency conversion method primarily applicable at the burner tip and does not represent a value equivalency at the wellhead. NON-GAAP MEASURES This news release refers to certain financial measures that are not determined in accordance with IFRS (or "GAAP"). This news release contains the terms "adjusted funds flow", "adjusted funds flow per share", "adjusted working capital (deficiency), "operating netback" and "net operating expenses" which do not have any standardized meaning prescribed by GAAP and therefore may not be comparable to similar measures used by other companies. The Company uses these measures to help evaluate its performance. For additional information relating to Non-GAAP Measures please refer to the Company's MD&A for the three and nine months ended September 30, 2021, which is available under the Company's profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Management uses adjusted funds flow (used) to analyze performance and considers it a key measure as it demonstrates the Company's ability to generate the cash necessary to fund future capital investments and abandonment obligations and to repay debt, if any. Adjusted funds flow (used) is a non-GAAP measure and has been defined by the Company as cash flow from (used in) operating activities excluding the change in non-cash working capital related to operating activities, expenditures on decommissioning obligations, and transaction costs on property dispositions. The Company also presents adjusted funds flow (used) per share whereby amounts per share are calculated using weighted average shares outstanding, consistent with the calculation of net earnings (loss) per share. Adjusted funds flow (used) is reconciled from cash flow from (used in) operating activities under the heading "Cash Flow From Operations and Adjusted Funds Flow" in the MD&A. Management uses adjusted working capital (deficiency) as a measure to assess the Company's financial position. Adjusted working capital (deficiency) includes current assets less current liabilities excluding the effects of any current portion of risk management contracts. Adjusted working capital (deficiency) is reconciled to working capital (deficiency) under the heading "Liquidity and Capital Resources" in the MD&A. Management considers operating netback an important measure as it demonstrates its profitability relative to current commodity prices. Operating netback, which is calculated as average unit sales price less royalties, net operating expenses, and transportation and marketing expenses, represents the cash margin for every barrel of oil equivalent sold. Operating netback per boe is reconciled to net earnings (loss) per boe under the heading "Operating Netback" in the MD&A. Net operating expenses is calculated as operating expenses less processing revenues. Management uses net operating expenses to determine the current periods' cash cost of operating expenses less processing revenue and net operating expenses per boe is used to measure operating efficiency on a comparative basis. The measure approximates the Company's operating expenses relative to its produced volumes by excluding third party operating costs. PRODUCT TYPES The Company uses the following references to sales volumes in this news release: Natural gas refers to shale gas Oil and condensate refers to condensate, light and medium crude oil, and tight oil combined Other NGLs refers to butane, propane and ethane combined Oil and NGLs refers to light and medium crude oil, tight oil, and NGLs combined Oil equivalent refers to the total oil equivalent of shale gas, light and medium crude oil, tight oil, and NGLs combined, using the conversion rate of six thousand cubic feet of shale gas to one barrel of oil equivalent as described above. The following is a complete breakdown of sales volumes for applicable periods by specific product types of shale gas, light and medium crude oil, tight oil, and NGLs: Sales Volumes by Product Type Q1 2021 Q2 2021 Q3 2021 YTD Q3 2021 Condensate (bbls/d) 124 79 68 90 Other NGLs (bbls/d) 41 34 26 34 NGLs (bbls/d) 165 113 94 124 Light and medium crude oil (bbls/d) - - - - Tight oil (bbls/d) 354 318 231 300 Condensate (bbls/d) 124 79 68 90 Oil and condensate (bbls/d) 478 397 299 390 Other NGLs (bbls/d) 41 34 26 34 Oil and NGLs (bbls/d) 519 431 325 424 Shale gas (mcf/d) 13,053 10,559 8,953 10,840 Natural gas (mcf/d) 13,053 10,559 8,953 10,840 Oil equivalent (boe/d) 2,695 2,191 1,817 2,231 Sales Volumes by Product Type Q1 2020 Q2 2020 Q3 2020 YTD Q3 2020 Condensate (bbls/d) 144 166 145 153 Other NGLs (bbls/d) 271 317 248 278 NGLs (bbls/d) 415 483 393 431 Light and medium crude oil (bbls/d) 41 - - 14 Tight oil (bbls/d) 406 645 397 481 Condensate (bbls/d) 144 166 145 153 Oil and condensate (bbls/d) 591 811 542 648 Other NGLs (bbls/d) 271 317 248 278 Oil and NGLs (bbls/d) 862 1,128 790 926 Shale gas (mcf/d) 12,354 16,019 13,739 14,036 Natural gas (mcf/d) 12,354 16,019 13,739 14,036 Oil equivalent (boe/d) 2,921 3,797 3,080 3,266 FORWARD-LOOKING INFORMATION This news release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information within the meaning of applicable securities laws. The use of any of the words "expect", "anticipate", "continue", "estimate", "may", "will", "should", "believe", "intends", "forecast", "plans", "guidance" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements or information. More particularly and without limitation, this news release contains forward-looking statements and information relating to the Company's risk management program, oil and condensate, other NGLs, and natural gas production, capital programs, adjusted working capital, and debt. The forward-looking statements and information are based on certain key expectations and assumptions made by the Company, including expectations and assumptions relating to prevailing commodity prices and exchange rates, applicable royalty rates and tax laws, future well production rates, the performance of existing wells, the success of drilling new wells, the availability of capital to undertake planned activities, and the availability and cost of labour and services. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements and information are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Since forward-looking statements and information address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated due to a number of factors and risks. These include, but are not limited to, the risks associated with the oil and gas industry in general such as operational risks in development, exploration and production, delays or changes in plans with respect to exploration or development projects or capital expenditures, the uncertainty of estimates and projections relating to production rates, costs, and expenses, commodity price and exchange rate fluctuations, marketing and transportation, environmental risks, competition, the ability to access sufficient capital from internal and external sources and changes in tax, royalty, and environmental legislation. The forward-looking statements and information contained in this document are made as of the date hereof for the purpose of providing the readers with the Company's expectations for the coming year. The forward-looking statements and information may not be appropriate for other purposes. The Company undertakes no obligation to update publicly or revise any forward-looking statements or information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, unless so required by applicable securities laws. Leucrotta is an oil and natural gas company, actively engaged in the acquisition, development, exploration, and production of oil and natural gas reserves in northeastern British Columbia, Canada. Further Information For additional information, please contact: Leucrotta Exploration Inc. Suite 700, 639 - 5th Avenue SW Calgary, Alberta T2P 0M9 Phone: (403) 705-4525 www.leucrotta.ca Mr. Robert J. Zakresky President and Chief Executive Officer Mr. Nolan Chicoine Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer 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/103866 VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / November 17, 2021 / NeonMind Biosciences Inc. (CSE:NEON)(OTCQB:NMDBF)(FRA:6UF) ("NeonMind' or the "Company"), an integrated drug development and wellness company, is pleased to announce that President and CEO, Rob Tessarolo, is scheduled to participate in a panel discussion at Lift & Co. Expo's new Psychedelics Business Summit, on November 19, 2021, in Toronto. The panel entitled, "Business Leaders: Committing to Business Strategies and Approaches that Will Benefit Patients - and Investors,' will include Canada's leading psychedelics entrepreneurs in medical research, clinical therapy, product innovation and business investment. Lift Psychedelics Business Summit Place: Metro Toronto Convention Center, North Building Date: Friday, November 19, 2021 Time: 2:45 pm - 3:45 pm EST Registration: liftexpo.ca Building on the success of psychedelics content launched at the Cannabis Business Conference Vancouver in 2020, The Lift Psychedelics Business Summit will take a deep dive into psychedelics research and the psychedelics industry. It is structured to offer attendees the most up-to-date business intelligence, specifically on the four pillars of today's psychedelic renaissance: medical research, legalization and investment for a professional and business-focused audience. About NeonMind Biosciences Inc. NeonMind operates two divisions: (i) a pharmaceutical division engaged in drug development of psychedelic compounds with two lead psilocybin-based drug candidates targeting obesity; and (ii) a medical services division focused on launching specialty mental health clinics that integrate psychedelic therapeutics into traditional psychotherapy settings. In its pharmaceutical division, NeonMind has two distinct psilocybin drug development programs targeting obesity. NeonMind's lead candidate, NEO-001, employs psilocybin as an agonist at the serotonin 5- HT2A receptor, which is involved in the hallucinogenic effect of psychedelics. The Company's second drug candidate, NEO-002, employs low-dose psilocybin as an agonist at the 5-HT2C receptor, which controls appetite. NeonMind established a medical services division with the goal of launching NeonMind-branded specialty mental health clinics in Canada that incorporate evidence-backed innovative treatments to address a variety of mental health needs. For more information on NeonMind, go to www.NeonMindBiosciences.com. Rob Tessarolo, President & Chief Executive Officer, NeonMind Biosciences Inc. rob@neonmind.com Tel: 416-750-3101 Investor Relations: KCSA Strategic Communications Scott Eckstein/Tim Regan neonmind@kcsa.com Tel: 212-896-1210 The Canadian Securities Exchange has not reviewed, approved nor disapproved the contents of this news release. Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements contained in this press release constitute forward-looking information. These statements relate to future events or NeonMind's future performance. The use of any of the words "could", "expect", "believe", "will", "projected", "estimated" and similar expressions and statements relating to matters that are not historical facts are intended to identify forward-looking information and are based on NeonMind's current belief or assumptions as to the outcome and timing of such future events. Actual future results may differ materially. In particular, NeonMind's drug development plans, its ability to retain key personnel, and its expectation as to the development of its intellectual property and other steps in its preclinical and clinical drug development constitute forward-looking information. Actual results and developments may differ materially from those contemplated by forward-looking information. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking information. The statements made in this press release are made as of the date hereof. NeonMind disclaims any intention or obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be expressly required by applicable securities laws. SOURCE: NeonMind Biosciences Inc. View source version on accesswire.com:https://www.accesswire.com/673269/NeonMind-to-Participate-in-Panel-Discussion-at-Lift-Co-Expos-Psychedelics-Business-Summit-on-November-19-2021 Vancouver, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - November 17, 2021) - Cabral Gold Inc. (TSXV: CBR) (OTC PINK: CBGZF) ("Cabral" or the "Company") is pleased to provide an update regarding the ongoing drilling and exploration program within the NW-SE trending Central trend at the Cuiu Cuiu gold district in northern Brazil. Highlights are as follows: Central Gold Deposit : Diamond drilling at the Central gold deposit is in progress and is aimed at defining and delimiting high-grade zones within the deposit which is open both at depth and along strike. A total of 43 holes are planned totaling 5,400m. Previous drilling at Central returned 220m @ 2.0 g/t gold, including 9.8m @ 17.9 g/t gold; 65.8m @ 3.5 g/t gold, including 6.1m @ 23.5 g/t gold; 179.6m @ 1.1 g/t gold, including 5.1m 14.1 g/t gold; and 174.2m @ 1.5 g/t gold including 2m @ 36.2 g/t gold RC drilling at Central is also in progress and is aimed at identifying a gold-in-oxide blanket, resulting from weathering of the underlying primary Central gold deposit. Gold-in-oxide blankets were recently identified at the PDM target and above the MG gold deposit PDM Target : Diamond drilling at PDM is also in progress, testing directly below the recently discovered gold-in-oxide blanket, which has returned up to 40m @ 2.2 g/t gold in oxide material. Limited historic drilling at PDM tested the underlying basement rocks, and returned up to 47m @ 1.8 g/t gold and 30m @ 1.1 g/t gold Mutum and Central SE Targets : Drilling is planned during Q1 2022 at the Mutum and Central SE targets. Limited historic drilling at Central SE returned values of 27m @ 6.9 g/t gold and 8m @ 8.4 g/t gold. At Mutum, which is located 750m SE of PDM, surface trenches returned 32m @ 1g/t, 25.5m @ 0.9g/t and 16.5m @ 0.9g/t gold. The target has never been drill-tested Magnetic and auger geochemical surveys of the 2.5km region between Central and PDM suggests a broad NW-trending structure may connect the two targets. This intervening area has never been drill-tested and will be followed up in 2022 Alan Carter, Cabral's President and CEO commented, "The current drilling campaign has focused in and around the MG gold deposit, and resulted in the discovery of the near surface gold-in-oxide blanket at MG, and the mineralized zone in hard-rock at Machichie. Following these successes, we are turning our attention to the 5km-long Central trend at Cuiu Cuiu, which includes the Central gold deposit and the recently identified PDM gold-in-oxide blanket, located 2.5km to the north. This trend also contains a number of other excellent targets, notably the Central SE target, where historic drilling returned 27m @ 6.9 g/t gold, and the Mutum target where surface trenching previously returned 32m @ 1 g/t gold. These targets, as well as PDM and Central, will be the subject of an aggressive program of follow-up drilling during the coming months." Central Trend at Cuiu Cuiu The NW-trending Central trend at Cuiu Cuiu extends at least 5km in a NW direction. It is defined by coincident and pronounced gold-in-soil and gold-in-auger geochemical anomalies and a magnetic-low geophysical anomaly. The trend contains a number of important targets including (from north to south), PDM, Mutum, Central North, the Central gold deposit and Central SE. It is also parallel to the major NW-trending TZ lineament located 4km to the northeast. The crustal-scale TZ structure is spatially related to all of the known gold deposits in the northern Tapajos, including G Mining Venture Corp's 2Moz TZ deposit. Figure 1: Topographic map showing the location of the MG and Central gold deposits (in red) and the outline of the recently discovered gold-in-oxide blankets at PDM and MG (in beige). The outline of the historic placer gold workings are shown in pale yellow. To view an enhanced version of Figure 1, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/3900/103969_688bc4aa64d8a845_002full.jpg Figure 2: Map showing the 5km-long Central trend at Cuiu Cuiu including the Central gold deposit (in yellow) and the main gold-in-auger soil anomaly (black lines) with the airborne magnetic data. The outline of the historic placer workings and the main targets along the trend are also highlighted To view an enhanced version of Figure 2, please visit: https://orders.newsfilecorp.com/files/3900/103969_688bc4aa64d8a845_003full.jpg Central Gold Deposit The Central deposit is currently the largest gold deposit known at Cuiu Cuiu. It is a NW-trending deposit, which is up to 100m wide and 1.2km in length, and remains open along strike and down-dip. The current resource at Central comprises Indicated Resources of 5.9Mt @ 0.9 g/t gold (200,000oz), and Inferred Resources of 8.7Mt @1.1 g/t gold (300,000oz). Previous drill results at Central include: 134.5m @ 1.1g/t gold; 65.8m @ 3.5 g/t gold including 6.1m @ 23.5 g/t gold; 179.6m @ 1.1 g/t gold including 5.1m 14.1 g/t gold; 174.2m @ 1.5 g/t gold including 2m @ 36.2 g/t gold; and 220m @ 2.0 g/t gold, including 9.8m @ 17.9 g/t gold. A total of 76 historic diamond-drill holes, totaling 23,191m, define the current resource at Central. Within the broader zones of lower grade mineralization, 34 high-grade drill intercepts (>10 g/t Au) were encountered at Central. Historic drilling was designed to delimit a potential open-pit, bulk-tonnage deposit and therefore the high-grade intercepts were not the focus of historical drill programs and hence, were not followed up. Moreover, sections were very wide-spaced (in places over 200 m, but more commonly 100 m apart, to 50 m in the core area), and most sections just had one hole, all drilled to various depths. Of the holes intersecting high grades, only 13 had one or more other holes drilled up-dip or down-dip on the same section, some of these intercepts were nearly 400 m down hole, or close to 350 m deep. As a result, it was not possible to correlate the high-grade intercepts between sections or within sections with any degree of confidence and therefore the orientation of the higher-grade structures and their true widths are not known. Nevertheless, Cabral believes it is important to better define and assess these high-grade intercepts, as several were significantly impacted through implementing top cuts in the 2018 resource estimates. Better defined continuous higher-grade zones could have a material impact on the grade and contained ounces of gold in future resource estimates. Diamond drilling recently commenced at the Central gold deposit, and is aimed at defining and delimiting high-grade zones within the Central gold deposit. A total of 43 holes are planned totaling 5400m. In addition, RC drilling is also in progress designed to test the near surface material for a possible third gold-in-oxide blanket at Cuiu Cuiu above the primary Central gold deposit. A total of 25 RC holes are planned. PDM (Pau de Merenda) Target The PDM target is an important target at Cuiu Cuiu and is located approximately 2.5km NW of the Central gold deposit (Figures 1 and 2). PDM comprises a gold-in-soil anomaly which is similar in size and magnitude to the Central gold deposit. Limited historic diamond drilling (nine holes totaling 2,593m) at this target previously returned encouraging drill results within the underlying bedrock, including; 30m @ 1.1 g/t gold, 47m @ 1.8 g/t gold, and 9m @ 5.1 g/t gold. The recent completion of 31 RC holes at PDM has identified a gold-in-oxide blanket 27 hectares in size. This is akin to the recently identified gold-in-oxide blanket above the primary MG gold deposit. Assay results from the gold-in-oxide blanket have included: 40m @ 2.2 g/t gold, including 7m @ 9.4 g/t gold; 13m @ 0.9 g/t gold; 10m @ 0.9 g/t gold; and 11m @ 0.6 g/t gold (see press releases dated August 10, 2021 and October 28, 2021). Perhaps more importantly, the RC drilling is continuing to define a NW-trending higher grade gold mineralization corridor. This extends at least 500m along strike and may indicate the location of an underlying primary mineralized structure which has eroded to form the gold-in-oxide blanket at PDM. Diamond drilling aimed at testing for the presence of an underlying deposit is currently in progress. A total of five diamond-drill holes have been completed to date from a planned total of 11 initial holes. Results are pending. Mutum Target The Mutum target is located within the Central trend 750m SE of the PDM target and within the Central trend adjacent to extensive alluvial placer gold workings. Trenching of this saprolitized basement target revealed extensive stockwork gold mineralization and alteration akin to that which characterizes the primary gold mineralization at the Central gold deposit and the PDM target. Surface trench results at PDM previously returned 32m @ 1g/t gold, 25.5m @ 0.9g/t gold and 16.5m @ 0.9g/t gold, indicating the possible presence of another gold deposit. Central North Target The Central North target is located 1km NW of the Central gold deposit (Figure 2). Ten diamond-drill holes totaling 3,470m were previously drilled at this target. The best intervals included 39.4m @ 1.3 g/t gold, 20m @ 0.6 g/t gold and 19m @ 0.5 g/t gold. The drill spacing was however wide and results are not yet clearly understood. No drilling has been previously completed between the Central North and PDM targets and this part of the Central Trend will also be tested during H1 2022. In particular the Mutum target has never been drill-tested but is expected to be drilled during Q1 2022. Central SE Target The Central SE target area covers at least 1km in strike length and is located directly along strike and SE of the Central Gold Deposit (Figure 2). The area is characterized by unexplained historic placer gold workings, and a large unexplained gold-in-soil anomaly. Limited historic drilling on this target has returned gold values including 27m @ 6.9g/t gold, including 14m @ 13.1 g/t gold, and 8m @ 8.4g/t gold. Follow-up diamond drilling is planned at Central SE during Q2 2022, and is designed to test for the SE extension to the Central gold deposit. Other Drilling at Cuiu Cuiu Diamond drilling at the MG gold deposit is continuing with the objective of further defining and delimiting high-grade zones of mineralization along strike and down-dip. Results are currently pending on nine drill holes, and a further 26 diamond-drill holes are planned. Results are currently pending on five diamond drill holes at the Alonso target which is located 3km SE of the MG gold deposit. Twenty-three samples of boulder float material from Alonso previously returned gold values of 11.6 to 200.3 g/t gold (see press release dated February 11, 2020). About Cabral Gold Inc. The Company is a junior resource company engaged in the identification, exploration and development of mineral properties, with a primary focus on gold properties located in Brazil. The Company has a 100% interest in the Cuiu Cuiu gold district located in the Tapajos Region, within the state of Para in northern Brazil. Two gold deposits have so far been defined at Cuiu Cuiu and contain 43-101 compliant Indicated resources of 5.9Mt @ 0.90g/t (200,000 oz) and Inferred resources of 19.5Mt @ 1.24g/t (800,000 oz). The Tapajos Gold Province is the site of the largest gold rush in Brazil's history producing an estimated 30 to 50 million ounces of placer gold between 1978 and 1995. Cuiu Cuiu was the largest area of placer workings in the Tapajos and produced an estimated 2Moz of placer gold historically. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT: "Alan Carter" President and Chief Executive Officer Cabral Gold Inc. Tel: 604.676.5660 Guillermo Hughes, MAusIMM and FAIG., a consultant to the Company as well as a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101, supervised the preparation of the technical information in this news release. Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as such term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-looking Statements This news release contains certain forward-looking information and forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities legislation (collectively "forward-looking statements"). The use of the words "will", "expected" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or events to differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements should not be unduly relied upon. This news release contains forward-looking statements and assumptions pertaining to the following: strategic plans and future operations, and results of exploration. Actual results achieved may vary from the information provided herein as a result of numerous known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors. The Company believes the expectations reflected in those forward-looking statements are reasonable, but no assurance can be given that these expectations will prove to be correct. Notes Gold analysis has been conducted by SGS method FAA505 (fire assay of 50g charge), with higher grade samples checked by FAA525. Analytical quality is monitored by certified references and blanks. Until dispatch, samples are stored under the supervision the Company's exploration office. The samples are couriered to the assay laboratory using a commercial contractor. Pulps are returned to the Company and archived. Drill holes results are quoted as down-hole length weighted intersections. To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/103969 - Array of product innovations to serve specific air circulation needs of various civil and industrial environments with process development fuels centrifugal fan wheels market - Rising installation of centrifugal fans for a number of industrial operations from light dust loading to clean air handling and material handling to high temperature applications to stimulate growth in centrifugal fan wheels market ALBANY, N.Y., Nov. 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The growing emphasis on heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems of buildings, workplaces, and factories with the recognition of significance of ventilation to prevent infectious diseases is fueling the centrifugal fan wheels market. 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